Sabrina and the Making of English History in Poly-Olbion and A Maske Presented at Ludlow Castle

The mythical figure Sabrina had a robust life in English writing about the past in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. This essay explores the many Sabrinas of this period, culminating in an examination of the relationship between the nymphs of Drayton's Poly-Olbion and Milton's A Maske Presented at Ludlow Castle. The Sabrina tradition shows that the nymph of Milton's masque arises not only from the Severn, but also from shifts in historiography. This new understanding of Sabrina and the making of history reveals how the radical presence and virginity of Milton's nymph engage ideas of national temporality, providing fertile ground for his later attacks on hereditary monarchy.