This book brings together the work of two of the most significant women writers of the Renaissance. Elizabeth Cary's The Tragedy of Manam (printed in 1613) is the first surviving play printed in England known to be written by a woman, while Aemilia Lanyer's collection of poems Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum (1611) is an early attempt to create a network of female readers and patrons.

The works of both women explore questions of relationships between women, as well as contemporary political and social issues, religion and religious practice.

Elizabeth Cary was one of the few Renaissance Englishwomen with a publicly acknowledged position as a writer and patron within the discourses of Protestant humanism. Her later conversion to Roman Catholicism, however, cost her this place and, ironically, meant that until recently she was seen solely in terms of her religion.

This edition of The Tragedy of Mariam and The History of the Life, Reign and Death of Edward II, together with Aemilia Lanyer's Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum restores these two innovative women writers to literary and cultural history.