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Ambrose Rookwood (c. 1578 – 31 January 1606) was a member of the failed 1605 Gunpowder Plot, a conspiracy to replace the Protestant King James I with a Catholic monarch. Rookwood was born into a wealthy family of Catholic recusants, and educated by Jesuits at Flanders. His older brother became a Franciscan, and his two younger brothers were ordained as Catholic priests. Rookwood, however, became a horse-breeder. He married the Catholic Elizabeth Tyrwhitt, and had at least two sons. He was enlisted into the plot in September 1605 by Robert Catesby, a religious zealot whose impatience with James's treatment of English Catholics had grown so severe that he conspired to blow up the House of Lords with gunpowder, killing the king and much of the Protestant hierarchy. With the other conspirators he had recruited, Catesby also planned to incite a rebellion in the Midlands, during which James's nine-year-old daughter Princess Elizabeth would be captured, and installed as titular queen. Rookwood's stable of fine horses was essential for the uprising to succeed. The explosion was planned to coincide with the State Opening of Parliament on 5 November 1605, but the man left in charge of the gunpowder stored beneath the House of Lords, Guy Fawkes, was discovered there and arrested. Rookwood fled the city, and informed Catesby and the others of the plan's failure. Together the remaining conspirators rode to Holbeche House in Staffordshire, where on 8 November they were attacked by the pursuing Sheriff of Worcester and his men. Catesby was killed, but Rookwood survived, and was imprisoned in the Tower of London. Rookwood and the survivors were arraigned on 27 January 1606 in Westminster Hall. Pleading not guilty, he claimed to have loved Catesby "above any worldly man". His subsequent request for mercy was ignored, however, and he was hanged, drawn and quartered on 31 January, in the Old Palace Yard at Westminster. ==Early life== Born sometime about 1578, Ambrose Rookwood was the second of four sons born to Robert Rookwood and his second wife, Dorothy Drury, the daughter of Sir William Drury and Elizabeth Sothill. During his first marriage to Bridget Kemp, Robert had sired four sons, but all predeceased their father.〔. 〕 The Rookwood family had lived at Stanningfield in Suffolk for 300 years. Wealthy, and staunch Catholics, the authorities viewed them as trouble-makers. Ambrose's Papist cousin Edward had spent ten years in prison for his faith, but in 1578 he entertained Queen Elizabeth I at his home, Euston Hall. It was an expensive visit that made a serious dent in the family's finances, and which neutered their influence for years thereafter. Ambrose's parents had been imprisoned for their recusancy, and he was indicted on the same charge in February 1605. However, he was apparently happy to advertise his faith; in the summer of 1605 he commissioned a London cutler, John Craddock, to place a Spanish blade into a sword hilt engraved with the story of the Passion of Christ. As such weapons were generally worn in public, it was "a potentially dangerous statement of faith". Ambrose and two of his brothers, Robert and Christopher, were educated by Jesuits at Saint-Omer, then in Flanders. Both brothers became priests (Ambrose's elder brother, Henry, became a Franciscan), and his half-sisters Dorothea and Susanna became nuns.〔 Ambrose married into the Tyrwhitts, a prominent family of Catholics from Kettleby in Lincolnshire, and with his wife Elizabeth (cousin to Robert Keyes) had at least two sons, Robert and Henry. According to the Jesuit Oswald Tesimond, Rookwood was "well-built and handsome, if somewhat short",〔 which he compensated for by his taste in extravagant clothing. In author Antonia Fraser's opinion, this affectation was somewhat inappropriate at a time when "clothes were supposed to denote rank rather than money". On his father's death in 1600, Rookwood inherited Coldham Hall, which subsequently became a refuge for priests.〔 The following year he joined the Earl of Essex's abortive rebellion against the government, for which he was captured and held at Newgate Prison. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Ambrose Rookwood」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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