ABSTRACT
Thomas Tomkins's collection of twenty-eight madrigals, the Songs of 3, 4, 5 and 6 parts, was steadily building throughout these years, each a tribute to a friend, relation or colleague. A very different kind of courtier gained Tomkins's admiration: William Herbert, earl of Pembroke. Both Clarendon in his History of the Rebellion and Aubrey in his Brief Live claim that Pembroke was the most universally loved and esteemed young man of his age. He was, wrote Aubrey, 'the greatest Maecenas to learned men of any peer of his time; or since'. Tomkins dedicated each of the twenty-eight Songs to individual members of his family and to friends, as well as collectively to the earl of Pembroke. He was the only English madrigalist to do this, albeit that the practice was well established in Italy.
