SHAKESPEAREAN PATRONS.

This article provides information about ten influential patrons of the arts during the late Tudor and early Stuart period. These patrons include Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton, who supported writers like William Shakespeare; Queen Elizabeth I, who favored the paintings of Nicholas Hilliard and established the Queen's Men acting company; Anne of Denmark, who supported British arts and had a fondness for masques; William Herbert, 3rd Earl of Pembroke, who supported playwrights like Ben Jonson; James VI and I, who granted a patent to Shakespeare's company and hired Inigo Jones to build Banqueting House; Edward Manners, 3rd Earl of Rutland, who was one of Shakespeare's earliest backers; Thomas Radclyffe, 3rd Earl of Sussex, who promoted plays and appointed patrons of acting companies; Sir Francis Walsingham, who was a powerful figure in Elizabethan England and commissioned plays for propaganda purposes; Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, who collected and commissioned paintings; and Henry Carey, Baron Hunsdon, who partnered with Walsingham in arranging court entertainment. [Extracted from the article]