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
Wealth and Poverty Elizabeth Clinton, Countess of Lincoln
After a dozen years of marriage, however, her parents-in-law were being pressed by the Privy Council (at the behest of Queen Elizabeth ) to provide suitable accommodation for the young couple and their growing family.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Wealth and Poverty Lady Anne Clifford
For these ventures, designed to recoup the fortunes he had lost, he had the personal backing and favour of Queen Elizabeth . He was a man of great courage, and endured terrible hardships during some...
Travel Margaret Hoby
They also made frequent winter visits to London: in 1600-1 in connection with their court case against William Eure , again in April-June 1603 for the funeral of Queen Elizabeth (a visit that was...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Maria Callcott
MC opens her preface with a kind of apology for not being a mother herself. Her history is attentive to women, both public and private. Of her three chapters on Queen Elizabeth , she says,...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Ruth Padel
The style of these poems, said one reviewer, is vintage RP : dynamic, baroque and jam-packed full of neocultural reference. Padel often writes about animals (sometimes in exotic wild places, often wild animals in captivity)...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Elinor James
She defends the reputation of Queen Elizabeth , mentions John Dryden 's dismissal of her in his preface to The Hind and the Panther (published this year) as anti-Catholic, but not one who merits an...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Mary Deverell
In a prologue MD jokes about her own daring to judge Queen Elizabeth. Her language is formal and stilted, but she has a strong dramatic grasp of the complex and shifting feelings of Mary and...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Elizabeth Ogilvy Benger
Despite her subject, EOB refrains from demonizing Queen Elizabeth . She goes into great detail about the cultural milieu in which Mary grew up (the sixteenth-century French court) and uses unpublished letters to add depth...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Elinor James
EJ here brings together her unfailing concern for the Church of England with homage to Elizabeth , who presided over the church's infancy. She also defends the memory of Charles I , with a threatening...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Anne Dowriche
Critic Elaine V. Beilin discerns the influence on AD 's text of John Foxe 's Actes and Monuments, 1563.
“Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
172
Her comment on the martyrdom of de Bourg is particularly explicit in its critique...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Eglinton Wallace
She recommends the study of history, and her moral exhortation leans heavily on anecdotal, historical examples. (She also uses quotations from her own unpublished tragedy.)
Wallace, Eglinton. Letter from Lady Wallace to Capt. William Wallace. J. Debrett.
62
She cites Queen Elizabeth (among many others) as a...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Sarah Green
This novel, a third-person narrative, opens arrestingly—It was a cold, and dreary evening, in the month of October 1548
Green, Sarah. The Royal Exile; or, Victims of Human Passions: An Historical Romance of the Sixteenth Century. J. J. Stockdale.
1: 1
—on the French Count d'Almaile's discovery of a female skeleton in her coffin...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Enid Blyton
It was made of the same mix as Sunny Stories: a letter from the editor, nature notes, stories, strip cartoons, serials, puzzles and competitions, letters from child readers, and the organisation of fund-raising for...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Sally Purcell
These poems dwell in SP 's familiar territory of icy waters, towers and forests, dreaming stones, desert saints, and mythological fauns and mermaids. March 1603 presents Queen Elizabeth on her deathbed, with a sword by...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Sarah Josepha Hale
In her preface SJH quotes a Blackwood's article on Hemans which says the many contemporary women with cultivated minds have made it highly feminine to be intelligent. Hale herself somewhat puzzlingly adds that the Bible...

Timeline

889-899: King Alfred's last decade was a kind of renaissance...

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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...

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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,...

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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...

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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,...

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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...

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17 November 1558

Queen Mary I died, and Elizabeth I assumed the throne of England and Wales.

1559: Negotiating between opposing factions, Elizabeth...

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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 Geneva Bible appeared, translated...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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...

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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,...

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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. et al., University of Chicago Press, 2000.
Shell, Marc et al. 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.