ABSTRACT

Elizabeth Jocelin’s Mother’s Legacy to her Unborn Child is a book of conventional moral advice set out in the form of a single day’s ideal conduct. It was written during her first pregnancy to anticipate the possibility of dying in childbirth – highly likely in this age – and thus being prevented from guiding her child’s upbringing. Unfortunately her fears were justified, as she died nine days after giving birth to a daughter on 12 October 1622. Her manuscript (still extant though unfinished, and which provides the text for the Epistle presented below) was published in 1624 by Thomas Goad, who had known Elizabeth from childhood and was presumably a family friend. He prefaced her main work with a brief ‘Approbation’ of her life, and by including this moving personal letter from Jocelin to her husband.