Add MS 48043

This collection of late 16th-century political tracts forms part of the Yelverton Manuscripts, which originate in the collections of the administrator and diplomat Robert Beale (1541-1601). The volume is in its original binding of covers made from a 15th-century antiphoner, and bears a lettered label ('I') which is usually taken as conclusive that the volume was put together in Beale's lifetime, probably in the 1590s. There is a brief extract wholly in Beale's hand (f. 273) and elsewhere Beale himself makes brief comments or adds marginal glosses. The partial index (f. v recto) is in the hand of one of his customary clerks, while the transcription of George Buchanan's 'De Jure Regni' and the text which follows (ff. 123r-152v, 155r-157r) are in the hand of another of his clerks probably employed by him from early 1577.

Much of the volume is in scribal copies (and the later texts of French Huguenot theory probably by French scribes). The treatise at ff. 1r-9r possibly, and the autograph notes of John Hales on John Leslie's defence of the title of Mary, Queen of Scots to the English crown certainly, are not scribal copies. Beale was Hales's executor and son of the latter's stepbrother. Other documents may have come to Beale from the estate of his friend Thomas Norton (Mark Taviner, 'Robert Beale and the Elizabethan Polity', University of St Andrews Ph.D. thesis, 2000, pp. 271-279, comparing the Beale papers with the inventory of Norton's manuscripts taken after his death in 1584, suggests ff. 97r-117r (the account of Rizzio's murder), possibly the tract in French advocating the trial of Mary, Queen of Scots, ff. 226r-235v, and John Leslie's treatise (ff. 10v-55v).

Contents:

f. v recto: Partial index.

ff. xv verso, 1r-9v: Treatise in answer to John Knox, The First Blast of the Trumpet . . . , 1558, ascribed by Robert Beale (f. xv verso) to Richard Bertie, husband of Katherine, Duchess of Suffolk; 1558. The piece was written shortly before Bertie returned to England from exile in Poland, winter 1558-1559 (there are references to a forthcoming journey, and lack of access to his library, f. 1). In English. In mid 16th-century hand.

ff. 10v-55v. John Leslie, Bishop of Ross: 'A declaration of the right title and interest, of the high and excellent Princess Mary the Queen of Scotland, into the succession of the crown of England, with a defense of her honor', c. 1569. Title and note by Robert Beale, 'This booke was published in writing in the time of the Northern rebellion; and after wards published in Printe Leodii [Liége] ,etc.' Books 1, ff. 12r-31r, and (in a different hand) 2, ff. 33r-55v, only of the versions published at Rheims 1569 and Liége 1571 (ESTC S108490, S106704), in the reverse of the published order. The preface, however, mentions the third book (f. 11) and the text concludes with a version of the final lines thereof. The manuscript differs considerably from both published versions, but is closer to the first. Marginal notes in book 2 collate the manuscript with the 1571 printed version, noting (f. 55) 'Here the printed booke cesseth' (just above, the scribe has written 'seke a better Copie'). Add. 48027, ff. 284r-291v, is part of a printed text of Book 2 (ESTC 93456) which seems to have circulated separately. Another version of Book 2 (described however as Book 3) is Harley MS 4314, ff. 91r-113r; and Cotton MS Caligula B V, ff. 207r-217r, is a version of Book 1 closer to the present than the printed text.

f. 56r: Anglicised copy of a letter from Mary, Queen of Scots, to the Privy Council, 18 Nov 1566. This copy differs slightly from the original (Cotton MS Caligula B X, f. 408). In the same hand as Book 2 of Leslie's work, above, ff. 33r-55v.

ff. 65r-81r. Notes by John Hales, M.P. (d.1572), on John Leslie's work on the title of Mary, Queen of Scots: three pages of comments, ff. 65r-67r; then, ff. 72r-81r, a more extended response to the book, citing in the heading the Liége edition. It is here, at f. 72r, that Robert Beale identifies this as being in John Hales's hand.

ff. 90r-96r. Tract against the succession of Mary, Queen of Scots, to the English crown, c. 1564. It begins 'Solon his opinion is that in a civill disention to which the state semes to bende . . . '. It lacks the genealogical tables to be found in the otherwise almost identical copy in Cotton MS Caligula B V, ff. 258r-266r, although space has been left for them, and the first line of one table entered. In English, with extensive Latin quotation.

ff. 97r-117r: Account of the murder of David Rizzio [Riccio], 'A discorse of the late trobeles hapned in Scotland be tweane the quenes maiestye and the King hur husband and certayne ther nobility . . . 1565 [1566] 9 Marti' 1566. The title (f. 97) is followed by a note ascribing the account to Patrick Ruthven, 3rd Lord Ruthven, one of the conspirators, by Thomas Randolph, formerly ambassador to Mary's court: 'This discouse was wrytten by the L. Ruthen of Scotlande a lyttle before his deathe [16 May 1566]at wch tyme he protested all thinges were trewe contayned in the same, and that of purpose he did leave yt in wrytinge that everie mans parte myghte be knowne that were previe to that enterprince'. Beale notes of this passage: 'Testified by Mr. Randolph who wrote the lines above'. Although the hand making the note iks different from that of the hands who wrote the text, it is evidently not Randolph's own: Beale must be referring to an original validated by Randolph of which this is a copy. The main text is in two hands with many alterations and deletions, is largely as printed in A Relation of the Death of David Rizzi, 1699, pp. 13-49. the murder took place on 9 Mar 1566. Another contemporary copy, Cotton MS Caligula B IX, ff. 270r-283v, is dated 29 March in a later hand; Add Ms 33256, ff. 134-149, is a later copy of the Cotton MS. All the MS texts have blank spaces at the same points in the account. A slightly different version is in Lansdowne MSS 9, ff. 94r-115r (apparently an original despatch to Sir Nicholas Throckmorton and others), 817, ff. 6-17, and Cotton MS Julius F X, ff. 74r-81r.

