Penelope Rich, Lady Rich

Penelope Devereux, later Lady Rich and Countess of Devonshire, was the daughter of Walter Devereux, Earl of Essex, and Lettice Knollys. Through her mother’s secret marriage to Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, and through her brother Robert Devereux, she stood close to the political centre of Elizabeth I’s court. The poet Philip Sidney is traditionally associated with Penelope as the inspiration for Stella in his sonnet sequence Astrophil and Stella.

Her marriage to Robert Rich was unhappy, and Penelope maintained a long relationship with Charles Blount, Lord Mountjoy. She was questioned after her brother’s failed rebellion in 1601 but escaped the fate that overtook many of his supporters. Under James VI and I she remained socially prominent, though her separation from Rich and later marriage to Blount created a major scandal.

Penelope Rich appears directly in Tony Riches’s Essex – Tudor Rebel, Penelope – Tudor Baroness and Frances – Tudor Countess, where her family connections, relationship with Philip Sidney and survival after the Essex Rebellion link several strands of the Elizabethan series.