|
Lettice Knollys ( , sometimes called Laetitia, also known as Lettice Devereux or Lettice Dudley), Countess of Essex and Countess of Leicester (8 November 1543〔Adams 2008a 〕 – 25 December 1634), was an English noblewoman and mother to the courtiers Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex and Lady Penelope Rich, although via her marriage to Elizabeth I's favourite, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, she incurred the Queen's unrelenting displeasure.〔Lacey 1971 p. 15〕〔Hammer 1999 p. 280〕 A grandniece of Anne Boleyn and close to Princess Elizabeth since childhood, Lettice Knollys was introduced early into court life. At 17 she married Walter Devereux, Viscount Hereford, who in 1572 became Earl of Essex. After her husband went to Ireland in 1573 she possibly became involved with Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. There was plenty of scandalous talk, not least when Essex died in Ireland of dysentery in 1576. Two years later Lettice Knollys married Robert Dudley in private. When the Queen was told of the marriage she banished the Countess forever from court, effectively curtailing her social life. The couple's child, Robert, Lord Denbigh, died at the age of three, to the great grief of his parents and ending all prospects for the continuance of the House of Dudley. Lettice Knollys' union with Leicester was nevertheless a happy one, as was her third marriage to the much younger Sir Christopher Blount, whom she unexpectedly married in 1589 only six months after the Earl's death. She continued to style herself Lady Leicester. The Countess was richly left under Leicester's will; yet the discharge of his overwhelming debts diminished her wealth. In 1604–1605 she successfully defended her widow's rights in court when her possessions and her good name were threatened by the Earl's illegitimate son, Robert Dudley, who claimed that he was his father's legitimate heir, thus implicitly declaring her marriage bigamous. Lettice Knollys was always close to her large family circle. Helpless at the political eclipse of her eldest son, the second Earl of Essex, she lost both him and her third husband to the executioner in 1601. From the 1590s she lived chiefly in the Staffordshire countryside, where, in reasonably good health until the end, she died at age 91 on Christmas Day 1634. ==Family and upbringing== Lettice Knollys was born on 8 November 1543 at Rotherfield Greys, Oxfordshire.〔 Her father, Sir Francis Knollys, was a Member of Parliament and acted as Master of the Horse to Prince Edward.〔Varlow 2007 pp. 23–24〕 Her mother, Catherine Carey, was a daughter of Mary Boleyn, sister to Anne Boleyn. Thus Catherine Knollys was Elizabeth I's first cousin, and Lettice Knollys her first cousin once removed.〔Varlow 2007 p. 22〕 Lettice was the third of her parents' 16 children.〔Varlow 2007 p. 24〕 Sir Francis and his wife were Protestants.〔 In 1556 they went to Frankfurt in Germany to escape religious persecution under Queen Mary I, taking five of their children with them.〔 It is unknown whether Lettice was among them, and she may have passed the next few years in the household of Princess Elizabeth with whom the family had a close relationship since the mid-1540s.〔Adams 2008a〕 They returned to England in January 1559, two months after Elizabeth I's succession.〔 Francis Knollys was appointed Vice-Chamberlain of the Royal Household; Lady Knollys became a senior Lady of the Bedchamber, and her daughter Lettice a Maid of the Privy Chamber.〔 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「Lettice Knollys」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|