praise. We heare them sing and playe, and both passing well; we knowe
that they learne the best and finest of our learned languages to the
admiration of all men.... Whoso shall denie that they may not compare
even with our kind in the best degree.... Do we not see some of that
sex in our countrie so excellently well trained as to be compared to
the best Romaines or Greekish paragonnes--
to the German, the French, or the Italians?
If no storie did tell it, if no state did allow it, if no example
did confirme it, that young maidens deserve trayning, this our own
myrrour, the majestie of her sex, doth prove it in her own person,
and commendes it to our reason. We have besides her Highness as
undershining starres, many singuler ladies and gentlewymen so skilful
in all cunning of the most laudable and loveworthy qualities of
learning, as they may well be alledged as presidents to prayse.
As they are “educated according to the wealth of their parents, the
greater born have better means of prosecuting it best.”
I quote so much, as this is the sole special authority I have for
their _secondary education_. We know of their higher culture from
Spenser, Harrison, and others. It is evident that private tutors were
the teachers of at least the higher education to women, and after the
suppression of the monasteries the number of these “poor scholars”
would be greatly increased for a time. But the profession of governess
had already been established.
In Dr. Dee’s Diary he notes, 1st September 1587:
I covenanted with John Basset to teach the children the Latin tongue,
and I to give him seven duckats by the quarter.
September 1st, 1596, Mary Goodwyn cam to my service to governe and
teach Madinia and Margaret my young daughters.
I have not been able to learn anything of voluntary schools in general,
but there is reference to one in the description of the education of
one girl of the wealthy upper middle classes of London, daughter of one
great merchant, and wife of another. Though her fame shows that her
successes were not quite commonplace, it also suggests that she had
numerous competitors and rivals. Elizabeth Withypoll[107] is included
by Ballard among his “learned ladies”; and Stow notes her distinction,
as may be seen on her tombstone in the south aisle of the parish
church of St. Michael in Crooked Lane. Many such may have passed into
oblivion; this has been handed on to us.
Every Christian heart seeketh to extoll
The glory of the Lord, our only Redeemer;
Wherefore Dame Fame must needs inroll
Paul Withypoll his childe, by Love and nature
Elizabeth, the wife of Emanuel Lucar
In whom was declared the goodness of the Lord,
With many high vertues which truely I will record.
She wrought all needleworks that women exercise,
With Pen, Frame, or Stoole, all pictures artificial,
Curious Knots, or Trailes which Fancy could devise,
Beasts, birds or Flowers, even as things natural.
Three maner handes could she write them faire all.
To speake of Algorism, or accounts in every fashion,
Of women, few like (I think) in all this nation.
Dame Cunning her gave a gift right excellent,
In goodly practice of her science musical,
In divers tongues to sing and play with Instrument
Both Vial and Lute and also Virginall;
Not only upon one, but excellent in all.
For all other vertues belonging to Nature
God her appointed a very perfect creature.
Latine and Spanish, and also Italian
She spake, writ and read, with perfect utterance
And for the English, she the _garland_ won
In Dame Prudence Schoole, by graces purveyance
Which cloathed her with vertues, from naked Ignorance
Reading the Scriptures, to judge light from darke
Directing her faith to Christ, the only marke.
The said Elizabeth deceased the 29th day of October, An. Dom. 1537, of
yeeres not fully 27. This stone and all hereon contained made at the
cost of the said Emanuel, Merchant Taylor.
It is interesting to know that there _was_ at least _one_ school for
upper class girls in England, where English was taught, and where
Elizabeth won the prize, interesting also that she used her English
to read the Scriptures at that date. There is almost a hint that
her husband taught her accounts, and it is possible she helped him
with his business affairs. Doubtless Elizabeth, however, learned her
accomplishments from tutors and masters, and there she becomes a
link with the upper ten thousand, educated in the same way to a high
standard in learning and accomplishments, such as we see suggested in
“The Taming of the Shrew.”
Petrucio Ubaldini, a Florentine who came to England in 1551, says:
The rich cause their sons and daughters to learn Latin, Greek, and
Hebrew, for since this storm of heresy has invaded the land they hold
it useful to read the Scriptures in the original tongue.
Erasmus, in his Epistles, says:
31. The scene of human things is changed: the monks, famed in past
times for learning, are become ignorant, and women love books. It is
beautiful that this sex should now betake itself to ancient examples.
