Francis Tregian the Younger

Francis Tregian the Younger (1574–1618) was an English recusant. Once thought to have been the copyist of a handful of important music manuscripts, his musical activities are the subject of dispute.

Francis Tregian was the son of Francis Tregian the Elder and Mary Stourton. He is thought to have been born in 1574. (The birth year is derived from a household list drawn up in 1594 at the death of his teacher William Allen which referred to Tregian as being 20 years old: "molto nobile, di 20 anni, se colare di ingennio delicessimo dotto in filosofia, in musica et nella lingua latina." Not only is this the only document suggesting his age but it is also the only document associating him with music.) In 1577 his father was arrested for being a Roman Catholic and sheltering priests. He was imprisoned and dispossessed, and the Tregian family had to leave their manor house in Probus, Cornwall.

Tregian's mother and her children travelled 200 miles to London where her mother lived. Her father had been executed and her brother John had inherited the title of Baron Stourton. She hoped her brother could intercede for her husband. She lodged in Clerkenwell with her mother Lady Anne Arundell (her mother had remarried). She eventually moved to her husband's prison.

The younger Tregian was sent to France sometime between 1582 and 1586. Despite a statute enacted in 1585 by Queen Elizabeth I which levied a penalty on religious dissidents who sent their children to school overseas, on 29 September 1586, he entered the English College in Douai, a stronghold of Roman Catholicism. As fees had to be paid in advance, Persons surmises that the elder Tregian arranged payment of fees in advance with the College's agent based in London. At English College he probably undertook the typical course of study required of all beginning students which included Latin and Greek literature and grammar. Persons notes there was no evidence of Tregian's possible musical training at the English College. The younger Tregian apparently did well; he was chosen to give the congratulatory address to the Bishop of Piacenza on the latter's visit in 1591.

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