Woodville, Elizabeth, 1437-92, queen consort of Edward IV of England. She was the daughter of Richard Woodville (later the 1st Earl Rivers). Her first husband, Sir John Grey, was killed fighting on the Lancastrian side at the battle of St. Albans (1461) in the Wars of the Roses. By him she had two sons, Thomas, 1st marquess of Dorset, and Richard. Edward IV married her in secret in 1464, partly because the powerful Richard Neville, earl of Warwick, had other marriage plans for him and partly because of Elizabeth's Lancastrian connections. The marriage was soon made public, however, and Elizabeth's large family received numerous royal favors. At the death (1483) of Edward IV, Richard, duke of Gloucester (later Richard III), seized custody of the young Edward V, Elizabeth's eldest son by the late king, and destroyed the power of the Woodvilles (Elizabeth's brother the 2d Earl Rivers and son Richard Grey were executed). The queen mother again took sanctuary in Westminster and soon surrendered her second son by Edward, Richard, duke of York, to Gloucester. He then placed both boys in the Tower of London and declared them illegitimate, asserting that Elizabeth's marriage to Edward was voided by a precontract of marriage on Edward's part. (The boys were subsequently murdered.) After Henry VII seized the throne from Richard, he married (1486) Elizabeth's eldest daughter, who was also named Elizabeth.

Willard, Frances Elizabeth, 1839-98, American temperance leader and reformer, b. Churchville, N.Y., grad. Northwestern Female College, 1859. She was president of Evanston College for Ladies and dean of women at Northwestern Univ. After leaving the university, she helped organize (1874) the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and in 1879 became its president. She devoted most of her life to the organization of women for the prohibition of alcoholic beverages but was active in other causes, especially that of woman suffrage.

Wetherall, Elizabeth: see Warner, Susan Bogert.

Vestris, Lucia Elizabeth (Bartolozzi), 1797-1856, English actress and manager, the first woman to be a lessee of a theater. The daughter of a music and fencing teacher, she made an unsuccessful marriage at 16 to Armand Vestris, her ballet master. Following her debut (1815) in Italian opera, she acted at the Comédie Française with Talma, who suggested to her the ideas on realism in costuming that she was later to develop. After her success as Don Giovanni in a burlesque of Mozart's opera in 1820, Vestris became known for her natural style as a ballad-singing comedienne in light opera and in breeches parts (male roles). Not satisfied with contemporary methods of production, she leased the Olympic Theatre, London, in 1831, and was an instant success as manager and director. At great expense, she redecorated the theater and used realistic stage settings and real props; she was perhaps the first to use the box set complete with ceiling. Vestris produced Shakespearean comedies, with attention to text and historical accuracy, as well as burlesques and farces. She married Charles James Mathews in 1838 on the eve of what was to be an unsuccessful American tour and from 1839 to 1842 managed Covent Garden with him. In 1841 they produced Boucicault's London Assurance. In 1847 they took over the Lyceum, where they introduced French plays to England.

Taylor, Elizabeth, 1932-, Anglo-American film actress, b. London. Regarded as one of the world's most beautiful women, Taylor went from child star to a series of ladylike roles to playing worldly, sometimes shrewish women. She won Academy Awards for her work in Butterfield 8 (1960) and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966). Her other films include National Velvet (1944), A Place in the Sun (1951), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), Cleopatra (1963), and The Mirror Crack'd (1979). She has also appeared on Broadway in such productions as The Little Foxes (1981). Taylor has been married nine times, twice to Richard Burton, with whom she co-starred in many films. She has been active in raising money for AIDS research, and was made a Dame Commander, Order of the British Empire, in 2000.

Stanton, Elizabeth Cady, 1815-1902, American reformer, a leader of the woman-suffrage movement, b. Johnstown, N.Y. She was educated at the Troy Female Seminary (now Emma Willard School) in Troy, N.Y. In 1840 she married Henry Brewster Stanton, a journalist and abolitionist, and attended with him the international slavery convention in London. The woman delegates were excluded from the floor of the convention; the indignation this aroused in Elizabeth Stanton and Lucretia Mott was an important factor in their efforts to organize women to win greater equality. With several others they called the first women's rights convention in the United States in 1848 at Seneca Falls, N.Y. Stanton insisted that a suffrage clause be included in the bill of rights for women that was drawn up at the convention. From 1852, despite occasional disagreements, she was intimately associated with Susan B. Anthony in leading the women's movement. She was president of the National Woman Suffrage Association (1869-90) and of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (1890-92). With Anthony as publisher she and Parker Pillsbury edited (1868-70) the Revolution, a militant feminist magazine. Elizabeth Stanton was a brilliant orator and an able journalist, and as a writer and lecturer she strove for legal, political, and industrial equality of women and for liberal divorce laws. She compiled with Susan B. Anthony and Matilda Joslyn Gage the first three volumes of History of Woman Suffrage (1881-86) and wrote Eighty Years and More (1898).

Shrewsbury, Elizabeth Talbot, countess of, 1520-1608, English noblewoman, known as Bess of Hardwick. At the age of 12 she married Robert Barlow, who died shortly afterward. She was married and widowed twice more, inheriting large estates, before she was married in 1568 to George Talbot, 6th earl of Shrewsbury. The marriage (1574) of her daughter Elizabeth to Charles Stuart, brother of Lord Darnley, angered Queen Elizabeth I because Stuart had a claim to the throne, and the countess was sent to the Tower of London for three months. The countess quarreled with her husband and accused (1584) him of a love affair with Mary Queen of Scots, whose custodian he was (1569-84), but the couple was nominally reconciled before his death (1590). She built a number of great mansions, including Hardwick Hall.

Seton, Saint Elizabeth Ann, 1774-1821, American Roman Catholic leader, usually called Mother Seton, b. Elizabeth Ann Bayley, New York City. She was the daughter of a prominent physician. Her husband, William Seton, a successful merchant, died (1803) in Italy, leaving her with five young children. Soon afterward she became (1805) a Roman Catholic. This conversion severed her from her relatives, and she started a school in New York City to support her family. In 1808, invited by Bishop Carroll, she opened a school in Baltimore, then moved (1809) to Emmitsburg, Md., already the seat of a Catholic school for boys, Mt. St. Mary's. There she opened the first Catholic free school, the beginning of American parochial education and also founded St. Joseph's College (for women). About her she formed a community of women, which soon adopted the rule of the Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul, the great sisterhood centered in Paris. This was the first American congregation of Daughters of Charity (or Sisters of Charity). Mother Seton was superior of her community; this had grown into 20 communities before her death. She was beatified in 1963 and canonized in 1975, thereby making her the first native-born American saint. Feast: Jan. 4. Her journals, letters, and memoirs have been published.

Roberts, Elizabeth Madox, 1886-1941, American poet and novelist, b. Perryville, Ky., grad. Univ. of Chicago, 1921. She is best known for her novels and stories of the Kentucky mountain people, whose dialect and customs she carefully represented. All her work is distinguished by the beauty and rhythm of her prose. Her novels include The Time of Man (1926), My Heart and My Flesh (1927), Jingling in the Wind (1928), The Great Meadow (1930), and Black Is My Truelove's Hair (1938). Some of her short stories are collected in The Haunted Mirror (1932) and Not by Strange Gods (1941). Her volumes of poetry include Under the Tree (1922) and Song in the Meadow (1940).

Queen Elizabeth Islands, northern part of the Arctic Archipelago, Northwest Territories and Nunavut, N Canada. Ellesmere Island (the largest), the Parry group (Melville, Bathurst, Devon, Prince Patrick, and Cornwallis islands), and the Sverdrup group (Axel Heiberg, Ellef Ringnes, Amund Ringnes, and many smaller islands) are found there. The islands are underlain by oil-bearing rock; extensive drilling has been under way since the early 1960s. The British explorer Sir William Parry explored (1819-20) many of the islands, and they were known (until 1954) as the Parry Islands.

