Richard Martin (Recorder of London)
Encyclopedia
Richard Martin was an English lawyer
, orator, and supporter of the Virginia Company
who was appointed Recorder of the City of London at the recommendation of James I of England
in 1618 but died shortly thereafter.
, one of the Inns of Court
providing legal training in Elizabethan
London, on 7 November 1587. He was a member of a group of intellectual men, poets, and playwrights including John Donne
and Ben Jonson
who met the first Friday of every month at the Mermaid Tavern
in Bread Street
. Martin was "universally well regarded for his warmth of nature, personal beauty, and graceful speech", and was elected "prince of Love" to preside over the Christmas
grand revels
of the Middle Temple in the winter of 1597/98. Michelle O'Callaghan points out that those elected to oversee the grand revels had to be skilled in "singing, dancing, and music", and well-versed in "rhetoric, law and other scholastic exercises travestied" in the revels. The poet John Davies
dedicated his 1596 collection "Orchestra, or a Poeme of Dauncing" to Martin, but they fell out soon after, and Davies was disbarred and briefly thrown in the Tower of London
in February 1598 "for thrashing his friend, another roysterer of the day, Mr. Richard Martin, in the Middle Temple Hall" with a cudgel. (Davies publicly apologized to Martin in 1601 and was readmitted to the English Bar
. He went on to have a brilliant legal career.)
Martin defended Jonson and his controversial 1602 play "The Poetaster" to the Lord Chief Justice
Sir John Popham. Later, Jonson acknowledged Martin in the dedication of the 1616 folio edition of "The Poetaster" "for whose innocence as for the author's you were once a noble and kindly undertaker to the greatest justice [Popham] of this kingdom."
Martin is mentioned in, and was perhaps a co-author of, the poetic libel "The Parliament Fart", one of the most popular and malleable comic poems of the early Stuart era, which originated in the circle of tavern wits of which Martin was a part.
for Barnstaple
in 1601. Following the death of Queen Elizabeth
in 1603, Martin was chosen to give a speech welcoming the new King James to London on behalf of the Sheriffs of London and Middlesex
as part of the celebrations of the royal entry
on 7 May. In his speech, Martin reminded the king of the breadth of his new kingdom and warned of the dangers of piracy
. The speech was printed that same year.
Martin was M.P. for Christchurch
in James's first Parliament (1604-11) and Counsel to the Virginia Company from 1612. In May 1614, Martin was invited to speak before the Addled Parliament
on the Colony of Virginia as lawyer for the company. From 1611 Martin had taken an active interest in the colonization of the Bermuda Islands
or Somers Isles, and in 1615 was a founding shareholder of the Somers Isles Company
chartered to manage the colony.
On the death of Sir Anthony Benn, 29 September 1618, King James recommended Martin to the City of London for their recorder or chief counsel to the Lord Mayor, and he was chosen to the position, but died about a month after, of the smallpox
, on Sunday morning 2 November 1618, and was buried in the Temple Church
, London.
In 1617, when the treasury of the Virginia Company was exhausted, societies of private adventurers were authorized to settle plantations in Virginia under the style of "hundreds." One of the first of these societies, organized in 1618 as the Society of Martin's Hundred, was named in honor of Richard Martin who had so eloquently defended Virginia before Parliament in 1614. Martin's Hundred
, containing some 80000 acres (323.7 km²), was about seven miles (11 km) below Jamestown, Virginia
, on the north side of the James River
.
Lawyer
A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...
, orator, and supporter of the Virginia Company
Virginia Company
The Virginia Company refers collectively to a pair of English joint stock companies chartered by James I on 10 April1606 with the purposes of establishing settlements on the coast of North America...
who was appointed Recorder of the City of London at the recommendation of James I of England
James I of England
James VI and I was King of Scots as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the English and Scottish crowns on 24 March 1603...
in 1618 but died shortly thereafter.
Lawyer and tavern wit
Martin studied at Oxford University and was admitted to the Middle TempleMiddle Temple
The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers; the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn...
