Elizabeth Talbot Shrewsbury

Shrewsbury, Elizabeth Talbot, countess of (1518-1608). ‘Bess of Hardwick’ was one of the most remarkable women in Elizabethan England. The daughter of a Derbyshire squire, she gained wealth and status through four increasingly ambitious marriages, the last (in 1567) to George Talbot, earl of Shrewsbury. After the earl's death, Bess, intriguer and termagant, was free to concentrate on her building and furnishing at Chatsworth and Hardwick Hall.