Port Elizabeth, city (1991 pop. 670,653), Eastern Cape, SE South Africa, on Algoa Bay, an arm of the Indian Ocean. It is a tourist center and a major seaport that ships diamonds, wool, fruit, and other items. Automobile assembly is the chief industry; shoe manufacturing, metal and timber processing, and electrical engineering are also important. There is some food processing, tanning, and chemical production. Port Elizabeth was founded the British in 1820 near Fort Frederick (1799; now a monument). The city grew rapidly after 1873, when a railroad to Kimberley began. The Univ. of Port Elizabeth (1964) and a technical college (1925) are in the city. A national park is nearby.

Peabody, Elizabeth Palmer, 1804-94, American educator, lecturer, and reformer, b. Billerica, Mass. The Peabody family moved (c.1809) to Salem, where the father began practicing dentistry. Of the three Peabody sisters, the second, Mary, married Horace Mann, and the youngest, Sophia, married Nathaniel Hawthorne. Elizabeth, after a period as governess in Hallowell, Maine, with her sister Mary, established a school for girls in what is now Brookline, Mass. Although she was an inspired teacher, she was a poor businesswoman, and her ventures were short-lived. After giving up this school she wrote a series of history textbooks and became a successful lecturer on history. She assisted Bronson Alcott in his Temple School and created an annotated transcript of conversations regarding his educational theories in Record of a School (1835). Her path crossed those of most of the great New Englanders of her day—Emerson, William Ellery Channing, Henry David Thoreau, and many others.

The bookshop Peabody opened in Boston in 1840 was a literary center. Margaret Fuller held her conversation classes there, and Elizabeth soon found herself a publisher as well as a bookseller; the transcendental magazine, the Dial, pamphlets of the Anti-Slavery Society, and several of Hawthorne's early works were published by her. Of a projected periodical, Aesthetic Papers, only one number appeared, in 1849. After closing her bookshop she traveled about, lecturing and selling historical charts. An ardent abolitionist, Elizabeth went to Richmond in 1859 to plead unsuccessfully with the governor of Virginia for the life of one of John Brown's aides at Harpers Ferry. In Boston she opened (1861) one of the first kindergartens in the country. With her sister Mary she wrote Moral Culture of Infancy and Kindergarten Guide (1866). In 1867-68 she studied Froebel's methods in Germany and on her return she established a Froebel Union and opened the first kindergarten training school in the country. From then on kindergarten training was the cause that took her traveling about the country. Two years after her death a Boston settlement, Elizabeth Peabody House, was established as a memorial; it moved to Somerville, Mass., in the 1950s and is still in operation.

Patterson, Elizabeth, 1785-1879, American wife of Jérôme Bonaparte, b. Baltimore. On a visit to America, Jérôme Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon Bonaparte, met and married her (1803). Jérôme was a minor, and Napoleon refused to recognize the marriage. When Jérôme returned (1805) to France, his wife was forbidden to land and went to England, where her son, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte, was born. Napoleon issued (1806) a state decree of annulment for his brother, and Elizabeth Patterson was given a large annual pension.

Norton, Caroline Elizabeth Sarah (Sheridan), 1808-77, English author; granddaughter of Richard Brinsley Sheridan. She gained more renown for her eventful life than for her writings. Her husband George Norton's divorce suit, with Lord Melbourne as correspondent, caused a sensation in its time. Although Norton lost the suit, he was given custody of their children and allowed to collect his wife's literary earnings. Her writings included poems and novels; however, she is best-remembered for English Laws for Women in the Nineteenth Century (1854) and A Letter to the Queen (1855), both of which helped bring about improvement of the status of married women in England.

Montagu, Elizabeth (Robinson), 1720-1800, English author, one of the bluestockings. She was noted for her wit and beauty, and her London literary salon was frequented by Johnson, Walpole, Burke, and other eminent men. She wrote An Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakespeare (1769), defending the poet against Voltaire's condemnation. She also conducted a voluminous correspondence, edited in part by E. J. Climenson (1906) and in part by Reginald Blunt (1923).

Longford, Elizabeth, 1906-2002, British author. Born Elizabeth Harman, she married (1931) Frank Pakenham, later (1961) earl of Longford. She was educated at Oxford, lectured for the Workers Education Association (1929-35), and was an unsuccessful Labour candidate for Parliament (1935 and 1950). A long-time writer for the Daily Express and the Sunday Times, she was also an excellent biographer and historian. Her chief works are Jameson's Raid (1960), Victoria (1964), and Wellington (2 vol., 1969-72). She continued to write about royals and politicians well into her 90s. Five of her children became writers: the journalist Catherine Longford, the novelist Rachel Billington, the biographer Antonia Fraser, the poet Judith Kazantzis, and the historian Thomas Pakenham.

Lease, Mary Elizabeth, 1853-1933, American agrarian reformer and temperance advocate, b. Ridgeway, Pa. The daughter of an Irish political refugee, she first gained recognition for a series of lectures (1885-87) on Ireland and the Irish. She had gone to Kansas as a young woman, was admitted to the bar, and became active in Populist politics in the campaign of 1890. Known during this period as Mary Ellen Lease, she was dubbed Mary Yellin Lease by her opponents because of her flamboyant oratorical style. Urging the popular election of Senators, the setting up of postal savings banks, government control of railroads, federal supervision of corporations, woman suffrage, free silver, prohibition, and other reforms, she gained lasting fame by advising the farmers "to raise less corn and more hell." In 1908 she became a lecturer for the New York department of education and in 1912 supported Theodore Roosevelt in the Bull Moose campaign.

Kenny, Elizabeth, 1886-1952, Australian nurse, b. New South Wales, grad. St. Ursula's College, Australia, 1902. She became "Sister" Kenny as a first lieutenant nurse (1914-18) in the Australian army. While caring for poliomyelitis victims in her homeland, she developed a method using hot, moist applications in conjunction with passive exercise. She came to the United States in 1940 to demonstrate her techniques, which were used extensively with good results. She was coauthor with John F. Pohl of The Kenny Concept of Infantile Paralysis and Its Treatment (1942); with Martha Ostenso she wrote the autobiographical And They Shall Walk (1943).

Kemble, Elizabeth: see under Kemble, Roger.

Jolley, Elizabeth (Monica Elizabeth Jolley), 1923-2007, Australian novelist, b. Birmingham, England. A nurse during World War II, she immigrated to Western Australia in 1959. Although she had written since childhood, her first book, Five Acre Virgin and Other Stories, did not appear until 1976; several other short-story volumes were later published. With her first novel, Palomino (1980), Jolley succeeded in combining a rather brooding traditional style with an assertion of feminist concerns. She continued in this vein in later novels, writing of human eccentricity and alienation, often with a dark humor. These works include Miss Peabody's Inheritance (1983), Mr. Scobie's Riddle (1983), Foxybaby (1986), The Sugar Mother (1988), My Father's Moon (1989), Cabin Fever (1991), The Orchard Thieves (1995), and The Accomodating Spouse (1999). Fellow Passengers, a volume of her collected stories, was published in 1997.

Inchbald, Elizabeth, 1753-1821, English author. The daughter of a farmer, Joseph Simpson, she went to London in 1772 to seek her fortune on the stage. The same year she married a fellow actor, Joseph Inchbald. In 1784 she turned from acting to writing. Her plays, moral and sentimental, include I'll Tell You What (1785) and Wives as They Were, and Maids as They Are (1797). However, she is better remembered for two romantic novels, A Simple Story (1791) and Nature and Art (1796).

Howard, Elizabeth Jane: see under Amis, Kingsley.

