1590s in England

Events from the 1590s in England.

Incumbents

• Monarch – Elizabeth I

Events

• 1590
• Publication of Edmund Spenser's poetry The Faerie Queene and his satire Mother Hubbard's Tale.
• Publication of Thomas Lodge's prose tale Rosalynde: Euphues Golden Legacie.
• 1591
• 10 April – Merchant James Lancaster sets off on a voyage to the East Indies.
• 22 July – The Durtnell (Dartnell) family of Brasted, Kent, begin to work as building contractors. The business continues under thirteen generations of the family until ceasing to trade in 2019.
• 30 August–1 September – Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604): Battle of Flores off Flores Island (Azores) – the fleet of Spain is victorious over the English; English ship Revenge is captured on 1 September (and Richard Grenville fatally wounded) but soon afterwards is among many ships lost with all hands in a week-long Atlantic hurricane.
• 11 September – Completion of My Ladye Nevells Booke, a manuscript anthology of keyboard music by William Byrd.
• 3 November – Rebel Irish lord Brian O'Rourke is hanged at Tyburn having been extradited from Scotland and tried in London for treasons committed in Ireland.
• John Harington translates Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando furioso into English.
• Probable first production of William Shakespeare's play Henry VI, Part 1 and writing of Henry VI, Part 2 and Part 3; approximate date of writing of Richard III.
• Posthumous publication of Sir Philip Sidney's poetry Astrophel and Stella.
• Nicholas Bacon completes the building of his red brick mansion, Culford Hall, in Suffolk, planting an oak in Culford Park which, as "King of the Park", will still be flowering in the 21st century.
• 1592
• May/June – Case of the Swans, a landmark decision in English property law, is decided in the Exchequer of Pleas: wild animals cannot be given by transfer or taken by prescription.
• August – 1592–93 London plague outbreak first observed: over 19,000 deaths in London and its surrounding parishes up to December 1593. Theatres in London are consequently closed for much of the period.
• 7 September – The great Portuguese carrack the Madre de Deus, captured on 3 August at the fierce Battle of Flores (1592) in the Azores, enters Dartmouth harbour and is subjected to mass theft.
• 26 September – A "strange fish", probably an ocean sunfish, is washed ashore at Dripole near Kingston upon Hull.
• 3 November – Sir John Perrot, former Lord Deputy of Ireland, dies in the Tower of London awaiting sentence for a conviction for high treason.
• Henry Constable's Diana, one of the first sonnet sequences in English, is published in London.
• approximate date – First performance of Shakespeare's play Richard III.
• 1593
• January – John Norden commissioned to make maps of all the counties of England.
• 23 February – Peter Wentworth imprisoned for raising the issue of succession to the throne in Parliament.
• 6 April – Witches of Warboys: Alice, John and Agnes Samuel found guilty of witchcraft and hanged.
• 18 April – Anglo-Spanish War: Naval Battle of Blaye in the Gironde estuary sees a Spanish victory over the blockading English fleet, allowing the Spanish to relieve the French Catholic garrison of Blaye.
• After April – William Shakespeare's poem Venus and Adonis probably becomes his first published work, printed in London from his own manuscript. In his lifetime it will be his most frequently reprinted work: at least nine times.
• 5 May – "Dutch church libel": bills posted in London threatening Protestant refugees from France and the Netherlands allude to Christopher Marlowe's plays.
• 12 May – Arrest of dramatist Thomas Kyd in connection with the "Dutch church libel". "Atheist" literature found in his home is claimed to be Marlowe's.
• 18 May – A warrant for the arrest of Christopher Marlowe is issued. On 20 May he presents himself to the Privy Council.
• 29 May – Execution of the Welsh Protestant John Penry suspected of involvement with the Marprelate Controversy.
• 30 May – Marlowe is stabbed to death in a dispute over the bill at a lodging house in Deptford.
• 12 June – Sir Richard Hawkins sails from Plymouth to the South American Pacific with the aim of emulating the circumnavigation voyage of his cousin Drake. His squadron consists of the galleon Dainty (flagship), the storeship Hawk and the pinnace Fancy.
• Irish pirate queen Grace O'Malley meets with Queen Elizabeth at Greenwich.
• Sir Thomas Tresham designs and begins construction of Rushton Triangular Lodge in Northamptonshire, symbolic of his Catholic recusancy.
• 1594
• May – Nine Years' War: in Ireland, Hugh O'Neill, 2nd Earl of Tyrone and Hugh Roe O'Donnell form an alliance to try to overthrow English domination.
• 7 June – Roderigo Lopez executed for allegedly trying to poison Queen Elizabeth.
• 1 or 2 July – Anglo-Spanish War: Hawkins is defeated in the South American Pacific by the Spanish Beltrán de Castro in the action of Atacames Bay, being captured along with his flagship.
• Christmas – Students of Gray's Inn perform The Maske of Proteus and the Adamantine Rock before the Queen. Written by Francis Davison with music by Thomas Campion, it is probably the first staged masque in England.
• First known performances and publication of Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus in London.
• Publication of Shakespeare's narrative poem The Rape of Lucrece.
• Posthumous publication of Marlowe's play Edward II.
• Thomas Nashe's picaresque novel The Unfortunate Traveller published.
