Queen Elizabeth I

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Standard Name: Elizabeth I, Queen
Birth Name: Elizabeth Tudor
Royal Name: Elizabeth I
QEI was a scholar by training and inclination (who wrote translations both as learning exercises and for recreation), as well as a writer in many genres and several languages. As monarch she wrote speeches, and all her life she wrote letters, poems, and prayers. (Some of these categories occasionally overlap.) Once her writing moved beyond the dutifulness of her youth, she had a pungent and forceful style both in prose and poetry.
Full-length portrait of Queen Elizabeth I, by the school of Nicholas Hilliard, 1590. Behind her two hovering angels prepare to crown her. She wears formal and elaborate clothes: tight blonde curls, a ruff, a stiff bodice, petticoat and over-skirt in intricate brocade patterns, deep lace cuffs, strings of pearls and several rings. A lengthy Latin inscription calls her an invincible virgin, mistress of all sciences, founder of Jesus College, Oxford, where the painting hangs.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Birth Lady Arbella Stuart
LAS was born, under the displeasure of Queen Elizabeth . Her most likely birthplace is Lennox House in Hackney (now part of London).
Stuart, Lady Arbella. “Introduction and Textual Introduction”. The Letters of Lady Arbella Stuart, edited by Sara Jayne Steen, Sara Jayne Steen, and Sara Jayne Steen, Oxford University Press, 1994, pp. 1-113.
14
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray, Brian Harrison, and Lawrence Goldman, editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/, http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Cultural formation Aemilia Lanyer
She belonged to the closely-defined group of artists and performers dependent first on Henry 's, then Elizabeth 's, court. She and her family were probably Protestant in sympathies.
Woods, Susanne. Lanyer: A Renaissance Woman Poet. Oxford University Press, 1999.
4-8
Cultural formation Vita Sackville-West
She was born into the noble Sackville family, one of the oldest-established in England. Her father, the third Baron Sackville, inherited Knole, the estate given to Thomas Sackville by Elizabeth I in 1566. Vita herself...
Dedications Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke
Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke , presented a fine copy of the psalms written by herself and her brother to Queen Elizabeth , with a dedication to her.
Hannay, Margaret P. Philip’s Phoenix: Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke. Oxford University Press, 1990. http://U of A HSS, http://U of A HSS.
95
Education Lady Mary Wroth
LMW and her siblings were well educated, in learning . . . fit for their birth and condition.
Roberts, Josephine A., and Lady Mary Wroth. “Introduction and Notes”. The Poems of Lady Mary Wroth, Louisiana State University Press, 1983, pp. 3 - 75, 219.
8
A report to her father called her very forward in her learning.
Roberts, Josephine A., and Lady Mary Wroth. “Introduction and Notes”. The Poems of Lady Mary Wroth, Louisiana State University Press, 1983, pp. 3 - 75, 219.
8
She danced well...
Education Mary Basset
Mary Roper (later MB ) was taught as a child to read Greek and Latin. Her mother tried to get Roger Ascham to teach her, but found him unwilling to leave Cambridge University. (He did...
Education Lady Anne Clifford
LAC was educated first by a governess, Anne Taylor . Between the ages of nine and twelve she was tutored by the poet Samuel Daniel , whom her mother engaged for that purpose. But she...
Employer Lady Arbella Stuart
LAS became a Maid of Honour to Queen Elizabeth in 1588, but with unspoken restrictions on her conduct. She was quite soon dismissed for infringing them.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray, Brian Harrison, and Lawrence Goldman, editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/, http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Employer Sir Philip Sidney
On his first return from his travels SPS became a courtier to Elizabeth I , for whom he subsequently conducted diplomatic business with monarchs and others abroad. He also gave the queen gifts, appeared at...
Employer Christopher Marlowe
Meanwhile records from summer 1587 indicate that Marlowe was already performing valuable secret services for the queen : that is, he was employed as an intelligence agent or spy, perhaps in the network which Sir Francis Walsingham
Family and Intimate relationships Virginia Woolf
She noted in her diary: All the centuries seemed lit up, the past expressive, articulate . . . & so we reach the days of Elizabeth quite easily.
Woolf, Virginia. The Diary of Virginia Woolf. Editors Bell, Anne Olivier and Andrew McNeillie, Hogarth Press, 1977–1984.
3: 125
Family and Intimate relationships Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke
Mary Sidney's famous uncle, the Earl of Leicester , was one of Elizabeth 's leading courtiers during Mary's youth, and a patron of actors. Of her mother's other two brothers, one became an earl as...
Family and Intimate relationships Mary Sidney Herbert, Countess of Pembroke
A few months later Mary came to London, to Elizabeth 's court.
Hannay, Margaret P. Philip’s Phoenix: Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke. Oxford University Press, 1990. http://U of A HSS, http://U of A HSS.
31-2
Family and Intimate relationships Susanna Hopton
Susanna's father, Sir Simon Harvey , was at the top of the grocery business. He had borne the title of Royal Grocer under Elizabeth I and James I , and became Clerk of Greencloth (overseeing...
Family and Intimate relationships Lady Margaret Sackville
Vita Sackville-West was LMS 's second cousin: Queen Elizabeth I had presented their common ancestor, Thomas Sackville (a minor writer), with Knole, near Sevenoaks, the estate that Vita was barred from inheriting because of...

