Elizabeth I

The Other Favourite

Christopher Hatton rose to great power as a favourite of Elizabeth I. Born in obscurity, why has he returned to it?

The Crowd-Funded War

In the wake of the failure of the Spanish Armada, England sought retaliation by launching an invasion of its own. But how to finance such a venture?

The Final Years of Elizabeth I's Reign

Historians have often depicted the final years of Elizabeth I’s reign as a period of decline or crisis. Yet her government operated more successfully than is usually thought.

The Ridolfi Plot, 1571

The failure of the Plot, writes Cyril Hamshere, forms a complex story of espionage and counter-espionage; its events caused Elizabeth I to give up all ideas of restoring Mary Queen of Scots to the Scottish throne.