Record revealed
Letters from the curator of St Vincent Botanic Gardens
Discover how plants travelled across the British Empire in the 19th century and the effect this has on our natural environment, and eating habits, today.
Series
Secretaries of State: State Papers Foreign, Elizabeth I
Catalogue reference: SP 70
What's it about?
SP 70
Letters and papers relating to foreign countries, of the reign of Elizabeth I to the year 1577 (other than the final piece in the series, SP 70/148). The majority of the volumes are composed of individual letters and papers except where stated.
Full description and record details
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Reference (The unique identifier to the record described, used to order and refer to it)
- SP 70
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Title (The name of the record)
- Secretaries of State: State Papers Foreign, Elizabeth I
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Date (When the record was created)
- 1558-1577
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Description (What the record is about)
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Letters and papers relating to foreign countries, of the reign of Elizabeth I to the year 1577 (other than the final piece in the series, SP 70/148).
The majority of the volumes are composed of individual letters and papers except where stated.
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Arrangement (Information about the filing sequence or logical order of the record)
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Arrangement
The records were rearranged and numbering in chronological order for the most part prior to calendaring.
Any original context has almost wholly been overlaid by their rearrangement and numbering in date order throughout the series (other than SP 70/146-148) as published in the 'Calendar of State Papers Foreign Series of the Reign of Elizabeth I for the period November 1558 to June 1577' edited by Joseph Stevenson and Allan James Crosby (London 1863-1880). Pencil notes on many documents identify particular documents as 'Flanders', 'Germany', 'Denmark' etc; these may perhaps indicate that the papers had previously been arranged in country order.
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Separated material (A cross-reference between records that are related by provenance but now kept separately)
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Many state papers from the reign of Elizabeth can be found among the Salisbury Manuscripts at Hatfield House. These papers were calendared by the Historical Manuscripts Commission: see Calendar of the manuscripts of the Most Honourable The Marquis of Salisbury, KG (London, 1883-1976).
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Held by (Who holds the record)
- The National Archives, Kew
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Legal status (A note as to whether the record being described is a Public Record or not)
- Public Record(s)
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Language (The language of the record)
- English
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Physical description (The amount and form of the record)
- 148 volume(s)
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Access conditions (Information on conditions that restrict or affect access to the record)
- Available in digital format
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Subjects (Categories and themes found in our collection (our subject list is under development, and some records may have no subjects or fewer than expected))
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- Topics
- International
- Litigation
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Custodial history (Describes where and how the record has been held from creation to transfer to The National Archives)
- The provenance of the letters and papers contained in this series is difficult to discover, except that the papers were kept in the custody of the State Paper Office and were not in general added to from other repositories. SP 70/1-145 were bound up, apparently in the early 1860s, in approximately the same size and style (except for SP 70/99 and SP 70/129A). Nearly all of these volumes contain a note dated June 1893 stating that the papers formerly bound up in the volumes relating to the affairs of the Borders of Scotland were restored to the series of Border Papers from which they were originally taken (series SP 59). SP 70/146-148 were added to the series later.
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Publication note(s) (A note of publications related to the record)
- Most of the records are described in the 'Calendar of State Papers Foreign Series of the Reign of Elizabeth I for the period November 1558 to June 1577' edited by Joseph Stevenson and Allan James Crosby (London 1863-1880). Please speak to staff at the Map and Large Document Room enquiry desk for the precise location.
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Record URL
- https://beta.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/id/C13612/
Catalogue hierarchy
Over 27 million records
This record is held at The National Archives, Kew
209,296 records
Within the department: SP
Records assembled by the State Paper Office, including papers of the Secretaries...
You are currently looking at the series: SP 70
Secretaries of State: State Papers Foreign, Elizabeth I
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