ff. 123r-152v. 'De Jure Regni apud Scotos Dialogus Authore Georgio Buchanano'; c. 1570-1579. In Latin. The text, though with some omissions and blank spaces, is generally the same as that published in 1579 with a preface addressed to James VI, corrigenda and the lines 'Rex Stoicus ex Seneca' not found here, in 1579 (ESTC: 106055), However, one passage of some twenty lines, 'Neque Multus secus . . . ut cepisti perge' (f. 124), is not in the printed version, and there are other minor variants. The treatise circulated in manuscript form for several years before its publication, and Mark Taviner, 'Robert Beale and the Elizabethan Polity', University of St Andrews Ph.D. 2000, pp. 244-263, from an analysis of the Frankfurt paper stock on which it was written, and what is known of Beale's clerk who transcribed it, and Beale's diplomatic movements, speculates that this copy may date to late 1577/early 1578, the text coming to Beale through his fellow-diplomat Daniel Rogers who had a copy by Sep 1576.

ff. 155r-157v: Treatise, 'An liceat Principi Auriaco resistere Duci Albano. Themata collecta anno 1572'. The title is provided in the hand of Robert Beale, over a text in a scribal hand; the initial 'B' with which the work concludes (f. 157r) may signify Buchanan. The text, in thirty seven sections, is followed by the oath taken in French, by Charles V and Prince Philip, 5 July 1549, on the installation of the latter as Duke of Brabant (see also Add MSS 48014, ff. 210r-v and 48088, ff. 12v-13r), and a reference to Bartole da Sassferrato, 'De Represaliis', a work frequently cited by Buchanan in the De Jure Regni. Mostly in the same hand as ff. 123r-152v, though f. 157v is in other hands. The text justifies resistance to the Duke of Alva, whilst the significance of the oath was that allegation that the Habsburgs had broken it.

f. 173r: Extract, in the hand of Beale, from Rodriquez Sanchez de Arévalo, Bishop of Palencia, Historiae Hispanicae, [1470?], pt.iii, cap. 30; 16th cent. Printed in Andre Wechel, Rerum hispanicarvm scriptores aliquot, quorum nomina versa pagina indicabit ex bibliotheca clarissimi viri dn. roberti beli angli (Frankfurt, 1579-81), i, p. 354, which - as the title says, drew heavily on Beale's library.

ff. 175r-190r: Etienne de la Boétie, 'Discours de la Servitude voluntaire', c. 1552-1553. In French. In scribal hand with marginal glosses and underlings by Robert Beale. The text lacks title and the author's name; the text in general is that of the de Mesmes copy (Paris, BN MS 839) and differs from that published in Simon Goulart, Mémoires de l'estat de France sous Charles IX , 3 vols (Middleburg, 1578) Vol. 3, pp. 116-139, and an extract (roughly ff. 175v-178r of the present text) is printed in Eusebe Philadelphe Cosmopolite [Nicholas Barnaud?], Le reveille-matin des François . . . (1574), pp. 182-90.

ff. 193r-200v. Tract in the form of a letter headed 'Pour Jhean Cousin ministre de leglise francoise A Londres: beg. 'Monsieur mon compagnon Jay esté joyeux de'entendre par vos lettres . . . '; 7 March 1569 (f. 200v). A Huguenot discussion of the lawfulness of opposing the King by force. Differs slightly from the copy in Cotton MS Faustina C II, ff. 50r-60r. Jean Cousin was pastor of the French church in London from 1562 until his death in 1574.

ff. 205r-225r: Tract beginning: 'Il est fort malaisé de juger des affaires du monde . . . ', arguing for liberty of conscience and toleration for Huguenots, c. 1568. Most of the present text appears, altered and expanded, in 'Le Politiqve Dialogve traittant de la puissance, authorité, & du deuoir des Princes . . . ', published without date in Simon Goulart, Mémoires de l'estat de France sous Charles IX , 3 vols (Middleburg, 1578), Vol. 3,pp. 61-116, and in 1650 republished as a single work, Le Politique du temps. It is not clear whether the anonymous author of the Goulart text was responsible for the present manuscript text; the manuscript alone appears to show the influence of Michel de L'Hôpital, Discours des raisons et persuasions de la paix en l'an 1568 (see for instance f. 214v, and p. 198 of the version in J. de Lannel, Recueil de divers Memoires . . . ,Paris, 1623, pp. 179-199. References to events in Scotland and Sweden (f. 219) and the date of the Discours des raisons . . . suggest a date c. 1568.

ff. 226r-235v: Tract urging the trial of Mary, Queen of Scots, beginning 'Nostre aage a produict en la pluspart des estats de la Chrestienité des accidens desastres plus estranges et violens . . . '. In French. Mostly published, with additions in the form of a dialogue, in Eusebe Philadelphe Cosmopolite [Nicholas Barnaud?], Le reveille-matin des François . . . 2nd edn., 2 vols (1578), vol. 1, pp. 181-199. See also Calendar ofState Papers Scotland, 1571-1574, pp. 450-454, for extracts from another copy in Cotton MS Caligula C III, ff. 371r-381v. Another slightly different version is Add MS 48023, ff. 137r-145r. A reference (f. 226r) to the 'L'infortune' Duke of Norfolk indicates a date of composition after 2 June 1572.