The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book:

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND AND

PERFORMANCE PRACTICE ISSUES

by

Pamela Palmer Jones

A paper submitted to the faculty of The University of Utah

in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

Doctor of Musical Arts

in

Piano Performance

School of Music

The University of Utah

May 2009

Copyright Pamela Palmer Jones 2009

All Rights Reserved

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THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS

SUPERVISORY COMMITTEE APPROVAL

of a thesis submitted by

Pamela Palmer Jones

This thesis has been read by each member of the following supervisory committee and by majority vote has been found to be satisfactory. ____________________ __________________________________________ Chair: Susan H. Duehlmeier ____________________ __________________________________________ Margaret Rorke ____________________ __________________________________________ Susan Neiymoyer ____________________ __________________________________________ Ning Lu ____________________ __________________________________________ Eric Hinderaker

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THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS

FINAL READING APPROVAL

To the Graduate Council of the University of Utah: I have read the thesis of ____________Pamela Palmer Jones __________in its final form and have found that (1) its format, citations, and bibliographic style are consistent and acceptable; (2) its illustrative materials including figures, tables, and charts are in place; and (3) the final manuscript is satisfactory to the supervisory committee and is ready for submission to The Graduate School. _________________________ __________________________________________ Date Susan H. Duehlmeier Chair: Supervisory Committee Approved for the Major Department __________________________________ Robert Walzel Chair/Dean Approved for the Graduate Council __________________________________ Raymond Tymas-Jones

Dean, College of Fine Arts

ABSTRACT OF THE PAPER

The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book:

Historical Background and

Performance Practice Issues

by

Pamela Palmer Jones Doctor of Musical Arts

The University of Utah, 2009 Professor Susan H. Duehlmeier, Chair

During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I in England in the late sixteenth-early

seventeenth centuries, very repressive anti-Catholic laws were enacted by Parliament.

Catholicism then became the illegal underground religion of the gentry, sustained

primarily by a web of intricate family alliances. The aims of this paper include: (1) a

discussion of how the anti-Catholic laws passed by Parliament during the 1570s and

1580s severely affected the Tregian family, specifically Francis Tregian Sr. and Francis

Tregian Jr.; (2) an in-depth exploration of the Tregian familys relationships with other

aristocratic Catholic recusant families and musicians within the larger context of late

sixteenth-century Tudor England; and (3) a detailed examination of the facsimile of the

manuscript of The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book as an aid in creating a more accurate

modern performing edition of four pieces from this anthology that have not been re-

edited since the first printing by Breitkopf und Hrtel in 1899.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1 The History of the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book ................................................ 1

Description and Ownership ........................................................................................... 1

Political History of Tudor England in the Late Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Centuries ..................................................................................................................... 10

History of the Tregian Family: Francis Tregian Sr. and Francis Tregian Jr. ............. 14

Three Other Tregian Manuscripts ........................................................................... 28

Francis Tregian Jr. as Copyist - Legend or Fact? ....................................................... 29

Chapter 2 A New Examination of the FVB Manuscript ............................................... 39

Chapter 3 The Tregian Circle: Composers, Family, Friends, and Patrons .................... 51

Composers Represented in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book ......................................... 51

William Byrd (1539/431623) .............................................................................. 51

Dr. John Bull (ca. 1559-1628) .............................................................................. 53

Peter Philips (ca. 1560-1628) ................................................................................ 55

Giles Farnaby (ca. 1563-1640) ............................................................................. 56

Family, Friends, and Patrons ...................................................................................... 57

Chapter 4 Performance Practice Issues .......................................................................... 63

The Edition of the FVB Published by Dover Publications ......................................... 63

Ornamentation ............................................................................................................. 64

Tempo ......................................................................................................................... 66

Fingering ..................................................................................................................... 67

Creating a New Performing Edition of Four Pieces from the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book ............................................................................................................................ 69

Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 84

Bibliography ..................................................................................................................... 85

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I thank my DMA committee members for their guidance and support, especially

Dr. Susan Duehlmeier and Dr. Margaret Rorke. I am extremely grateful for the

unwavering love of my dear husband Alan and my three sons Andrus, Adam and

Richard, all of whom had to put up with having a partially-absentee wife and mother for

the past two years. I am also very thankful for my wonderful parents, Richard and

Carolyn M. Palmer, who provided emotional and financial help throughout this endeavor.

And finally, I give thanks to my best friend Jean Varney who so kindly offered invaluable

help with the research for and editing of this D.M.A. document.

CHAPTER 1

THE HISTORY OF THE FITZWILLIAM VIRGINAL BOOK

Sometime between 1614 and 1617, a man from a very prominent English Catholic

recusant family named Francis Tregian Jr. was imprisoned in Londons Fleet Prison.

During his confinement, he transcribed nearly 300 keyboard pieces into an anthology that

today bears the name of Fitzwilliam Virginal Book. Several other collections of music

have subsequently been attributed to him as well, including a mammoth collection of

over 1,200 madrigals and instrumental works known today as the Egerton 3665

manuscript.

This chapter traces the history and ownership of the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book

from its present-day location in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge back through time

to Francis Tregian Jr. and the Fleet Prison. The political and social climate of

Elizabethan England will also be discussed, as well as the severe persecutions inflicted

upon Tregians devoutly Catholic family trying to survive in an extremely anti-Catholic

atmosphere.

Description and Ownership The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book is by far the largest of several manuscripts of

harpsichord music that were compiled in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth

centuries, during the late Tudor and early Stuart eras in England. For a time, it was

thought that the collection had once belonged to Queen Elizabeth I, as it was formerly

known as Queen Elizabeths Virginal Book. Further research has proven, however,

that the manuscript never belonged to Elizabeth I, and subsequently this collection was

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named after its final owner, Viscount Fitzwilliam. Currently, it is housed in the

Fitzwilliam Museum located in Cambridge, England.

The manuscript is contained in a small volume, which consists of 220 leaves, with

music filling 209 pages. The music is written on six-line staves with inner lines of each

stave ruled by hand. The manuscript measures 33 9/10 centimeters by 22 centimeters

(approximately 13 inches high and 9 inches wide).1 The red morocco gilt leather cover is

enriched with gold tooling, the sides being sprinkled with fleurs-de-lis. 2 The paper most

likely came from Basel, as the crozier-case watermark also appears in the arms of that

town.3 The manuscript had been cut in places by the binder, but the style of the work

shows that the binding dates from approximately the same time period as the

handwriting.

The book was compiled by Francis Tregian Jr., the oldest son of a wealthy

Catholic family from Truro in Cornwall. Tradition has it that Tregian copied the

manuscript sometime between 1611 and 1619, while he was serving time in the Fleet

Prison in London for violation of English recusancy laws and failure to pay his debts.4

More recent scholarship from the 1990s has revised the dates of Francis Tregian Jr.s

1 J.A. Fuller Maitland and W. Barclay Squire, eds., The Fitzwilliam Virginal

Book, vol. I, rev. ed. Blanche Winogron (New York: Dover Publications, 1979), iii.

2 Morocco leather, usually made from goatskin, is dyed red on the grain side to produce a birds-eye effect. It is valued especially for bookbindings and purses. Definition from The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, s.v. Morocco leather, http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/society/A0834070.html (accessed July 28, 2008).

3 Maitland and Squire, Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 1: iii.

4 Anne Cuneo, Francis Tregian the Younger: Musician, Collector and Humanist? trans. Adrienne Burrows, Music and Letters 76 (1995): 401.

3

imprisonment to 1614-1617, and his death to 1617.5 It is also possible that Tregian began

the process of compiling his keyboard anthology, along with his huge collection of vocal

music, even earlier, during the late 1590s, while he was living on the Continent. After his

death in 1617, the warden of the Fleet Prison claimed that Tregian owed him 200 for

room and board. It appears that the warden recognized that Tregians numerous books

and manuscripts were valuable, particularly the one book of gilt, as he attempted to

claim possession of them in payment of the debt. Tregians sisters also recognized the

importance of the virginal book and had a difficult time obtaining possession of it from

the warden.6

It is likely that Tregians vast collection of music stayed within the protection of

the extended Tregian family over the next century, although there are no surviving

records of this. By 1740, the keyboard anthology had fallen into the possession of Dr.

John Christopher Pepusch, a German composer and theorist living in London. Pepusch

came to England in 1711 to work for the first Duke of Chandos, who was a direct

descendent of the Tregian family.7 Pepusch worked extensively in operatic/theatrical

circles in London and wrote the overture and several airs for John Gays immensely

popular The Beggars Opera. Pepusch was also a founding member of the Academy of

Ancient Music (1726) and was known as one of the most learned antiquarians of his day.8

5 Raymond Francis Trudgian, Francis Tregian - 1548-1608 - Elizabethan

recusant - A Truly Catholic Cornishman (Brighton: The Alpha Press, 1998), 41.

