Elizabeth Freke

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The early-eighteenth-century remembrances of EF were edited in 1913 as a diary, but are regarded by their latest editor as a heterogenous group of two commonplace-books and other papers, together making up a life-story dominated by the pattern of the inventory or stock-taking. These texts are a rich mine of material about EF 's material circumstances and tortured emotional relationships with her husband, son, and others. She began writing out of an autobiographical impulse. She was also, apparently, a poet of unusual skill and forcefulness for an amateur.

Milestones

1 January 1642

EF was born at Westminster, eldest of five surviving daughters and reputedly her father's favourite.
Historian Margaret George numbers the surviving daughters as four, but five outlived the mother, according to her memorial stone.
Freke, Elizabeth. “Introduction”. The Remembrances of Elizabeth Freke, 1671-1714, edited by Raymond A. Anselment, Cambridge University Press for the Royal Historical Society, pp. 1-36.
5
Freke, Elizabeth. “Introduction”. The Remembrances of Elizabeth Freke, 1671-1714, edited by Raymond A. Anselment, Cambridge University Press for the Royal Historical Society, pp. 1-36.
4, 5
George, Margaret. Women in the First Capitalist Society. University of Illinois Press.
184

Late 1702

EF probably began to set down her earlier set of remembrances: a record of significant events in her life, which developed into a kind of diary, reaching back to her marriage thirty-one years before.
Anselment, Raymond A. “Elizabeth Freke’s Remembrances: Reconstructing a Self”. Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature, Vol.
16
, No. 1, pp. 57-75.
60

About 1712

EF probably began writing a second version of her remembrances. This time she revised and recast, omitted and added, apparently aiming at a tighter chronological continuity.
Freke, Elizabeth. “Introduction”. The Remembrances of Elizabeth Freke, 1671-1714, edited by Raymond A. Anselment, Cambridge University Press for the Royal Historical Society, pp. 1-36.
20

15 February 1714

EF wrote the last-dated of her remembrances or diary entries, describing the dreadfull'st storme and hurrycane of wind for severall howers was ever heard.
Freke, Elizabeth. The Remembrances of Elizabeth Freke, 1671-1714. Editor Anselment, Raymond A., Cambridge University Press for the Royal Historical Society.
209

7 April 1714

EF died in her mid seventies.
Freke, Elizabeth. “Introduction”. The Remembrances of Elizabeth Freke, 1671-1714, edited by Raymond A. Anselment, Cambridge University Press for the Royal Historical Society, pp. 1-36.
17-18

Biography

Birth and Family

1 January 1642

EF was born at Westminster, eldest of five surviving daughters and reputedly her father's favourite.
Historian Margaret George numbers the surviving daughters as four, but five outlived the mother, according to her memorial stone.
Freke, Elizabeth. “Introduction”. The Remembrances of Elizabeth Freke, 1671-1714, edited by Raymond A. Anselment, Cambridge University Press for the Royal Historical Society, pp. 1-36.
5
Freke, Elizabeth. “Introduction”. The Remembrances of Elizabeth Freke, 1671-1714, edited by Raymond A. Anselment, Cambridge University Press for the Royal Historical Society, pp. 1-36.
4, 5
George, Margaret. Women in the First Capitalist Society. University of Illinois Press.
184

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