Dear Joseph,
Here is an excerpt from my Oxford M.Phil. thesis on "Spenser and
Genealogy" (advised by Richard McCabe). I quote an interesting anecdote
from Anthony Wagner, _English Genealogy_ (1972): Robert Dudley, Earl
Leicester apparently wrote a letter to the Earl Marshall recommending
(successfully) one Humphrey Hales to the office of Bluemantle Pursuivant.
Leicester vouches for the genealogical work of Hales in a way that strongly
suggests that Leicester has seen such work. His patronage of Hales might
further suggest that Hales had done such work specifically for Leicester.
There is then, I think, at least a possibility that this Hales was involved
in "Leicester sa Genealogie."
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Leicester himself was very interested in his genealogy, as is seen from
this anecdote told by Anthony Richard Wagner:
By 1581 the need for a new [more scientific] type of herald was beginning
to be felt for in that year Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, wrote to the
Earl Marshal, whose deputy he was, recommending one Humphrey Hales for the
vacant post of Bluemantle Pursuivant, as 'an honest gentleman . . .
altogether given to matters of pedigrees, and very well seen in them
already. He doth draw and paint excellently well, as may appear by a thing
done for your lordship by him. He is properly studied in the law, but his
chief and whole study is this service.' He adds 'that there is nothing more
honourable for you, nor more profitable to the nobility, than to see fit
men placed in these offices, especially the pursuivants (362).'
Pursuivants were the assistants to the heralds, officially in charge of
issuing and authorizing family arms, but also masters of genealogy to whom
noble families turned for legitimisation. The above quotation shows that in
1581 Leicester was very concerned with the role of professional
pursuivants. This interest perhaps helps explain his reaction to the
amateur attempts of Sidney and Spenser. No work entitled Stemmata Dudleiana
by Spenser has survived, possibly because Leicester suppressed it, along
his nephew's "Defence of Leicester." Spenser certainly anticipates such a
reaction in the letter to Harvey: "Of my Stemmata Dudleiana, and especially
of the sundry Apostrophes therein, addressed you knowe to whome, muste more
advisement be had, than so lightly to send them abroad (Gottfried 18)."
Spenser obviously recognizes that Leicester's response to such a work would
be awkward at best. It appears never to have been published although, as
many critics have pointed out, it may survive embedded in Spenser's other
poetry, a possibility considered later in this thesis.
Brad Tuggle
Visiting Instructor of English, 2007-2008
The University of the South
Sewanee, Tennessee
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