Hardwick, Elizabeth, 1916-2007, American literary critic, novelist, and short-story writer, b. Lexington, Ky.; grad Univ. of Kentucky (B.A., 1938; M.A., 1939). She moved (1939) to New York City, where she studied at Columbia and soon became a member of a circle of prominent urban intellectuals. Early associated with the Partisan Review, she was one of the founders (1962) of the New York Review of Books and was an editor of it and frequent contributor to it and to The New Yorker. Insightful, sophisticated, witty, and often acerbic, her essays were collected in A View of My Own: Essays in Literature and Society (1962); Seduction and Betrayal: Women and Literature (1974), a brilliant study of female literary characters and of such writers as Virginia Woolf, the Brontës, and Sylvia Plath; Bartleby in Manhattan and Other Essays (1983); and Sight-Readings: American Fictions (1998), critical portraits of such writers as Margaret Fuller, Henry James, Gertrude Stein, and various contemporaries. She also wrote a critical biography of Herman Melville (2000) and edited The Selected Letters of William James (1961) and a work on American women writers (1977). Her three novels, which are at least partially autobiographical, are The Ghostly Lover (1945), The Simple Truth (1955), and the highly acclaimed Sleepless Nights (1979), a book of memories portrayed in evocative vignettes. Her fiction also includes numerous short stories. Hardwick was married (1949-72) to the poet Robert Lowell.

Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn (Stevenson), 1810-65, English novelist. When she was still an infant her mother died, and she was brought up by an aunt in Knutsford, Cheshire, the background for several of her novels of provincial life. In 1832 she married William Gaskell, a Unitarian minister. They settled in Manchester, and she lived a quiet, small-town life, rearing a large family and writing her novels. In Cranford (1853) and Wives and Daughters (1866), Mrs. Gaskell describes the joys and sorrows common to middle-class village life. In Mary Barton (1848) and North and South (1855) she depicts the social conditions of early Victorian England, particularly of the working classes in the large industrial towns. Although often overly moralistic, her novels are distinguished by humor, perceptive characterization, and superb descriptive passages. Her excellent Life of Charlotte Brontë (1857) roused a furor because of its candid statements about the Brontë family, particularly concerning the excesses of Branwell.

Fry, Elizabeth (Gurney), 1780-1845, English prison reformer and philanthropist. Deeply religious, she was recognized as a minister by the Society of Friends (Quakers). From 1813 she worked untiringly to improve the conditions of women in Newgate prison, advocating separation of the sexes, employment, and religious training. The success of her methods at Newgate impressed the government and were tried in other prisons. For several years she traveled throughout Europe, visiting penal institutions. Her other philanthropies included the founding of soup kitchens in London.

Fox-Genovese, Elizabeth Ann: see under Genovese, Eugene Dominick.

Farnese, Elizabeth: see Elizabeth Farnese.

Elizabeth, Saint, in the Gospel of St. Luke, mother of John the Baptist and kinswoman of the Virgin Mary. Feast: Nov. 5.

Elizabeth, Saint, 1207-31, daughter of King Andrew II of Hungary and wife of Landgrave Louis II of Thuringia. She is called St. Elizabeth of Hungary. She led a simple life, personally tended the sick and the poor, and spent long hours at prayer. After the death of her husband (1227) she saw to it that her children's welfare was taken care of and retired to a small cottage near Marburg. There, under the spiritual direction of Conrad of Marburg, she led an austere life. St. Elizabeth died at the age of 23. Feast: Nov. 19.

Elizabeth of Valois, 1545-68, queen of Spain, daughter of Henry II of France. Originally intended to wed Don Carlos, son of Philip II of Spain, she was married (1559) to Philip himself. The unfounded legend of a tragic love between Elizabeth and Carlos is often found in literature, notably in Schiller's Don Carlos.

Elizabeth Woodville: see Woodville, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Islands, chain of small islands off Cape Cod that form the southern boundary of Buzzards Bay; SE Mass. Naushon is the largest island. Cuttyhunk Island was settled in 1641 and has a U.S. Coast Guard station. Most of the islands are privately owned.

Elizabeth II, 1926-, queen of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (1952-), elder daughter and successor of George VI. At age 18 she was made a State Counsellor, a confidante of the king. During World War II she trained as a junior subaltern (second lieutenant) in the women's services. On Nov. 20, 1947, she married Philip Mountbatten, duke of Edinburgh (see Edinburgh, Prince Philip Mountbatten, duke of). They were in Kenya (en route for a tour of Australia and New Zealand) when the king died (Feb. 6, 1952) and Elizabeth succeeded to the throne. Her coronation, on June 2, 1953, was the first to be televised.

An extremely popular queen, Elizabeth has traveled more extensively than any previous British monarch. Throughout her reign, expanded media coverage has brought the monarchy closer to the British people. Although the queen, who in public is formal and unemotional, continues to be greatly admired and respected, since the mid-1980s a barrage of tabloid reports about her children and their spouses has seriously tarnished the royal image. In 1992 she celebrated her 40th year on the throne, but it was also a year in which part of Windsor Castle suffered a devastating fire; her son Prince Andrew (b. 1960) separated from his wife, the former Sarah Ferguson (they were divorced in 1996); her daughter, Princess Anne, divorced; and her son and heir to the throne Prince Charles and his wife Princess Diana separated (they were divorced in 1996). Elizabeth's youngest son is Prince Edward (b. 1964). In 1992 Elizabeth, the wealthiest woman in England, agreed to pay income tax for the first time. Although she was widely criticized for her seeming insensitivity in the days following Princess Diana's death (1997), she had regained the public's esteem by the time of her golden jubilee, less than five years later.

Elizabeth I, 1533-1603, queen of England (1558-1603).

Early Life

The daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, she was declared illegitimate just before the execution of her mother in 1536, but in 1544 Parliament reestablished her in the succession after her half brother, Edward (later Edward VI), and her half sister, Mary (later Mary I). Elizabeth was well educated by a series of tutors, most notably Roger Ascham.

In 1553 she supported the claims of Mary I over Lady Jane Grey. After Mary was crowned, Elizabeth was careful to avoid implication in the plot of the younger Sir Thomas Wyatt (1554). Nevertheless, since Elizabeth's potential succession to the throne inevitably furnished a rallying point for discontented Protestants, she was imprisoned. She later regained a measure of freedom through outward conformity to Roman Catholicism.

Reign

When Elizabeth succeeded her sister to the throne in 1558, religious strife, a huge government debt, and failures in the war with France had brought England's fortunes to a low ebb. Elizabeth came to the throne with the Tudor concept of strong rule and the realization that effective rule depended upon popular support. She was able to select and work well with the most competent of counselors. Sir William Cecil (Lord Burghley) was appointed immediately, and Sir Francis Walsingham in 1573.

At her death 45 years later, England had passed through one of the greatest periods of its history—a period that produced William Shakespeare, Edmund Spenser, Francis Bacon, Walter Raleigh, Martin Frobisher, Francis Drake, and other notable figures in literature and exploration; a period that saw England, united as a nation, become a major European power with a great navy; a period in which English commerce and industry prospered and English colonization was begun.

Although Elizabeth has been accused, with some justice, of being vain, fickle, vacillating, prejudiced, and miserly, she was nonetheless exceedingly successful as a queen. Endowed with immense personal courage and a keen awareness of her responsibility as a ruler, she commanded throughout her reign the unwavering respect and allegiance of her subjects.

Domestic Developments

One of Elizabeth's first acts was to reestablish Protestantism (see England, Church of) through the acts of Supremacy and Uniformity (1559). The measures against Roman Catholics (see Penal Laws) grew harsher over the course of her reign, particularly after the rebellion of the Catholic earls of Northumberland and Westmorland (1569), Elizabeth's excommunication by the pope (1570), and the coming of the Jesuit missionaries (1580). But the persecution of the Catholics was due, at least in part, to a series of plots to murder Elizabeth and seat the Catholic Mary Queen of Scots on the throne. English Puritans, like the Catholics, objected to the Established Church, and a severe law against conventicles (unauthorized religious assemblies) in 1593 kept the separatist movement underground for the time.