Timeline

889-899
King Alfred 's last decade was a kind of renaissance of learning in his kingdom of Wessex.
12 April 1533
Anne Boleyn , already secretly married to Henry VIII , was publicly recognised as his consort in the public celebrations of the end of Lent.
19 May 1536
Anne Boleyn , mother of the future Queen Elizabeth , was executed in London for alleged high treason.
1538
Royal Injunctions appeared: a radical, Erasmian document whose first provision was that an English bible should be made available in every parish church.
June 1554
An eighteen-year-old servant, Elizabeth Croft , confessed in front of a crowd gathered at St Paul's Cross in London that she had taken part in a hoax, playing a supernatural voice that spoke from a...
17 November 1558
Queen Mary I died, and Elizabeth I assumed the throne of England and Wales.
1559
Negotiating between opposing factions, Elizabeth I sought to establish the English Church under her headship; Thomas Cranmer 's Prayer Book of 1552 became the official Book of Common Prayer.
1560
The complete GenevaBible appeared, translated by English Protestant exiles from the reign of Mary : the first accessible or mass-circulation edition of the Bible in English, with small format and roman (not gothic) print.
18 July 1564
The Merchant Adventurers' Company received a new charter from Elizabeth I that, among other things, incorporated the company in London, extended the geographical range of its dealings, and solified its status as a national...
May 1568
Mary Queen of Scots fled from Scotland to England; she was imprisoned by Elizabeth I after standing trial in October that year.
1570
The Scholemaster was published, by Roger Ascham , who had been tutor to Princess Elizabeth .
25 February 1570
Pope Pius V issued his papal bull Regnans in excelsis, excommunicating Elizabeth I and releasing her subjects from their allegiance to her.
9-27 July 1575
Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester , favourite of Queen Elizabeth , threw a particularly magnificent entertainment for her at Kenilworth Castle in Warwickshire.
August 1578
Three female wax figures were found in a London dunghill with bristles through the chest; the Spanish ambassador reported a widespread assumption that this was a witchcraft threat to the queen 's life.
1579
For the first time in Elizabeth 's reign, the Jesuits were expelled from England.

Texts

Marguerite de Navarre,. A Godly Medytacyon of the Cristen Sowle. Translator Elizabeth I, Queen, Wesel D. van der Straten, 1548.
Elizabeth I, Queen. Elizabeth I: Collected Works. Editors Marcus, Leah S., Janel M. Mueller, and Mary Beth Rose, University of Chicago Press, 2000.
Shell, Marc, Marguerite de Navarre, and John Bale. Elizabeth’s Glass. Translator Elizabeth I, Queen, University of Nebraska, 1993.
Marguerite de Navarre, and Marguerite de Navarre. The Mirrour or Glasse of the Sinful Soul. Translator Elizabeth I, Queen, 1544.
Elizabeth I, Queen. The Poems of Queen Elizabeth I. Editor Bradner, Leicester, Brown University Press, 1964.