Elizabeth Cary (1585–1639)

The writer and translator Elizabeth Cary was born Elizabeth Tanfield in Burford, Oxfordshire. She was the only child of the lawyer Lawrence Tanfield (c. 1551–1625) and Elizabeth Symonds, the daughter of Giles Symonds and Catherine (née Lee). She was educated at home, possibly by Michael Drayton (1563–1631) and John Davies of Hereford (1565?–1618), both of whom dedicated works to her. Her aptitude for languages was renowned and her earliest extant work, ‘The mirror of the world’, was a translation of Abraham Ortelius’s Le miroir du monde (1598).

In 1602, Elizabeth married Sir Henry Cary (c. 1575–1633), with whom she had eleven children. Despite unrelenting years of pregnancy and nursing children, she continued to write. Her first play, the manuscript of which does not survive, was a tragedy set in Syracuse; her second, The Tragedy of Mariam, the Fair Queen of Jewry, was published in 1613. Much of what is known of Elizabeth’s life and work relies on an account of her life written some thirty-five years later by one of her daughters, Lucy, who from 1638 was a nun at Our Lady of Consolation, Cambrai. This Life mentions a number of lost manuscript works, including a life of Tamburlaine in addition to those of a number of saints, and a translation of Seneca. A narrative of English history, published in 1680, was attributed traditionally to her husband, but is now thought to have been by Elizabeth; the manuscript for it (Northamptonshire Record Office, Finch-Hatton papers, FH1) is in her hand.

Henry Cary was created Lord Falkland and appointed to the post of lord deputy of Ireland in 1622. Elizabeth followed her husband to Ireland but the mortgage of her jointure to meet expenses incurred in this move caused her father to disinherit her. After three years she returned to England where, in London, she converted to Catholicism, a decision that caused Charles I to place her under temporary house arrest. Her husband demanded a separation. Although Henry Cary was ordered to pay her maintenance, no payments were made and Elizabeth was reduced to poverty. In 1630 she published in Douai Her Reply of the most Illustrious Cardinal of Perron and dedicated this work to Queen Henrietta Maria. The book is thought to have been burnt upon arrival in England, although several copies survived. Throughout her life, Elizabeth forged links with many influential women, in particular fellow Roman Catholic converts. These included members of the Villiers family, including Mary, countess of Buckingham (the mother of the king’s favourite, George Villiers, duke of Buckingham); Susan, countess of Denbigh (George Villiers’s sister); and Katherine, duchess of Buckingham (his wife).

In September 1633, Henry Cary died following a leg injury sustained at Theobalds Palace, whereupon Elizabeth resolved to send six of their children—who had been living with her eldest son, Lucius Cary ((1609/10–1643)—to be received into the Catholic faith on the continent. In consequence, she was summoned to appear before Lord Chief Justice Sir John Bramston and, subsequently, in the Star Chamber. Elizabeth Cary died in October 1639 in London, where she was buried in Henrietta Maria’s chapel (designed by Inigo Jones) in Somerset House.