6 Ibid.

7 Elizabeth Cole, Seven Problems of the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book. An Interim Report, Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association 79 (1952-53): 64, http://jstor.org/journals (accessed December 30, 2007).

8 The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, s.v. Pepusch, Johann Christoph (by Malcolm Boyd, Graydon Beeks and D.F. Cook), http://www.grovemusic.com/ (accessed October 19, 2008).

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The particulars of how Pepusch came into possession of this collection are

unknown. It seems that the knowledge or tradition of Francis Tregian Jr. as compiler of

these manuscripts seems to have been lost at this point in time. Apparently Pepusch had

shown his music collection to a man named John Ward, author of a book written in 1740

entitled Lives of the Gresham Professors. In his book, Ward made reference to Dr. John

Bulls compositions that were found in Pepuschs keyboard collection, and also gave a

physical description of the keyboard anthology, stating that it was a large folio neatly

written, bound in red Turkey leather and gilt. 9 Other contemporary books also mention

this keyboard anthology, which was now associated with Tudor England and Queen

Elizabeth I. In his History of Music (1776), Sir John Hawkins relates a story of

Pepuschs wife, the opera star and amateur harpsichordist Margherita de lEpine, who

was unable to master the difficulties of the first piece in this keyboard collection, John

Bulls variations on Walsingham. The erroneous connection between Tregians keyboard

anthology and Queen Elizabeth seems to have originated in Hawkinss book, where he

stated that it once belonged to her.10 This same idea was also alluded to in Charles

Burneys History of Music, which was also published in 1776. In it, he relates an account

from Sir James Melvils Memoirs of Queen Elizabeths performance on the virginals,

adding that if Her Majesty was ever able to execute any of the pieces that are preserved

in a MS. which goes under the name of Queen Elizabeths Virginal Book, she must have

been a very great player.11

9 Edwin Naylor, An Elizabethan Virginal Book, rev.ed (1905; repr., New York:

Da Capo Press, 1970), 9.

10 Maitland and Squire, Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 1: iii.

11 Ibid, v.

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By 1762, the keyboard collection had been purchased from the estate of Pepusch

by a man named Robert Bremmer, and in 1783 it passed into the possession of Richard

Fitzwilliam, seventh Viscount Fitzwilliam of Merrion and Thorncastle. Over the course

of his lifetime, Fitzwilliam amassed a spectacular collection of works of art, antiquities,

books, and music. His collection of music included Tregians keyboard manuscript

(which would be known as the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book after his death), Lord Herbert

of Cherburys Lutebook, fifteen volumes of G.F. Handel music manuscripts, and large

quantities of prints and manuscripts of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.12 At his

death in February of 1816, Fitzwilliam bequeathed his entire collection to the University

of Cambridge, together with the dividends from 100,000 of South Sea Islands annuities

to pay for the construction of a museum to house the collection.13

The bulk of Fitzwilliams collection was housed in the family mansion in

Richmond. It was there in Richmond that Mr. James Bartleman prepared an index of the

music of Fitzwilliams collection.14 Known as an incomparable bass singer,15

12 Philip Olleson and Fiona M. Palmer, Publishing Music from the Fitzwilliam

Museum, Cambridge: The Work of Vincent Novello and Samuel Wesley in the 1820s, Journal of the Royal Musical Association 130 (2005): 40, http://www.jstor.org (accessed June 30, 2008).

13 Ibid.

14 Charles Cudworth, A Cambridge Anniversary: 2, The Musical Times 107 (1966): 209, http://www.jstor.org (accessed June 30, 2008).

15The Georgian Era: Memoires of the Most Eminent Persons, who have Flourished in Great Britain, from the Accession of George the First to the Demise of George the Fourth (London: Vizetelly, Branston & Co., 1834), 4: 537.

6

Bartleman owed much of the grandeur of his style to his profound knowledge of the

most sublime compositions of every age and country.16

The index was compiled in March of 1816, only a month after Fitzwilliams death

and before the entire collection was permanently moved to Cambridge. An account of

the contents of the collection reads:

A catalogue of [Fitzwilliams] music was prepared by the well-known bass singer James Bartleman . . . . From it we can derive a very good estimate of the richness and range of his Lordships music collection.

The greater part was by Italian composers, ranging from Palestrina and Marenzio via Stradella and the Scarlattis to Steffani and Clari, Leo and Pergolesi and Paradies, and the other eminent Italians of Fitzwilliams own day. But there were Frenchmen there as well; Lully and Rameau, of course, and others such as Lalande and Couperin, Colasse, Charpentier, and even Mlle. Jacquet de la Guerre. And there were many English composers, too, ranging from the great names of the Golden Age, Morley and Byrd in particular, and of course the famous Virginal Book composers, through the eminent men of the 17th century, Blow and Purcell, to the Georgian composers of the mid-18th. Not many German names, though, unless you count Pepusch and Handel and Hasse, who were less German than English or Italian. There was a great deal of harpsichord music, for it seems that his Lordship had been no mean keyboard player, and indeed even left some books which according to Bartleman were filled with Fitzwilliams own compositions for harpsichord and organ.17

A copy of Bartlemans index, which listed the contents of the Virginal Book,

was written down by Mr. Henry Smith in the back of the manuscript. At the end of the

index is the following postscript: Henry Smith, Richmond, Scripsit / from a M.S. Index

in the Possession of Mr. Bartleman / 24 March 1816. 18

When Fitzwilliams massive collection arrived in Cambridge in the spring of

1816, a supervisory committee was set up to oversee the task of cataloguing and

16 George Hogarth, Musical History, Biography, and Criticism: Being a General

Survey of Music from the Earliest Period to the Present Time (London: John W. Parker, 1835), 423, http://books.google.com/books (accessed 26 June 2008).

17 Cudworth, Cambridge Anniversary, 209.

18 Francis Tregian Jr., Fitzwilliam Virginal Book [manuscript], i.

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managing this enormous bequest. William Shield was put in charge of cataloguing the

music in the collection, and the task was completed by August 16, 1816, only six months

after the death of Fitzwilliam.

At this point, nothing further was done with Fitzwilliams music collection for

eight years, until 1824, when the Senate of Cambridge University decided that parts of

the collection should be made available for editing or publication. This decision resulted

in the issuing of Vincent Novellos five-volume set, The Fitzwilliam Music (1825-27),

which contained Roman Catholic church music by Italian composers of the sixteenth

through the eighteenth centuries. There was also an edition by Samuel Wesley of three

hymn tunes by Handel set to words by his father, Charles Wesley. An edition of motets

from William Byrds Gradualia was also planned, but, because of financial difficulties,

this project never materialized.19 None of the keyboard works from Fitzwilliams

collection were published at this time, although it was known that these works existed

and were housed at Cambridge. For example, William Chappell makes reference to the

Elizabethan virginal manuscripts in a book he wrote in 1859.

In spite of the knowledge of its existence, the manuscript remained in obscurity

until 1887, when it was rediscovered in the archives during the continuing process of

cataloguing Fitzwilliams collection. In 1894, a huge transcription and editing project

was undertaken by J.A. Fuller Maitland, the distinguished music critic of the London

Times, and his brother-in-law William Barclay Squire, editor and music librarian of the

British Museum in London.20 The task was finished in 1899 and was soon afterwards

published as The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book (FVB) by Breitkopf und Hrtel.

19 Olleson and Palmer, Publishing Music, 73.

20 Maitland and Squire, Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 1: iii.

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The 297 compositions in the FVB were mostly written by native Englishmen.

Those composers featured most prominently in the collection are William Byrd, John

Bull, Giles Farnaby, and Peter Philips. The amount of music written by these four men

represents about two thirds of the total music in the entire collection. In fact, the FVB

contains all of the known keyboard music written by Giles Farnaby except for two pieces.

Other English keyboard composers represented are William Blithman, Richard Farnaby,

Orlando Gibbons, James Harding, William Inglot, Edward Johnson, Robert Johnson,

Thomas Morley, John Munday, Robert Persons, Martin Peerson, Ferdinando Richardson,

Nicholas Strogers, Thomas Tallis, William Tisdall, Thomas Tomkins, Francis Tregian Jr.,

and Thomas Warrock. A few of these composers, such as Tallis and Gibbons, are well-

known, but most of the others remain obscure even today.

