On 4th July 1623, Elizabethan composer, William Byrd died at Stondon Massey in Essex.

Byrd served as a gentleman of the Chapel Royal from 1572, and in 1575 he and fellow composer Thomas Tallis were granted a patent for the importing, printing, publishing, and sale of music, and the printing of music paper for a period of twenty-one years. They published a collection of 34 motets – 16 written by Tallis and 18 by Byrd, in 1575 as their first work.