The Tudor Society

11 March – William Warner, our English Homer

On this day in history, 11th March 1609, Tudor poet and lawyer William Warner was buried at the Church of St John the Baptist at Great Amwell in Hertfordshire.

Not many people today have heard of William Warner, but he was a well-respected and well-known poet in the Tudor era and even described as "our English Homer". He is known for his huge poem, "Albion's England, or, Historicall Map of the same Island".

Find out more about this poet in today's talk.

Here's a link to read Warner’s work “Albion’s England” for yourself - https://archive.org/details/albionsenglandco00warn/page/n8/mode/2up

Also on this day in history, 11th March 1611, poet, diplomat and member of Parliament, Giles Fletcher the Elder, died in London. In last year’s video, I shared his wonderful deathbed speech:

Also on this day in history:

  • 1513 - Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici was proclaimed Pope Leo X after being elected on 9th March. He was Pope until December 1521.
  • 1521 - Death of Andrew Forman, diplomat and Archbishop of St Andrews, at Dunfermline. He was buried at St Andrews Cathedral.
  • 1563 – Death of Antoine de Noailles, soldier, Admiral of France and French ambassador to the English court during the reign of Mary I, at Bordeaux. He was also Chevalier of the order of St Michel. His body was buried at Noailles, but his heart was buried in Bordeaux Cathedral. It was rumoured that Noailles was poisoned.

Transcript:

On this day in history, 11th March 1609, Tudor poet and lawyer William Warner was buried at the Church of St John the Baptist at Great Amwell in Hertfordshire.
Warner’s works included “Albion's England” and “Pan his Syrinx, or Pipe, Compact of Seven Reedes”.
Let me tell you a little bit more about this Tudor poet…
• William Warner was born in around 1558/1559 in London.
• Little is known of his background, but we know from his own work that his father accompanied navigator Richard Chancellor on his voyage to Russia in 1553 and that he died while accompanying William Towerson to Guiana in 1577.
• Nothing is known about Warner’s education but he worked as an attorney in the court of common pleas in London.
• Warner married Anne Dale, a widow, in October 1599 at Great Amwell in Hertfordshire and the couple had a son, William, who was born in 1604.
• Warner published his first work, “Pan his Syrinx, or Pipe, Compact of Seven Reedes” in 1584, which is described as an episodic prose romance. His best known work is “Albion's England, or, Historicall Map of the same Island”, which was published in 1586 and dedicated to Henry Carey, Lord Hunsdon, Queen Elizabeth I’s cousin and the son of Mary Boleyn. It’s a long poem in 14-syllable couplets and the first edition told the history of England from the time of Noah to the Norman Conquest. It was expanded in later editions to the reign of Elizabeth I. Warner’s biographer Katharine A. Craik describes Albion’s England as “an eclectic mixture of classical mythology and Christian legend, together with episodes from the English chronicles and theological debate”.
• The vicar of Great Amwell, Warner’s local church, recorded that Warner died “suddenly in the night in his bedde without any former complaynt or sicknesse on Thursday night, beeinge the 9th daye of March.”
• William Warner was well-known and well-respected as a poet in his lifetime, being described by Francis Meres as “our English Homer”, but sadly not many today have heard of him.

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11 March – William Warner, our English Homer