Sir Henry Herbert: The Master of the Revels as Man of Letters

Abstract

Sir Henry Herbert, Master of the Revels for more than fifty years during the seventeenth century, has been known in literary history chiefly because of his activity as licenser of plays. The excerpts from his Office Book, first transcribed and set forth by Edmond Malone, have been published since his time, most significantly by George Chalmers, Peter Cunningham, Halliwell-Phillipps, F. G. Fleay, Albert Feuillerat, Joseph Quincy Adams, and W. J. Lawrence.' Sir Henry has served generations of his royal masters and students of the drama commendably; but his very service as Master of the Revels has heretofore placed well in the background his own writings, public and private, whether in print or in manuscript. Every student of English literature knows something of the literary merits of Sir Henry's brothers, Edward, the first Lord Herbert of Chirbury and Castle Island, poet and philosopher, and George, Cambridge fellow and rector of Bemerton, the author of the greatest English devotional verse. Students of the seventeenth century may know that two other Herbert brothers were also writers in some degree, although the extent of their work has not yet been determined.2 To the best of my knowledge, however, no one has heretofore considered any of the writings of Sir Henry Herbert not related to the Office of the Revels. It is my purpose therefore to focus attention on the public and the private writings of Sir Henry Herbert apart from his official tasks and to describe the scope of his writing. Before proceeding, however, I should like to say something of his life that will show other sides of that familiar functionary, the Master of the Revels, as a man of his own family, his own time, and his own concerns. Henry Herbert, the sixth son of Magdalene and Richard Herbert, was their eighth child, following George and before Frances and the posthumous son Thomas. He was baptized at the church of St. Nicholas, Montgomery, on July 7, 1594, and for some years thereafter probably shared most of the experiences of his brother George, who was about fifteen months older. Their brother Edward, whose Life includes brief sketches of all the nine other Herberts, says that Henry, after he had been brought up in Learning as the other Brothers were, was sent by his Friends into France, where he attained the Language of that Country in much perfection.3 Before Henry set out for France to attain the French language in much perfection, however, it is likely that he and George together studied French with a tutor (modern languages at the time not being a part of the curriculum of the grammar schools) and that in the course of their studies they utilized Randle