Background
Fulke Greville was born 3 October 1554, at Beauchamp Court, near Alcester, Warwickshire. He was the grandson of Robert Greville, younger son of Sir Fulke Greville and Elizabeth, 3rd Baroness Willoughby de Broke.
english courtier, official and poet
Fulke Greville was born 3 October 1554, at Beauchamp Court, near Alcester, Warwickshire. He was the grandson of Robert Greville, younger son of Sir Fulke Greville and Elizabeth, 3rd Baroness Willoughby de Broke.
He was educated at Shrewsbury School before enrolling at Jesus College, Cambridge in 1568.
In 1581, he was elected in a by-election as Member of Parliament for Southampton. Queen Elizabeth made him secretary to the principality of Wales in 1583. However he was put out of favour more than once for leaving the country against her wishes.
Greville participated in the Battle of Coutras in 1587. About 1591 Greville served further for a short time in Normandy under King Henry III of Navarre in the French Wars of Religion. This was his last experience of war.
Greville represented Warwickshire in parliament in 1592-1593, 1597, 1601 and 1621. In 1598 he was made Treasurer of the Navy, and he retained the office through the early years of the reign of James I. He was an informed observer of international affairs and wished to see a Protestant League in Europe, but his efforts to forward it were thwarted by royal authority, with the result that he developed a cynical attitude toward politics which is mirrored in his Senecan closet dramas, Mustapha and Alaham, published in 1609 and 1633, but probably written before 1600.
Greville was granted Warwick Castle by King James I in 1604. The castle was in a dilapidated condition when he took possession of it, and he spent £20,000 to restore it to former glory.
In 1614 he became chancellor and under-treasurer of the exchequer, and throughout the reign he was a valued supporter of James I, although in 1615 he advocated the summoning of Parliament.
In 1618 he became commissioner of the treasury, and in 1621 he was raised to the peerage with the title of Baron Brooke, a title which had belonged to the family of his paternal grandmother.
Lord Brooke left no natural heirs, and his senior (Brooke) barony passed to his cousin and adopted son, Robert Greville (1608–1643), who took the side of Parliament part in the English Civil War, and defeated the Royalists in a skirmish at Kineton in August 1642. Robert was killed during the siege of Lichfield on 2 March 1643, having survived the elder Greville by only fifteen years. His other barony (Willoughby de Broke) was inherited by his sister Margaret who married Sir Richard Verney.