At the beginning of her reign, Elizabeth's government enacted needed currency reforms and took steps to mend English credit abroad. Other legislation of the reign dealt with new social and economic developments—the Statute of Apprentices (1563) to stabilize labor conditions; the poor laws (1563-1601) to attempt some remedy of widespread poverty; and various acts to encourage agriculture, commerce, and manufacturing.

Foreign Affairs and the Spanish War

Elizabeth had many suitors, including King Philip II of Spain; Francis, duke of Alençon and Anjou; and her own favorite, Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester. For a combination of personal and political reasons, she was reluctant to choose a husband and remained unmarried, although she often used the lure of marriage as a weapon of diplomacy. Elizabeth engaged in a long series of diplomatic maneuvers against England's old enemy, France, and the new enemy, Spain, but for 30 years she managed to keep the country at peace.

In 1559 she concluded a treaty ending her sister's unfortunate war with France and refused the marriage offer of Philip of Spain. The next year the Treaty of Edinburgh initiated a policy toward Scotland, successful in the long run, of supporting the Protestant lords against the Catholic party. By lending unofficial aid to French Huguenots she managed for some time to harass France and Spain without involving England in an actual war. As part of her marriage negotiations she later supported the duke of Alençon's participation in the Dutch war against Spain.

The major problem posed by Elizabeth's refusal to marry was that of the succession. The chief claimant was Mary Queen of Scots, but her Catholicism made her a threat to Elizabeth. In 1568 after Mary's forced abdication from the Scottish throne, Elizabeth gave her refuge but then kept her prisoner for nearly 19 years. Despite the numerous plots, both real and alleged, on Mary's behalf, Elizabeth resisted until 1587 her counselors' advice that Mary be executed.

By that time Spain had emerged as England's main enemy. English sailors had been unofficially encouraged to encroach on Spanish monopolies and raid Spanish shipping. In 1588, Philip launched the long-planned expedition of the Spanish Armada as a great Catholic crusade against Protestant England. The Armada was defeated by the skill of such leaders as John Hawkins and Francis Drake and by storms, rather than planning on Elizabeth's part, but the victory strengthened English national pride and lowered the prestige of Spain. An indecisive war with Spain dragged on until Elizabeth's death. From the beginning of the reign Ireland had been the scene of civil wars and severe rebellions, culminating with that of the earl of Tyrone, which was suppressed by the campaigns of Lord Mountjoy from 1600 to 1603.

Declining Years

After the Armada, Elizabeth's popularity began to wane. Parliament became less tractable and began to object to the abuse of royally granted monopolies. The rash uprising of Elizabeth's favorite, Robert Devereux, 2d earl of Essex, darkened her last years. She refused until on her deathbed to name her successor—the son of Mary Queen of Scots, James VI of Scotland, who became James I of England.

Elizabeth Farnese, 1692-1766, queen of Spain, second consort of Philip V; niece of Antonio Farnese, duke of Parma. Soon after her marriage (1714), arranged by Cardinal Alberoni and the princesse des Ursins, she gained a strong influence over her weak husband and for some time, at first with Alberoni, virtually ruled Spain, though after 1743, Ensenada was the chief power in government. Her ambition to recoup Spanish losses incurred at the Peace of Utrecht and to secure Italian thrones for her children plunged Spain into several wars. As a result of a Spanish attack on Naples during the War of the Polish Succession, her son Carlos (later Charles III of Spain) became king of Naples and Sicily in 1734. Though Carlos was obliged to give up Parma and Piacenza, which he had inherited (1731), this duchy passed (1748) to his brother Philip. Elizabeth retired from court upon the accession (1746) of her stepson, Ferdinand VI.

Elizabeth City, city (1990 pop. 14,292), seat of Pasquotank co., NE N.C., a port of entry on the Pasquotank River (which, with the Dismal Swamp Canal, forms part of the Intracoastal Waterway); settled mid-1600s, inc. 1793. It is the largest city in the Albemarle Sound area, a trade and shipping center for the region's diversified farm products. There are shipyards, lumberyards, crabmeat processing plants, and varied manufactures. The area was first visited (1584) and mapped by a scouting expedition from Roanoke Island. The first General Assembly of Carolina met there in 1665. In the Civil War, Elizabeth City was occupied (1862) by Union troops and burned. It is the seat of Elizabeth City State Univ. and the College of the Albemarle. A large U.S. Coast Guard air station is nearby, as is Kitty Hawk.

Elizabeth Charlotte of Bavaria, 1652-1722, German princess, called the Princess Palatine and also known as Charlotte Elizabeth; wife of Philippe I d'Orléans, brother of King Louis XIV. She abjured the Protestant faith before her marriage (1671). The death of her brother, Elector Charles, provided Louis XIV with an opportunity to use her tenuous claims to part of the Palatinate as a pretext to expand French influence in that area, eventually contributing to the outbreak (1689) of the War of the Grand Alliance. Her frank and vigorous letters are a valuable source for the social history of her time. She was a friend and patron of Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz and mother of Philippe II d'Orléans, regent to King Louis XV.

Elizabeth, 1837-98, empress of Austria and queen of Hungary. A Bavarian princess, she was married (1854) to her cousin, Emperor Francis Joseph. Despite her exceptional beauty, intelligence, and kindness she led an unhappy domestic life, which was marred, moreover, by family tragedies (notably the death of her only son, Archduke Rudolf, and the death of one of her sisters in the charity bazaar fire in Paris, 1897). Independent and unconventional, she avoided the stiff etiquette of the Viennese court and spent much of her time abroad, chiefly on Corfu. She was assassinated by the Italian anarchist Luccheni in Geneva, Switzerland.

Elizabeth, 1709-62, czarina of Russia (1741-62), daughter of Peter I and Catherine I. She gained the throne by overthrowing the young czar, Ivan VI, and the regency of his mother, Anna Leopoldovna. Her coup was made possible by her popularity with the imperial guards, who hated the German favorites of Anna Leopoldovna. Elizabeth herself, armed, led the bloodless revolution. Guided in her foreign policy by her chancellor, A. P. Bestuzhev-Ryumin, Elizabeth sought to rid Russia of German influence. She victoriously sided against Frederick II of Prussia in the Seven Years War, but her death and the accession of her nephew, Peter III, took Russia out of the war and made Frederick's ultimate victory possible. During her reign the nobles acquired more power over their serfs and gained a dominant position in local government, while the terms of service they owed the state were shortened. The Moscow Univ. (now Moscow State Univ.) and the Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg were founded during her reign.

Elizabeth, 1596-1662, queen of Bohemia, daughter of James I of England. Her beauty attracted most of the royal suitors of Europe (she was nicknamed the "Queen of Hearts"), but she was married (1613) to Frederick V, elector palatine (see Frederick the Winter King) in order to cement an alliance between English and German Protestantism. She became queen of Bohemia in 1619, when her husband accepted the crown offered by the Bohemian diet. After Frederick was defeated (1620) in the battle of the White Mt., Elizabeth took up her residence in Holland, where she courageously endured privation and misfortune. She received little support from abroad, even from her son Charles Louis, who was restored to the Palatinate in 1648. In 1661 she returned to England against the wishes of King Charles II, who, however, pensioned her. Among her children were Prince Rupert; Princess Elizabeth, who was the patroness of Descartes; and Sophia, who was electress of Hanover and mother of George I of England.

Elizabeth, 1843-1916, queen of Romania, consort of King Carol I, whom she married in 1869. Of German birth, she was the daughter of Hermann, prince of Wied. She completely identified herself with her adopted people and devoted herself to their cultural development. Under the pseudonym Carmen Sylva the queen wrote extensively and with almost equal facility in German, French, English, and Romanian. She collaborated on several books with her lady-in-waiting, Mite Kremnitz.

