"Scandalous Speech and Slanderous Libelles": Robert Peterson, Claudio Tolomei, and the Translation of Free Speech in Early Modern England

Abstract:At the turn of the seventeenth century, Robert Peterson, an attorney working at the heart of Elizabethan government, translated one of the most detailed works on free speech to have emerged from the early modern era: Claudio Tolomei's treatise on "la libertà del parlare." Drawing on sources ancient and contemporary, Tolomei puts forward a rich and wide-ranging account of free speech and its implications for the prince and the smooth operation of government. This article offers the first analysis of Peterson's manuscript translation of Tolomei, locating it among the most important legislative trends concerning free speech in late Elizabethan England.