seditious literature, Elizabeth, Mary, proclamation, daughter of debate
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49
acting as substitute proclamations against the rebels.
87
If only for this and for no other reason, Mary’s accolade of “the daughter of debate”, given her by Elizabeth, is well deserved.
88
In 1570 two proclamations were issued in response to a glut of seditious literature from pens and presses both on the continent and in the British Isles. The first appeared on the 1st of July and complains of the “boldness of certain wicked and seditious persons that, envying and malicing the good universal quiet of this her realm and subjects, do by secret manner contrive and scatter certain infamous scrolls and bills in some parts of her realm”, such as this example which was supposedly distributed surreptitiously around public places in Northampton.
89
A second proclamation followed on the 14th of November. As Cyndia Susan Clegg observes, no provision is made in either of these to “censor specific texts”, and she notes of the second that it is “coercive in language alone”.
90
Thus, as she acknowledges, if they were to counter the influence of proscribed literature effectively then these proclamations depended upon loyal subjects taking the queen’s part by handing in seditious literature to the authorities and reporting those associated with it. A further patriotic reaction was to answer outlawed literature directly and in kind.
87 In 1570 Elderton penned several ballads belonging to this ilk, including A Ballat Intituled Northomberland Newes and A Ballad Intituled, a Newe Well Aday, As Playne Maister Papist as Donstable Waye (STC 7554 and STC 7553). A number of proclamatory answer-poems produced by his fellow balladeers are also concerned with the Rebellion and its aftermath (see Cat. A 62, K 193a-b, P 226 and S 242). The Scottish poet, Sir Robert Sempill, even appears to have been paid by William Cecil, Lord Burghley, for his services in disseminating counterpropaganda in the form of flyting ballads responding to Mary’s supporters. See Carole Rose Livingston, British Broadside Ballads of the Sixteenth Century: A Catalogue of the Extant Sheets and an Essay (London and NY: Garland, 1991), p.812 and my discussion of Sempill, pp.106-7.
88 From Elizabeth’s poem beginning “The doubt of future foes, exiles my present ioy”, Cat. E 122.
89 ‘Ordering Arrest for Circulating Seditious Books and Bulls’ and ‘Ordering Discovery of Persons Bringing in Seditious Books and Writings’, Hughes and Larkin eds (1961), II. p.341.
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