A detailed account of the "secret services" operated by the great men of Elizabethan England, whose clandestine efforts sprang from the collective Protestant fear provoked by the exiled presence in England of Mary, Queen of Scots. After the rising of the Northern Earls in her favour in 1569 - an event that shocked the government - any claimant to the English throne was viewed with hostile suspicion as a potential focus for religious malcontents and foreign meddlers. By stealthy efforts at home and abroad the Elizabethan spy clusters became forces to be feared. Kidnapping, surveillance, conspiracy, counter-espionage, theft and lying were just a few of the methods employed to defeat the ever-present threat of regicide. The author aims to challenge many of the stale notions about espionage in Renaissance England and to show the reign of Elizabeth I in a new light.
- ISBN10 0312086067
- ISBN13 9780312086060
- Publish Date 1 September 1992 (first published 28 May 1992)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 10 April 2014
- Publish Country US
- Imprint St. Martin's Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 179
- Language English