In spite of the preponderance of English works, the FVB also contains a number

of Italian compositions, with an occasional German and French piece and intabulations of

Italian madrigals thrown into the mix. Names such as Caccini, Galeazzo, Lasso,

Marenzio, Pichi, Striggio are found in the collection along with Marchant and

Oystermayre. Several pieces by the great Netherlandish organist and composer Jan

Pieterszoon Sweelinck also appear in the FVB. From the multi-national flavor of the

compositions represented in the FVB, it seems that the original collector was someone

who was quite familiar with both English and continental European musical styles. This

description perfectly fits Francis Tregian Jr., as he had spent many years of his life on the

Continent, receiving his education in France, and working in Rome and the Spanish

Netherlands.

The FVB also contains a wide variety of genres:

134 dances (pavans, galliards, almans, corantos, gigges, maskes, toyes, lavoltas, rounds, spagniolettas, brauls, moriscos, and muscadins)

9

17 organ pieces, such as settings of plainchants, In nomines, etc.

46 arrangements of 40 different popular songs

9 arrangements of madrigals

22 fantasias and ricercares

7 fancies

19 preludes

6 compositions based on the hexachord

In his book entitled An Elizabethan Virginal Book (1905), Edwin Naylor says:

The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book can tell us more about the state of music in Elizabeths days than many of us have ever known about our own times. . . .

It is not going too far to say that if all other remains of the period were

destroyed, it would be possible to rewrite the History of Music from 1550 to 1620 on the material which we have in the Fitzwilliam Book alone.21

The important historical position of the FVB in relation to other Elizabethan

keyboard repertoire is significant. The most important of these anthologies include:

My Ladye Nevells Booke (1590) contains 40 pieces by William Byrd. This magnificent book was copied by a professional scribe named John Baldwin, under the supervision of Byrd himself. It is currently housed at Eridge Castle as the personal property of the Abergavenny family. First published in 1926 by J. Curwen and Sons, London, it is now available through a Dover reprint.

Benjamin Cosyns Virginal Book (1600), housed in Buckingham Palace, contains 98 virginal pieces. Composers represented include Orlando Gibbons, John Bull, William Byrd, Thomas Tallis, Nicholas Strogers, Thomas Weelkes, and Elway Bevin.

Will Fosters Virginal Book, also located in Buckingham Palace, contains 70 pieces by the above-named composers, plus Thomas Morley and John Ward.

Parthenia (1611) has the distinction of being the first music for the virginals ever to be printed. It contains 21 works by Bull, Byrd, and Gibbons. 22

21 Naylor, Elizabethan Virginal Book, 4.

22 Ibid., 1-3.

10

Although all of these anthologies are very important, they are eclipsed by the sheer size

of the FVB. With 297 compositions in all, it is much larger than the other Elizabethan

compilations and contains the greater part of the repertoire of the English virginal school.

Political History of Tudor England in the Late Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Centuries

In order to fully understand the significance of the music that was chosen by

Francis Tregian Jr. for inclusion in his keyboard anthology, it is necessary to know

something of the tumultuous religious and political history of England throughout the

sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries.

In 1485, the War of the Roses between the Houses of York and Lancaster finally

came to an end. Henry Tudor of the House of Lancaster claimed victory over Richard III

and thus became Henry VII, King of England by right of conquest. His tenuous claim

to the throne was strengthened through the bloodline of his mother, Margaret Beaufort, a

descendant of Edward III. Henry later solidified his claim by marrying Elizabeth of

York, the eldest child of the late King Edward IV, thereby uniting the two factions.

Henry VII was a successful king in restoring faith and strength in the monarchy.

He managed to establish a new dynasty after thirty years of struggle, strengthened the

judicial system, built up the treasury, and successfully denied all other claimants to the

throne. At his death, he left a fairly secure and wealthy monarchy. His oldest son,

Arthur, was expected to become the next king. Arthur and Catherine of Aragon

(daughter of famed Spanish monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella) were betrothed as young

children as part of an alliance between England and Spain. Unfortunately, Arthur died of

tuberculosis after only a few months of marriage to Catherine. It was then arranged that

the next son, Henry, should marry Catherine when he became of age. According to the

11

book of Leviticus, marriage to a dead brothers wife was prohibited, although Catherine

insisted throughout her life that her marriage to Arthur had not been consummated. It

was for this reason that a papal dispensation was sought and obtained, so that the

legitimacy of the new marriage between Henry and Catherine would be recognized by all

parties.

At the death of his father, Henry VIII became king in 1509 and soon thereafter

married Catherine of Aragon. Catherine bore him several children, but only Mary would

survive. In pursuit of a male heir, Henry later sought a divorce from Catherine. After

failing to obtain papal approval for this divorce, Henry broke all ties with Rome and with

Catholicism, and set out to create a state church. The Church of England now became the

official religion of the country, and anti-Catholic or recusancy laws were then enacted

and put into practice. Henry went on to marry five more wives, divorcing several and

executing two.

When he died in 1547, Henry VIII had only three surviving legitimate children:

Edward VI (son of third wife, Jane Seymour), Mary (daughter of first wife, Catherine of

Aragon), and Elizabeth (daughter of second wife, Anne Boleyn). At the age of nine,

Prince Edward was too young to rule. Instead, he would be guided through a council

of regency. The first leader of the council was Edwards maternal uncle, Edward

Seymour, First Duke of Somerset, who was appointed to serve as Lord Protector of the

Realm and Governor of the Kings Person from 1547-49. A series of internal rebellions

coupled with steep inflation caused great social unrest in England during this time, and,

when France formally declared war on England in 1549, Somerset was soon deposed by

the council. He was imprisoned in the Tower of London, where he was later executed in

the early 1550s.

12

The council was then led by John Dudley, Earl of Warwick, 1st Duke of

Northumberland, from 1549 to Edwards death in 1553. The rise to power of the Duke of

Northumberland also led to an increase in the persecution of Catholics in England.

Under his leadership all official editions of the Bible were replaced with those with anti-

Catholic annotations. Mobs were encouraged to desecrate Catholic symbols in churches.

The Ordinal of 1550 replaced the divine ordination of priests with a system in which the

government appointed priests instead. Parliament also passed the Act of Uniformity of

1552, which replaced the Book of Common Prayer (1549) with a newer and more

Protestant version. This book was the only authorized one for church services, and

anyone who did not attend a service where this liturgy was used faced imprisonment

ranging from six months to life.

Edward became ill with tuberculosis in early 1553, and it soon became clear that

he was dying. According to Henry VIIIs will, his daughters Mary and Elizabeth were

next in line for the throne, followed by his niece, Lady Frances Brandon, daughter of his

younger sister Mary, the Duchess of Suffolk. The Duke of Northumberland did not find

any of these three women to his liking, so he devised a plan to retain his power by

altering the line of succession. Part of his plan included marrying his son, Guilford

Dudley, to Lady Jane Grey, the daughter of Lady Frances Brandon, who was a first

cousin to Edward, Mary, and Elizabeth. After the marriage took place, two different

versions of Edwards will that contained the Device to Alter the Succession were written

in Edwards own hand. The first excluded Mary, Elizabeth, the Duchess of Suffolk, and

Lady Jane Grey from the line of succession, with the crown being left only to Lady Jane

Greys male heirs. When it became clear that Edward would die before Lady Jane Grey

could produce a male heir, Edwards second draft of the Device to Alter the Succession

stipulated that the crown would be left to Lady Jane and her male heirs. Edward finally

13

died on July 6, 1553 at the age of fifteen, and a power struggle immediately ensued.

Although some supported Lady Janes claim to the throne, most people maintained that

Mary was the rightful heir, based on Henry VIIIs Act of Succession (1543), which

stipulated that Mary, then Elizabeth, would follow Edward in the line of succession.

Lady Janes reign was brief, lasting only nine days, after which Mary Tudor was

proclaimed the rightful queen. The Duke of Northumberland was executed soon

afterwards. Lady Jane, her husband, and her father would eventually share that same

fate.

As the fourth crowned monarch of the Tudor dynasty, Mary was devoutly loyal to

the memory of her mother, Catherine, to her half-Spanish heritage, and to Catholicism.

Mary and her cousin, papal legate Cardinal Pole, promptly set out to restore Catholicism

in England. Although her reign of five years proved to be a brief respite from

persecution for her Catholic subjects, Marys unwise decision to marry Phillip II of Spain

cost her most of the initial popularity that she had enjoyed with the English public.

Eventually, she became known as Bloody Mary because of the persecution and killing

of hundreds of Protestant dissenters during her five-year reign.

After her death in 1558, Marys younger half-sister, Elizabeth Tudor, became

queen. Although it has been said that Elizabeth was personally ambivalent towards

religion, as the monarch she chose to continue with the process that her father, Henry

VIII, had begun many years before: nationalizing Englands state religion.23 In

Elizabeths realm, to be a Catholic was to be an unnatural Englishman. This attitude

stemmed from a perceived threat of enemies from within (the English Catholic seminary

23 Alice Hogge, Gods Secret Agents: Queen Elizabeths Forbidden Priests and

the Hatching of the Gunpowder Plot (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2005), 9.

