William Cecil

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the impact on the British Isles of William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, the most poweful man in the court of Elizabeth I. He was both praised and attacked for his flexibility, adapting to the reigns of Protestant and Catholic monarchs and, under Elizabeth, his goal was to make England strong, stable and secure from attack from its neighbours. He sought control over Ireland and persuaded Elizabeth that Mary Queen of Scots must die, yet often counselled peace rather than war in the interests of prosperity.

→ Play on BBC Sounds website

Guests

• Diarmaid MacCulloch 11 episodes
  University of Oxford
• Susan Doran No other episodes
  University of Oxford
• John Guy 6 episodes
  University of Cambridge

Reading list

• Burghley: William Cecil at the Court of Elizabeth I
  Stephen Alford (Yale University Press, 2008) Google Books →
• Burghley: Tudor Statesman
  B.W. Beckingsale (Macmillan, 1967) Google Books →
• The Queen's Agent: Francis Walsingham at the Court of Elizabeth I
  John Cooper (Faber & Faber, 2012) Google Books →
• Elizabeth I and Her Circle
  Susan Doran (Oxford University Press, 2015) Google Books →
• Burghley: William Cecil, Lord Burghley
  Michael A.R. Graves (Longman, 1998) Google Books →
• Elizabeth: The Forgotten Years
  John Guy (Penguin, 2017) Google Books →
• My Heart is My Own: The Life of Mary Queen of Scots
  John Guy (Fourth Estate, 2004) Google Books →
• Governing by Virtue: Lord Burghley and the Management of Elizabethan England
  Norman Jones (OUP, 2015) Google Books →
• The Cecils: Privilege and Power behind the Throne
  David Loades (Bloomsbury, 2009) Google Books →
• Elizabeth I: War and Politics 1588-1603
  Wallace T. MacCaffrey (Hodder Arnold, 1993) Google Books →

Related episodes

• The Davidian Revolution
  
  5 May, 2022 940 History of Europe
• Thomas Becket
  
  14 Dec, 2017 270 History of Christianity
• The Death of Elizabeth I
  
  15 Oct, 2009 900 History
• Saint Cuthbert
  
  28 Jan, 2021 270 History of Christianity
• The Second Barons’ War
  
  6 May, 2021 940 History of Europe
• Edmund Burke
  
  3 Jun, 2010 320 Political science
• Mary, Queen of Scots
  
  2 Jul, 2020 940 History of Europe
• The Treaty of Limerick
  
  7 Nov, 2019 940 History of Europe
• The Interregnum
  
  27 May, 2021 940 History of Europe
• Gerald of Wales
  
  4 Oct, 2012 940 History of Europe
• The Trial of Charles I
  
  4 Jun, 2009 940 History of Europe
• The Covenanters
  
  12 Mar, 2020 940 History of Europe
• The Tudor State
  
  26 Oct, 2000 940 History of Europe
• Margaret of Anjou
  
  24 May, 2018 940 History of Europe
• Cnut
  
  6 Apr, 2023 940 History of Europe
• The Battle of Bosworth Field
  
  26 Apr, 2012 940 History of Europe
• Athelstan
  
  1 Jul, 2010 940 History of Europe
• The Fable of the Bees
  
  25 Oct, 2018 330 Economics
• Wyclif and the Lollards
  
  16 Jun, 2011 270 History of Christianity
• Holbein at the Tudor Court
  
  15 Oct, 2015 750 Painting

---

Programme ID: m0002zq6

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0002zq6

Auto-category: 942.055 (History of England - Elizabeth I, 1558-1603)