Resumen de The Earl of Essex and Elizabethan parliaments

Paul E. J. Hammer

• This article challenges the old notion championed by J.E. Neale that Robert Devereux, 2nd earl of Essex (1565–1601), displayed ‘megalomania’ in his parliamentary patronage during the latter years of Elizabeth I's reign. In addition to surveying Essex's influence on the membership of late Elizabethan parliaments, this article addresses the likelihood that the earl was angling for the summoning of a parliament in the spring of 1601. Instead, thanks to the Essex rising of 8 February 1601, Essex himself was executed and posthumously attainted for treason at a parliament summoned in October 1601. Finally, the article speculates about the possible impact of Essex's example and political research on the 12 peers who sought to force Charles I to summon a parliament in 1640.