General Note
First Baron Lumley. Collector and conspirator. Inherited family estates on death of his grandfater 1545. Created Baron Lumley 1547 after petition to parliament. Fellow-commoner at Queens' Cambridge 1549 with Henry Fitzalan, Lord Maltravers. Educated at court of Edward VI. KB 1553. Married Jane Fitzalan, daughter of Henry Earl of Arundel whose library he received, spent a lot of time with him. Keeper of the park of Nonsuch from 1559 til his death. High steward of Oxford 1559. Implicated in Ridolfi plot 1571, imprisoned in the Tower of London 1571, other locations til 1573. Erected the grove of Diana at Nonsuch, England's first allegorical garden, as an apology to Queen Elizabeth. Inherited Arundel's massive debts 1580, as a result gave Nonsuch to the Queen but remained resident as keeper for a lease. Sponsored surgery lectures at Royal College of Physicians 1582-3. Donated books to Cambridge and Oxford 1598 and 1599. Collected many books, prints and marbles, owned one of the largest libraries in Elizabethan England, nearly 3000 volumes covering a wide variety of subjects, but predominance of scientific, medical and geographic works. Also very interested in family history and genealogy. Died London 1609. "He owned a large library, every book and M.S. of which bore his signature on the title; he had inherited the library of his father-in-law, Henry Fitzalan, 12th Earl of Arundel (154?-1580) containing many books from the library of Thomas Cranmer, archibishop of Canterbury (1489-1556). Lumley gave 84 volumes to Cambridge in 1598 and in 1599 40 to the newly-founded Bodleian. When he died, his library was purchased by James I for Henry, Prince of Wales, and soon passed into the "Old Royal" library, given in 1753 by George II to the British Museum where most of Lumley's books are still preserved. Some are in the Harsnett Library at Colechester" (Ricci, S de. English collectors of books and MSS, 1930, p19-20)