14

priests and Jesuits who were illegally reentering the country after receiving their training

on the Continent) and without (France, the Pope, and Spain).

During Elizabeths reign, severe persecutions against English Catholics would

reach an all-time high, especially from the early 1570s until the mid 1590s, as numerous

pieces of legislation were passed aimed directly against Catholics. Much of the

legislation involved exorbitant fines, but the most severe of the laws included death by

drawing and quartering of any Catholic priest or Jesuit who was caught on English soil,

and for those who harbored any such priests, praemunire, the complete loss of lands and

wealth coupled with imprisonment for life.

It is this volatile political society and intolerant religious climate of Elizabethan

England which provides the backdrop and context to both the Tregian family saga and the

Fitzwilliam Virginal Book.

History of the Tregian Family: Francis Tregian Sr. and Francis Tregian Jr.

In his book entitled Ballad Literature and Popular Music of the Olden Time

(1859), William Chappell proposed the idea that the Elizabethan manuscript might

have been made for or by an English resident of the Netherlands and that Dr. Pepusch

probably obtained it in that country. This conjecture was based on the fact that the name

Tregian was the only name that occurred frequently in abbreviated form throughout the

manuscript. Additionally, a sonnet signed Fr. Tregian prefaced Richard Verstegans

Restitution of Decayed Intelligence, which was published in 1605 in Antwerp.24

Verstegan was an expatriate Catholic Englishman living in the Netherlands. His

24 Maitland and Squire, Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 1: vii.

15

occupation was publisher of Catholic devotional books and anti-Elizabethan political

tracts, but he was also the corresponding agent for Cardinal Allen in Rome and for the

Jesuits.25

Maitland and Squire also noticed that references to the name Tregian were

found in several places scattered throughout the FVB:

No. 60, Treg Ground by William Byrd (vol. I, p. 226 of Dover Edition)

No. 80, Pavana Doloros. Treg by Peter Philips (vol. I, p. 321)

No. 93, Pavana Ph. Tr. by William Byrd (vol. I, p. 367)

No. 181, A Gigg. by William Byrd (vol. II, p. 237) In the margin of this piece are the letters F. Tr.

No. 214, Pavana Chromatica. Mrs Katherin Tregians Paven by William Tisdall (vol. II, p. 278)

No. 105, Heaven and Earth by Fre [thought to be an abbreviation for Francis Tregian]

No. 160, Rowland by William Byrd (vol. II, p. 190). There is a marginal note which reads 300 to S.T. by Tom. This is probably a reference to Sybil Tregian, sister of Francis Tregian Jr.26

Maitland and Squire continued to research the name Tregian and found that the

Tregians had been a rich and powerful Catholic family living in Truro in Cornwall. For a

time, John Tregian, the grandfather of Francis Tregian Sr., served as an officer in the

royal court, as Esquire of the Body to Henry VIII, Steward of the Chamber, and

Gentleman Sewer of the Kings Chamber.27 In recognition of a job well done, in 1514 he

25 The Catholic Encyclopedia, s.v. Richard Verstegan (by J. H. Pollen),

http://www.catholicity.com/encyclopedia/v/ verstegan,richard.html (accessed 7/13/08).

26 Maitland and Squire, Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 1: vi.

27 P.A. Boyan and G.R. Lamb, Francis Tregian: Cornish Recusant (London: Sheed and Ward, 1955), 20.

16

was granted a lifetime monopoly in the exporting of cowhides out of Cornwall.28 He

became very wealthy and accumulated much property. The wealth and prestige of the

Tregian family increased even further when his son, John Tregian Jr., married Katherin

Arundell, thus creating an alliance between two of the most powerful families in

Cornwall. This marriage greatly chagrined another powerful Cornish family, the

Protestant Greenvilles, led by Sir Richard Grenville. Sir Richard had attempted to marry

his daughter to John Tregian Jr., but his efforts went unrewarded. As a future sheriff of

Cornwall, Grenvilles grandson, Richard, would later be one of the prime instigators

against the Tregian family.

Like the Tregian family, the Arundell family was staunchly Catholic. In 1549,

during King Edwards reign, an Arundell was one of the leaders in the ill-fated

Rebellion of the West, in which an army of Cornish Catholic insurgents had planned to

march on London in an effort to restore the old religion. John Tregian Jr.s father-in-

law, Sir John Arundell, and his brother, Thomas Arundell, were arrested as part of this

uprising, and both were imprisoned in the Tower of London. Thomas Arundell was later

beheaded for conspiring against the Duke of Northumberland, the de facto ruler of

England during this time. Sir John was luckier than his brother; when Mary came to the

throne in 1553, he was released from prison and returned to Cornwall as the newly

appointed sheriff.29

John Tregian Jr. and Katherin Arundell were the parents of Francis Tregian Sr.,

who was born around the time of the Cornish Rebellion (1549). At the age of twenty-

28 Ibid.

29 Ibid., 23

17

one, Francis married Mary Stourton, also linked to the Arundell family.30 The exact date

of the marriage is unknown, although it was probably around 1570.

During the 1560s, the policies toward Catholic citizens in England were those of

deprivation rather than of persecution. Many former Catholic priests (including the so-

called Marian priests who were ordained during Marys reign) now chose to serve as

priests in the English Church. It was common during this time for a bishop to turn a

blind eye to the superficial conformity of these ex-Marian clergy, allowing them great

freedom in officiating the services.31 Many of the gentry in England during this decade

were still Catholic, and it was common for a Catholic aristocratic family to have its own

priest on the estate, living in disguise. It was also common for these aristocrats to send

their sons over to the Continent to further their religious education. There was a

tremendous shortage of qualified Catholic clergy and teachers and no Catholic schools or

universities in England during this time, since these were all illegal.

Soon after his marriage, Francis Tregian Sr. went abroad, presumably to further

his religious studies. This would have been sometime between 1570 and 1572.32 Many

of his fellow Catholics had also been leaving the country for the same reason, so in 1571

Parliament passed an act which made it an offence for any of the Queens subjects to

leave the country without an official license and not return within six months. The

penalty for disobeying this law was the loss of lands and material goods for life. Francis

came back to England before his six months were up, returning to his wife and family.

30 Francis Plunkett, Heroum speculum de vita D.D. Francisci Tregeon (Lisbon,

1655), repr. with English translation, no city, date), 12.

31 Adrian Morey, The Catholic Subjects of Elizabeth I (Totowa: Rowman and Littlefield, 1978), 40.

32 Boyan and Lamb, Cornish Recusant, 24.

18

He then decided to go to London and live at Elizabeths court for a time. His primary

motivation for doing this was to plead the Catholic cause before the Queen. From all

accounts it seems that Francis was a very charming and successful courtier, and

eventually he did get the attention of the Queen, although certainly not in a way that he

had intended. It seems that Elizabeth was enamored of Francis Tregian, and she

proposed to make him a viscount, an offer which Tregian quickly refused. He explained

to the Queen that the main purpose behind his appearance at court was to plead for the

rights of Catholics in England.33 Rather than having him arrested and imprisoned for this

seemingly treasonous behavior, Elizabeth allowed him to remain at court. An account of

what happened next was written by Franciss grandson, Father Francis Plunkett:

The friendship of Elizabeth for Francis developed into passion, and she desired to keep him as near to her person as she felt him near to her heart. As the attraction waxed stronger, Elizabeth offered to make Francis a Viscount, but he, in his modesty, shrank from the burden and courteously declined the honour, lest, as he said, this premature mark of royal favour should detract from his merits by being attributed solely to affection. To me, he added, it would be quite enough, if the Faith, for the sake of which I came to Court, should breathe more freely and recover strength. But because violent passion exceeds all bounds and knows no law, it came to pass shortly afterwards that the Queen, late at night, sent . . . one of those ladies who are called Maids of Honour. She earnestly begged him to go and see the Queen without delay . . . . She added that he had captivated the Queen, that nothing more agreeable could be imagined than that their intercourse, with increasing familiarity, should ripen into intimate friendship, and that Francis ought to realize what immense advantages would accrue to him from the favours of royalty.34

Francis was greatly upset by this royal proposition, as he wished to honor his

marriage vows, yet he also saw that he and his family would be in danger if he refused

the Queen. He told the lady-in-waiting that he was very ill and that he must be excused

for not complying with Her Majestys wishes. A short time later Queen Elizabeth herself

33 Ibid., 27.

34 Plunkett, Heroum speculum, 12.

19

came to Tregians room to assess the situation. She again offered to make him a

viscount. Again, Tregian refused her offer, expressing his great unworthiness at such a

high honor, but this time he offered the Queen his entire fortune and all of his

possessions. She could have everything that was his except for his conscience.