Elizabeth, 1900-2002, queen consort of George VI of Great Britain, mother of Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret, b. London. She was Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon until her marriage (1923). During the Blitz in World War II, she and the king remained in London, becoming symbols of courage to the British people. Elizabeth assumed the title Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, when her daughter was crowned. An active public figure, affectionately called the "Queen Mum," she was Chancellor of the Univ. of London (1955-80) and one of the most enduringly popular members of the royal family.

Elizabeth, 1764-94, sister of King Louis XVI of France, known as Madame Elizabeth. Deeply loyal to her brother, she remained in France during the French Revolution, suffered imprisonment, and was guillotined.

Elizabeth: see Russell, Mary Annette.

Elizabeth, city (1990 pop. 110,002), seat of Union co., NE N.J., on Newark Bay; inc. 1855. It is a shipping and transportation hub, with some of the world's largest containerized dock facilities at Port Elizabeth. Since 1985 the harbor, as part of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, has seen a steady increase in the volume of containerized exports. Highly industrialized, Elizabeth makes furnaces, plastics, chemicals, metal and food products, tea, paperboard boxes, and pharmaceuticals. A campus of Union College is in the city. The Goethals Bridge (1928) links Elizabeth with Staten Island, N.Y., and Newark International Airport is nearby. Since the 1980s the Jersey Gardens Mall and other developments have made Elizabeth a retailing center.

The area was purchased (1664) from the Delaware and called Elizabethtown. From 1668 to 1682, Elizabeth borough served as the meeting place of the New Jersey assembly. Chartered as the town of Elizabeth in 1740, it was the scene of several Revolutionary clashes; many buildings were burned (1780). Among surviving older buildings are the 18th-century Elias Boudinot House and the 17th-century Nathaniel Bonnell House. Early industries were tanning and brewing. In the 19th cent., Elizabeth's proximity to New York City and the coming of the railroad stimulated great industrial expansion, especially in shipbuilding, machine production, and oil refining. Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr lived at times in Elizabeth.

Drew, Elizabeth, 1935-, American journalist, b. Cincinnati. A deeply insightful analyst of the national political scene, she was the Washington correspondent for two major U.S. magazines, the Atlantic (1967-73) and New Yorker (1973-92). Her account of the Watergate affair was published as Washington Journal (1975). She has also written ten other books, including Politics and Money (1983), On the Edge: The Clinton Presidency (1994), Showdown: The Struggle between the Gingrich Congress and the Clinton White House (1996), The Corruption of American Politics (1999), and Citizen McCain (2002).

Dole, Elizabeth Hanford, 1936-, American public official, b. Salisbury, N.C., B.A., Duke Univ., 1958, J.D., Harvard, 1965; wife of Bob Dole. A Republican, she held several government positions including commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission (1973-79). President Reagan appointed her secretary of transportation (1983-89) and President George H. W. Bush named her secretary of labor in 1989. In 1991 she resigned to become president of the American Red Cross. She took one-year leave of absence from the Red Cross in 1995-96 to support her husband's unsuccessful campaign for the presidency, then resigned in 1999 to run for president herself, but left the race before the primaries. In 2002 she was elected to the U.S. Senate from North Carolina.

David, Elizabeth, 1914-92, English food writer, b. Elizabeth Gwynne. Daughter of a wealthy Conservative MP, she cut her culinary eyeteeth in Paris while studying at the Sorbonne, then developed her literary style and taste for fine food while living in the south of France, in Italy, on a Greek island, and in Egypt during World War II. She returned to an England that had suffered through wartime and postwar shortage and rationing, which made an already notoriously bland diet more dismal. David soon began a quiet culinary revolution. With wit, wisdom, and various cookery ingredients previously considered suspiciously foreign, she introduced the English to fresh, flavorful fare and a sensual approach to the art of eating. David's cornucopia of influential books, famous for their refined style and historical accuracy, include the pioneering A Book of Mediterranean Food (1949), French Country Cooking (1951), Italian Food (1954), French Provincial Cooking (1960), and the pieces collected in An Omelette and a Glass of Wine (1984). Her later works often concentrate on livening up traditional English fare. Posthumously published collections of her work are Harvest of the Cold Months (1995) and Is There a Nutmeg in the House? (2001).

Charlotte Elizabeth: see Elizabeth Charlotte of Bavaria.

Carter, Elizabeth, 1717-1806, English poet and translator. Under the pen name Eliza she contributed for years to the Gentleman's Magazine. One of the group of 18th-century women known as the bluestockings, she was a friend of Johnson, Burke, Reynolds, and Horace Walpole. Collections of her poems appeared in 1738 and 1762. Her translations of Epictetus were published in 1758.

Cadbury, Dame Elizabeth, 1858-1951, English social worker and philanthropist, b. Elizabeth Mary Taylor, studied in France and Germany; wife of George Cadbury. She became interested in social service and was active in many organizations working for improvement in education, housing, and peace. She was a member of the Birmingham Education Committee after 1911 and of the International Council of Women and was city councilor of Birmingham (1919-25), president (1925) of the National Council of Evangelical Free Churches, and a justice of the peace (1926). In 1934 she was made Dame Commander of the British Empire.

Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 1806-61, English poet, b. Durham. A delicate and precocious child, she spent a great part of her early life in a state of semi-invalidism. She read voraciously—philosophy, history, literature—and she wrote verse. In 1838 the Barrett family moved to 50 Wimpole St., London. Six years later Elizabeth published Poems, which brought her immediate fame. The volume was a favorite of the poet Robert Browning, and he began to correspond with her. The two fell in love, but their courtship was secret because of the opposition of Elizabeth's tyrannical father. They married in 1846 and traveled to Italy, where most of their married life was spent and where their one son was born. Mrs. Browning threw herself into the cause of Italian liberation from Austria. "Casa Guidi," their home in Florence, is preserved as a memorial. Happy in her marriage, Mrs. Browning recovered her health in Italy, and her work as a poet gained in strength and significance. Her greatest poetry, Sonnets from the Portuguese (1850), was inspired by her own love story. Casa Guidi Windows (1851), on Italian liberty, and Aurora Leigh (1857), a novel in verse, followed. During her lifetime Mrs. Browning was considered a better poet than her husband. Today her life and personality excite more interest than her work. Although as a poet she has been criticized for diffuseness, pedantry, and sentimentality, she reveals in such poems as "The Cry of the Children" and some of the Sonnets from the Portuguese a highly individual gift for lyric poetry.

Brooks, Gwendolyn Elizabeth, 1917-2000, American poet, b. Topeka, Kans. She grew up in the slums of Chicago and lived in that city until her death. Brooks's poems, technically accomplished and written in a variety of forms including quatrains, free verse, ballads, and sonnets, deal with the experience of being black and often of being female in America. She attracted critical attention with her first volume, A Street in Bronzeville (1945). Brooks went on to win the 1950 Pulitzer Prize for poetry for Annie Allen (1949), becoming the first black woman to win this award. Her verse was collected in The World of Gwendolyn Brooks (1970), which also includes an earlier novelette, Maud Martha (1953). Her work took on a more radical tone beginning with In the Mecca (1968); the subsequent poems in Riot (1970) are written in street dialects. Her other writings include Primer for Blacks (1980) and To Disembark (1981).

Bowen, Elizabeth, 1899-1973, Anglo-Irish novelist, b. Dublin. In impeccable prose she treated love and frustration through studies of complex psychological relationships. Her novels include The Hotel (1927), To the North (1932), The House in Paris (1936), The Death of the Heart (1938), and The Heat of the Day (1949). In her last three novels—A World of Love (1955), Two Little Girls (1964), and Eva Trout; or, Changing Scenes (1968)—Bowen was less concerned with rendering reality than with exploring truths best expressed in myth or parable. Look at All Those Roses (1941), Ivy Gripped the Steps (1946), and A Day in the Dark and Other Stories (1965) are volumes of short stories. Nonfiction works include Bowen's Court (1942), on her ancestral home; The Shelbourne Hotel (1951); and Seven Winters; and Afterthoughts (1962), a collection of childhood memories and literary studies. Pictures and Conversations (1975) is a collection of miscellaneous writings, including portions of a novel and autobiography left unfinished at Bowen's death.