• Richard Hooker's Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie commences publication.
• Bevis Bulmer sets up a system at Blackfriars to pump water to London.
• 1595
• 21 February – Catholic martyr Robert Southwell hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn, London. His Saint Peters Complaint, with Other Poemes is published in three editions posthumously.
• 23 July – Spanish raid burns Penzance and Mousehole in Cornwall.
• Probable first performance of William Shakespeare's plays Richard II, A Midsummer Night's Dream and Romeo and Juliet.
• Thomas Morley's part song "Now Is the Month of Maying" is first published.
• 1596
• February – James Burbage buys the disused Blackfriars Theatre in London, but is prevented from reusing it as a public theatre by a November petition by wealthy influential neighbors.
• 14 February
• Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge is founded under the supervision of Archbishop John Whitgift.
• John Whitgift begins building his hospital at Croydon.
• June – Sir John Norreys and Sir Geoffrey Fenton travel to Connaught to parley with the local Irish lords.
• 21 November – Bartholomew Steer attempts to launch a rebellion on Enslow Hill in Oxfordshire.
• First production of Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice.
• Richard Johnson's The Famous Historie of the Seaven Champions of Christendom first published.
• William Slingsby discovers that water from the Tewitt Well mineral spring at Harrogate in North Yorkshire possesses similar properties to that from Spa, Belgium.
• John Harington describes the "Ajax", a precursor to the modern flush toilet, in The Metamorphosis of Ajax.
• 1597
• October/November – The 3rd Spanish Armada almost makes landfall after being dispersed by a storm – a number of Spanish ships are captured off the coasts of Wales, Cornwall and Devon.
• Parliament passes the Vagabonds Act introducing penal transportation of convicted criminals to England's colonies.
• Gresham College founded in the City of London.
• Aldenham School founded in Hertfordshire by brewer Richard Platt.
• Completion of Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire, designed by Robert Smythson for Bess of Hardwick.
• Approximate date of the first performance of the Shakespeare plays Henry IV, Part 1, Henry IV, Part 2 and King John.
• Thomas Nashe and Ben Jonson's satirical comedy The Isle of Dogs performed in July or August before being suppressed by the Privy Council for its "slanderous matter".
• Francis Bacon's first Essays published.
• Thomas Deloney's Jack of Newbury published.
• John Gerard's The Herball, or generall historie of plantes published.
• John Dowland's The Firste Booke of Songes or Ayres published.
• 1598
• 23 February – Thomas Bodley refounds the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford.
• March – Poor Relief Act establishes early workhouses.
• c. July/September – first performance of Ben Jonson's play Every Man in His Humour, at the Curtain Theatre, Shoreditch.
• 14 August – Nine Years' War: Battle of the Yellow Ford: Irish rebels under Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, rout an English expeditionary force under Henry Bagenal (who is mortally wounded in the action).
• 22 September – Ben Jonson kills actor Gabriel Spenser in a duel at Hoxton in London and is briefly held in Newgate Prison but escapes capital punishment by pleading benefit of clergy.
• c. September – Publication of Francis Meres' Palladis Tamia, Wits Treasury, including the first critical discussion of Shakespeare's works.
• 28 December – In London, The Theatre is dismantled.
• Montacute House, Somerset, built, a notable early example of an unfortified country residence built completely from new.
• Publication of the poem Hero and Leander unfinished by Marlowe and completed by George Chapman.
• Chapman translates Homer's Iliad into English.
• Publication of John Florio's Italian/English dictionary A World of Words.
• Publication of John Stow's A Survey of London.
• 1599
• 1 January – Darcy v. Allein (The Case of Monopolies): The Court of King's Bench decides it is improper for any individual to be allowed a state monopoly over a trade.
• 12 March – Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex is appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland by Queen Elizabeth I.
• Spring/Summer – Globe Theatre built in Southwark utilising material from The Theatre.
• 23 April – Essex in Ireland: Essex arrives in Dublin.
• 29 May – Nine Years' War: Essex captures Cahir Castle in Munster.
• 4 June – Bishops' Ban of 1599: Thomas Middleton's ' and John Marston's Scourge of Villainy are publicly burned as the ecclesiastical authorities clamp down on published satire.
• 15 August – Nine Years' War: Irish rebel victory at the Battle of Curlew Pass.
• 8 September – Essex in Ireland: Essex signs a truce with Hugh O'Neill. He leaves Ireland against the instructions of Queen Elizabeth.
• 28 September – Essex returns to England and is arrested.
• Late – War of the Theatres: Satire, being prohibited in print, breaks out in the London theatres. In Histriomastix, Marston satirizes Jonson's pride through the character Chrisoganus; Jonson responds by satirizing Marstons's wordy style in Every Man Out of His Humour, acted by the Lord Chamberlain's Men.
• Approximate date of the first performances of the Shakespeare plays As You Like It, Much Ado About Nothing, Henry V and Julius Caesar.
• The publisher William Jaggard issues The Passionate Pilgrime, poems attributed to "W. Shakespeare".
• Henry Buttes publishes his cookbook Dyets Dry Dinner.