Letters: Earl of Oxford to King James; January 30, 1603 [1604 N.S.]. [Spelling modernized.]

Essex Record Office MS D/DMh C1; Oxford to King James; 30 January 1604. [Click here for original spelling.]

Seeing that it has pleased your Majesty of your most gracious inclination to Justice & right to restore me to be keeper of your game as well in your forest of Waltham, as also in Havering park, I can do no less in duty and love to your Majesty, but employ myself in the execution thereof. And to the end you might the better know in what sort both the forest, & the park have been abused, and yet continued, as well in destroying of the Deer, as in spoiling of your demesne wood, by such as have patents, & had licenses heretofore for felling of Timber in the Queen’s time lately deceased, presuming thereby that they may do what they list. I was bold to send unto your Majesty a man skillful, learned & experienced in forest causes, who being a dweller and eyewitness 

thereof might inform you of the truth. And because your Majesty, upon a bare information, could not be so well satisfied of every particular, as by lawful testimony & examination of credible witness upon oath, according to your Majesty’s appointment, by Commission a course has been taken, In which your Majesty shall be fully satisfied of the truth. This Commission together with the depositions of the witness I do send to your Majesty by this bearer, who briefly can inform you of the whole contents. So that now, having lawfully proved unto your Majesty that Sir John Gray has killed and destroyed your Deer in Havering park without any warrant for the same, his patent is void in law, & therefore I most humbly beseech your Majesty to make him an example for all others that shall in like sort abuse their places & to restore me to the possession thereof, in both which your Majesty shall do but Justice and right to the one & other. this 30 of January 1603.

Your Majesty’s

most

humble

Subject and

Servant

E Oxenforde

 

Addressed (in Oxford’s hand): for his most excellent Majesty.

 

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• A 1572 Oxford Letter and the Player’s Speech in Hamlet. August 11, 2020. “The player’s speech has been a source of consternation among Shakespeare scholars for above 200 years.  Why was Aeneas’ tale chosen as the subject?”
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