Biography of Edward Seymour 1529-1593

Diary of Edward VI. 3rd June 1550. The King came to Schein, wher was a mariag mad(e) betwen the lord Lisle (age 23), th'erle of Warwic's (age 46) sone, and the ladi [his half-sister] Anne (age 12), daughter to the [his father] duke of Somerset (age 50)³, wich don and a faire diner made, and daunsing finished, the King and the ladies went into tow chamhers mad of bowis, wher first he saw six gentlemen of on(e) side and six of another rune the course of the field, twis over, Ther names hiere do folow:

The lord Edward (age 21).^1a

Sir Jhon Aplebey.

(The rest omitted.)

And afterward cam three mascers of one side and tow of another, wich rane fowre courses apece. Ther names be (left blank).

Last of al came the count of Ragonne,^2a with 3 Italians, who ran with al the gentlemen fowre courses, and afterward fought at tornay. And so, after souper, he (the King) retorned to Whestmuster.

Note 3. On this occasion Dudley must have held out a brother's hand to Seymour, and hopes must have been entertained that the alliance would cement their future friendship, and secure the position of both parties. The result, as is well known, was otherwise. Little is on record of the history, and less of the character, of the bridegroom. When earl of Warwick, he was condemned with his father the duke of Northumberland in 1553, and he died without children in 1554, within ten days after his release from the Tower. The bride — one of the "trois belles chanteresses "(as they were styled by the poet Ronsard) who under the guidance of their tutor Denisot celebrated in French verse the death and virtues of Marguerite de Valois, queen of Navarre — suffered severely from the miseries to which her high birth subjected her. After losing her father by decapitation in 1552, and having her husband condemned to the like fate in the following year, — after attending him in the Tower, and losing him (probably from the effects of his confinement), — the countess was remarried on the 29th April, 1555, to Edward Unton (age 16), a Berkshire squire, afterwards a knight of the Bath. By an inquisition taken many years after, it was found that she had been a lunatic from the year 1566. She was however the mother of seven children by sir Edward Unton, and the younger surviving son was the celebrated sir Henry Unton, ambassador in France, whose dispatches have been edited for the Roxburghe Club by Mr. Stevenson. For more minute particulars relative to the countess see the memoir of the Unton Family, by the present Editor, prefixed to the Unton Inventories, printed for the Berkshire Ashmolean Society in 1841.

Note 1a. Lord Edward Seymour, the duke of Somerset's eldest son. [Note. In 1550 the Duke's eldest son [his brother] John Seymour (age 23) was alive; he would die in 1552.]

Note 2a. On the 20th April, in the year before us, the council had issued a "warrant to (blank) to pay cxxvli. to the young conte Rangone for the half-yeres pension of one thousand crownes by the yere assigned to him during his abode in the King's majesties service, as well in respect of the young gentleman's good will and towardnesse, as for the love of his father, being a nobleman of Italie, and one that hath alwaies borne unto the King's majestic and his most noble father a singuler afiection: for a token whereof he sent this his eldest sonne hither to serve his highnesse." (Council Book.) This annuity of 250l. to Pallavicino Eangoni, during pleasure, was confirmed by letters patent dated the 20th Jan. 4 Edw. VI. 1550-1, printed in Rymer, xv. 252.