His refusal of her amorous advances greatly enraged Elizabeth, and she was

deeply offended and insulted. After she stormed out of the room, Francis Tregian packed

his bags in a hurry and left in the middle of the night for Cornwall. The account by

Plunkett continues:

When Elizabeth heard of Tregians departure, thinking herself deceived by him, she flew into a most unroyal rage. With an oath she asserted that the traitor had left to plot some crime against her royal person; called him a perfidious criminal, and declared that being a Catholic, nothing but evil could be expected of him. She ordered the laws enacted against Catholics to be published without delay, and further commanded the Knight Marshal to proceed against the said Francis, his family, and dependents with all rigour, and promised their property and goods to him for his pains. 35

The Knight Marshal was Sir George Carey, a cousin to Queen Elizabeth. He was

the grandson son of Henry VIII and Mary Boleyn, Anne Boleyns sister. As Knight

Marshal, Carey was in charge of one of the most notorious prisons in England, the

Marshalsea. Carey immediately got in touch with Richard Grenville, who was by then

the appointed sheriff in Cornwall, to enlist his help in framing Francis Tregian.

Grenville, who had no love for the Tregian or Arundell families, was more than happy to

assist with this task.

A plan was hatched with the intent of ruining the Tregian family by enforcing the

anti-Catholic recusancy laws. In June of 1577, Richard Grenville appeared at the door of

35 Ibid., 15. Because Francis Plunkett is the only source for this account, its

authenticity has been questioned by historians. On the other hand, he heard it directly from his mother, Philippa Tregian, and it might only be family members who knew the true story.

20

the Tregian mansion, accompanied by eight or nine justices of the peace and one hundred

armed men, and demanded to search the premises under the false pretense of looking for

an escaped prisoner. Grenville had no search warrant, so, when Tregian refused him

entrance, he and his armed men barged in and ransacked the house, looking for evidence.

Grenville and his men found Cuthbert Mayne, the Catholic seminary priest for the

Tregian household, who lived on the Tregian estate disguised as the steward. Francis

Tregian and Cuthbert Mayne would be the first nobleman and priest to be prosecuted

under the full penalty of recusancy laws.

For two years, Francis Tregian was confined illegally without a hearing or fair

trial in some of the worst prisons in England and under the vilest of conditions.

Eventually, he was convicted of recusancy in 1579 and was then deprived of all of his

property, money, and possessions and sentenced to life in prison. Soon afterwards his

wife and three little children were thrown out of their house in the dead of winter with

only the clothes on their back, when Carey took over the Tregian estate. Mary Tregian

was eight months pregnant at the time. As for the priest, Cuthbert Mayne (who had

studied for the priesthood at Dr. William Allens English College in Douai and had then

come back to England illegally as an ordained Catholic priest), his fate was even more

horrific than Tregians. Mayne was convicted of high treason and sentenced to death.

His sentence read as follows:

That you be taken to the place from whence you came, and from thence be drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution, where you shall be hanged by the neck, not till you are dead; that you be taken down, while yet alive, and your bowels be taken out and burnt before your face. That your head be then cut off and your body cut in four quarters to be at the [Queens] disposal. And God Almighty have mercy on your soul.36

36 Boyan and Lamb, Cornish Recusant, 56.

21

Mayne was the first seminary priest from the English College in Douai to be

executed for high treason; about one third of the graduates of this seminary would

eventually suffer the same fate. Nearly four centuries later, in 1970, Cuthbert Mayne was

canonized as a martyr in the Catholic faith, and Francis Tregian as a confessor.37

It was thought that punishing both Francis Tregian and Cuthbert Mayne to the full

extent of the law would discourage other Catholic aristocrats from having their own

priests on their estates. In reality, however, it did little to stop the English aristocrats

from practicing Catholicism. It seems that many times the degree of punishment of

recusants depended on the whims of the monarch. For example, Francis Tregians father-

in-law, Sir John Arundell, did not suffer the loss of all his money and property, as did his

son-in-law, even though he also spent time in prison and was fined repeatedly for

recusancy. It seems likely that the severity of Tregians punishment was based on the

fact that he had personally offended the Queen in a very embarrassing way.

Prison life was nearly fatal for Francis Tregian, and he suffered terribly. He was

confined in two of the most horrendous prisons in England, the Marshalsea Prison and

later in Launceston Prison. He was almost murdered several times by other inmates, and

finally he became very ill due to unsanitary living conditions. His captors also tried

starving him to death in an effort to break his spirits. Amazingly enough, Mary Tregian

chose to join her husband in captivity in the Launceston Prison. She also suffered

terribly. She gave birth to two children in these filthy conditions, and neither child

survived. She was finally forced to leave her husband for a time and stay with her mother

in an effort to regain her health.

37 The Catholic Encyclopedia, s.v. Blessed Cuthbert Maine (by John

Wainewright), http://www.newadvent.org/ (accessed 28 July 2008).

22

The Tregian and Arundell families still had some royal connections, and so in

1580 Francis Tregian was transferred from the Launceston Prison to the Fleet Prison,

where his living conditions greatly improved. Francis and Mary Tregian were the parents

of twelve children, eight of which were born while he was a prisoner at the Fleet.38

The fact that Francis Tregian Sr. was able to father so many children while

confined to prison or that later his son, Francis Tregian Jr., would be able to amass such a

large and valuable collection of books while he was also a prisoner in the Fleet requires

some explanation. Unlike the Marshalsea and Launceston Prisons, which existed for the

sole purposes of torturing inmates or holding hardened criminals, the Fleet Prison was a

money-making enterprise, which was populated primarily by upper-class debtors and

political dissidents. It seems that Francis Tregian and later his son, Francis Tregian Jr.,

lived in relative comfort in a private room in the Fleet because they had been wealthy and

still had rich relatives who could help pay for their room and board. According to

Annika Jokinen:

All prisoners had to pay fees for their lodgings and for favorable treatment. The wardens of the Fleet were notorious for charging exorbitantly high sums and abusing their posts. Prisoners, for a certain sum, could reside within the Liberties of the Fleet, or mansion houses near the prison. Here too, money could buy a certain amount of freedom; alas, for the debtors, such possibilities were few.39

Soon after he arrived at the Fleet, Francis Tregian Sr. was moved from the

Common Ward into a private suite, which included a study. Here he was able to write

poetry, study foreign languages, and conduct a busy social life in the prison, along with

other intellectual recusants. It was also widely known that for a certain price a prisoner

38 Trudgeon, Francis Tregian, 42-43.

39 Luminarium, s.v. Fleet Prison (by Anniina Jokinen), www.luminarium.org/ encyclopedia/fleetprison.htm (accessed February 14, 2008).

23

could leave under surveillance, and unaccompanied for an even higher price. This would

explain how his son, Francis Tregian Jr., would later have the chance to travel, continue

to collect music, and attend to the copying of the manuscripts that he had presumably

accumulated on his travels.40

Mary Tregian was again allowed to live with her husband. She was free to move

about as she pleased and was even allowed to attend court, where she unsuccessfully

attempted many times to entreat Queen Elizabeth to release Francis from prison.

Apparently Mary Tregian was well-acquainted with William Byrds brother, John, and so

it is likely that William Byrd also knew the Tregian family, especially since the surname

Tregian appears in titles of several of his keyboard works found in the FVB.41

After spending twenty-four years in confinement, Francis Tregian was granted

parole in 1601.42 Queen Elizabeth died in 1603, and in 1605 the new monarch, James I,

banished him. Tregian left England in July of 1606 and subsequently immigrated to

Spain, visiting the colleges of Douai and Brussels en route. There is no record of his wife

accompanying him. In Spain he was given a heros welcome by King Philip III, who also

granted him a pension. Tregian eventually retired to Lisbon, where he died on September

25, 1608 at the age of sixty. Seventeen years later he was re-buried standing up, facing

England, an honor which signified that he had stood up to the Queen for his beliefs. Over

time his burial place has become a pilgrimage site for Catholics.

40 Cuneo, Francis Tregian the Younger, 402. 40 Naylor, Elizabethan Virginal Book, 9. 41 The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, s.v. Tregian, Francis (by

O.W. Neighbour), http://www.grovemusic.com/ (accessed February 14, 2008).

42 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, s.v. Tregian, Francis (by Raymond Francis Trudgian), http://www.oxforddnb.com/ (accessed June 30, 2008).