, one of the Inns of Court
Inns of Court
The Inns of Court in London are the professional associations for barristers in England and Wales. All such barristers must belong to one such association. They have supervisory and disciplinary functions over their members. The Inns also provide libraries, dining facilities and professional...
providing legal training in Elizabethan
Elizabethan era
The Elizabethan era was the epoch in English history of Queen Elizabeth I's reign . Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history...
London, on 7 November 1587. He was a member of a group of intellectual men, poets, and playwrights including John Donne
John Donne
John Donne 31 March 1631), English poet, satirist, lawyer, and priest, is now considered the preeminent representative of the metaphysical poets. His works are notable for their strong and sensual style and include sonnets, love poetry, religious poems, Latin translations, epigrams, elegies, songs,...
and Ben Jonson
Ben Jonson
Benjamin Jonson was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor. A contemporary of William Shakespeare, he is best known for his satirical plays, particularly Volpone, The Alchemist, and Bartholomew Fair, which are considered his best, and his lyric poems...
who met the first Friday of every month at the Mermaid Tavern
Mermaid Tavern
The Mermaid Tavern was a tavern on Cheapside in London during the Elizabethan era, located east of St. Paul's Cathedral on the corner of Friday Street and Bread Street. It was the site of the so-called Friday Street Club...
in Bread Street
Bread Street
Bread Street is a ward of the City of London and is named from its principal street, which was anciently the bread market; for by the records it appears that in 1302, the bakers of London were ordered to sell no bread at their houses but in the open market...
. Martin was "universally well regarded for his warmth of nature, personal beauty, and graceful speech", and was elected "prince of Love" to preside over the Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
grand revels
Revels
Revels is a contemporary series of American seasonal stage performances, initially given at Christmas time as the Christmas Revels at Town Hall in New York City in 1957, which involve singing, dancing, recitals, theatrics , and usually some audience participation, all appropriate to the season...
of the Middle Temple in the winter of 1597/98. Michelle O'Callaghan points out that those elected to oversee the grand revels had to be skilled in "singing, dancing, and music", and well-versed in "rhetoric, law and other scholastic exercises travestied" in the revels. The poet John Davies
John Davies (poet)
Sir John Davies was an English poet and lawyer, who became attorney general in Ireland and formulated many of the legal principles that underpinned the British Empire.-Early life:...
dedicated his 1596 collection "Orchestra, or a Poeme of Dauncing" to Martin, but they fell out soon after, and Davies was disbarred and briefly thrown in the Tower of London
Tower of London
Her Majesty's Royal Palace and Fortress, more commonly known as the Tower of London, is a historic castle on the north bank of the River Thames in central London, England. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the eastern edge of the City of London by the open space...
in February 1598 "for thrashing his friend, another roysterer of the day, Mr. Richard Martin, in the Middle Temple Hall" with a cudgel. (Davies publicly apologized to Martin in 1601 and was readmitted to the English Bar
Call to the bar
The Call to the Bar is a legal term of art in most common law jurisdictions where persons must be qualified to be allowed to argue in court on behalf of another party, and are then said to have been "called to the bar" or to have received a "call to the bar"...
. He went on to have a brilliant legal career.)
Martin defended Jonson and his controversial 1602 play "The Poetaster" to the Lord Chief Justice
Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales
The Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales is the head of the judiciary and President of the Courts of England and Wales. Historically, he was the second-highest judge of the Courts of England and Wales, after the Lord Chancellor, but that changed as a result of the Constitutional Reform Act 2005,...
Sir John Popham. Later, Jonson acknowledged Martin in the dedication of the 1616 folio edition of "The Poetaster" "for whose innocence as for the author's you were once a noble and kindly undertaker to the greatest justice [Popham] of this kingdom."
Martin is mentioned in, and was perhaps a co-author of, the poetic libel "The Parliament Fart", one of the most popular and malleable comic poems of the early Stuart era, which originated in the circle of tavern wits of which Martin was a part.