Blow, Susan Elizabeth, 1843-1916, American educator, b. St. Louis. After study in New York City under a disciple of Froebel, she opened in Carondelet (now in St. Louis) the first successful public kindergarten (1873) and a training school for kindergarten teachers (1874). Among her books are Symbolic Education (1894), Educational Issues in the Kindergarten (1908), and a translation of Froebel's Mutter- und Kose-Lieder (called Mother Play) in two volumes (1895).

Blackwell, Elizabeth, 1821-1910, American physician, b. England; sister of Henry Brown Blackwell. She was the first woman in the United States to receive a medical degree, which was granted (1849) to her by Geneva Medical College (then part of Geneva College, early name of Hobart). With her sister, Emily Blackwell (1826-1910) who was also a doctor, and Marie Zackrzewska, she founded (1857) the New York Infirmary for Women and Children, which was expanded in 1868 to include a Women's College for the training of doctors, the first of its kind. In 1869, Dr. Blackwell settled in England, where she became (1875) professor of gynecology at the London School of Medicine for Women, which she had helped to establish. She wrote Pioneer Work in Opening the Medical Profession to Women (1895) and many other books and papers on health and education.

Bishop, Elizabeth, 1911-79, American poet, b. Worcester, Mass., grad. Vassar, 1934. During the 1950s and 60s she lived in Brazil, eventually returning to her native New England, where she taught at Harvard (1970-77). Her first volume of poetry, North and South (1946), was reprinted with additions as North and South—A Cold Spring (1955; Pulitzer Prize). Her poetic vision is penetrating and detached; her style is subtle yet conversational. Without straining for novelty, she finds symbolic significance in objects and events quietly observed and scrupulously described. Among her other works are her Complete Poems (1979), The Collected Prose (1984), Geography III (1985); several travel books, notably Questions of Travel (1965) and Brazil (1967); and the posthumously published Edger Allan Poe & the Juke-Box: Uncollected Poems, Drafts and Fragments (2006). With Emanuel Brasil she edited An Anthology of Twentieth Century Brazilian Poetry (1972) and she also translated the works of several Brazilian poets.

Barton, Elizabeth, 1506?-1534, English prophet, called the Maid of Kent or the Nun of Kent. She was a domestic servant who, after a period of illness, began (c.1525) to go into trances and to utter prophecies, which were claimed to be of divine origin. She entered a convent in Canterbury, and, under the influence of Edward Bocking, her prophecies became increasingly dangerous politically. She foretold dire consequences to King Henry VIII should he divorce Katharine of Aragón and marry Anne Boleyn. Bocking probably hoped to stir an uprising against the king, but his protégée was arrested (1533) and brought to confess herself an impostor. She and her accomplices were put to death.

Barry, Elizabeth, 1658-1713, English actress. She gained entrance to the stage through the patronage of the earl of Rochester. From the time of her appearances at the Theatre Royal (1682-95) until her last performance at the Haymarket in 1710, she was Betterton's leading lady and reigned as the greatest tragic actress of the Restoration stage. She created the heroines in the tragedies of Thomas Otway, who all his life nourished a hopeless love for her.

Barrett, Elizabeth: see Browning, Elizabeth Barrett.

Anderson, Elizabeth Garrett, 1836-1917, English physician. A sister of Millicent Garrett Fawcett, Elizabeth also worked for woman suffrage. With difficulty she obtained a private medical education under accredited physicians and in London hospitals; in 1865 she was licensed to practice by the Scottish Society of Apothecaries. In London in 1866 she opened a dispensary, later a small hospital, for women and children, the first in England to be staffed by women physicians; it was known after 1918 as the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital. Largely as a result of her efforts, British examining boards opened their examinations to women.

Agassiz, Elizabeth Cabot Cary, 1822-1907, American author and educator, b. Boston. In 1850 she married Louis Agassiz, and together they established the pioneering Agassiz School for girls in Boston (1856-65). She accompanied her husband on expeditions to Brazil (1865-66) and along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the Americas (1871-72). She was one of a group (along with Arthur Gilman and Alice Longfellow) influential in the founding of Radcliffe College, and was (1894-1903) its first president. Her writings include A Journey in Brazil (in collaboration with her husband, 1868); a biography of her husband (1885); and, with her stepson Alexander Agassiz, Seaside Studies in Natural History (1865).

(born Feb. 27, 1932, London, Eng.) U.S. film actress. She left London for Los Angeles with her American parents at the outset of World War II. Noted for her exceptional beauty from childhood, she was discovered by a talent scout in Beverly Hills. She made her screen debut in 1942, appeared in Lassie Come Home in 1943, and became a star with National Velvet in 1944. She was a glamorous adult star in A Place in the Sun (1951), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), and Butterfield 8 (1960, Academy Award). In Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (1966, Academy Award) and other films, she starred opposite her husband, Richard Burton. After the mid-1970s, she appeared only intermittently in films, Broadway plays, and television films. Taylor's personal life (she was married eight times) was exceptionally well publicized and often tended to overshadow her acting career.

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orig. Elizabeth Cady

(born , Nov. 12, 1815, Johnstown, N.Y., U.S.—died Oct. 26, 1902, New York, N.Y.) U.S. social reformer and women's suffrage leader. She graduated from Troy Female Seminary (1832), and in 1840 she married the abolitionist Henry B. Stanton and began working to secure passage of a New York law giving property rights to married women. She and Lucretia Mott organized the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention. She joined forces in 1850 with Susan B. Anthony in the woman suffrage movement, and later she coedited the women's-rights newspaper The Revolution (1868–70). In 1869 she became the founding president of the National Woman Suffrage Association.

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orig. Elizabeth Ann Bayley known as Mother Seton

(born Aug. 28, 1774, New York, N.Y.—died Jan. 4, 1821, Emmitsburg, Md., U.S.; canonized Sept. 14, 1975; feast day January 4) U.S. religious leader and educator, the first native-born U.S. citizen canonized by the Roman Catholic church. Born into an upper-class family, she married William Magee Seton in 1794. In 1797 she founded the Society for the Relief of Poor Widows with Small Children, and in 1803 she was herself left a widow with five children. After converting from Episcopalianism to Roman Catholicism in 1805, she opened a free Catholic elementary school in Baltimore, Md., in 1809. In 1813 she founded the Sisters of Charity, the first U.S. religious order, and she served as its superior until her death. She is often considered the mother of the parochial school system in the U.S.

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orig. Elizabeth Ann Bayley known as Mother Seton

(born Aug. 28, 1774, New York, N.Y.—died Jan. 4, 1821, Emmitsburg, Md., U.S.; canonized Sept. 14, 1975; feast day January 4) U.S. religious leader and educator, the first native-born U.S. citizen canonized by the Roman Catholic church. Born into an upper-class family, she married William Magee Seton in 1794. In 1797 she founded the Society for the Relief of Poor Widows with Small Children, and in 1803 she was herself left a widow with five children. After converting from Episcopalianism to Roman Catholicism in 1805, she opened a free Catholic elementary school in Baltimore, Md., in 1809. In 1813 she founded the Sisters of Charity, the first U.S. religious order, and she served as its superior until her death. She is often considered the mother of the parochial school system in the U.S.

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Island group, northern Canada. Part of the Canadian Arctic archipelago, it comprises all the islands north of latitude 74°30' N, including the Parry and Sverdrup island groups. The islands, the largest of which are Ellesmere, Melville, Devon, and Axel Heiberg, have a total land area of over 150,000 sq mi (390,000 sq km). Probably first visited by the Vikings circa AD 1000, they were partially explored (1615–16) by English navigators William Baffin and Robert Bylot. The islands, which are administratively split between the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, were named in 1953 to honour Queen Elizabeth II.

