Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Abbreviations
- Acknowledgements
- Editorial Procedures
- Introduction
- Part I Roots 1548–1562
- Part II Youth 1562–1571
- Part III Emancipation 1571–1574
- Part IV Exploration 1574–1576
- Part V Alienation 1576–1579
- Part VI Intrigue 1579–1580
- 37 Oxford vs. Sidney
- 38 Oxford vs. Leicester
- 39 Table, Gallery, Garden
- 40 Atheist
- 41 Sodomite
- 42 Prophet
- 43 A Passing Singular Odd Man
- 44 Oxford's Folly
- 45 Literary Patronage (1)
- 46 Oxford's Players (1)
- Part VII Sedition 1580–1581
- Part VIII Release 1581–1585
- Part IX Reiteration 1586–1591
- Part X Renewal 1592–1595
- Part XI Re-engagement 1595–1599
- Part XII Decline 1600–1604
- Part XIII Aftermath 1604–1613
- Notes
- Appendix: Oxford's Letters and Libel Documents
- Bibliography
- Index
- Liverpool English texts and Studies
45 - Literary Patronage (1)
from Part VI - Intrigue 1579–1580
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Abbreviations
- Acknowledgements
- Editorial Procedures
- Introduction
- Part I Roots 1548–1562
- Part II Youth 1562–1571
- Part III Emancipation 1571–1574
- Part IV Exploration 1574–1576
- Part V Alienation 1576–1579
- Part VI Intrigue 1579–1580
- 37 Oxford vs. Sidney
- 38 Oxford vs. Leicester
- 39 Table, Gallery, Garden
- 40 Atheist
- 41 Sodomite
- 42 Prophet
- 43 A Passing Singular Odd Man
- 44 Oxford's Folly
- 45 Literary Patronage (1)
- 46 Oxford's Players (1)
- Part VII Sedition 1580–1581
- Part VIII Release 1581–1585
- Part IX Reiteration 1586–1591
- Part X Renewal 1592–1595
- Part XI Re-engagement 1595–1599
- Part XII Decline 1600–1604
- Part XIII Aftermath 1604–1613
- Notes
- Appendix: Oxford's Letters and Libel Documents
- Bibliography
- Index
- Liverpool English texts and Studies
Summary
Like other members of his class, Oxford was the frequent dedicatee of printed books. Most of the dedications attracted by Oxford were for translations, including the first four: three of ancient histories, one of Calvin's commentary on the Psalms:
Arthur Golding (tr.), Thabridgment of the Histories of Trogus Pompeius (1564: STC 24290).
Thomas ‘Vnderdoune’ (tr.), An Æthiopian Historie, by Heliodorus (1569?: STC 13041).
Edmund Elviden (tr.), The most pleasant metaphoricall historie of Pesistratis and Catanea (?1570: STC 7624).
Arthur Golding (tr.), The Psalms of David and others, with J. Caluins Commentaries, by Jean Calvin (1571: STC 4395): dedication signed 20 October, from London.
Oxford's uncle Arthur Golding dedicated two of these four. Underdowne's dedication in Æthiopian Historie embodies an oddly characteristic message discouraging the young Earl from intellectual pursuits:
… I doo not denie, but that in many matters, I meane matters of learninge, a Noble man ought to haue a sight; but to be to[o] muche addicted that waye, I think is not good.
An imprint from 1571, Bartholomew Clerke's De Curiali, translated into Latin from Baldassare Castiglione's original Italian (STC 4782), is dedicated to Queen Elizabeth, but contains a kind of secondary dedication to Thomas Sackville, and letters of compliment to the author from, among others, Sackville and Oxford. The latter, as we have seen, is taken by Gabriel Harvey to have been Oxford's original composition. It is replete with predictable and characteristically repetitive literary observations.
A fifth translation, published in 1573, has also been noted already: Cardanus Comforte, Englished by Thomas Bedingfield (STC 4608). In the same year appeared a sixth translation, Humphrey Llwyd's The Breuiary of Britayne (STC 16636), rendered from the Latin by ‘Thomas Twyne, Gentleman’, with a dedication to Oxford on the grounds that ‘your honour taketh singular delight’ in ‘bookes of Geographie, Histories, and other good learnynge’. (Twyne was among the hysterics who would compose pamphlets on the earthquake of 6 April 1580.)
In 1574 appeared the first book dedicated to Oxford which is not merely a translation: his surgeon George Baker's The Composition or Making of the … Oil called Oleum Magistrale (STC 1209).
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Monstrous AdversaryThe Life of Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, pp. 236 - 238Publisher: Liverpool University PressPrint publication year: 2003