Childhood
Arbella's father died in 1576 when she was still an infant. She was raised by her mother Elizabeth Cavendish until 1582. The death of her mother left seven-year-old Arbella an orphan, whereupon she became the ward of her grandmother Bess, rather than Lord Burghley the Master of the Court of Wards, as might have been expected.
During most of her childhood she lived in the protective isolation of Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire with her grandmother, who had married George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury in 1568. There were, apparently, periodic visits to the court and to London, including court visits during the summers of 1587 and 1588 and one that lasted from November 1591 to July 1592.
Starting in early 1589 or thereabouts "one Morley ... attended on Arbell and read to her", as reported in a dispatch from Bess of Hardwick to Lord Burghley, dated 21 September 1592. Bess recounts Morley's service to Arbella over "the space of three years and a half". She also notes he had hoped for an annuity of some £40 a year from Arbella based on the fact that he had "been so much damnified by leaving the University". This has led to speculation that Morley was the poet Christopher Marlowe, whose name was sometimes spelled that way.
Read more about this topic: Lady Arbella Stuart
Famous quotes containing the word childhood:
“But no matter how they make you feel, you should always watch elders carefully. They were you and you will be them. You carry the seeds of your old age in you at this very moment, and they hear the echoes of their childhood each time they see you.”
—Kent Nerburn (20th century)
“Ah happy hills! ah pleasing shade!
Ah fields beloved in vain!
Where once my careless childhood stray’d,”
—Thomas Gray (1716–1771)
“From his childhood onwards this boy will be surrounded by sycophants and flatterers.... In due course, following the precedent which has already been set, he will be sent on a tour of the world and probably rumours of a morganatic marriage alliance will follow, and the end of it will be the country will be called upon to pay the bill.”
—James Keir Hardie (1856–1915)