The Elizabethans (78 page)

Sir Francis Drake who circumnavigated the globe...

...and his cousin Sir John Hawkins were navigators of genius

Both Drake and Hawkins instigated the challenge to Hispanic world-dominance, and their defeat of the Spanish Armada changed world history

Sir Philip Sidney, soldier, scholar, poet and novelist, was the archetypical Renaissance man.

At Penshurst Place Sidney was the patron of many other poets.

Sidney's death in the Low Countries, as a result of a wound in battle, was followed by one of the largest funerals ever witnessed in Elizabethan London.

‘The great Globe itself ’ (
The Tempest
Act IV.ii) – when a carpenter named Burbage built the first theatre in London he made possible the prodigious renaissance in the drama which produced Marlowe and Shakespeare.

Hunting and outdoor sports were a passion for Elizabethans, most of whom lived in the country.

Sir Henry Lee, the Queen’s Champion, stage-managed nearly all the great Accession Day tilts and other examples of royalist pageantry.

Lettice Knollys, a mischievous beauty, was a Boleyn cousin of the Queen. She was by turns Countess of Essex (and mother of the Queen’s last favourite) and second wife of the Earl of Leicester (the Queen's childhood friend and great love).

Queen Elizabeth’s extensive and elaborate wardrobe was largely paid for by her admirers and courtiers. A pair of gloves would be the least she would expect as a New Year’s present from a member of her court.

A satirical picture which depicts Spain losing control of the Low Countries. Philip II, by now an old man, is barely in control of the Cow (the Dutch) who is being surreptitiously fed by Elizabeth.