Both born in 1552, they held academic posts in Oxford colleges. Wikimedia Commonsīoth of them were resident foreigners – one, Italian, the other French – who had come to England some five years earlier as Protestant asylum seekers. They solicited the advice of two of Europe’s most prestigious experts in international law, Alberico Gentili and Jean Hotman.īernardino de Mendoza by an unknown artist. Elizabeth’s Privy Council wanted Mendoza tried for treason, but they weren’t sure of the legality of this move. By replacing Elizabeth on the throne with her Catholic cousin Mary Queen of Scots, the plan was to restore Protestant England to Catholicism.
Elizabeth I faced just such situation in 1584, when the Spanish ambassador in London, Don Bernardino de Mendoza, was implicated in the Throckmorton Plot to assassinate her. Sometimes these hostile foreign agents are under diplomatic cover. These are questions the UK government has asked time and time again when dealing with hostile foreign agents operating on British soil – most recently following the attempted murder of former Russian spy, Sergei Skripal and his daughter. In its aftermath, Her Majesty’s government asks her expert advisers what is the appropriate level of response and what action should be taken against murderous foreign agents and state-sponsored terrorism.
Professor of Shakespeare and Performance StudiesĪ foreign state sponsors a political assassination on English soil. When the Spanish ambassador to Elizabeth I’s court was implicated in a plot to kill her, he was protected by the fledgling laws of diplomacy.
Mary Queen of Scots was at the centre of numerous plots to kill Queen Elizabeth I.
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