Seven Solutions for Seven Problems: the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book

This chapter answers questions posed by Elizabeth Cole in 1953:

What was the book; who made it?
when was it made and where?
How made, and with what motive;
and who in the book did share?

The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book is a vast anthology of keyboard music. Although doubt has been cast on the identification of its scribe, Francis Tregian was probably the copyist. Scribal practice and the contents of the manuscript suggest that copying began in England c.1605. A detailed physical examination of the manuscript and its scribal characteristics shows how it was made and elucidates the motivation lying behind its compilation. Tregian had contact with Catholic composers, and obtained some of his exemplars from Peter Philips on the Continent.