The 'court' referred both to the various royal palaces, mostly in and around London, and to the body of people who surrounded the monarch. The Elizabethan court was made up of the collection of privileged people serving the Queen � the members of the Privy Chamber, Royal Household and the Privy Council. One estimate suggests that Elizabeth�s court included some 1250 people.

Elizabeth maintained a splendid court to project an image of power but she did not spend money on expensive vanity projects, such as the major building works of Henry VIII. This was left to her courtiers, like Christopher Hatton and William Cecil, Lord Burghley, who built massive country houses as symbols of status and power. These private houses were often used as surrogate palaces for the Queen and the court on their travels around the country, known as 'progresses'.

Once a year the Queen would often go on a progress to the southern counties, but most of the time, she resided in one of the great royal palaces; Whitehall, Hampton Court, Greenwich, Richmond, Westminster, St James, Windsor Castle, and towards the end of her reign, Nonsuch. All these palaces were, in their different ways, magnificent to behold with high fanciful towers and a sea of spiraling chimneys. Whitehall was reputedly the largest palace in Europe, spanning an incredible 23 acres, and it was this palace that Elizabeth resided in more than any other.

It was important that the court moved after a few weeks as the palaces needed to be "aired and sweetened". Sewerage facilities were primitive and unless the palaces were cleaned after several weeks, it would become an unhygienic and unpleasant place to be. When the court was not in residence, the Palace would be cared for by a Keeper and resident staff and they were expected to have things ready so that the Queen and her court could arrive at a moments notice. Windsor Castle, for example, was the strongest and best placed strategically to offer the best defense should enemy forces invade the country, and thus it was imperative that the Queen and court could resort there immediately should an invasion occur.

Over a thousand people attended court and the larger the palace, the easier it was to accommodate this number of people. But no matter which palace the Queen was staying in, it was still not possible to house everyone and many courtiers, ambassadors, or other people who wished to attend court had to lodge nearby. All these palaces were in or near London so finding suitable lodgings was not difficult. London was one of the greatest cities in Europe with a population of 200,000 and growing, and offered everything that a visitor could want from traveling inns to shops to entertainment. However, being lodged at court was an honor and the Spanish Ambassador, Count de Feria, was not at all pleased that he had to lodge in city dwellings rather than at the court as he had done in Mary's reign.

Everyone who was permitted to court had access to the Presence Chamber. This was a great hall in which the monarch would give audience and where all entertaining and general socializing took place. Access to other parts of the palace, depended on status and relationship to the Queen. Security was necessarily tight as with so many people daily visiting court there was always the danger that an assassin could target the Queen. Elizabeth was thus well guarded and access to her privy chambers was strictly controlled by her Gentleman Usher. The Queen had two private rooms, the Privy Chamber and the Bedchamber, although she was rarely, if ever, alone in either. Not only were her six maids of honour often present, but there were also ladies of the bedchamber, ladies and grooms of the Privy Chamber, as well as the Gentleman Usher. The Queen would also entertain government officials or Ambassadors here.

The court revolved around elaborate ceremony and ritual, which reinforced Elizabeth's position as head of state and provided opportunities for courtiers to catch the Queen's eye. While Elizabeth relied on the devotion of her courtiers for advice and protection, they relied on her continued favour for their positions and promotions. Her favourites were often in direct competition with each other for her affection and support, and the wooing of her favour and patronage literally adopted the forms of a courtship ritual. In the centre of this extraordinary cult of love was Elizabeth, who managed to induce her favourites to command and combine the affection of a subject for their sovereign with that of a man for his lover.

Elizabeth had pet names for many of her favourites and they showered her with extravagant compliments, gifts and letters using the language of love. Hatton, one of the Queen's most trusted courtiers, whom she called 'Lids' and her 'sheep', is a case in point. He built an immense house at Holdenby, the largest in England at the time, in honour of the Queen and wrote to her in language more befitting a lovesick suitor than a government official:

Would God I were with you but for one hour. My wits are overwrought with thoughts. I find myself amazed. Bear with me, my most dear sweet Lady, Passion overcometh me. I can write no more. Love me, for I love you.

