Vem daterade Robert Dudley, earl av Leicester?

Robert Dudley, 1:e earl av Leicester, född 24 juni 1532, död 4 september 1588, var under lång tid Elisabet I:s gunstling och ryktades många gånger vara nära att bli hennes make. Leicester utsågs år 1585 till Elisabets Governor-General i Nederländerna, och han var "Lieutenant and Captain-General of the Queen's Armies and Companies" när England besegrade den spanska armadan 1588. Leicester var också medlem av drottningens Privy Council och kansler för universiteten i Cambridge och Oxford.

Douglas, Lady Sheffield (née Howard; 1542/1543 – 1608), was an English noblewoman, the lover of Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester and mother by him of explorer-cartographer Sir Robert Dudley, an illegitimate son.

Seventeen years after Leicester's death she claimed in litigation that she had secretly been his wife, although she had herself remarried while Leicester was still alive.