24

Francis Tregian Jr. was the oldest son of Francis and Mary Tregian and the

presumed compiler and scribe of the FVB. He was born in 1574 at Golden Manor, the

Tregian family seat in Cornwall. Francis Jr. and his younger brother, Charles, were both

educated abroad at Eu and at the English College at Douai that was later moved to

Rheims. It should be remembered that, according to English recusancy law, the practice

of sending Catholic children away from England to be educated was strictly prohibited.

The English College in Douai was founded in 1568 by Dr. William Allen, one of the ex-

Oxford Catholic professors who fled England after Elizabeth I came to power. Many of

these exiled professors had congregated into a colony in Douai. The main objective of

Allens college was to train young Englishmen to be Catholic priests in the hope that

someday Catholicism would be restored to England. Dr. Allen left Rheims for reasons of

health, and was afterwards summoned to Rome to help with the English College there.

He was promoted to Cardinal in 1587 and remained in Rome for the rest of his life. It is

possible that Francis Jr. was later able to secure employment as a personal secretary to

Cardinal Allen in 1592 because of his success as an outstanding student and orator at the

English College in Douai.43

Cardinal Allen sincerely believed that it was in Englands best interest to return

to the old religion, and he was engaged in activities against Queen Elizabeth to help

facilitate this return. Cardinal Allen had in fact helped plan the Spanish Armadas

invasion of England, and, if that plan had succeeded, Allen would have been appointed

both Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Chancellor. Allen also encouraged Pope Pius V

to issue the Papal Bull Regnet in Excelsis, which excommunicated Elizabeth I and

declared her deposed. After this bull was issued in 1570, Elizabeth chose not to continue

43 Pamela Willetts, Oportet Meliora Tempora Non Expectare Sed Facere. The Arduous Life of Francis Tregian, The Younger, Recusant History 28:3 (2007): 380.

25

her policy of religious tolerance and instead began actively persecuting her religious

opponents.44 Therefore, rather than helping the situation of his fellow Catholics back

home, the effect of Allens Counter-Reformation activities abroad resulted in making life

even more difficult for Roman Catholics in England.

In Cardinal Allens papers, Francis Tregian Jr. is described as of great nobility, a

secular person [not an ordained priest], twenty years old, layman, exceptional

intelligence, versed in philosophy, in music, and in the Latin language.45 Cardinal Allen

died in 1594, and it was Francis Tregian Jr. who delivered the eulogy at Allens funeral.

There is also a record of Francis Tregian Jr. returning to England in 1594 to visit his

parents. After Allens death, he went to work for Albert, Archduke of the Spanish

Netherlands, where he came in contact with the English composer Peter Philips. It is

likely that when Francis Tregian Sr. left England in July 1606 on his way to Spain, he

also visited his son, Francis Jr., in Brussels, where he presumably gave him instructions

to return to England as head of the Tregian family to reclaim the properties and titles that

had been confiscated by the Crown.46 By December of 1606, Francis Jr. was back in

England and had begun the task of reclaiming possession of his familys estate, which

had been given to George Carey (Lord Hundson) by Queen Elizabeth. In 1614, he was

convicted of recusancy and debt and sentenced to the Fleet Prison, just as his father had

been before him.47 The fact that he had worked for Archduke Albert, an enemy to Queen

44 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, s.v. Allen, William (15321594)

(by Eamon Duffy), http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/391 (accessed July 29, 2008).

45 Cuneo, Francis Tregian the Younger, 403: molto nobile, di 20 anni, secolare, di ingenio felicissimo, dotto in filosofia, in musica, et nella lingua Latina.

46 Willetts, Arduous Life of Francis Tregian, The Younger 382, fn. 42.

47 Maitland and Squire, Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 1: vii.

26

Elizabeth, was a factor in his sentencing. Tregian was known to have been working on a

very important book for two years while he was confined in the Fleet, which scholars

now believe was the FVB. Francis Tregian Jr. died in the Fleet Prison in 1617 at the age

of forty-three.48

In the 1899 publication of the FVB, Barclay and Squire listed incorrectly the date

of Francis Tregian Jr.s imprisonment as 1609 and his death as 1619. They wrote:

From a statement drawn up by the Warden of the Fleet prison (apparently about 1622), it seems that at his death he owed over 200 for meat, drink and lodging, though in his rooms there were many hundreds of books, the ownership of which formed a matter of dispute between his sisters and the Warden. It may be conjectured with much plausibility that the present collection of music was written by the younger Tregian to wile away his time in prison.49

This fragmentary passage about Francis Tregian Jr. formulated by Barclay and Squire

became the basis of the story of Tregian and his keyboard manuscript, which would

remain unchanged for many years.

Over fifty years later, in 1952, Elizabeth Cole wrote an article entitled Seven

Problems of the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book. This oft-quoted article is considered to be

one of the most authoritative even today, in spite of the fact that many of her conclusions

are now thought to be incomplete or somewhat inaccurate. Cole was able to locate a

signature of Francis Tregian Jr. on a legal document, along with other writings

purportedly in his hand. As the handwriting style of the legal documents seemed to

match that of the FVB, this appeared to be the long-awaited proof that Tregian Jr. was

indeed the copyist of the Fitzwilliam manuscript.

48 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, s.v. Tregian, Francis.

49 Maitland and Squire, Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 1: viii.

27

Cole was of the opinion that the FVB was a musical representation of Tregians

friends, many of them living underground lives in the face of political and religious

turmoil. She wrote:

As for the question of who made [the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book], Squire noticed a set of initials in some of the titles like Pavana Treg: at one point the name appears in full as Tregian. This led him to surmise that the book was written for or by one of the Tregian family, the two heads of which spent a total of thirty-four years in prison for Catholic recusancy. . . . Now going directly to the MS. we find . . . that no less than seventeen other names (both in full and in abbreviation) appear in exactly the same circumstances as the name of Tregianthat is, in the titles of the pieces and in the margins. . . . Between the lines of music cluster these little groups of men and women and they mean nothing to us. But they must surely have meant something to the composers and to the maker of the book. . . . To find out who they are and what they are doing there we must reverse the usual process of reading history backwards and go ourselves to the scene of action. Let us then go back for a few moments to the London of the first Elizabethan age, forgetting the musical statistics, and using the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book as a map of fifty years in the most troubled period of our history. The first stop is Tower Hill, a familiar piece by Giles Farnaby, and a place with two special features. From Stowes Survey of London, we learn that Upon this hill is alwayes prepared . . . a large Scaffolde and Gallowes for the execution of such Traytors as are delivered out of the Tower. Along one side of it runs the wall and entrance to Lord Lumleys House. Now Lord Lumley, introduced by Bull as the first of [Tregians] friends pictured within the Book, came from a long line of Catholic conspirators. He was deeply implicated in the Ridolfi plot, to marry his brother-in-law to Mary Queen of Scots. For twenty years he was in and out of various prisons, and died in his house on Tower Hill in 1609. The Elizabethan age was an uncomfortable time for the old diehards; an age of violent contrast, of feminine inconsistency, and of fear which radiated downwards from the Queen herself, for one tends to forget that for fifty years she went in fear for her very life.50

Cole then goes on to talk about several other references to Catholicism which

Tregian wrote in the margins of the manuscript. According to Cole, the Pagget for

whom Peter Philips wrote the Pavana and Galiarda was a Charles Pagget, Catholic spy

50 Cole, Seven Problems of the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, 52-53.

28

and agent of the Spanish king.51 William Byrds Lady Montegles Paven was dedicated

to Lady Montegle but written for her husband, who helped dispatch an envoy to Spain

with an invitation for King Philip to invade England. The anonymous composition

entitled Lady Rich refers to a warm-hearted Catholic-sympathizer cousin of the Tregian

family. Ph Tr and S.T. refer to sisters of Francis Tregian Jr., Philippa and Sybil.52

Three Other Tregian Manuscripts Around 1950, the British Museum acquired a manuscript that contained about

1,200 villanellas, madrigals, and instrumental pieces primarily written by English and

Italian composers. Identified as Egerton 3665, this huge anthology became of interest

almost immediately because the handwriting in the manuscript appeared to be the same

as the handwriting found in the FVB. In 1951, Bertram Schofield and Thurston Dart

wrote an article for Music and Letters. In it they said the following:

Whoever wrote the famous Fitzwilliam Book also wrote Egerton 3665. The two hands are identical, even down to minute details of erasure, pagination, correction of mistakes and numbering of the contents of the books; there can be no doubt that the British Museum now owns a companion volume to the Fitzwilliam manuscript, written by the same man at the same time. Though there is still no final proof that this man was in fact the younger Francis Tregian, the probability that he compiled both books is further strengthened by the presence of new items in the Egerton manuscript signed F. and F.T. and an Allemanda Tr. set by P[eter] P[hilips]. . . .

