People in History: 1500s

Hungarian noblewoman (1560–1614): listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the most prolific female serial killer in history; her life was fictionalised in the 1971 Hammer Horror film Countess Dracula, when she was played by Ingrid Pitt		Elizabeth Báthory
Illegitimate son of Pope Alexander VI (1476–1507): an influential condottiero (military mercenary) – said to have been a major influence on Machiavelli; held the notorious 'Ballet (or Banquet) of Chestnuts' in 1501; Leonardo da Vinci served him briefly (1502–3) as military architect and engineer		Cesare Borgia
Illegitimate daughter of Pope Alexander VI (1480–1519), frequently cast as a femme fatale in the machinations of her family; married Giovanni Sforza (Lord of Pesaro), Alfonso of Aragon (Duke of Bisceglie), and Alfonso I d'Este (Duke of Ferrara)		Lucrezia Borgia
Third husband of Mary Queen of Scots		James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell
Chief advisor to Elizabeth I for most of her reign		William Cecil, Lord Burghley
Vice–Admiral and adventurer, the only positively identified casualty of the sinking of the Mary Rose in 1545		Sir George Carew
Henry VIII's chief minister, 1532–40: a strong supporter of the English Reformation; supported Henry's disposal of Anne Boleyn and his courtship of Jane Seymour, but fell from grace after arranging the marriage to Anne of Cleves; executed on the day that Henry married Catherine Howard; the main antagonist to Thomas More (depicted as such in A Man for All Seasons), and the central character of Wolf Hall (Hilary Mantel 2009, Booker prize winner)		Thomas Cromwell
Second husband of Mary Queen of Scots, father of James I of England, murdered 1567		Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley
Court astronomer to Elizabeth I: said to have coined the term 'British Empire', and inspired the character of Prospero in Shakespeare's The Tempest; may also be referred to in Spenser's The Faerie Queen		John Dee
Leader of the first English circumnavigation of the world (1577–80); set fire to the Spanish fleet at Cadiz ("singed the King of Spain's beard"), 1587; second–in–command (to Lord Howard) of the English fleet against the Spanish Armada (1588)		Francis Drake
Husband and consort of Queen Jane, executed one hour before her in February 1554; son of John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland (who engineered Jane's accession to the throne)		Lord Guilford Dudley
Succeded his rival Edward Seymour (Duke of Somerset) as Chief Minister to Edward VI, in 1549; conspired with Edward to exclude Mary and Elizabeth and enthrone Lady Jane Grey, who married his youngest son (Guilford Dudley); executed by Mary one month after her accession in 1553		John Dudley (1st Duke of Northumberland)
Son of John Dudley (Duke of Northumberland), and elder brother of Lord Guildford Dudley: favourite of Elizabeth I; it's said she might have married him if he hadn't already been married (to Amy Robsart); he was suspected of murdering Amy, after she died in a fall down a flight of stairs in 1560; created Earl of Leicester in 1564; in 1576 he secretly married Lettice Knollys, widow of the first Earl of Essex and mother of Robert Devereux; died unexpectly in 1588, shortly after the defeat of the Spanish Armada, having been at Elizabeth's side as she gave her famous speech at Tilbury in defiance of it		Robert Dudley
Favourite of Elizabeth I: put under house arrest following a poor campaign in Ireland 1599, executed for treason in 1601		Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex
Lord Chancellor, 1596–1617: born in Cheshire in 1540, the illegitimate son of Sir Richard (of a family seated at Oulton Park, near Tarporley, since the Middle Ages); studied law at Lincolns Inn, and became a barrister in 1572; bought Tatton Park (near Knutsford) in 1598 – it remained in the family until 1958 when it was bequeathed to the National Trust		Thomas Egerton
Itinerant alchemist, astrologer, and magician of the German Renaissance: gave rise to a classic German legend, dramatised by Christopher Marlowe in the 1590s (some 50 years after his death) and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, in which he is portrayed as having sold his soul to the devil		Johann Georg Faust