Udall, the Master of Eton, speaks with admiration of their advance in
learning:
The great number of noble women not only given to the study of human
sciences and strange tongues, but also so thoroughly expert in Holy
Scriptures that they were able to compare with the best writers, as
well in enditing and penning of godly and fruitful treatises to the
instruction and edifying of readers in the knowledge of God, as also
in translating good books out of Latin or Greek into English, for
the use and commodity of such as are rude and ignorant of the said
tongues. It is now no news in England to see young damsels in noble
houses, and in the Courts of princes, instead of cards and other
instruments of idle trifling, to have continually in their hands
either psalms, homilies, or other devout meditations, or else Paul’s
Epistles or some book of Holy Scripture matters, and as familiarly
both to read and reason thereof in Greek, Latin, French, or Italian,
as in English.
Dr. Wotton, in his “Reflections upon Ancient and Modern Learning,” says
that “learning was so very modish then, that the fair sex seemed to
believe that Greek and Latin added to their charms. Plato and Aristotle
untranslated were the frequent ornaments of their closets. One would
think by its effects that it was a proper way of educating them, since
there are no accounts in history of so many great women in any one age
as are to be found between the years fifteen and sixteen hundred.”
Amid all the discussions over the causes of the great outburst of
literature in the sixteenth century I have never noted any one allude
to the fact that the cultivation of the _mothers_ paved the way for
the higher development of the sons. Sir Thomas Elyot, who wrote
“The Defence of Good Women” (1545), also advised his sister, Margery
Puttenham, on the bringing up of her children, Margery, Richard, and
George who wrote “The Art of English Poesie.”
Lyly dedicated his “Euphues” to the ladies and gentlewomen of England,
a work which more than any other one volume refined the old and moulded
the later English speech; Shakespeare wrote of, and to, cultivated
women; numerous ladies were patronesses of struggling authors, and
nearly every poet of the time has his dedication to, if not his
adoration of, some peerless woman. The very delicacy and power of the
poems on the passion of love bear witness to the culture of the women
as well as that of the men: for example, the “Amoretti” of Spenser.
Two causes, besides the inspiration of the reforming spirit of the
age, may be considered in regard to the advance of Englishwomen. The
first was the association of the sexes in so many spheres. Foreign
ambassadors note of the women that they go everywhere with their
husbands, even to outdoor sports, such as hunting and hawking. In the
semi-religious guilds established for good fellowship and a community
of good works through life, and common prayers for each other at death,
the initial and nobler forerunner of the modern _Club_, women joined
freely in equal numbers and with privileges equal to men, the same
standard of morality being demanded from each.
Most of the trade guilds were open to women by inheritance or by
apprenticeship, and all were open to the widows of freemen. Women went
to all the guild dinners with their male relatives; they went to the
secret Bible readings, to the public sermons, and when the time came,
to the theatres.
The other cause lay in the fact that the higher education of women was
distinctly _fashionable_. I do not think that the reason it became so
has ever been sufficiently realized.
Our natural detestation of Spanish religious intolerance and our
political rivalry with Spain have blinded our eyes to much that we
owed to that country. The widening of our geographical horizon seemed
to stimulate and suggest new poetic ideas. There is no doubt that the
English Sebastian Cabot did much for his country, but a greater halo
of romance and wonder floated over the sails of Columbus that bore
him to the golden islands of the Spanish Main. But women, as a sex,
owed something more to Spain than the dreams of El Dorado, for thence
came, early in the century, the noble but unfortunate Queen Katharine
of Aragon. It was her intelligent culture that first made the higher
education of women _fashionable_ in the best sense of the word. She
was the youngest of the four distinguished daughters of the “Ferdinand
and Isabella to whom Columbus gave a new world.” Isabella was the
most learned woman of her time, and she had taken special care of the
education of her daughters.
When Katharine came to England as the affianced bride of Prince Arthur,
the greatest lady in the land was the King’s mother, Margaret, the
Countess of Richmond and Derby. She was a woman of wonderful abilities,
with a tenacious memory and a piercing wit. She spoke French fluently,
and had some acquaintance with Latin, but she always regretted that in
her youth she had not made herself mistress of that language. She was
very pious. About the beginning of the sixteenth century she translated
out of French a Latin book called “The Mirroure of Gold for the Sinful
Soul,” and “The Fourth Book of Dr. John Gerson’s Treatise of the
Imitation and Following the Life of Christ.” She also commanded other
translations, was a patroness of learned men, founded lectureships,
schools, colleges, almshouses, and decided and wrote down the orders
for state etiquette and the management of the Royal household.
