DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.67419#0306
284
THE DAYS OF « GOOD QUEEN BESS?
cealed, and the curiosity to explore and rifle the
treasures of the Greek and Roman world, which
mystery and imagination had swelled into the mar-
vellous, contributed to excite an absolute passion
for study and for books. The court, the ducal
castle, and the baronial hall were suddenly con-
verted into academies, and could boast of splendid
tapestries. In the first of these, according to
Ascham, might be seen the queen reading “ more
Greeke every day than some prebendarie of this
church doth read Latin in a whole week;” and while
she was translating Isocrates or Seneca, it may be
easily conceived that her maids of honour found it
convenient to praise and to adopt the disposition of
her time. In the second, observes Warton, “ the
daughter of a duchess was taught not only to distil
strong waters, but to construe Greek; and in the
third, every young lady who aspired to be fashion-
able was compelled, in imitation of the greater
world, to exhibit similar marks of erudition.”
A contemporary writer says, that some of the
ladies of the court employ themselves “ in continuall
reading either of the holie Scriptures, or histories
of our owne or forren nations about us, and diverse
in writing volumes of their owne, or translating of
other mens into our English and Latine toongs. I
might here (he adds) make a large discourse of such
honorable and grave councellors, and noble person-
ages, as give their dailie attendance upon the
queene’s majestie. I could in like sort set foorth a
singular commendation of the vertuous beautie, or
beautiful vertues of such ladies and gentlewomen
as wait upon his person, betweene whose amiable
THE DAYS OF « GOOD QUEEN BESS?
cealed, and the curiosity to explore and rifle the
treasures of the Greek and Roman world, which
mystery and imagination had swelled into the mar-
vellous, contributed to excite an absolute passion
for study and for books. The court, the ducal
castle, and the baronial hall were suddenly con-
verted into academies, and could boast of splendid
tapestries. In the first of these, according to
Ascham, might be seen the queen reading “ more
Greeke every day than some prebendarie of this
church doth read Latin in a whole week;” and while
she was translating Isocrates or Seneca, it may be
easily conceived that her maids of honour found it
convenient to praise and to adopt the disposition of
her time. In the second, observes Warton, “ the
daughter of a duchess was taught not only to distil
strong waters, but to construe Greek; and in the
third, every young lady who aspired to be fashion-
able was compelled, in imitation of the greater
world, to exhibit similar marks of erudition.”
A contemporary writer says, that some of the
ladies of the court employ themselves “ in continuall
reading either of the holie Scriptures, or histories
of our owne or forren nations about us, and diverse
in writing volumes of their owne, or translating of
other mens into our English and Latine toongs. I
might here (he adds) make a large discourse of such
honorable and grave councellors, and noble person-
ages, as give their dailie attendance upon the
queene’s majestie. I could in like sort set foorth a
singular commendation of the vertuous beautie, or
beautiful vertues of such ladies and gentlewomen
as wait upon his person, betweene whose amiable