(c.1570–1618): Wit, Prince of Love and Recorder of London
Prominent in Temple Church is the monument to Richard Martin. His education and career could not be more of a contrast with a modern barrister’s: he spent around 15 years as a student at Middle Temple (where he seems to have spent most of his time having fun) before being called to the bar. He became a Member of Parliament a year before he was admitted as a barrister. He was born around 1570 in Devon, the eldest son of an Exeter merchant whose family came from Dorset gentry [1]. In the two years before he was admitted to Middle Temple, he went to Oxford University and then studied at New Inn – an Inn of Chancery at which Law French and Legal Latin were taught.
In 1585 he entered Broadgates Hall, Oxford (now Pembroke College), where he was admired as a debater and left without a degree [2]. In 1587 he was admitted to the Middle Temple. He was called to the bar in 1602 and became a Reader and Bencher in 1615 [1].
Martin’s family was prosperous, but money was a constant problem. He inherited land and £300 when his father died in 1609. Later he relied heavily on the financier Sir Lionel Cranfield, to whom he owed £2,400 in 1618. The two men exchanged Martin’s legal advice for Cranfield’s financial help [1].
In the Christmas Revels of 1597–98 Martin was elected “Prince d’Amour”, the Prince of Love, who presided over the Inn’s festivities as a mock monarch. He associated with poets and John Davies dedicated Orchestra (1596), his poem in praise of dancing, to “his very friend, Master Richard Martin”, and credited him with first prompting it. Ben Jonson praised his help in the 1616 edition of Poetaster. Music, dancing and poetry were expected accomplishments for a young gentleman, and the Christmas revels which Martin presided over as Prince d’Amour were full of all three.
Martin also promoted English settlement in America. He sat on a Virginia Company committee in 1609 and invested £75 in the venture. In May 1614 he spoke as counsel for the Company before the House of Commons. Instead of sticking to the case, he lectured the House on how it should behave. The letter-writer John Chamberlain reported that he “so schooled the House” he was called to the bar to apologise [3]. Martin told the House that his zeal had got the better of his judgement. He was pardoned and then asked for a committee to consider Virginia’s affairs [4]. In 1615 he joined the Somers Isles Company, which governed Bermuda [1].
In 1618 King James recommended him for Recorder of London, the City’s senior law officer. He held the office for less than a month and died of smallpox on 31 October 1618.
Hear more stories like this on our Legal London walking tour of the Royal Courts of Justice and the Inns of Court.
[1] History of Parliament: Martin, Richard (c.1570–1618)
[2] Anthony à Wood, Athenae Oxonienses, vol. 1, p. 374
[3] Calendar of State Papers Colonial, May 1614 (Chamberlain’s letter)
[4] House of Commons Journal, 18 May 1614