Hatton knew that his powerful position was a result of their special relationship. He never married, so as not to incur the wrath of his beloved Queen, and to keep the courtship ritual alive. Many of Elizabeth's courtiers who did marry, such as Dudley and Raliegh, did so secretly and, when it was discovered, often found themselves out of favour.

Entertainment at court included such pastimes as jousting, dancing, poetry reading, dramatic performances, hunting, riding, banqueting and concerts. Elizabeth was a skilled hunter, rider, dancer, poet and musician and admired proficiency in these areas in her courtiers. In addition to pleasure and recreation, court entertainments thus provided a means to interact with the Queen and to come to her attention. They also partly explain why the Elizabethan age was such a notable one for poetry, drama and music.

These entertainments also allowed Elizabeth to see and be seen. One of her first public appearances after her coronation took place at Greenwich in July 1559, with courtiers and citizens in attendance. An elaborate entertainment was held over a few days that included a staged military skirmish, a tilt (a form of jousting), a masque, a banquet and fireworks. A good time was had by all and Elizabeth's behaviour � dignified, confident, gracious and obviously enjoying herself � reassured those present that she was fitted for the role of appealing to and ruling over both court and commoners.

Tilts, in particular, were rituals designed to impress, allowing Elizabeth's favourites to show off their athletic prowess. Henry Lee, one of Elizabeth's favourites, became her first Champion, representing the Queen in tournaments until his retirement in 1590. He was responsible for initiating her Accession Day celebrations, one the grandest events of each year.

There was a lot of ceremony surrounding the Queen. For example, as she moved around the palace, guards would line her route and a fanfare would announce her arrival. The Queen's head was always theoretically meant to be higher than everyone else�s, although in practice this may have been hard to observe without all the tall men of her court permanently kneeling. No one was supposed to turn their back on the monarch, which often meant walking backwards if leaving the Queen's presence. All courtiers were also expected to present the Queen with a New Year's gift, and in return the Queen would present them with a gilt plate to the value of their status. Later, it became customary to present her with a gift on her birthday and accession day also.

Much was expected of a male courtier. He was expected to be graceful and courteous in manner and discourse; well educated in classical works of literature, history, geography, mathematics, languages; athletic, industrious, generous, and witty.

While all the men who frequented the court were technically a courtier, the role of the traditional courtier was very different to the role of the councillor or the politician.

Therefore Elizabeth expected different things from various of her men. Of traditional Courtiers like Robert Dudley, she expected a certain flamboyance of dress and manner. She expected to be courted very much in the courtly love tradition. She was the available but ultimately unobtainable lady that they were trying to woo. She expected flattery, gifts, expected to be courted by music, by dancing, and by words of love and devotion. It was all part of the courtly ideal and a perfect solution to the problem of how a man should behave towards a female monarch, more over a single female monarch. It was in many ways frivolous fun and married men as well as single men played this game with the Queen. It was not meant to be taken from the courtly to the personal level or to result in an actual relationship or personal romance with the Queen. Hostile outsiders sometimes misconstrued the innocent flirtations for serious romantic intentions and this was partly responsible for Elizabeth's erroneous lascivious reputation.

Of her political advisors, Elizabeth expected a degree of sobriety, and her relationship with these men was rarely tinged with the romanticism of her relationships with the traditional courtier. One of the strengths of her rule was that she had the ability to judge men well and in choosing courtiers as opposed to politicians she chose men of very different characters. Both William Cecil and Francis Walsingham were piously religious, family men, and incredible hard workers. More often than not they dressed in black and were the models of sobriety. Her courtiers like Robert Dudley and later Robert Devereux were flamboyant men with an eye for the spectacular, outgoing men with great wit and charm, and handsome and athletic men who excelled at courtly events such as jousts.

Despite many of his efforts, Robert Dudley never really managed to successfully place a foot in both camps. He was ambitious for a political career, but the unkind truth is that he was a much better courtier than he was a politician. If personal circumstances had been more favorable towards him, his courtly virtues meant that he would have made a good Prince consort. It was only one man, Christopher Hatton, who was successful in bridging the gap between both worlds. He was a both a handsome, athletic, courtier, and also a successful politician, rising to become Lord Chancellor of England. Like his step father, Robert Devereux also tried to become a courtier and a politician, but his attempts only ended in personal and political disaster.

As well as ambitious courtiers, politicians, bishops and servants, Elizabeth's court also housed its share of spies. These spies belonged to various foreign powers who planted them in the Royal household to find out secrets and to generally provide them with information. The Queen had her own spies in royal residences in other countries.

1. The Monarch

The Queen held supreme power according to law, heredity and the doctrine of divine right; she was the primary source of patronage and had the last word on all state policy. Government was viewed as the monarch's private business and its success therefore depended greatly upon the ruler's strength of character and political acumen.

Elizabeth was particularly successful because she valued the goodwill of her subjects above all; the abuse of royal prerogative under James and Charles I provoked much resentment and led to increasing limitations upon royal power.

The Privy Council constituted the governing executive and chief advisors of the monarch; Privy Councillors were all chosen personally by the Queen, to whom they swore an oath of personal loyalty.

Under Elizabeth there were about 18 members, drawn from the nobility and gentry, but most business was handled by a minority of leading officials.

The most important and active members of the Council were usually the Lord Treasurer, Lord Chancellor, Lord Privy Seal and, most influential of all, the Secretary.

The Oath of a Privy Councillor, 1570

Here is the text of the oath given to every Privy Councillor on his appointment to that office. He swears, his hand upon the Bible.

You shall swear to be a true and faithful councillor to the Queen's Majesty as one of her Highness's Privy Council.

You shall not know or understand any manner of thing to be attempted, done, or spoken against her Majesty's person, honour, crown, or dignity royal but you shall let and withstand the same to the utmost of your power, and either do or cause it to be forthwith revealed either to her Majesty's self or to the rest of her Privy Council.

You shall keep secret all matters committed and revealed to you as her Majesty's councillor, or that shall be treated of secretly in council.

And if any of the same treaties or counsels shall touch any of the other councillors, you shall not reveal the same to him, but shall keep the same until such time as by consent of her Majesty, or the rest of the Council, publication shall be made thereof.

You shall not let to give true, plain, and faithful counsel at all times, without respect either of the cause or of the person, laying apart all favour, meed [reward], affection, and partiality.

And you shall to your uttermost bear faith and true allegiance to the Queen's Majesty, her heirs and lawful successors, and shalll assist and defend all jurisdictions, preeminences, and authorities granted to her Majesty and annexed to her Crown against all foreign princes, persons, prelates, or potentates, whether by act of Parliament or otherwise.

And generally in all things you shall do as a faithful and true councillor ought to do to her Majesty.

So help you God and the holy contents of this book.

3. The Chamber

The domestic servants of the monarch, living in close quarters with the Queen (or King) at Court. The 40 messengers of the Chamber were also used by the Privy Council to make arrests.

4. The Household

Servants of the monarch who attended to the public face of Court administration; the Court merged with central government since servants of the Household and Chamber often held offices in the Privy Council and state bureaucracy.

5. Vice Admirals

Overseers of coastal counties or of seaboard areas within a county. Though appointed by the Admiralty they were instructed by the Privy Council as were the Lords Lieutenant and Judges.

6. The Exchequer

The centre of Crown finance; the Lord Treasurer, a leading member of the Privy Council, appointed officials to collect revenues from the counties. The revenue was then passed up through the various levels of administration from the Parish Constables.

Fraud and tax evasion inevitably diverted much government revenue, and no effective method was devised to resolve the problem largely because officials were insufficiently paid; even the scrupulous Lord Burghley was guilty of tax evasion while acting as Lord Treasurer.

7. The Lords Lieutenant

About thirty peers and privy councillors were appointed by the monarch to oversee the local administration of counties, usually in areas where they had estates or business interests of their own. They acted as a liaison between the military and local branches of government and were responsible for the division of the country into its administrative regions. they supervised the muster roll and summoning of soldiers, the provision of military supplies and storehouses, and the provision of local tax money to provide for the equipment and transportation of military troops. These officials were instructed by royal messengers and by visits to Court.

Deputy Lieutenants were assistants to the Lords Lieutenant. They were drawn from gentry and also appointed by the Crown; there were at least two deputies in each county.

8. Sherriffs and Under-Sherriffs

Though beneath the Lords Lieutenant, the Sheriffs remained the most direct representative of the Crown in the counties. They were appointed annually from among leading men of the counties, chosen by the monarch from a list of nominees compiled by privy councillors and judges. Among their duties were the collection of fines, keeping of the jails, some law enforcement, and the arranging of elections to Parliament (they ordered gentry or town burgesses under their jurisdiction to elect two representatives to the Commons--and often influenced the final choice).

9. The Coroner

The coroner (or "crowner") was elected from gentry below the rank of knight. There were from 1-6 per county, and they assisted with law enforcement and the assembling of juries. Their main responsibility (as today) was to determine the cause of death where circumstances were suspicious.

(e) Role of Privy Council � how it also controlled the regions through appointments, and its links with Parliament

EXTRACT FROM Queenship and Political Discourse in The Elizabethan Realms By Natalie Mears, University of Durham

Yet, in contrast to works that were issued in 1958 to mark the quatercentenary of her accession, the picture recent works have painted of Elizabeth, particularly in academic circles, has been darker than that portrayed by Sir John Neale, Sir Roy Strong and others.³ Whereas, for Neale and Strong, Elizabeth was a genuine champion of Protestantism, who ruled effectively over an increasingly prosperous and politically and culturally significant realm, adored and celebrated by her subjects, for more recent historians Elizabeth's reign was troubled and its legacy more so. Though Geoffrey Elton attacked Neale's interpretation of Elizabethan parliaments, the first significant assault on Elizabeth's queenship was Chris Haigh's Elizabeth I, which argued that Elizabeth was, if an astute politician able to manipulate council, court and subjects through courtly love, emotional blackmail and propaganda, also an indecisive and vain monarch. She was both a bully and weak, who created many of her own problems, whether this was by conciliating conservative religious opinion too much at the beginning of her reign or allowing both council and court to become a dangerously narrow clique in her final years. This negative picture has been developed further, increasingly highlighting the political and religious fissures between Elizabeth and her leading subjects. John Guy has pointed to the significant differences in political beliefs between Elizabeth and many of her councillors, like Burghley, Leicester and Walsingham. Patrick Collinson and Stephen Alford have demonstrated that, in conjunction with conflicts over political issues, these differences created tensions over the issues of marriage and succession, with councillors willing to invoke quasi-republican ideas to provide remedies and to force Elizabeth into action. Collinson, Peter Lake, Brett Usher, Thomas Freeman and others have highlighted the continuing conflict between Elizabeth and moderate puritans over the perceived failure of the religious settlement of 1559 to reform the church fully � Conversely, crucial questions about Elizabeth's queenship, the nature of court politics and policy-making, the extent to which political issues were discussed outside the court and how Elizabethans perceived their queen and her governance, remain disputed or unanswered. John Neale's and Conyers Read's influential readings of Elizabethan governance � that it was based on social connections and was divided by factionalism � have been challenged. Simon Adams demonstrated that the near-contemporary sources on which Neale and Read based their arguments � Camden's Annals (Books 1�3, 1615; Book 4, 1629) and Sir Robert Naunton's Fragmenta regalia (1641) � were infused with personal agendas and modelled on classical styles. He has also shown that factionalism was absent from the court until the disruptive influence of Robert Devereux, second earl of Essex, was felt in the 1590s � a position with which many historians agree. Yet, revisionist history largely failed to deal with the wider questions raised by Neale and Read: the role of social connections and ideology in politics. With the exception of Haigh's Elizabeth I � which outlined instances where Elizabeth took counsel from individuals, including those who were not privy councillors � Elizabethan politics was increasingly seen in Eltonian, institutional terms. The privy council was identified as the central advisory and policy-making body, even when research by David Starkey, George Bernard, Eric Ives, Cliff Davies, Steve Gunn and Penry Williams re-emphasised the importance of social connections in early Tudor governance vis-�-vis Elton's �Tudor revolution in government�. Instances of informal counselling, highlighted by Haigh and others, were conceived in terms of exceptions to the rule, often means by which Elizabeth consciously isolated herself from the council whose opinions conflicted with hers.

Similarly, though the work of Paula Scalingi and Constance Jordan has shown that contemporary debate on royal power was dominated by the issue of female monarchy in the second half of the sixteenth century, there is little consensus about the role gender played in Elizabeth's queenship. Feminist historians, such as Allison Heisch, Mary Thomas Crane, Mary Hill Cole and Anne McLaren, have argued that gender was the defining force in Elizabeth's reign. According to Crane, Elizabeth played with gender conventions to wrong-foot her counsellors; Heisch, Cole and McLaren have seen Elizabeth more as a prisoner of her gender. In her increasingly influential work, McLaren has suggested that Elizabeth's gender forced her to redefine her queenship in �extraordinary� and providential terms: as a corporate activity, executed jointly by her and her male counsellors. In contrast, while acknowledging that gender formed part of the politico-cultural milieu of the age, Patrick Collinson, John Guy, Stephen Alford and others have all identified religion as the key factor. Elizabeth consistently refused to resolve the central problems the regime faced: reforming the church fully and securing a Protestant succession, to prevent the accession of Mary Stuart and the reconciliation of England to Rome. Simply, Elizabeth remained under constant pressure to live up to Protestant expectations that her accession had inspired.

Gender has also influenced more recent studies of public discourse on or during Elizabeth's reign. Carole Levin's �The heart and stomach of a king� has analysed popular public debate of Elizabeth's queenship, concluding that ordinary Elizabethans shared the concerns of her most eminent privy councillors: Elizabeth's failure to follow gender expectations by marrying and having a child to succeed her. The strengths of Levin's study are that she has sought to examine popular knowledge and discussion of major political issues and has implied that such debate was independent of elite discourse in the court and council. It contrasts with earlier work which has defined public debate as directed by the council to �bounce� Elizabeth into action, whether this involved planting speeches in parliament or commissioning pamphlets, such as John Stubbe's The discouerie of a gaping gulf (1579) against the Anjou match. However, Levin's study is also problematic because she assumes a consciousness and deliberate manipulation of gendered imagery by Elizabeth and her subjects that is disconcertingly and anachronistically modern. It also fails to distinguish between different types of participants in debate � ambassadors, Catholic polemicists, puritan clergymen, yeomen and labourers � and denies that other issues, like religion, had equal or greater importance.

Levin's work, therefore, leaves important questions about the nature of Elizabethan public debate unanswered: who participated in debate, why and what did they say? Moreover, the significance of these questions has grown since the publication of an English translation of J�rgen Habermas's highly influential work on the public sphere, Strukturwandel der �ffentlichkeit (The structural transformation of the public sphere).Though Habermas's definition of the public sphere, and his identification of the late seventeenth century as its birth date, have been widely challenged, there remains a reluctance to date the emergence of a public sphere in England earlier than the early or mid-seventeenth century.²² Preliminary research on the existence of public debate in Elizabethan England points to the need to reconsider these issues fully and in detail.

This study attempts to answer these questions. It grew out of my doctoral work on Elizabeth's final marriage negotiations, with Francis, duke of Anjou, brother of Henry III of France, between 1578 and 1582. In the course of reconstructing the negotiations and exploring how they could help us define the nature of politics and political culture in the much-neglected mid-Elizabethan period, two things struck me. First, an examination of the process of the negotiations in 1579 drawn from memoranda principally in Burghley's archive, suggested that Elizabeth not only took a more active role in policy-making than some recent studies had suggested, but that the privy council did not take the leading advisory role. Rather, Elizabeth appeared to select individual councillors whom she trusted to discuss the marriage separately from formal conciliar meetings. Moreover, related issues and incidents, such as attempts to secure the release of the former Scottish Regent, the earl of Morton, in 1580�1, suggested that Elizabeth took counsel from those who were not privy councillors, such as her Scottish agent, Thomas Randolph, often privileging their advice over that given by councillors.

Second, my re-evaluation of the circumstances surrounding the publication of John Stubbe's controversial pamphlet against the marriage, The discouerie of a gaping gulf (1579), raised questions about the extent to which public political debate was organised by the regime. It proved difficult to ascertain close connections between Stubbe and Leicester and Walsingham, often regarded as the commissioners of the pamphlet. Closer connections existed between Stubbe and Burghley, through Burghley's secretaries, Vincent Skinner and Michael Hickes, who were Stubbe's friends and contemporaries at Cambridge and Lincoln's Inn. These connections appeared to be confirmed not only by the possibility of an earlier collaboration between Stubbe, Skinner and Hickes on The life off the 70. Archbishopp off Canterbury presentlye sittinge Englished (1574), but by apparent references in A gaping gulf to memoranda by Burghley and Sussex now extant in Burghley's archive. Equally, however, a reconstruction of Stubbe's political assumptions, his education, religious commitment and his earlier forays in print � including his collaborative work with Skinner and Hickes � made the likelihood that Stubbe was commissioned to parrot the words of others less convincing. Rather, it appeared that Stubbe wrote the pamphlet because of his own concerns about the marriage and his belief that he could counsel the queen or comment on political issues. It raised the possibility that a forum for public debate existed in Elizabethan England.

These two themes form the basis of this study. On the one hand, therefore, I have sought to explore the nature of Elizabethan court politics � both policy-making and wider political debate � and of Elizabeth's queenship, to test the extent to which the methods I found characteristic of the late 1570s and early 1580s were evident earlier in the reign. On the other, I have attempted to expand the model of public debate I identified with Stubbe across a broader social and geographic canvas. Therefore, chapter 2 seeks to answer the questions posed by Neale and Read about the nature of Elizabethan court politics; chapter 3 discusses the specific question of whether Elizabeth's queenship, and court politics, were shaped by her gender or by other factors. In what often felt like a �book of two halves�, chapter 4 attempts, in part, to connect the discussion of court politics to the examination of public debate. Having established in the previous two chapters that the court was the main forum for policy-making, chapter 4 explores ways in which political issues were discussed at court aside from direct counselling by Elizabeth's trusted advisers. Chapter 5 lays the foundation for examining the nature of public debate by surveying how news circulated in England, Wales and Ireland; the nature of public debate itself is explored in chapter 6. Though both the issues of debate, and the factors which may have encouraged participation, are highlighted in chapters 5 and 6, chapter 7 focuses on how a variety of Elizabethans understood and perceived Elizabeth's queenship.

In what appeared to be an increasingly ambitious project, especially concerning the nature of public debate, a number of points have underpinned my approach. First, my methodological approach to Elizabethan politics has been to combine study of real politics with political culture, part of what has been termed �New Tudor Political History�. Influenced by political theorists and historians, like Quentin Skinner, John Guy, Patrick Collinson and others, I have increasingly understood Tudor politics as the interplay between people, institutions and ideas. Therefore, I have found it necessary to explore the social, educational and ideological background of political actors in order to understand how they perceived the Elizabethan regime, the issues facing it and their own responses. Second, though this study was initially conceived to concentrate on the mid-Elizabethan period, which has been rather neglected, it grew to consume the first decade of the reign too. Indeed, it covers what John Guy has identified as the first of two coherent periods into which Elizabeth's reign can be divided, 1558�1585/7. This was partly born out of the availability of sources: a number of crucial pieces of evidence on political discourse at court and in the country dated from the 1560s, while corresponding material for the 1570s could be rare. My desire to explore the origins of what I perceived to be a more active style of leadership by Elizabeth was also important. However, whilst not the primary focus of this study, the result has been to enable me to reconsider Guy's arguments about the coherence of the so-called �first reign� and pursue reservations about these arguments which I had experienced during my doctoral research.

Third, I have found it more useful to define the court in terms that lie between David Starkey's very narrow definition and the much wider ones of Perez Zagorin and Malcolm Smuts. Whilst Starkey's emphasis on the royal household, and in particular on the monarch's personal body servants in the privy chamber, ignores the nobility and gentry who were physically attendant at court but lacked official positions, Zagorin's inclusion of all county officials, and Smuts's of courtiers' London houses and the Inns of Court, seems too liberal. Though there were close connections between the court and the counties, on which Tudor governance relied, a blanket inclusion of all officials conceals the differing levels of contact individuals had with the queen and her immediate regime. In turn, this blurs differences in access to, and involvement in, political debate at court which, as will be shown in later chapters, could be practically and ideologically distinct from that in the counties. Rather, when I talk of the court, I refer to the royal household and those aristocrats and gentry, male and female, who were resident or attendant at the royal palaces for at least part of the year. This has been estimated to be approximately two-thirds of the nobility and as many as fifty to sixty gentry families in the early and middle years of the reign. I see the court as a collection of individuals � some with official positions, others without � rather than as an institution or a physical space, circumscribed by the palace walls or dictated by proximity to Elizabeth. Hence, individuals became courtiers because they were attendant, in one way or another, on the monarch but did not cease to be courtiers when they returned to their estates or went abroad on official business. One of the most important, and interesting, aspects of the court and its relationship with public debate is the permeable barrier between the two, a permeability created by courtiers who were able to traverse or occupy the different physical spaces of the royal palaces and the counties. To explore this more accurately, however, we need to think of the court as a collection of individuals and to use the term �courtiers� more readily than �the court�.

Fourth, perhaps unsurprisingly for a former student of St Andrews, I have also attempted to take a �British� approach. It has become increasingly clear, thanks to the work of Jane Dawson and Roger Mason, that leading Elizabethans, like Burghley, perceived politics in �British� terms, looking at the strategic and ideological problems and benefits posed by constituent parts of the British Isles. If their work has informed my understanding of Elizabethan court politics, then I have also attempted to translate this to my exploration of public debate. I have consciously tried to explore public debate in England, Wales and Ireland, even if, because of the imbalance of evidence, England has assumed the lion's share. Irish debate in particular seems to make important correctives to our current understanding of early modern discourse and point to some important avenues of research.

Fifth, though Peter Lake's and Michael Questier's recent study of the public sphere, The anti-christ's lewd hat, has demonstrated how much information on the dissemination and reception of printed texts can be gained from the texts themselves � something that I had recognised in reading countless pamphlets in the British Library � I have chosen to try and reconstruct the nature of the public sphere by identifying real readers and real participants, through book inventories, booksellers' accounts, cases of seditious and slanderous words etc. Sixth, having outlined how I use the term �court�, it seems equally imperative to delineate how I have used a number of different labels for the public sphere and public debate in the course of the following exploration � though I discuss explicitly what we should call the Elizabethan public sphere at the end of chapter 6. I use �public sphere� to denote the concept of the public sphere and as an initial term to refer to the Elizabethan public sphere prior to defining exactly what we should call it, or (with the adjective �Elizabethan�) as a short-hand to signify that I am referring to the concept of the public sphere in relation to the Elizabethan period. I use �public discourse� to denote an unsituated discourse, a common theme debated by a variety of people who were not always aware of each other's existence. Conversely, I use �public debate� as an umbrella term to refer very generally to the act of discussing political issues by those who were not members of the court.

Finally, this study is not concerned with conceiving the public sphere, as Habermas and others have done so, in terms of an essential prerequisite of liberal�democracy and one of its major causes. Thus, it does not seek primarily to respond to some of the most recent research, notably by David Zaret, that traces the origins of public opinion and the development of conscious appeals to it to legitimate political action. Rather, it is born out of the debate on the nature of Tudor political history as articulated by Patrick Collinson in his inaugural lecture as Regius Professor of Modern History at Cambridge in 1989 and uses the notion of the public sphere as a new, and necessary, conceptual framework to examine Elizabethan political discourse. Chapter , therefore, details the historiography of Elizabethan court politics and political debate and discusses the conceptual frameworks needed to resolve some of the unanswered questions it poses. It also lays down some of the problems posed by extant sources and how these shape our pursuit of a better understanding of political awareness and debate under Elizabeth.

Cecil 1520-1598, was Elizabeth's most trusted and capable advisor. He served in both Edward VI's and Mary I's administrations, and acquired the reputation of a reserved and dedicated servant of the crown. He was probably Elizabeth's most trusted advisor on the Privy Council. He first met Elizabeth in her teenage years, and she recognized his abilities; she appointed him her surveyor 'accountant'. They were close friends, and Cecil, understandably, was often at odds with the queen's favourite courtier, Robert Dudley. Both men viewed the other as their main rival for Elizabeth's affections. Dudley was open in his ambition to marry the queen, and Cecil was just as openly opposed to the idea.

Burghley, also spelled Burghleigh, was known as Sir William Cecil from 1551 to 1571. He was a pillar of state through three reigns and for forty years was the main architect of the successful policies of the Elizabethan era, earning a reputation as a master of renaissance statecraft whose talents as a diplomat, politician and administrator won him high office and a peerage.

Despite Cecil's prodigious administrative gifts, Elizabeth remained the true power in England. She enjoyed occasionally disagreeing with him, and never hesitated to have her own way. But she trusted him unconditionally, and loved him deeply. His death was a devastating blow in the last years of her reign; no other councillor received the same favour and affection.

He continued to sit in Parliament, as a commoner until 1571 and as Lord Burghley thereafter, and was Elizabeth�s chief spokesman there, as well as administrative head of her government. One of his greatest skills was his ability to function as a liaison, representing royal policy to Parliament and keeping Elizabeth in touch with its feelings. His personal religious sympathies were with the Puritans, but politically he considered the interests of the country best served by a middle-of-the-road Anglican church, which he supported against both Protestant and Roman Catholic extremes. He urged Elizabeth to marry and perpetuate a Protestant Tudor house, and he supported the cause of the Scottish Protestants against the Roman Catholic Mary Queen of Scots. He was not able to maintain a policy of moderation, however. A succession of Catholic plots against Elizabeth led to increasing harshness toward Catholics generally and finally the execution of Mary Queen of Scots. In the Privy Council Burghley took a decisive role in the suppression of the Catholic revolts, but he was opposed to the entrance of England into European wars on behalf of the Protestants. This policy was defeated (1585) by the Puritan wing of the council under Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester, and Sir Francis Walsingham. Although Elizabeth�s favourites often opposed Burghley�s influence, his role as chief adviser was never seriously challenged. After Burghley died, his son Robert , who he had hand-picked and trained for the job, took over as Elizabeth's advisor in her later years.

Dudley was Elizabeth's main favourite throughout her reign. Many historians believe Dudley was Elizabeth's true love. Whether Dudley deserved the queen's affections is debatable; he was often ill-tempered and arrogant. But he and Elizabeth remained close until his death, and there is much surviving proof of their emotional connection. In fact, during the early years of her reign, most foreign ambassadors believed Elizabeth and Dudley would marry.

The son of the duke of Northumberland who had engineered Jane Grey's disastrous nine day reign, Dudley's fortunes were low until he met Elizabeth again in adulthood, they first met as children. He sought to keep his first marriage secret, though his wife, Amy Robsart, died in mysterious and scandalous circumstances in 1560. Later, he made a secret marriage to the queen's cousin, Lettice Knollys.

When Elizabeth contracted smallpox in 1562, she named him as heir of England. Elizabeth only titled him earl of Leicester in 1564, and ostensibly this was to make him a more attractive candidate for marriage to the queen of Scots. But, as the Scottish ambassador James Melville noted wryly, the queen openly tickled Dudley's neck as she fastened the mantle around his shoulders. Still, Elizabeth was always quick to keep Dudley off-balance and insecure in her favour. As she told him once, 'If you think to rule here, I will take a course to see you forthcoming. I will have here but one mistress, and no master.' A privy counsellor, he favours an aggressive foreign policy and further reform of the Church of England. He is made general of the English forces in the Netherlands in 1585, but his support of the Dutch rebels against Spain is ineffectual.

Dudley died on 4 September 1588. Despite her emotional ties to Dudley, Elizabeth had over 20 different "favourites" during the course of her realm.

Hatton was one of Elizabeth's most gifted and trusted courtiers. He was very intelligent, though he left Oxford without taking a degree; he went to court instead, and his wit and skills as a dancer impressed the queen. Elizabeth kept him at court for nearly a decade before rewarding him adequately for his services (she was perversely fond of withholding titles and monies from her favourites.) Hatton eventually served ably in several offices, including Captain of the Queen's Bodyguards and as one of her spokesmen in the House of Commons. In 1587, he reached the summit of his career when he was made Lord Chancellor. And, ironically enough, she also made him Chancellor of Oxford University.