Study title

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.This project arose from an appendix to the principal investigator's PhD, Foreign Diplomatic Representatives to the Court of James VI and I. Over past years historians have provided numerous partial lists, some more comprehensive than others, which relate to specific countries and which demonstrate a certain fascination with the question of diplomacy in the early modern period. However, very little work has been undertaken on the ambassadorial group as whole who came to the Stuart court. This project, therefore, aims to provide information on the diplomatic representatives who were sent by their sovereigns or governing aristocracies to the court of St James in the seventeenth century. Main Topics:This handlist is the first part of a prosopographical database of foreign diplomats to the Court of St James under the Stuarts. Part I establishes which individuals came as diplomats to the English court during the reign of James VI and I. The handlist contains details of country of origin; dates of embassies; date and place of first audience for each embassy; type of embassy and the object of the mission; place of residence and at whose expense; titles held by the ambassador and details of any honours granted by James; and promotions received on return home. In respect of the information gathered together in the database, the principal purpose has been to identify the diplomats and to provide as accurate a record as possible of their missions. For this purpose a systematic study of a number of sources has taken place. The essential sources surveyed were the various relevant manuscript holdings, as well as the Calendar of State Papers, Domestic and Foreign, the lists and calendars of the Historical Manuscripts Commission and various other collections of correspondence. In addition, the secondary sources available relating to Jacobean domestic and foreign diplomatic history have been identified...