Cesare Adelmare

Cesare Adelmare (died 1569) was a physician to Queens Mary I and Elizabeth I of Italian origin. He was also known by various other spellings, his first name often anglicised to Caesar, and his surname given forms such as Dalmariis, Dalmare, and Adelmari.[1]

Life

Cesare Adelmare, having graduated in arts and medicine at the University of Padua, migrated to England, apparently about 1550, and began practice in London as a physician. On 20 April 1554 "Caesar A Dalmariis" was "fined because they were practicing medicine against the law of the realm". A few days later 27 April 1554, he was elected to be a fellow, and in the following year censor, of the College of Physicians.[2]

He was appointed medical adviser to Queen Mary, from whom he obtained letters of naturalisation with immunity from taxation in 1558, and from whom he on one occasion received the enormous fee of £100 for a single attendance. Spanish agents to their government about him from England, suspecting him of being an agent of the Pope, or the Duke of Urbino, and perhaps even of poisoning Mary. In 1566 he was arrested as a partisan of Margaret Douglas, Countess of Lennox. Elizabeth also consulted him and rewarded his services by sundry leases of church lands at rents somewhat below their actual value. In 1561 he fixed his residence in Bishopsgate, having purchased a house which had formed part of the dissolved Priory of St. Helen's. There he died in 1569 and was buried at the church of Great St. Helens.[1]

Family

His father was Pietro Maria Adelmare, a citizen of Treviso, near Venice. This Pietro Maria Adelmare, was a lawyer, who married Paola, daughter of Giovanni Pietro Cesarini, possibly of the same family as Giuliano Cesarini, cardinal of St. Angelo, and president of the Council of Basle, 1431–8.

His wife was Margaret Perient or Perrin (died c.1583).[3] Margery Perient or Perrin's father was identified in one old visitation as the daughter of Martin Perient or Perrin, a treasurer in Ireland.[4][5] The name of Caesar, by which the doctor was usually addressed by Mary and Elizabeth, was adopted by his children as a surname:

Shortly after his death his widow married Michael Lok.

References

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: "Cæsar, Julius (1558-1636)". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.

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