Parliament and the Virginia Company
Martin was elected member of ParliamentMember of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Barnstaple
Barnstaple (UK Parliament constituency)
Barnstaple was a parliamentary constituency centred on the town of Barnstaple in Devon, in the South West of England. It returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom until 1885, when its representation was reduced to one member.The constituency...
in 1601. Following the death of Queen Elizabeth
Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...
in 1603, Martin was chosen to give a speech welcoming the new King James to London on behalf of the Sheriffs of London and Middlesex
Middlesex
Middlesex is one of the historic counties of England and the second smallest by area. The low-lying county contained the wealthy and politically independent City of London on its southern boundary and was dominated by it from a very early time...
as part of the celebrations of the royal entry
Royal Entry
The Royal Entry, also known by various other names, including Triumphal Entry and Joyous Entry, embraced the ceremonial and festivities accompanying a formal entry by a ruler or his representative into a city in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period in Europe...
on 7 May. In his speech, Martin reminded the king of the breadth of his new kingdom and warned of the dangers of piracy
Piracy
Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence at sea. The term can include acts committed on land, in the air, or in other major bodies of water or on a shore. It does not normally include crimes committed against persons traveling on the same vessel as the perpetrator...
. The speech was printed that same year.
Martin was M.P. for Christchurch
Christchurch (UK Parliament constituency)
Christchurch is a parliamentary constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Centred on the town of Christchurch in Dorset, it elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election....
in James's first Parliament (1604-11) and Counsel to the Virginia Company from 1612. In May 1614, Martin was invited to speak before the Addled Parliament
Addled Parliament
The Addled Parliament was the second Parliament of England of the reign of James I of England , which sat between 5 April and 7 June 1614...
on the Colony of Virginia as lawyer for the company. From 1611 Martin had taken an active interest in the colonization of the Bermuda Islands
Bermuda
Bermuda is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, its nearest landmass is Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. It is about south of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and northeast of Miami, Florida...
or Somers Isles, and in 1615 was a founding shareholder of the Somers Isles Company
Somers Isles Company
The Somers Isles Company was formed in 1615 to operate the English colony of the Somers Isles, also known as Bermuda, as a commercial venture. It held a royal charter for Bermuda until 1684, when it was dissolved, and the Crown assumed responsibility for the administration of Bermuda as a royal...
chartered to manage the colony.
On the death of Sir Anthony Benn, 29 September 1618, King James recommended Martin to the City of London for their recorder or chief counsel to the Lord Mayor, and he was chosen to the position, but died about a month after, of the smallpox
Smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease unique to humans, caused by either of two virus variants, Variola major and Variola minor. The disease is also known by the Latin names Variola or Variola vera, which is a derivative of the Latin varius, meaning "spotted", or varus, meaning "pimple"...
, on Sunday morning 2 November 1618, and was buried in the Temple Church
Temple Church
The Temple Church is a late-12th-century church in London located between Fleet Street and the River Thames, built for and by the Knights Templar as their English headquarters. In modern times, two Inns of Court both use the church. It is famous for its effigy tombs and for being a round church...
, London.
In 1617, when the treasury of the Virginia Company was exhausted, societies of private adventurers were authorized to settle plantations in Virginia under the style of "hundreds." One of the first of these societies, organized in 1618 as the Society of Martin's Hundred, was named in honor of Richard Martin who had so eloquently defended Virginia before Parliament in 1614. Martin's Hundred
Martin's Hundred
Martin's Hundred was an early 17th century plantation located along about ten miles of the north shore of the James River in the Virginia Colony east of Jamestown in the southeastern portion of present-day James City County, Virginia...
, containing some 80000 acres (323.7 km²), was about seven miles (11 km) below Jamestown, Virginia
Jamestown, Virginia
Jamestown was a settlement in the Colony of Virginia. Established by the Virginia Company of London as "James Fort" on May 14, 1607 , it was the first permanent English settlement in what is now the United States, following several earlier failed attempts, including the Lost Colony of Roanoke...
, on the north side of the James River
James River
The James River may refer to:Rivers in the United States and their namesakes* James River * James River , North Dakota, South Dakota* James River * James River * James River...
.