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(born May 16, 1804, Billerica, Mass., U.S.—died Jan. 3, 1894, Jamaica Plain, Mass.) U.S. educator and leader in the kindergarten movement in America. She served as secretary to William Ellery Channing (1825–34) and worked with Bronson Alcott in his Temple School. She opened a Boston bookshop in 1839, which became a centre for Transcendentalist activities. She published works by Margaret Fuller and Nathaniel Hawthorne and also published and wrote articles for The Dial. Inspired by the work of Friedrich Froebel, she opened the first English-language kindergarten in the U.S. in 1860 and thereafter devoted herself to organizing public and private kindergartens. Her sisters married Horace Mann and Nathaniel Hawthorne.

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(born June 7, 1917, Topeka, Kan., U.S.—died Dec. 3, 2000, Chicago, Ill.) U.S. poet. Reared in the Chicago slums, Brooks published her first poem at age 13. With Annie Allen (1949), a loosely connected series of poems about growing up in Chicago, she became the first black poet to win the Pulitzer Prize. The Bean Eaters (1960) contains some of her best verse. Among her other books are In the Mecca (1968), the autobiographical Report from Part One (1972), Primer for Blacks (1980), Young Poets' Primer (1981), and Children Coming Home (1991).

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(born Oct. 25, 1692, Parma, Duchy of Parma—died July 11, 1766, Aranjuez, Spain) Queen consort of Philip V of Spain. A member of the ducal Farnese family of Parma, she became Philip's second wife in 1714 and quickly established ascendancy over her weak husband. Because his two sons by his first wife were in line to succeed him, she sought to secure Italian possessions for her own children, including Charles III. This quest embroiled Spain in wars and intrigues for three decades. However, she chose able and devoted ministers, who introduced beneficial internal reforms and improved Spain's economy. After Philip's death in 1746, she ceased to exert any real influence.

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(born Dec. 10, 1830, Amherst, Mass., U.S.—died May 15, 1886, Amherst) U.S. poet. Granddaughter of the cofounder of Amherst College and daughter of a respected lawyer and one-term congressman, Dickinson was educated at Amherst (Mass.) Academy and Mount Holyoke Female Seminary. She subsequently spent virtually all her life, increasingly reclusive, in her family home in Amherst. She began writing in the 1850s; by 1860 she was boldly experimenting with language and prosody, striving for vivid, exact words and epigrammatic concision while adhering to the basic quatrains and metres of the Protestant hymn. The subjects of her deceptively simple lyrics, whose depth and intensity contrast with the apparent quiet of her life, include love, death, and nature. Her numerous letters are sometimes equal in artistry to her poems. By 1870 she was dressing only in white and declining to see most visitors. Of her nearly 1,800 poems, only 10 are known to have been published during her lifetime. After posthumous publications (some rather inaccurate), her reputation and readership grew. Her complete works were published in 1955, and she has since become universally regarded as one of the greatest American poets.

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(born May 16, 1804, Billerica, Mass., U.S.—died Jan. 3, 1894, Jamaica Plain, Mass.) U.S. educator and leader in the kindergarten movement in America. She served as secretary to William Ellery Channing (1825–34) and worked with Bronson Alcott in his Temple School. She opened a Boston bookshop in 1839, which became a centre for Transcendentalist activities. She published works by Margaret Fuller and Nathaniel Hawthorne and also published and wrote articles for The Dial. Inspired by the work of Friedrich Froebel, she opened the first English-language kindergarten in the U.S. in 1860 and thereafter devoted herself to organizing public and private kindergartens. Her sisters married Horace Mann and Nathaniel Hawthorne.

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Chain of small islands, southeastern Massachusetts, U.S. Extending southwest for 16 mi (26 km) from the southwestern tip of Cape Cod, the group lies between Buzzards Bay and Vineyard Sound. The islands were visited in 1602 by the English navigator Bartholomew Gosnold, who established a short-lived (three-week) colony on the westernmost island of Cuttyhunk 18 years before the arrival of the Mayflower at Plymouth. Naushon, the largest island, was a British naval base during the War of 1812. The islands, covering an area of about 14 sq mi (36 sq km), are mostly privately owned. Cuttyhunk is a popular base for sportfishing.

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in full Elizabeth Alexandra Mary

(born April 21, 1926, London, Eng.) Queen of the United Kingdom from 1952. She became heir presumptive when her uncle, Edward VIII, abdicated and her father became king as George VI. In 1947 she married her distant cousin Philip, duke of Edinburgh, with whom she had four children, including Charles, prince of Wales. She became queen on her father's death in 1952. Increasingly aware of the modern role of the monarchy, she favoured simplicity in court life and took an informed interest in government business. In the 1990s the monarchy was troubled by the highly publicized marital difficulties of two of the queen's sons and the death of Diana, princess of Wales. In 2002 the queen's mother and sister died within two months of each other.

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(born Sept. 7, 1533, Greenwich, near London, Eng.—died March 24, 1603, Richmond, Surrey) Queen of England (1558–1603). Daughter of Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn, she displayed precocious seriousness as a child and received the rigorous education normally reserved for male heirs. Her situation was precarious during the reigns of her half brother Edward VI and her half sister Mary I. After Sir Thomas Wyatt's rebellion in 1554, she was imprisoned but later released. Her accession to the throne on Mary's death was greeted with public jubilation. She assembled a core of experienced advisers, including William Cecil and Francis Walsingham, but she zealously retained her power to make final decisions. Important events of her reign included the restoration of England to Protestantism; the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots; and England's defeat of the Spanish Armada. She lived under constant threat of conspiracies by British Catholics. Over time she became known as the Virgin Queen, wedded to her kingdom. Many important suitors came forward, and she showed signs of romantic attachment to the earl of Leicester, but she remained single, perhaps because she was unwilling to compromise her power. She had another suitor, the 2nd earl of Essex, executed in 1601 for treason. Though her later years saw an economic decline and disastrous military efforts to subdue the Irish, her reign had already seen England's emergence as a world power and her presence had helped unify the nation against foreign enemies. Highly intelligent and strong-willed, Elizabeth inspired ardent expressions of loyalty, and her reign saw a brilliant flourishing in the arts, especially literature and music. After her death, she was succeeded by James I.

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(born June 9, 1836, Aldeburgh, Suffolk, Eng.—died Dec. 17, 1917, Aldeburgh) British physician. Denied admission to medical schools, she studied privately with physicians and in London hospitals and was the first woman licensed as a physician in Britain (1865). Appointed general medical attendant to St. Mary's Dispensary (1866), later the New Hospital for Women, she created a medical school for women, and in 1918 the hospital was named for her.

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(born June 7, 1899, Dublin, Ire.—died Feb. 22, 1973, London, Eng.) Irish-born British novelist and short-story writer. Among her novels are The House in Paris (1935), The Death of the Heart (1938), and The Heat of the Day (1949). Her short-story collections include The Demon Lover (1945). Her finely wrought prose style frequently details uneasy and unfulfilling relationships among the upper middle class. Her essays appear in Collected Impressions (1950) and Afterthought (1962).

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orig. Elizabeth Cady

(born , Nov. 12, 1815, Johnstown, N.Y., U.S.—died Oct. 26, 1902, New York, N.Y.) U.S. social reformer and women's suffrage leader. She graduated from Troy Female Seminary (1832), and in 1840 she married the abolitionist Henry B. Stanton and began working to secure passage of a New York law giving property rights to married women. She and Lucretia Mott organized the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention. She joined forces in 1850 with Susan B. Anthony in the woman suffrage movement, and later she coedited the women's-rights newspaper The Revolution (1868–70). In 1869 she became the founding president of the National Woman Suffrage Association.