But the culture of Katharine was more varied and liberal, and during
the period of her supremacy she did much to mould the tastes of the
Court. Everything that was best in Henry responded to her influence;
it was only when he turned from her that his character began to change
for the worse. Learned men sought her Court and her favour. Erasmus
dedicated to her his book on “Christian Matrimony,” Ludovico Vives his
work on “Education.”
The first sixteenth-century woman student of whose training we have
any clear information was her sole surviving daughter, Mary Tudor,
born 18 February 1515-16. The third day after, she was christened,
confirmed, and proclaimed Princess. Not only had she a nurse selected
in Catharine, wife of Leonard Pole, Esq., but a “Lady Maistress,” or
governess, in Lady Margaret Bryan, a lady of great good sense and
ability. The Countess of Salisbury was made State governess and head of
her household.
Dr. Linacre, the learned physician, who had formerly been one of
Prince Arthur’s tutors, was appointed her physician and her instructor
in Latin. He wrote a Latin grammar for the child’s use, which seems
crabbed enough to modern minds of riper years, and dedicated it to her
with a complimentary preface, in which he speaks with praise of her
docility and love of learning. This is all the more remarkable when we
remember that Linacre died when she was eight years old. Lilly, who
brought out later editions of this grammar, added his praises to those
of Linacre. To Queen Katharine we may be said to owe the first treatise
on the “Theory of Education for Women.”
Ludovico Vives, born 1492 in Valentia, who was accounted one of the
three most learned men in Europe, was one of her correspondents.
Knowing her desire to educate her daughter wisely, he published a
treatise on the “Education of a Christian Woman” (1523), and dedicated
it to her as the most learned woman of her age. (This was translated
into English, and published in 1541, thus becoming the guide to many
sixteenth-century mothers.) Queen Katharine asked him to draw up a
special further course of study for her daughter, which he did. His
works are even yet well worthy of study.
He considers the intellects of women inferior to those of men, but he
would not on that account refuse them instruction, which they needed
the more to develop their character. He said that a learned woman
rarely or never failed in virtue. He did not fix the age at which
they should commence to learn, but remarked that they should learn
sewing and knitting at the same time as reading. He is not particular
whether they begin their serious study in their sixth or seventh year,
but of the seriousness of the study there is no doubt--in science,
philosophy, and languages. He knows hard work is not agreeable to all
women, any more than it is to all men. He does not speak of Art: there
was no Art-culture in his day beyond illuminations and embroidery;
but, strange to say, he does consider _hygiene_, air, exercise, the
amount of sleep necessary, the due _hardness_ of the bed. He has a
chapter on decoration, and says hard things of the face-painting of
the period. “How can a woman weep for her sins, when her tears would
stain her face?” She should not over-dress. (He blamed the painters
who represented the Virgin Mary with robes of silk and ornaments.)
She should have no affectation, she should be modest in society,
but when she does talk she should be able to talk well. Her parents
should choose her husband; affection will come after marriage. But he
disapproved of precocious marriages, and thought seventeen or eighteen
years the lowest age possible. There ought to be no rejoicings at a
marriage, because the results are very uncertain. He gives advice
regarding servants, showing that the domestic troubles of to-day
existed even then. A woman should know a little medicine, so as not
to call in the doctor and apothecary continually. Even a girl should
set aside an hour daily for meditation and prayer. She should read the
Gospels and the Fathers; for recreation, moral stories, such as stories
from the Bible, from Papyrius in Aulus Gellius, of Lucretia in Livy,
and of the patient Griselda, but _no romances_.
