The watchers : a secret history of the reign of Elizabeth I / Stephen Alford.
Material type: TextPublication details: New York : Bloomsbury Press, 2012.Edition: 1st U.S. edDescription: xvii, 397 p., [8] p. of plates : ill. (some col.) ; 25 cmISBN:- 1608190099
- 9781608190096
- Secret history of the reign of Elizabeth I
- Elizabeth I, Queen of England, 1533-1603 -- Adversaries
- Elizabeth I, Queen of England, 1533-1603 -- Relations with statesmen
- Conspiracies -- Great Britain -- History -- 16th century
- Espionage, British -- History -- 16th century
- Great Britain -- Foreign relations -- 1558-1603
- Great Britain -- History -- Elizabeth, 1558-1603
- Great Britain -- Kings and rulers -- History
- Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 1558-1603
Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book | Main Library | NonFiction | 942.055 A389 | Available | 33111007037712 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
In a Europe aflame with wars of religion and dynastic conflicts, Elizabeth I came to the throne of a realm encircled by menace. To the great Catholic powers of France and Spain, England was a heretic pariah state, a canker to be cut away for the health of the greater body of Christendom. Elizabeth's government, defending God's true Church of England and its leader, the queen, could stop at nothing to defend itself.
Headed by the brilliant, enigmatic, and widely feared Sir Francis Walsingham, the Elizabethan state deployed every dark art: spies, double agents, cryptography, and torture. Delving deeply into sixteenth-century archives, Stephen Alford offers a groundbreaking, chillingly vivid depiction of Elizabethan espionage, literally recovering it from the shadows. In his company we follow Her Majesty's agents through the streets of London and Rome, and into the dank cells of the Tower. We see the world as they saw it-ever unsure who could be trusted or when the fatal knock on their own door might come. The Watchers is a riveting exploration of loyalty, faith, betrayal, and deception with the highest possible stakes, in a world poised between the Middle Ages and modernity.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 333-377) and index.
Pt. 1. Spying out the land -- pt. 2. Enemies of the State -- pt. 3. Politics and money.
A gripping account of the unflagging battle by spies, code breakers, ambassadors and confidence-men who sought to protect Elizabeth I from the most powerful rulers of Europe who conspired to destroy her, their plans most fully realized by the Spanish Armada.