Spying for Queen Elizabeth I was very different from modern-day intelligence services - or was it? This lecture brings together historian Stephen Alford and Sir Richard Dearlove, former head of MI6, and will discuss Tudor spies and the modern-day secret service.

This lecture celebrates 500 years since the birth of William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, an intelligence-gatherer for Elizabeth I across Europe, who also brought his son, Sir Robert Cecil, into the world of secret Elizabethan intelligence.

The lecture also looks at the use of secret communications like codes and cipher.

A lecture by Stephen Alford and Sir Richard Dearlove KCMG OBE, 23 March

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/spying-for-queen-and-country

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

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