THE POEMS OF ISABELLA WHITNEY: A CRITICAL EDITION by ...

together for the sake of a few shillings obtained from the
printer" (ii). Henry Green, in 1866, however, drew part of
his biography of Geoffrey Whitney from the poems "of his
sister Isabella" (liii-lvii), and the entry on Geoffrey
Whitney in the Dictionary of National Biography followed
Green's assertion (Sanders 143). Betty Travitsky, writing
in 1980, was less convinced, and called her "possibly the
sister of Geoffrey Whitney of Cheshire" ("Wyll" 77).
Travitsky continued, however, by pointing out the seeming
discrepancy between Geoffrey's country upbringing and
Isabella's comment in her "Wyll and Testament" that she was
London-bred (11. 76-77), and suggested that Isabella might
have been a more distant relative of Geoffrey's instead of
his sister ("Wyll" 78 n9). In answer to Travitsky, R. J.
Fehrenbach pointed out that the use of "London-bred" in the
poem might have meant nothing more than "Isabella's viewing
herself as having been educated or trained in the larger
sense in and by the city," and referred the reader to
Ascham's "similar use of the verb in 1570" ("Isabella
Whitney, Sir Hugh Plat," 10, and n8) .
The poems of A Sweet Nosgay, with which Collier was
apparently not familiar, clearly show that Isabella and
Geoffrey were brother and sister, not distant relatives.
The collection itself is dedicated to George Mainwaring,
Esquier (of Namptwich Hundred, Cheshire), by his
"Wellwilling Countrywoman." This is apparently the same
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