Letters from all over England and abroad had to be brought and replies or orders sent. Decisions and movements were often affected by the threat of plague." "Firmly based on contemporary sources and complemented by a wealth of illustrative material, this new study will be immensely valuable to students and scholars and yet its accessible style will appeal to the amateur and local historian and to those with a general interest in the Elizabethan period."--Jacket.

Join Queen Elizabeth I on her annual summer procession through the English countryside in this majestically illustrated alphabet. With an A for Adventure, the queen leaves London for an extraordinary holiday among her people. Feast on blackbird pie, join the royal hunting party, and cheer on your favorite knights as they joust for the queen's favor. But watch out! T is for Treason. Traitors trail in the queen's path and it's up to her bravest and most loyal subjects to keep her from harm! Playful, rhyming verse, fascinating notes about each topic, and lavishly detailed pictures make this delightful romp through Elizabethan England a pleasure to read again and again.

There is no detailed account of any of Elizabeth IOs progresses and none of the many references in biographies mention more than the major occasions, such as the spectacular visit to Kenilworth. In this pioneering work Dovey uses contemporary documents to study in detail a single, long progress, covering the court servantsO preparations, the stops en route, and the work of the Council, who had to go along.

In a 1572 visit to Warwick, Queen Elizabeth looked out the window of her lodgings and saw local people dancing in the courtyard, a seemingly spontaneous performance meant to entertain her. During her travels, she was treated to fireworks, theatrical performances, and lavish banquets. Reconstructing the formal and informal events that took place throughout Elizabeth's progress visits, events rich in pageantry and ceremony, John M. Adrian demonstrates how communities communicated their character, as well as their financial and political needs, to noble guests. While previous scholars have studied Elizabeth I and her visits to the homes of influential courtiers, Fêting the Queen places a new emphasis on the civic communities that hosted the monarch and their efforts to secure much needed support. Case studies of the university and cathedral cities of Oxford, Canterbury, Sandwich, Bristol, Worcester, and Norwich focus on the concepts of hospitality and space--including the intimate details of the built environment.

What have poems and maps, law books and plays, ecclesiastical polemics and narratives of overseas exploration to do with one another? By most accounts, very little. They belong to different genres and have been appropriated by scholars in different disciplines. But, as Richard Helgerson shows in this ambitious and wide-ranging study, all were part of an extraordinary sixteenth- and seventeenth-century enterprise: the project of making England.

More than any other English monarch before or since, Queen Elizabeth I used her annual progresses to shape her royal persona and to bolster her popularity and authority. During the spring and summer, accompanied by her court, Elizabeth toured southern England, the Midlands, and parts of the West Country, staying with private and civic hosts, and at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. The progresses provided hosts with unique opportunities to impress and influence the Queen, and became occasions for magnificent and ingenious entertainments and pageants, drawing on the skills of architects, artists, and craftsmen, as well as dramatic performances, formal orations, poetic recitations, parades, masques, dances, and bear baiting. The Progresses, Pageants, and Entertainments of Queen Elizabeth I is an interdisciplinary essay collection, drawing together new and innovative work by experts in literary studies, history, theatre and performance studies, art history, and antiquarian studies. As such, it will make a unique and timely contribution to research on the culture and history of Elizabethan England. Chapters include examinations of some of the principal Elizabethan progress entertainments, including the coronation pageant Veritas temporis filia (1559), Kenilworth (1575), Norwich (1578), Cowdray (1591), Bisham (1592), and Harefield (1602), while other chapters consider the themes raised by these events, including the ritual of gift-giving; the conduct of government whilst on progress; the significance of the visual arts in the entertainments; regional identity and militarism; elite and learned women as hosts; the circulation and publication of entertainment and pageant texts; the afterlife of the Elizabethan progresses, including their reappropriation in Caroline England and the documenting of Elizabeth's reign by late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century antiquarians such as John Nichols, who went on to compile the monumentalThe Progresses of Queen Elizabeth (1788-1823).

No period of British history generates such deep interest as the reign of Elizabeth I, from 1558 to 1603. The individuals and events of that era continue to be popular topics for contemporary literature and film, and Elizabethan drama, poetry, and music are studied and enjoyed everywhere by students, scholars, and the general public. The Historical Dictionary of the Elizabeth World provides clear definitions and descriptions of people, events, institutions, ideas, and terminology relating in some significant way to the Elizabethan period. The first dictionary of history to focus exclusively on the reign of Elizabeth I, the Dictionary is also the first to take a broad trans-Atlantic approach to the period by including relevant individuals and terms from Irish, Scottish, Welsh, American, and Western European history. Editors' Choice: Reference