I’ve been mired in genealogy again. Not quite as brain-destroying as Medieval Welsh families but close.
So many names and stories and histories that have crossed my path over the decades are converging in an investigation of just one man’s life.
Robert Devereux is fascinating. He’s also very connected to Sir Philip Sidney. And if you know your Tudor history – the name Sir Francis Walsingham will be quite familiar.
Sir FW’s daughter, Frances, married Philip Sidney and their only child was Elizabeth Sidney. See yesterday’s posts?
Shakespeare’s Muse of Fire (Phil) died aged around 31 and his wife then married Robert Devereux.
Robert was the brother of Penelope, who was the mother of Henry Rich —- who was the first extra-marital lover of Marie de Rohan and a close friend of George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, who married Katherine Manners, who was the niece of Sir Roger Manners who married Elizabeth Sidney.
Get it?
SMH. It gets even worse from here. I haven’t even started on the Italians :o)