Raleigh, Sir Walter

Scribal manuscript in an early seventeenth-century secretary hand, apparently sent as a letter packet, integral address leaf ("To the worshipfull his worthy Freind William Trumbull Esquire"), docketed, 22 pages, 4to (215 x 160 mm), probably 1620s, stab-stitched; binding string broken. Blue cloth folding-box and slipcase by James MacDonald.

"...This is a kind of noble and royall deceiving in Marriage betwene greate kings and Princes, yea above all others the fairest and most unexpected Trade of betraying, yet hath bene as ordinary amongst them to adventure and cast away a daughter to bring some porpose to pase..." 

A hitherto unidentified manuscript copy of a tract usually attributed to Sir Walter Raleigh. This discourse was one of a pair, both  written in about 1611 when King James I was arranging marriages for Princess Elizabeth and his eldest son, Prince Henry. It was written in opposition to a proposed double match with the son and daughter of the Duke of Savoy, a close ally of the Spanish. Many of the surviving scribal copies of the dialogue were produced after Prince Henry's death and substitute Prince Charles's name instead, giving it the appearance of relevance to the proposed French match which dominated political debate in the early 1620s. Thirty-three copies of the dialogue (not including this manuscript) are recorded in CELM.