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(born June 7, 1899, Dublin, Ire.—died Feb. 22, 1973, London, Eng.) Irish-born British novelist and short-story writer. Among her novels are The House in Paris (1935), The Death of the Heart (1938), and The Heat of the Day (1949). Her short-story collections include The Demon Lover (1945). Her finely wrought prose style frequently details uneasy and unfulfilling relationships among the upper middle class. Her essays appear in Collected Impressions (1950) and Afterthought (1962).

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(born Feb. 3, 1821, Counterslip, Bristol, Gloucestershire, Eng.—died May 31, 1910, Hastings, Sussex) British-born U.S. physician. Her family immigrated to the U.S. in 1832. She began her medical education by reading medical books and hiring private instructors. Medical schools rejected her applications until she was accepted at the Geneva Medical (later Hobart) College in 1847. Though ostracized, she graduated at the head of her class in 1849, becoming the first woman doctor in modern times and the first to gain her degree from a U.S. medical school. In 1857, despite much opposition, she established the New York Infirmary, staffed entirely by women, and she later added a full course of medical education for women. She was also a founder of the London School of Medicine for Women. Her sister Emily (1826–1910) ran the infirmary for many years and served as dean and professor at the associated medical college.

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(born Feb. 8, 1911, Worcester, Mass., U.S.—died Oct. 6, 1979, Boston, Mass.) U.S. poet. Bishop was reared by relatives in Nova Scotia, Can., after her father died and her mother was institutionalized. In the 1950s and '60s she lived principally in Brazil with the Brazilian woman she loved. Her first book of poems (1946) contrasts her New England origins and her love of hot climates; reprinted with additions as North & South: A Cold Spring (1955), it received the Pulitzer Prize. Her works are celebrated for their formal brilliance and their close observations of everyday reality. They have elicited much admiration from other poets. Posthumous publications include The Collected Prose (1984) and One Art (1994), a collection of her letters.

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orig. Elizabeth Barrett

(born March 6, 1806, near Durham, Durham, Eng.—died June 29, 1861, Florence) British poet. Though she was an invalid who was afraid to meet strangers, her poetry became well known in literary circles with the publication of volumes of verse in 1838 and 1844. She met Robert Browning in 1845 and, after a courtship kept secret from her despotic father, they married and settled in Florence. Her reputation rests chiefly on the love poems written during their courtship, Sonnets from the Portuguese (1850). Her most ambitious work, the blank-verse novel Aurora Leigh (1857), was a huge popular success.

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orig. Elizabeth Barrett

(born March 6, 1806, near Durham, Durham, Eng.—died June 29, 1861, Florence) British poet. Though she was an invalid who was afraid to meet strangers, her poetry became well known in literary circles with the publication of volumes of verse in 1838 and 1844. She met Robert Browning in 1845 and, after a courtship kept secret from her despotic father, they married and settled in Florence. Her reputation rests chiefly on the love poems written during their courtship, Sonnets from the Portuguese (1850). Her most ambitious work, the blank-verse novel Aurora Leigh (1857), was a huge popular success.

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Russian Yelizaveta Petrovna

(born Dec. 18, 1709, Kolomenskoye, near Moscow, Russia—died Dec. 25, 1761, St. Petersburg) Empress of Russia (1741–61). Daughter of Peter I and Catherine I, she was proclaimed empress after staging a coup d'état and arresting Ivan VI, his mother, and their chief advisers. She encouraged the development of education and art and left control of most state affairs to her advisers and favorites. Her reign was characterized by court intrigues, a deteriorating financial situation, and the gentry's acquisition of privileges at the expense of the peasantry. However, Russia's prestige as a major European power grew. Russia adhered to a pro-Austrian, anti-Prussian foreign policy, annexed a portion of southern Finland after fighting a war with Sweden, improved its relations with Britain, and fought Prussia in the Seven Years' War. Elizabeth was succeeded by her nephew Peter III.

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(born Dec. 10, 1830, Amherst, Mass., U.S.—died May 15, 1886, Amherst) U.S. poet. Granddaughter of the cofounder of Amherst College and daughter of a respected lawyer and one-term congressman, Dickinson was educated at Amherst (Mass.) Academy and Mount Holyoke Female Seminary. She subsequently spent virtually all her life, increasingly reclusive, in her family home in Amherst. She began writing in the 1850s; by 1860 she was boldly experimenting with language and prosody, striving for vivid, exact words and epigrammatic concision while adhering to the basic quatrains and metres of the Protestant hymn. The subjects of her deceptively simple lyrics, whose depth and intensity contrast with the apparent quiet of her life, include love, death, and nature. Her numerous letters are sometimes equal in artistry to her poems. By 1870 she was dressing only in white and declining to see most visitors. Of her nearly 1,800 poems, only 10 are known to have been published during her lifetime. After posthumous publications (some rather inaccurate), her reputation and readership grew. Her complete works were published in 1955, and she has since become universally regarded as one of the greatest American poets.

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(born Feb. 27, 1932, London, Eng.) U.S. film actress. She left London for Los Angeles with her American parents at the outset of World War II. Noted for her exceptional beauty from childhood, she was discovered by a talent scout in Beverly Hills. She made her screen debut in 1942, appeared in Lassie Come Home in 1943, and became a star with National Velvet in 1944. She was a glamorous adult star in A Place in the Sun (1951), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), and Butterfield 8 (1960, Academy Award). In Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (1966, Academy Award) and other films, she starred opposite her husband, Richard Burton. After the mid-1970s, she appeared only intermittently in films, Broadway plays, and television films. Taylor's personal life (she was married eight times) was exceptionally well publicized and often tended to overshadow her acting career.

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(born June 7, 1917, Topeka, Kan., U.S.—died Dec. 3, 2000, Chicago, Ill.) U.S. poet. Reared in the Chicago slums, Brooks published her first poem at age 13. With Annie Allen (1949), a loosely connected series of poems about growing up in Chicago, she became the first black poet to win the Pulitzer Prize. The Bean Eaters (1960) contains some of her best verse. Among her other books are In the Mecca (1968), the autobiographical Report from Part One (1972), Primer for Blacks (1980), Young Poets' Primer (1981), and Children Coming Home (1991).

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(born Feb. 3, 1821, Counterslip, Bristol, Gloucestershire, Eng.—died May 31, 1910, Hastings, Sussex) British-born U.S. physician. Her family immigrated to the U.S. in 1832. She began her medical education by reading medical books and hiring private instructors. Medical schools rejected her applications until she was accepted at the Geneva Medical (later Hobart) College in 1847. Though ostracized, she graduated at the head of her class in 1849, becoming the first woman doctor in modern times and the first to gain her degree from a U.S. medical school. In 1857, despite much opposition, she established the New York Infirmary, staffed entirely by women, and she later added a full course of medical education for women. She was also a founder of the London School of Medicine for Women. Her sister Emily (1826–1910) ran the infirmary for many years and served as dean and professor at the associated medical college.

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(born Feb. 8, 1911, Worcester, Mass., U.S.—died Oct. 6, 1979, Boston, Mass.) U.S. poet. Bishop was reared by relatives in Nova Scotia, Can., after her father died and her mother was institutionalized. In the 1950s and '60s she lived principally in Brazil with the Brazilian woman she loved. Her first book of poems (1946) contrasts her New England origins and her love of hot climates; reprinted with additions as North & South: A Cold Spring (1955), it received the Pulitzer Prize. Her works are celebrated for their formal brilliance and their close observations of everyday reality. They have elicited much admiration from other poets. Posthumous publications include The Collected Prose (1984) and One Art (1994), a collection of her letters.

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(born June 9, 1836, Aldeburgh, Suffolk, Eng.—died Dec. 17, 1917, Aldeburgh) British physician. Denied admission to medical schools, she studied privately with physicians and in London hospitals and was the first woman licensed as a physician in Britain (1865). Appointed general medical attendant to St. Mary's Dispensary (1866), later the New Hospital for Women, she created a medical school for women, and in 1918 the hospital was named for her.

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