The contents of Egerton MS 3665 . . . have been copied mainly from

Italian and English printed books, some of the former being now exceedingly rare. Moreover the volume contains annotations in Italian. If, as seems probable, the writer was English he must have been someone like Tregian who had spent long enough in Italy for Italian to have become a second language. It has been suggested that Tregian wrote the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book in prison. Certainly

51 It is more likely that the Pagget mentioned in the FVB was his eldest brother,

Thomas Lord Pagget, an expatriate English recusant aristocrat who was also Philips employer.

52 Ibid., 54.

29

the vast amount of work involved in the compilation of so large a collection as Egerton 3665 could scarcely have been undertaken by anyone who was not forced to be idle, and the hundreds of books in Tregians lodging in the Fleet when he died may well have included the many collections of music from which the manuscript was copied.53

Discovery of the Egerton manuscript also led scholars to reevaluate a manuscript

that had been housed in the New York Public Library since the early twentieth century,

known as the Sambrook Manuscript. This smaller compilation also included motets

and madrigals by English and Italian composers and by its contents seemed to be a

continuation of the Egerton anthology. The Sambrook manuscript also looked like it was

written in the same hand as Egerton MS 3665 and the FVB.

Also in the early 1950s, yet another manuscript thought to be notated by Tregian

was discovered in the archives of Oxfords Christ Church Library. Now known as

Tregians Part-Books, this collection contained transcriptions of five-part Italian

madrigals, that were presumably copied from contemporary printed or other manuscript

sources. Several of those sources are now considered to be extremely rare.

Francis Tregian Jr. as Copyist - Legend or Fact? Up until the mid 1990s, the most widely accepted accounts of Francis Tregian Jr.

portrayed him as the obedient eldest son of a Catholic refugee and a highly educated

young man who served as an aide to Cardinal Allen. Upon hearing of his fathers death,

Tregian Jr. faithfully returned to reclaim his familys confiscated properties and was

eventually convicted of recusancy and sentenced to the Fleet because he was a devout

Catholic. Here he passed the last years of his life collecting valuable books and creating

music manuscripts.

53 Bertrand Schofield and Thurston Dart, Tregians Anthologies, Music and Letters 32 (1951): 206-07, http://jstor.org/journals (accessed February 22, 2008).

30

In 1995, this account was challenged by Anne Cuneo, who wrote the article

questioning some of the basic assumptions in the Tregian narrative:

I began to feel somewhat skeptical about current theories concerning Francis Tregian when I first saw the imposing Tregians Anthology in the British Library. It had seemed extraordinary enough that a man shut up in prison could have collected the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, with its great range and variety. Confronted by the unbelievable quantity of pieces in the Tregian collections as a whole, it became incredible: counting as well those in London and New York and those discovered in the 1950s at Oxford, there are close on 2,000. Approaching the question with an open mind, to speak of a poor copyist transcribing the pieces to wile away his time in prison becomes absurd. The writing out of 2,000 pieces was more than just a copying job: rather, it was surely the outcome of a life devoted to scholarship and the daily labour of research, and to study and reflection. Above all, it implies not only great open-mindedness but also freedom of movement and a degree of financial independence.54

Cuneo also challenged the like father, like son notion, especially with regard to

the fathers very conservative brand of Catholicism. Unlike Elizabeth Cole, who had

found a strong Catholic religious flavor inherent in the selections of music that Francis Jr.

chose for insertion in his manuscript, Cuneo argues that the sureness of taste and the

humanist spirit that his anthologies demonstrate should be counted as well.55 She

remarks that, after taking the historical context into account, the question of religion in

music was not the collectors main concern, as both Catholic and Protestant composers

were well-represented in the collection. She later states:

As one studies Elizabethan England, it soon becomes clear that this society was not quite as black and white as it has subsequently been depicted. The era was full of turmoil, as were the people. The two camps, Catholic and Protestant, each of them further split into moderates and extremists, sometimes mingled with each other, and for many the divide between the two religions was blurred. The gray area was extensive, and in private Elizabeth I herself was ambivalent. The choices [of the music in Tregians anthology] . . . reflect this social reality.56

54 Cuneo, Francis Tregian the Younger, 399.

55 Ibid., 398.

56 Ibid., 401.

31

Cuneo also provides a different date for Tregians confinement in the Fleet.

Previously, it had been thought that he began his sentence in 1609, but Cuneo supplied

evidence showing that the summons for Tregian was not issued until July 27, 1611. She

claimed that it was possible that he was at liberty as late as 1616, as in Truro, Cornwall

there have been found numerous contracts and business papers written or signed by

Tregian between 1613 and 1616.

Cuneo argues that the main reason Tregian was imprisoned was for his debts

rather than his Catholicism, and that was the primary reason that he was imprisoned in

the Fleet. In an age when an average family could live very well on a yearly income

between 10-20, Tregian had amassed a huge debt of 3000 which he was unable to

repay.

Cuneo also relates a family legend regarding Tregians supposed death in 1619, as

told by Mr. Thomas Tomkin, who was a descendant of Francis Tregian Sr.s sister, Jane:

Mr. [Francis] Tregian resolving to do the best that he could, received some money by compounding with various parties to confirm their titles, and thus embarked for Spain, where, as it is said, he was very well received on account of his own fathers sufferings for religion, and . . . he was made a grandee of that kingdom; and . . . his posterity still flourish there with the title of Marquis of St. Angelo. Whether this be true or not I cannot affirm, having it only by tradition.57

The family tradition held that Francis Tregian Jr. was still alive in 1630.

Still another musicologist questioned the notion of Tregian being the copyist at

all. In 2001, Ruby Reid Thompson published an article in Music & Letters that

challenged Elizabeth Coles 1951 supposition that the music script in any of the four so-

called Tregian manuscripts was really in the hand of Francis Tregian Jr. She argues:

57 Davies Gilbert and Thomas Tomkin, The Parochial History of Cornwall

(London, 1838), 361, quoted in Cuneo, Francis Tregian the Younger, 402.

32

[Cole] discovered two legal deeds signed by him [Francis Tregian Jr.] which she believed to be entirely in his hand. For she decided that the script was identical with the text script in FVB, a judgment endorsed, perhaps a little cautiously, by [Bertram] Schofield. Cole reported that Schofield, having compared photographs of the documents and several variations of the signature closely with the Egerton manuscript, saw no reason to doubt but that Tregian was indeed the scribe of Egerton 3665 and, therefore, of the Fitzwilliam Book. He remarked upon the distinct traces of Italianism in Tregians script, and the individually characteristic way in which he formed the letters F, T, M, the small v or u, and, above all, the most unusually shaped small t. . . . Many early seventeenth-century English scripts contain a mixture of italic and secretary letter shapes which create an impression of similarity between them. The separation of the two styles was already breaking down before the end of the sixteenth century, so that for several generations mixed hands combining features of both styles were common. . . . [I]t is hard to know which one [of the styles] Schofield may have found especially characteristic or close to those in the Egerton scripts.58

Thompson also presents other arguments against Tregian being the copyist. She

points out that it is not entirely clear from the signatures on several of the Tregian family

legal documents that the signatory (Tregian) was also the scribe of the legal text. She

conjectures that another relative of Francis Jr., Thomas Tregian, may have written the

text for Francis to sign.59 Thompsons main argument, however, deals with the type of

paper used in the FVB manuscript, paper considered to be very expensive, unique, and

difficult to obtain:

The 220 folios of FVB consist entirely of a single type of high-quality Swiss paper. The watermark is a simple crosier of Basle, with a letter D and the three-ring insignia of the manufacturers, the Dring family of Basle . . . . It is likely that all the paper was produced from three companion moulds, indicating that it has remained together since manufacture. . . . The paper is arranged in 36 perfect gatherings: 34 are made up of three bifolios each, and two of four bifolios each. . . . The great regularity of the paper content indicates that no leaves are missing and

58 Ruby Reid Thompson, Francis Tregian the Younger as Music Copyist: A

Legend and an Alternative View, Music & Letters 82 (2001): 6, http://jstor.org/journals (accessed February 17, 2008).