Born at Gawsworth, Cheshire, 1578: daughter of Sir Edward Fitton of Gawsworth (Old) Hall; became Maid of Honour to Elizabeth I, but dismissed after becoming pregnant to the Earl of Pembroke; believed by some to be the 'dark lady' of Shakespeare's sonnets		Mary Fitton
Founder of the Royal Exchange, 1565; his law states 'bad money drives out good'		Sir Thomas Gresham
Born in Derbyshire around 1527, into a relatively minor gentry family, she married four times and rose to the highest levels of English nobility, becoming enormously wealthy; built Chatsworth House (with her second husband) and Hardwick Hall (after the death of her fourth); her second husband was William Cavendish, an officer in the Exchequer who made a fortune in the dissolution of the monasteries; one of their sons, also William, was created Baron Cavendish and later Earl of Devonshire, and the fourth Earl was created Duke of Devonshire; William is also an ancestor of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother; her fourth and last husband (from 1567 until his death in 1590) was George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury; died in 1608		Bess of Hardwick
Family that ruled Florence from the 15th to the 18th centuries, and produced three Popes: Leo X (1513–21), Clement VII (1523–34), Leo XI (1605)		(de') Medici
Member of the above family (1519–89): consort of Henry II of France, and the mother of three French Kings – Francis II, Charles IX and Henry III		Catherine de' Medici
As regent on behalf of her second surviving son (Charles IX), following the death of her first (Francis II), was granted sweeping powers; also played a key role in the reign of her third (Henry III), who only survived her by seven months		Catherine de' Medici
First Viceroy of New Spain (Mexico) 1535–51; also Viceroy of Peru 1851-2; died in 1552 and was buried in Lima		Antonio de Mendoza
Spanish conquistador, c. 1487-1537: sailed up the River Plate in 1535, and founded the city of Buenos Aires in 1536; after battling famine and disease, and fierce resistance from the native people, set sail to return to Spain in 1537, but died on the voyage		Pedro de Mendoza
Cartographer, geographer and cosmographer: born in 1512 in what's now the Netherlands, real name Geert de Kremer; created the 1569 world map, based on a new projection, which represented sailing courses of constant bearing (rhumb lines) as straight lines – an innovation that's still employed in nautical charts		Gerardus Mercator
Imprisoned in the Tower of London, and executed, for refusing to recognise Henry VIII as head of the Church of England		Sir Thomas More
French seer, 1503–66; believed by some to have predicted the Great Fire of London, Pasteur, Franco and Hitler		Nostradamus
Spanish conquistador, c. 1475–1551: conquered the Inca empire, had the Inca king Atahualpa murdered; founded the city of Lima (1535), where he died and was buried		Francisco Pizzaro
Mary Queen of Scots' Italian secretary, murdered at Holyrood House in 1566		David Rizzio
Protector to Edward VI, 1547–9, created 1st Duke of Somerset: executed for treason in 1553, and succeeded by John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland		Edward Seymour
Ursula Southeil (c1488–1561), soothsayer from Knaresborough, said to have been born in the cave that now bears her name; mentioned in Pepys's diary as having foretold the Fire of London; but her supposed prophecy that the world would end in 1881 was actually invented in 1862; popularly known as		Mother Shipton
Pretender to the English throne in opposition to Henry VII (claimed to be the Earl of Warwick, brother of Edward IV, who was in fact imprisoned in the Tower of London); crowned in Dublin on 24 May 1487; eventually pardoned by Henry and became a royal falconer; died c. 1534 (see also Perkin Warbeck, Before 1500)		Lambert Simnel
Henry VIII's fool		Will Somers
Principal secretary to Elizabeth I, from 1573 until his death in 1590, and popularly remembered as her 'spymaster'; Christopher Marlowe may have been one of his spies		Sir Francis Walsingham

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People in History: 1500s