Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Lupo, Thomas

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LUPO or LUPUS, THOMAS, the elder (d. 1628?), musician, was son of Josepho Lupo, one of Queen Elizabeth's musicians. The father was living in Blackfriars in 1571, and was officially described in a return of strangers as a Venetian and musician (Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. viii. 448). His name appears in the third place in a list of the royal bandsmen dated 1 Jan. 1579, being immediately preceded apparently by his brothers, Ambrosio Lupo ‘de Milan,’ who came to England in 1559 and died in 1596 (cf. Hatfield MSS. pt. iv. 19), and by Petro Lupo. The son Thomas seems to have joined the queen's band some years before 1600, when his name follows his father's on a list of New-year's gifts presented by Elizabeth to her attendants. In a similar list for 1606 ‘Thomas Lupo, senior,’ figures again. About May 1628 Robert Johnson applied for the post of composer to the lutes and voices at court which he described as vacant owing to the death apparently of Thomas Lupo the elder.

Lupo, Thomas, the younger (fl. 1598–1641), was probably first cousin of the above, being the son of Petro Lupo, at one time in the service of Leicester, Queen Elizabeth's favourite, and afterwards (1 Jan. 1579) one of the queen's musicians. It is very difficult to distinguish between the elder and younger Thomas Lupo. The younger, apparently, was at midsummer 1598 appointed one of her majesty's violins at a salary of 20d. a day, besides 16l. 2s. 6d. for liveries—a sum exceeding that received by Petro his father at the same time. In the list of New-year's presents on 1 Jan. 1600 Petro's son is accorded a much lower place than the elder Thomas, and both figure in a similar list for 1606, being distinguished as senior and junior. The younger appears to have become one of the musicians of Prince Henry (Nichols, Progresses of James I). In 1610 Prince Henry's band of musicians was headed by Dr. John Bull, after whom came Thomas Lupo. In the following year he had fallen to the third place on the list. The first ten musicians, including Dr. Bull, received each of them 40l. a year. In 1622 Thomas Lupo was twice reduced to the necessity of petitioning the Prince of Wales for advances amounting in all to 50l. In the list of royal musicians at the accession of Charles I he occupies the sixth place, being preceded by Nicholas Laniere, T. Ford, A. Johnson, T. Day, and Alfonso Ferrabosco, and on 13 Jan. 1628 he wrote to Edward Nicholas, begging him to remind the Duke of Buckingham to give his son a purser's place, and offering a bribe of 30l. Late in 1628 Stephen Nau succeeded Lupo at court as composer for the violin. By a warrant dated 1 Dec. 1628 his pension of 40l. was continued to his son Theophilus, also one of his majesty's violins. Both he and Theophilus were living in 1641. Many compositions are assigned to Thomas Lupo, but it is impossible to determine to which of the two each belongs. In 1607 Thomas Lupo wrote, in conjunction with Thomas Giles, some of the songs in a masque ‘Presented before the Kinges Maiestie at White Hall on Twelfth Night last, in honour of the Lord Hayes and his Bride, Daughter … to … Lord Dennye, Invented and set forth by Thomas Campion, Dr. of Physic.’ The orchestra by which the music was to be performed is described as follows: ‘On right, 10 musicians, 2 lutes, Bandora, double Sack bott, harpsichord, 2 treble violins—on left, 9 violins and 3 lutes; and to answer both the Consorts (as it were in a triangle), 6 cornets, and 6 Chappell voyces were seated almost right against them.’ Sir William Leighton's ‘Teares or Lamentations of a Sorrowful Soule’ (1614) contains two pieces by Thomas Lupo: ‘O Lord, O Lord, giue eare,’ for four voices, and ‘The cause of death is wicked sinne,’ for five voices. Thomas Myriell, in his ‘Tristitiæ Remedium, Cantiones selectissimæ diversorum auctorum’ (Addit. MS. 29372–6), prepared for publication in 1616, has included, in addition to the above-named compositions, the following by Lupo for five voices: ‘O vos omnes qui transitis,’ ‘Miserere mei’ (in two keys), ‘Salva nos Domine,’ ‘Heu mihi Domine,’ and ‘Out of the Deepe’ (two keys). The library of Christ Church College, Oxford, contains many manuscripts by Thomas Lupo, including two anthems for five voices, ‘Heare my prayer, O Lord,’ and ‘Have mercy upon mee;’ a madrigal, ‘Ah mee, can love,’ a song ‘Daphnis,’ and some instrumental pieces, in three, four, and five parts. Six ‘Fantasias’ by Lupo in five parts are also among Brit. Mus. Addit. MSS. 17792–6. Elizabeth Rogers's ‘Virginal-book,’ compiled about 1656, contains an ‘Ayre’ by ‘Lupus.’

[The attempt here made to distinguish the biographies of the two Thomas Lupos is conjectural. See Calendars of State Papers; Rymer's Fœdera; Cotton MS. Titus B. vii.; Addit. MS. 5750; information supplied by the Rev. T. Vere Bayne, librarian of Christ Church, Oxford; and by Mr. A. Hughes-Hughes of the British Museum.]