59 Ibid., 9.

33

that no paper was spoilt during copying. The manuscript appears to have been planned professionally as a unified project.60

Thompson argues that the so-called Tregian manuscripts were not copied by

Francis Tregian Jr., but rather were compiled by more than one scribe in a scriptorium

and that there was a conscious effort among the different scribes to preserve a uniform

style of writing. Because she was able to find some surviving court documents that use

the same expensive Dring paper of the same origin as the FVB, Thompson puts forward

the theory that these manuscripts may have been prepared by a group of professional

scribes working for aristocratic patrons who may have been connected with the court.61

In an article of 2002, David J. Smith refutes Thompsons views, especially with

regard to the Dring paper. He writes:

In order to make a connection between the manuscripts and the court, there needs to be proof that the paper was obtained exclusively for use at court. Thompson does not show this was the case: a large batch of paper might have been imported and sold to anyone who could have afforded it. Although it could be argued that Tregian was not in a position where he could afford such luxurious paper, by all accounts it was an extravagant lifestyle coupled with a dogged persistence in his religious beliefs that had landed him in trouble in the first place. Tregian was precisely the sort of man who would purchase expensive paper for copying music regardless of the cost.62

I also find Thompsons theory about the employment of professional scribes in

copying the Tregian manuscripts hard to believe. I have studied facsimile manuscript

pages from both the FVB and the Egerton 3665 manuscript, and I have compared the

writing styles from those two collections with that of My Ladye Nevelles Booke. To me,

the scribal work of the FVB and Egerton 3665 seems be in the same hand. For example,

60 Ibid., 16-18.

61 Ibid., 2, 5.

62 David J. Smith, A Legend? Francis Tregian the Younger as Music Copyist, The Musical Times 143 (2002): 12.

34

certain notational elements such as clefs and custodes (Exs. 1 and 2) appear to be

identical in the FVB and Egerton 3665 manuscripts. Neither of these manuscripts

appears to be as professional in appearance as the stunningly beautiful handwriting found

in My Ladye Nevelles Booke, which was copied by John Baldwin, a professional scribe at

Windsor Castle and a member of the Chapel Royal.

Ex. 1. Egerton MS 3665, La Pecha by Peter Philips.

35

Ex. 2. The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, Walsingham by John Bull.

36

Ex. 3. My Ladye Nevelles Virginal Book, Will yow walke the woodes soe wylde by

William Byrd.

37

Additionally, I believe there is compelling visual evidence to support the idea that

the handwriting in the FVB, Egerton 3665, and Francis Tregian Jr.s signature in a legal

document all belong to the same person. Example 4 below is a facsimile of a deed signed

(and presumably written) by Francis Tregian Jr. If one compares the handwriting of this

legal document with samples of writing from The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book and Egerton

3665, they all appear to be in the same hand. For example, the large case letters L,

N, G, M, B, U, and A are all very similar, as are other letters with

idiosyncratic curves and long stems, T, P, h, and d (see exs. 5A, 5B and 5C).

Ex. 4. Facsimile of a legal document signed by Francis Tregian Jr.

Ex. 5A - Legal Document Ex. 5B - FVB Ex. 5C - Egerton 3665

L

38

N

G

M

B

T and h

P

U

A

d I believe that these handwriting samples from three different documents show that

the same person was the scribe for both. Since the legal document was signed by Francis

Tregian Jr. himself, it therefore seems logical to assume that he was also the

transcriber/copyist for the FVB.

39

CHAPTER 2

A NEW EXAMINATION OF THE FVB MANUSCRIPT

It was an invaluable experience to be able to immerse myself in looking at each

page of the microfilm of the manuscript. Over the course of a few weeks, I became very

familiar with Tregians handwriting. I noticed that the size of the handwriting on the first

page is slightly larger and wider than in the rest of the manuscript. By the middle of the

second page, the handwriting settles down to a smaller size that remains consistent

throughout the rest of the anthology. I also observed that the notes, stems and words on

MSS pages 1-176 of the manuscript are wider in appearance than those on MSS. pages

181-419; it looked as if the copyist was using a finer-point writing implement for those

pages.

Tregian consecutively numbered each page of his keyboard anthology beginning

with 1 and ending with 419. The page numbers are located in the upper left and right

edges. The manuscript naturally falls into the following subsections:

First section of manuscript, pages 1-176 (Pieces 1 through 95)

Four blank unruled pages, pages 177-180

Second section of manuscript, pages 181-419 (Pieces 96 through 297)

Three unnumbered ruled blank pages are found at the end

An index of pieces contained in the FVB was created by Richard Bartleman and copied by a Mr. Harry Smith in 1816 after the death of Lord Fitzwilliam, who had bequeathed the manuscript to Cambridge University. It was inserted into the manuscript after the three unnumbered ruled blank pages.

In addition to listing the titles of the pieces in the first section of the manuscript,

Tregian also consecutively numbered each piece, 1 through 95. When studying the

manuscript, I also noticed a secondary numbering system in which Tregian assigned

40

another number to select pieces, thus linking a particular piece to a specific composer as

part of a collection of works by that person. For example, 82. Amarilli di Julio

Romano. 13 by Peter Philips indicates that this is the eighty-second piece in the

manuscript, but the thirteenth piece in a group of works by that composer. This was an

interesting feature that the original transcribers, Maitland and Squire, may have missed,

misinterpreted, or ignored. For example, a ii in the manuscript (meaning the second

piece in a composer set, was transcribed as a nonsensical 11 in the original 1899

Breitkopf und Hrtel edition, later reprinted by Dover. In fact, of all of the literature

written about the FVB that I have read, I only found mention of this interesting

organizational system in one other source. In 2002, David J. Smith wrote:

The scribe [of the FVB] numbers pieces by each individual composer as they occur throughout the manuscript, but in the first layer (nos. 1-95) there is also a consecutive numeration. Judging from the position of the number for Byrds Pazzamezzo Pavan (no. 56, p. 102), the consecutive numeration was added later, post-dating entry of the titles and pagination.63

Following piece No. 95, there are four blank pages in the manuscript. Tregian

abandoned the chronological numbering of pieces in the second section of his anthology;

however, he did continue with the secondary numbering system of linking individual

pieces to composer sets. Smith postulates:

The numeration of the contents ceases in the remainder of the manuscript: the scribe finished the first layer as a unit, then inserted the numbers; presumably he would have continued the numeration had the manuscript been completed. The presence of empty, but ruled, folios at the end of the volume suggests that FVB was a work in progress.64

In 1988, a facsimile of the Egerton 3665 manuscript was published with a preface

written by Frank DAccone. In his preface, DAccone created a chart which shows how

63 Smith, A Legend? Francis Tregian the Youngest as Music Copyist, 11.

64 Ibid.

41

Tregian organized his huge madrigal and instrumental collection of over 1,100

compositions, using several different numbering systems. Using DAccones Egerton

3665 diagram as a model, I have constructed a chart of the FBV that shows how Tregian

used two different numbering systems to organize his keyboard anthology. The chart

lists the 297 pieces contained in the FVB in order of their appearance in the manuscript.

Spellings of proper names have been modernized. Column 1 shows the chronological

numbers (Chr. #) of the 297 pieces in the FVB. Column 2 (Tr.1) lists Tregians

arrangement of numbering pieces 1 through 95; after Piece No. 95 this column ends.

Column 3 (Tr.2) shows Tregians secondary numbering system, which linked pieces

together into composer sets.

Contents of Tregians Keyboard Anthology Outlining his two types of numbering systems

Chr. # Tr.1 Tr.2 Title_________________________________________ 1. 1. Walsingham by John Bull 2. 2. Fantasia by John Munday 3. 3. Fantasia by John Munday (Faire Wether) 4. 4. Pavana by Ferdinando Richardson 5. 5. Variatio by Ferdinando Richardson 6. 6. Galiarda by Ferdinando Richardson 7. 7. Variation by Ferdinando Richardson 8. 8. Fantasia by William Byrd 9. 9. Goe from my window by Thomas Morley 10. 10. Jhon come kisse me now by William Byrd 11. 11. Galliarda to my L. Lumleys Paven pag. 76 by John Bull 12. 12. Nancie by Thomas Morley 13. 13. Pavana by John Bull 14. 14. Alman by anonymous 15. 15. Robin by John Munday 16. 16. Pavana by M.S. (seems to say M.S. in the manuscript) 17. 17. Galiarda by John Bull 18. 18. Barafostus Dreame by anonymous 19. 19. Muscadin by anonymous 20. 20. Alman by anonymous 21. 21. Galiarda by anonymous 22. 22. Praeludium by anonymous

42

23. 23. Praludium El. Kidermister by anonymous 24. 24. Praeludium by anonymous 25. 25. Praeludium by anonymous 26. 26. The Irishe Ho-Hoane by anonymous 27. 27. Pavane by Fernando Richardson 28. 28. Variatio by Ferdinando Richardson 29. 29. Galiarda by Ferdinando Richardson 30. 30. Variatio by Ferdinando Richardson 31. 31. The Quadran Pavan by John Bull 32. 32. Variation of the Quadran Pavan by John Bull 33. 33. Galiard to the Quadran Pavan by John Bull 34. 34. Pavana by John Bull 35. 35. Galiard to the Pavan by John Bull 36. 36. St. Thomas Wake by John Bull 37. 37. In Nomine by John Bull 38. 38. (no tit