Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
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Sir Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, KG, PC (1 June 1563 – 24 May 1612), son of William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, and half-brother of Thomas Cecil, 1st Earl of Exeter. After his education at St John's College, Cambridge,[1][2] Salisbury was made Secretary of State following the death of Sir Francis Walsingham in 1590, and he became the leading minister after the death of his father in 1598, serving both Queen Elizabeth and King James as Secretary of State. He fell into dispute with Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, and only prevailed upon the latter's poor campaign against the Irish rebels during the Nine Years War in 1599. He was then in a position to orchestrate the smooth succession of King James. For most of his working life, serving King James that is, he was spymaster for King James.
James I raised him to the peerage on 20 August 1603 as Baron Cecil, of Essendon in the County of Rutland, before creating him Viscount Cranborne in 1604 and then Earl of Salisbury in 1605. Lord Salisbury was extensively involved in matters of state security. The son of Lord Burghley (Queen Elizabeth's principal minister) and a protégé of Sir Francis Walsingham (Elizabeth's principal spymaster), he was trained by them in matters of spycraft as a matter of course. In 1603 his brother-in-law Lord Cobham was implicated in both the Bye Plot and also the Main Plot, which were an attempt to remove James from the throne and replace him with Lady Arbella Stuart.
Salisbury served as both the third chancellor of Trinity College, Dublin and chancellor of the University of Cambridge [3] between 1601 and 1612. In addition, the Cecil family fostered arts: they supported musicians such as William Byrd, Orlando Gibbons and Thomas Robinson [4].
[edit] Portrayals
- He appears as the character "Lord Cecil" in the opera Roberto Devereux (1837) by Gaetano Donizetti
- In the TV miniseries Elizabeth I, Cecil is played by Toby Jones.
- Robert Cecil was portrayed as the unsympathetic, conniving antagonist of the play, Equivocation, written by Bill Cain, which first premiered at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in 2009. In the play, it is suggested that Cecil was behind the conspiracies of the gunpowder plot in order to kill King James and the royal family. Cecil was first portrayed by Jonathan Haugen. The character in the show was given a serious limp, and is said to hate the word "tomorrow" and to know every detail about everything that goes on in London.
[edit] References
- ^ Cecil, Robert in Venn, J. & J. A., Alumni Cantabrigienses, Cambridge University Press, 10 vols, 1922–1958.
- ^ Britannica.com
- ^ Cam.ac.uk, "Chancellors of the University of Cambridge"
- ^ William Casey (pub.), Alfredo Colman (pub.), Thomas Robinson: New Citharen Lessons (1609), 1997 Baylor University Press, Waco, Texas, ISBN 0-918954-65-7
[edit] External links
- Archival material relating to Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury listed at the UK National Register of Archives
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Sir Francis Walsingham |
Secretary of State 1590–1612 |
Succeeded by Sir Ralph Winwood |
| Preceded by In Commission |
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster 1597–1599 |
Succeeded by In Commission |
| Preceded by The Lord Burghley |
Lord Privy Seal 1598–1608 |
Succeeded by The Earl of Northampton |
| Preceded by The Earl of Dorset |
Lord High Treasurer 1608–1612 |
Succeeded by In Commission (First Lord: The Earl of Northampton) |
| Honorary titles | ||
| Vacant
Title last held by
The Lord Burghley |
Lord Lieutenant of Hertfordshire 1605–1612 |
Succeeded by The Earl of Salisbury |
| Preceded by The Viscount Howard of Bindon |
Lord Lieutenant of Dorset jointly with The Earl of Suffolk 1611–1612 |
Succeeded by The Earl of Suffolk |
| Peerage of England | ||
| Preceded by New Creation |
Earl of Salisbury 1605–1612 |
Succeeded by William Cecil |
| Head of State of the Isle of Man | ||
| Preceded by Henry Howard |
Lord of Mann 1608–1609 |
Succeeded by William Stanley |
