Russia at the Close of the Sixteenth Century

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. This volume contains two narratives about Russia: Of the Russe Common Wealth by Giles Fletcher, Queen Elizabeth's ambassador to the Russian court in 1588, and a transcription of the manuscript account of the travels of Sir Jerome Horsey, who lived in Russia from 1575 to 1591, firstly as an agent of the English Russia Company, and later as a diplomat. Appendices include Horsey's description of the coronation of Tsar Fyodor I in 1584.