The “Index Expurgatorius” that he gives is interesting to the
bibliographer:
The laws ought to take heed of such ungratious books, such as be in
my countrey of Spain, “Amadis,” “Florisande,” “Tirante,” “Tristram
and Celestina,” “Le Prison d’Amour.” In France “Lancelot du Lac,”
“Paris and Vienna,” “Pontus and Sidonia,” “Pierre de Provence,” and
“Melusyne.” In Flanders “Flory and White Flower,” “Leonella and
Canamour,” “Curias and Floreta,” “Pyramus and Thisbe.” In England
“Parthenope,” “Genarides,” “Hippomadon,” Wylliam and Meliour, Livius,
Arthur, Guye, Bevis and many other, and many translated out of Latin;
the “Facetiæ Poggii,” “Euryalus and Lucretia,” and the “Hundred Tales
of Boccaccio,” in Italy:
Of maids some be but little mete for lernyng lykewise as some men be
unapte, agayne, some be even borne unto it, or at least not unfit for
it. Therefore they that be dulle are not to be discouraged, and those
that be apt should be harted and encouraged. She that hath learned in
books hath furnished and fenced her mind with holy counsels.
He gives among examples of women good and learned: Portia, the wife
of Brutus; Cleobula, daughter of Cleobulas; and the daughter of
Pythagoras, who, after his death, became the ruler of his school.
Ludovico Vives was invited in 1523 to come to lecture at Oxford and to
superintend the education of Princess Mary. This he did.
She went to live at Oxford to be near him, and therefore was the first
woman student in that university town. His lessons to the Princess were
so interesting that the King and Queen often came to Oxford to listen.
He says a girl ought to be taught to pronounce clearly, and every day
commit something to memory and read over before retiring to rest. He
allows the use of a Latin dictionary, recommends translation from
English into Latin, and conversations in Latin with her preceptor.
He advises the learning by heart of the “Distiches” of Cato, the
“Sentences” of Publius Syrus, and the “Seven Sages of Greece,”
lately collected and published by Erasmus. The course of reading
drawn up included Cicero, Seneca, Plutarch; some dialogues of Plato,
particularly those of a political turn; Jerome’s “Epistle”; part of St.
Ambrose and St. Augustine; the “Enchiridion,” “Institutio Principis”;
the “Paraphrases” of Erasmus; and the “Utopia” of Sir Thomas More; a
portion of the New Testament to be read morning and evening, and of
the Christian poets, Prudentius Sydonius, Paulinus, Arator, Prosper,
and Juvencus, as well as Lucan, Seneca, and a part of Horace. Before
selections such as these even a modern candidate for classical honours
might feel nervous.
Poor little Princess! With these grave studies and serious maxims were
her natural high spirits toned down to meet her melancholy fate. She
proved an “apt” student and prospered in her work, being encouraged
and guided by her loving mother, who delighted in revising her Latin
exercises and criticizing her style. Many learned men watched her
progress with interest. Lord Morley, one of the literary nobles of the
day, dedicated a book to her at the time of her fallen fortunes, when
men were little likely to overestimate her powers, in which he says:
I do well remember that skant ye were come to twelve yeres of age, but
that ye were so rype in the Latin tonge, that rathe dothe happen to
the women-sex, that your grace not only coulde perfectly rede, wright,
and constrewe Laten, but farthermore translate eny harde thinge of the
Latin into ower Englyshe tonge.
And he refers with praise to one of her works she had given him.
The translation itself, preserved in a missal, is entitled, “The prayer
of Saynt Thomas of Aquine, translatyd oute of Latin ynto Englyshe by
ye moste exselent Prynses Mary daughter to the most hygh and myghtie
Prynce and Prynces Kyng Henry the VIII _and Quene Kateryn his wyfe_.
In the yere of oure Lorde God 1527, and the xi yere of her age.” (See
Cott. MS., Vesp. E, xiii, f. 72.)
That her studies were not limited to Latin we see in the quaint verses
of William Forrest, priest:
Shee had to her sorted men well expert,
In Latyne, Frenche, and Spaynische also
Of whome, before they from her did revert,
Shee gathered knowledge, with graces other mo,
The thing atchieved, departed her not fro,
For as shee had promptness the thynge to contryue
So had shee memory passing ententyue.
Anthonie Crispin, Lord of Milherbe, a French gentleman resident in
London, wrote in 1536 some verses also about her:
Souvent vaguant aux divines leçons
Souvent cherchoit des instruments des sons
Ou s’occupoit à faire quelque ouvrage
Ou apprenait quelqu’ estrange langage....
Puis à savoir raison des mouvements
Et le secret de tout le fermament
Du monde aussi la situation;
Des élémens l’association.
