ABSTRACT
Walter Ralegh devoted much of the latter portion of his life to writing a massive universal history that was published in 1614 as the History of the World. The condition of loss permeated this text in three ways. First, Ralegh wrote from the perspective, shared with his contemporaries, that histories, though ultimately futile, supplied the most powerful measure to resist the natural and inevitable destruction of knowledge of past events. Second, his narrative was strongly informed by a Calvinist perspective, emphasizing humanity's loss of innocence after the Fall and its consequent depravity. Finally, he wrote the History while imprisoned in the Tower of London, where he had been confined by King James VI and I after the death of his beloved Queen Elizabeth; it was thus written in part as a reflection on his personal fall from favour. Loss thus infused all dimensions of Raleigh's History.
