A biography of the sixteenth-century English sea captain Sir Francis Drake, who is famous for his voyage around the world, his raids against the Spanish, and his defeat of the Spanish Armada.

Drawing on archives from around the world, Colin Martin and Geoffrey Parker also deploy new evidence from Armada shipwrecks off the coasts of Ireland and Scotland. Their illustrated account provides a fresh understanding of how the rival fleets came into being; how they looked, sounded, and smelled; and what happened when they finally clashed. Looking beyond the events of 1588 to the complex politics which made war between England and Spain inevitable,...