QUEEN ELIZABETH herself, and London as it was in her time, with sketches
of Elizabethan England, and of its great men in the way of social
dignity, are here brought home to us by Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert
Naunton.
Paul Hentzner was a German lawyer, born at Crossen, in Brandenburg, on
the 29th of January, 1558. He died on the 1st January, 1623. In 1596,
when his age was thirty-eight, he became tutor to a young Silesian
nobleman, with whom he set out in 1597 on a three years’ tour through
Switzerland, France, England, and Italy. After his return to Germany in
1600, he published, at Nuremberg, in 1612, a description of what he had
seen and thought worth record, written in Latin, as “Itinerarium
Germaniæ, Galliæ, Angliæ, Italiæ, cum Indice Locorum, Rerum atque
Verborum.”
Horace Walpole caused that part of Hentzner’s Itinerary which tells what
he saw in England to be translated by Richard Bentley, son of the famous
scholar, and he printed at Strawberry Hill two hundred and twenty copies.
In 1797 “Hentzner’s Travels in England” were edited, together with Sir
Robert Naunton’s “Fragmenta Regalia,” in the volume from which they are
here reprinted, with notes by the translator and the editor.
Sir Robert Naunton was of an old family with large estates, settled at
Alderton, in Suffolk. He was at Cambridge in the latter years of
Elizabeth’s reign, having entered as Fellow Commoner at Trinity College,
and obtained a Fellowship at Trinity Hall. Naunton went to Scotland in
1589 with an uncle, William Ashby, whom Queen Elizabeth sent thither as
Ambassador, and was despatched to Elizabeth’s court from Scotland as a
trusty messenger. In 1596–7 he was in France, and corresponded with the
Earl of Essex, who was his friend. After the fall of Essex he returned
to Cambridge, and was made Proctor of the University in 1601, three years
after Paul Hentzner’s visit to England. Then he became Public Orator at
Cambridge, and by a speech made to King James at Hinchinbrook won his
Majesty’s praise for Latin and learning. He came to court in the service
of Sir James Overbury, obtained the active friendship of George Villiers
Duke of Buckingham, and was sworn as Secretary of State on the 8th
January, 1617. The king afterwards gave Naunton the office of Master of
the Court of Wards and Liveries.
Sir Robert Naunton wrote his recollections of the men who served Queen
Elizabeth when he was near the close of his own life. It was after 1628,
because he speaks of Edward Somerset, Earl of Worcester, as dead, and
before 1632, because he speaks of Sir William Knollys living as the only
Earl of Banbury. He was created Earl of Banbury in 1626, and died in
1632. The “Fragmenta Regalia” were first published in 1641, after Sir
Robert’s death. They were reprinted in 1642 and 1653, since which date
they have appeared in various collections. There was a good edition of
them in 1870 among the very valuable “English Reprints” for which we are
indebted to Professor Edward Arber.