Puis sagement avec Mathématique
Mêloit raison, morale, politique....
Puis apprenoit Latine et Grecque lettre
Par oraison, par histoire, et par mêtre.
The wonder of the records of her learning is increased when we remember
the frequent overtures of marriage that were laid before her, which
must somewhat have occupied her thoughts, also the extraordinary
fluctuations of her fortunes. The demands upon her hours, in the time
both of her prosperity and adversity, must have been great. In 1525,
when the Emperor broke off his engagement to her to marry Isabel of
Portugal, she was sent to hold High Court with viceregal splendour,
as the first Princess of Wales at Ludlow Castle. There she stayed
for eighteen months. The Countess of Salisbury was still her State
governess, and Mr. Featherstone her Latin tutor. She did not keep
strictly to the advice of the prudent Vives; for she gave considerable
time to dancing and playing on the virginals, and in her privy purse
expenses there are many entries of her losses when _playing at cards_.
On her return to her father’s Court, she is recorded not only to have
danced with him, but to have danced in the ballets, and acted in the
Court masques of the day, as well as in one of the comedies of Terence.
It was a new and hitherto unheard-of proceeding for Royal ladies
to appear as stage performers, but the example seems to have been
followed. (Mary was always devoted to the Drama, and spent more on it
in a year than did either her father or her sister.) In her sudden fall
from her high estate, she relinquished only her gaieties, but continued
her studies, including domestic economy, inculcated by Vives. Mary was
restored to Court favour after the death of Anne Boleyn, and was on
friendly terms with her later stepmothers, especially Katharine Parr.
At the request of the latter she undertook the translation of the Latin
paraphrase of St. John by Erasmus into the English language. She meant
to have translated more, but an attack of illness laid her aside. Her
rendering of St. John was printed and published in the same volume with
the translations of the other paraphrases of Erasmus by the celebrated
reformers, Kay, Cox, Udall, Old, and Allen, though her name was not
affixed to the first edition.
Among her scientific tastes was the study of botany, and she imported
many foreign plants and trees, striving to naturalize them. She also
had a special interest in clock-making, like her relative Charles
V. This was not, in her time, so commonplace a manufacture as it is
to-day. Her value for time, and the exact measurement thereof, carry
us back in thought to the days of her predecessor Alfred, with his
candle-measured hours.
Prepared as she was for the throne, the misfortunes of her life make
us almost believe in the power of evil stars. Her period of depression
lasted too long for her health and spirits; the doctrine of the virtue
of irresponsible feminine obedience prevented her from ever showing her
true nature, except once. Her courage and prudence at the _coup d’état_
of Northumberland, her clemency afterwards, show what she might have
been had she been allowed to act independently, as did the second royal
student of the century.
Elizabeth was born on 7th September 1533. Her stars were fortunate,
and the moon shone full upon her birth. Her physical health was
excellent; her period of depression lasted just long enough to steady
her flighty spirits and elevate her character. She was fortunate in
the kind sympathy of Katharine Parr, that excellent and learned woman,
who showed a genius for fulfilling wisely and tenderly the difficult
duties of a stepmother. Elizabeth is said to have been very precocious,
learning Latin, French, Italian, and music without difficulty. In a
letter of the Princess Mary to her father, Henry VIII, 21 July 1536,
she says: “My sister Elizabeth is well, and such a child toward as I
doubt not but your Highness shall have cause to rejoice of in time
coming.” She was four years old when her brother Edward was born, and
Sir John Cheke, being appointed his tutor, sometimes gave her lessons.
She was once reading with him when Leland called, and her tutor desired
her to address the antiquary in Latin. She immediately did so, and the
old scholar in return addressed to her four Latin verses of genuine
admiration. By the age of twelve she had considerably advanced in
history and geography, understood the principles of architecture,
mathematics, and astronomy, was fond of poetry, and studied politics
as a duty. She had a talent for languages, speaking French, Italian,
Spanish, and Flemish with facility. Her tutor Ascham tells us what
she had done in classics before she was sixteen. She had read almost
the whole of Cicero and a great part of Livy, some of the Fathers,
especially “St. Cyprian on the Training of a Maiden.” The select
orations of Isocrates and the tragedies of Sophocles were her Greek
text-books. During Mary’s reign Ascham wrote to John Sturmius: