70 Fun Facts About Elizabeth I

Who was Elizabeth I's mother?

She was beheaded when Elizabeth was two years and eight months old.

The princess was named after her two grandmothers, who were?

Archbishop Cranmer stood as one of her godparents at Greenwich in September 1533.

How old was Elizabeth when her mother was executed?

She was promptly declared illegitimate and struck from the succession, restored only when she was ten.

Which governess, appointed in 1537, taught the young Elizabeth French, Dutch, Italian and Spanish?

Born Catherine Champernowne, she remained Elizabeth's friend until her death in 1565.

At 12, Elizabeth I translated whose Prayers or Meditations into Italian, Latin and French as a gift for her father?

A translation of Tacitus in her own hand was identified at Lambeth Palace Library in 2019.

Which tutor taught Elizabeth from 1548 and left memoirs describing her precocity?

By the time her schooling ended in 1550 she was one of the best-educated women of her generation.

Which stepfather engaged in romps with the 14-year-old Elizabeth, entering her bedroom in his nightgown?

He was beheaded in 1549 for scheming to marry her and control the boy king; some think the episode put her off marriage for life.

How long did Lady Jane Grey reign before being deposed in favour of Mary in 1553?

Edward VI's will had bypassed both his half-sisters for their Protestant cousin.

After which 1554 rising was Elizabeth imprisoned in the Tower of London on suspicion of complicity?

Discontent at Mary's plan to marry Philip of Spain had made Elizabeth a focus for opposition.

Where did Elizabeth spend almost a year under house arrest after her release from the Tower in May 1554?

Crowds cheered her all along the road there.

Where was Elizabeth living when she learned she had become queen in November 1558?

Her council and peers came there to swear allegiance and hear her first speech.

How old was Elizabeth when she became queen?

Her half-sister Mary had recognised her as heir just eleven days before dying.

Who chose 15 January 1559 as the date of Elizabeth's coronation?

She was crowned by Owen Oglethorpe, the Catholic bishop of Carlisle, at Westminster Abbey.

Which chief adviser did Elizabeth create Baron Burghley?

He served her until his death in 1598, when his political mantle passed to his son Robert.

What title did Elizabeth accept as head of the English church, in place of her father's?

Many thought Supreme Head unacceptable for a woman to bear.

What was one of Elizabeth's mottoes, meaning 'I see and keep silent'?

Semper eadem, always the same, was another of hers.

Which childhood friend was Elizabeth evidently in love with in 1559, and later made Earl of Leicester?

After her death a note from him marked 'his last letter' in her hand was found among her most personal belongings.

How did Amy Dudley, wife of the queen's favourite, die in September 1560?

The inquest said accident, but many suspected her husband had arranged it so he could marry the queen.

Whom did Leicester finally marry in 1578, earning the queen's lifelong hatred?

Elizabeth reacted with repeated scenes of displeasure.

Elizabeth's last serious courtship, in her forties, was with which French prince 22 years her junior?

She wore a frog-shaped earring he had sent her.

What frog-shaped gift from her French suitor did Elizabeth wear?

Public tributes to the Virgin around 1578 doubled as coded opposition to the match.

Which Scandinavian king's proposal did Elizabeth entertain for several years early in her reign?

Denmark's Frederick II countered with his own proposal in late 1559.

Which tsar, whom she wrote to on amicable terms about trade, once proposed marriage to Elizabeth?

He also asked for a guarantee of asylum in England if his rule collapsed.

In 1563 Elizabeth told an envoy that if she followed her nature she would rather be what?

Far rather than queen and married, she said.

A man arrested in Spain in 1587 claimed to be Elizabeth's son by Leicester. What name did he use?

Philip II kept him very secure and he was never heard of again; scholars call the story impossible.

Which 1560 agreement removed the French threat from Scotland after Elizabeth aided Protestant rebels?

Mary, Queen of Scots refused to ratify it when she returned from France in 1561.

Whom did Elizabeth propose as a husband for Mary, Queen of Scots in 1563, without asking either party?

Both were unenthusiastic; Mary married Darnley instead in 1565.

For how many years was Mary, Queen of Scots held in England before her execution?

She had fled south after her defeat at Langside in 1568.

Which pope's 1570 bull Regnans in Excelsis excommunicated Elizabeth and released her subjects from allegiance?

He believed the Northern Rising of 1569 had succeeded; it had not, and over 750 rebels were executed.

Who ran the secret service that defeated the Catholic conspiracies against Elizabeth?

He built the case against Mary, Queen of Scots from the Ridolfi Plot of 1571 to the Babington Plot of 1586.

Which 1586 conspiracy provided the letters used to convict Mary, Queen of Scots?

The Ridolfi Plot of 1571 had already cost the Duke of Norfolk his head.

Where was Mary, Queen of Scots beheaded on 8 February 1587?

Elizabeth then claimed the signed warrant had been dispatched without her knowledge.

Which secretary did Elizabeth blame for dispatching Mary's death warrant without her knowledge?

Contemporaries and historians alike have doubted the sincerity of her remorse.

Which French port did the English occupy from October 1562 to June 1563, hoping to swap it for Calais?

Her Huguenot allies joined the Catholics to retake it; Calais had been lost in January 1558.

Which sea captain did Elizabeth knight after his circumnavigation of the globe in 1577–80?

He went on to raid Cádiz in 1587 and destroy ships meant for the Armada.

Which 1585 agreement, promising Elizabeth's military support to the Dutch rebels, started the Anglo-Spanish War?

She then undermined her own commander, Leicester, by opening secret peace talks with Spain within days.

What post did Leicester accept from the Dutch States in 1586, enraging Elizabeth?

She had her letters of rebuke read aloud before the Dutch Council of State while he stood nearby.

Off which port did English fire ships scatter the Spanish Armada at midnight on 28–29 July 1588?

The Armada then straggled home round Scotland and Ireland in shattered remnants.

Where did Elizabeth address her troops in August 1588 in a silver breastplate?

I know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king.

How did the English Counter Armada sent to Spain in 1589 fare?

Up to 15,000 men were lost and 40 ships sunk or captured, reviving Philip II's naval power.

What was the Madre de Deus, taken off the Azores in 1592?

Even after mass theft at Dartmouth, its remaining cargo was worth half the English treasury.

Which favourite led the 1596 raid on Cádiz, then annoyed the queen by handing out knighthoods?

His prestige began to rival hers, and their relationship soured.

Which Spanish-backed Irish rebel leader fought the Nine Years' War against Elizabeth from 1593?

He surrendered a few days after her death; the war nearly bankrupted her realm.

At which town did the Spanish land in Ireland in 1601 and hold out for three months before surrendering?

The decisive battle there in 1602 was won by Charles Blount, whom Elizabeth hailed as a hero.

Which territory in North America did Walter Raleigh claim and name, perhaps in the queen's honour?

It stretched from New England to the Carolinas; the Roanoke colony there vanished by 1590.

Which merchant body did Elizabeth charter on 31 December 1600 to trade in the Indian Ocean and China?

It later controlled half of world trade and much of India.

With which Ottoman sultan did Elizabeth exchange letters, discussing joint action against Spain?

He argued Protestantism and Islam had more in common than either did with Rome, since both rejected idols.

With which North African state did Elizabeth trade arms and timber for sugar, in defiance of a papal ban?

Its ambassador visited London in 1600 to discuss an alliance against Spain.

Which 1562 illness scarred Elizabeth's skin and left her half bald and dependent on wigs?

Parliament used the scare to press her to marry or name an heir; she did neither.

What two habits contributed to Elizabeth's severe tooth decay, according to her biography?

A French ambassador reported that many teeth were missing, so she was hard to understand when she spoke quickly.

Under what name did Edmund Spenser celebrate Elizabeth in his poem The Faerie Queene?

She gave him a pension, unusual for a queen who was never a major patron of the arts.

Which trusted physician was executed in 1594 after Essex wrongly accused him of treason?

The queen was angry at his arrest and seems not to have believed in his guilt, but could not save him.

What is Elizabeth I's 1601 address to the Commons that won them over amid anger about trading privileges called?

She professed ignorance of the abuses and appealed, as usual, to the emotions.

What was Essex's fate after he tried to raise a rebellion in London in February 1601?

An observer in 1602 said her delight was to sit in the dark and weep for Essex.

When Robert Cecil told the dying queen she had to go to bed, what did she snap back?

She had sat motionless on a cushion for hours in a settled melancholy.

Where did Elizabeth die on 24 March 1603?

By the old calendar, in which the year began on Lady Day, she died on the last day of 1602.

How old was Elizabeth when she died?

A few hours later the council proclaimed James king of England.

Which relative succeeded Elizabeth on the throne?

He was her first cousin twice removed; Robert Cecil had secretly coached him for the succession.

In 1606 Elizabeth's coffin was moved to lie on top of whose, under one monument in Westminster Abbey?

The Latin inscription reads: Consorts in realm and tomb, here we sleep, Elizabeth and Mary, sisters, in hope of resurrection.

How many years did Elizabeth reign?

She was the last and longest-reigning Tudor.

Which pope marvelled that Elizabeth I was 'only a woman, only mistress of half an island', yet feared by all?

Her reign raised England's standing abroad despite a largely defensive foreign policy.

According to Francis Bacon, Elizabeth did not wish to do what to her subjects?

She believed faith was personal, and strict Protestants regarded her 1559 settlement as a compromise.

Which two historians of the mid-20th century, Neale and Rowse, interpreted Elizabeth's reign as what?

They idealised her personally; recent historians take a more complicated view.

According to Walter Raleigh, how did Elizabeth's caution affect the war with Spain?

She, in turn, distrusted commanders who once in action were transported with an haviour of vainglory.

At which palace was Elizabeth born on 7 September 1533?

She was the second child of Henry VIII born in wedlock to survive infancy.

Which first governess described the infant Elizabeth as 'as toward a child and as gentle of conditions as ever I knew'?

Kat Ashley took over as governess in 1537 and stayed with Elizabeth for decades.

Roughly how many rebels were executed after the 1569 Catholic rising in the North was crushed?

The rising had aimed to free Mary, Queen of Scots and marry her to the Duke of Norfolk.

Which two famous sea captains both died on a disastrous 1595 expedition to the Caribbean?

The news shocked Elizabeth, but a new breed of 'Sea Dogs' such as Christopher Newport followed them.

Which of Elizabeth's leading councillors was still alive after Leicester, Walsingham and Hatton died around 1590?

Historians call the factional 1590s her 'second reign', with a new generation in the privy council.

During which later conflict was Elizabeth's memory revived as England again faced invasion?

In the Victorian era her legend was refitted to imperial ideology, and in the mid-20th century to national resistance.