Elizabeth Spencer, Baroness Hunsdon

Elizabeth Spencer, Baroness Hunsdon was an English noblewoman, scholar, and patron of the arts. She was the inspiration for Edmund Spensers Muiopotmos, was commemorated in one of the poets dedicatory sonnets to the Faerie Queene, and was represented as Phyllis in the latters pastoral poem Colin Clouts Come Home Againe. She herself translated Petrarch. Her first husband was George Carey, 2nd Baron Hunsdon, grandson of Mary Boleyn, elder sister of Anne Boleyn, mother of Queen Elizabeth I.

Elizabeth Spencer was bornJune 1552 at Althorp, Northamptonshire, the second eldest daughter of Sir John Spencer of Althorp and his wife Katherine Kitson, the daughter of Sir Thomas Kitson of Hengrave, Suffolk. She had three brothers, Sir John Spencer, Sir William Spencer, and Sir Richard Spencer and three sisters, Anne Spencer, Baroness Mounteagle, Katherine Spencer, and Alice Spencer. In the year of her birth, Elizabeths father held the office of High Sheriff of Northamptonshire, and the following year was Member of Parliament for Northamptonshire.

Source: Wikipedia