- "In the closing years of Queen Elizabeth I's reign, Henry Reginald lived in Stepney, just outside what was then London on the east. Around 1600, he and his wife had a daughter. The child was christened Bathsua, a variant form of the name Bathsheba, the beautiful wife of King David and mother of the wise King Solomon (1 Chronicles 3:5) Bathsua's sister Ithamaria was christened on 11 January 1600/1601, a year after Bathsua was born. Her name, like Bathsua's, is taken from the Old Testament. (In 1 Chronicles 24: 1-6, Ithamar is named as one of Aaron's sons.) This christening was performed in the parish church for Stepney, St. Dunstan's, and church records show that other families named Reginald, perhaps relatives, were members of the congregation." p. 26
- Even as a young teacher in her father's school, her learning was respected. p. 31
- "Those she knew best were Latin, Greek, and French, but she also dabbled in Hebrew, Syriac, Spanish, and German and had a good understanding of shorthand." p. 32
- "Bathsua Reginald's command of languages is best demonstrated by the book that was published when she was only sixteen years old. The title page mentions both the father and daughter: "MVSA VIRGINEA Greco-Latino-Gallica, Bathsvae R. (filiae HENRICI REGINALDI GYMNASIARCHAE ET PHILOGOTTI apud LONDINENSES) ANNO AETATIS SUAE DECIMO SEXTO edita" (The Virgin Muse in Greek-Latin-French, by Bathsua R[eginald], (daughter of Henry Reginald, schoolmaster and language lover, near London), published in her sixteenth year of age). The book is a remarkable collection of original excomiastic poems for the Stuart family.
Musa Virginea has a text of 16 pages. it begins with the dedication, "AD SERENISSIMUM ET POTENTISSIMUM JACOBUM DEI GRATIA Magnae Brittaniae, Franciae & Hyberniae Regem, fidei Defensorem" (to the most serene and powerful James, King by God's grace of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, and Defender of the Faith.) That dedication is followed by Latin and Greek poems to James, connected by short prose passages (or epigraphs) in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek. Next the work offers Greek and Latin epigraphs and poems praising James's queen, Anne of Denmark; Spanish and Latin epigraphs and French and Greek poems praising James's son, Charles, then Prince of Wales and later King Charles I; Greek, German, and Latin epigraphs and Latin and Greek poems for Fredrick, the Elector of Palatine, who was James's son-in-law; and French epigrams and French, Greek, and Latin poems for James's daughter, Elizabeth Stuart, who was married to Fredrick. Each section follows the same pattern, despite divergent languages." p. 38
- About the book mentioned above, "When a learned maid was presented to King James for an English rarity, because she could speake and rite pure Latine, Greek, and Hebrew, the King ask'd "But can she spin?" " p. 43
- Bathsua married and bore at least nine children, six of whom survived. p. 52
The accomplishment she referred to most often, possibly because she was proudest of it, was being the tutor to Princess Elizabeth. p. 59
Teague stresses that Makin was a tutor, not a governess. Makin was not Elizabeth's personal servant, she was Elizabeth's teacher. p. 60
Discussion about Comenius teaching methods and Makin's intellectual debt to the circle about Comenius for her teaching methods. p.66
- "Establishing that she knew about certain aristocratic or upper-class women who valued learning and formed patronage networks is a straightforward process, since she often names such women in An Essay: Lord Burleigh's daughters, Lady Mary Carr, Queen Christina of Sweden, the Cooke sisters, the Princess Elizabeth, Dr. Nicholas Love's daughters, Lady Grace Sherrington Mildmay, Margaret Duchess of Newcastle, Mary Countess of Pembroke, Katharine Philips, Anna Maria van Schurman, Lady Arbella Stuart, and Mrs. Thorold are her contemporaries and are mentioned. Some of these may have been her pupils: Lady Mary Carr's daughter Elizabeth Thorold is sometimes mentioned as a probable pupil, as are Dr. Love's daughters. Yet that need not mean she knew all of these women personally, nor does the list include all the educated women whom she did know and might have named. Hartlib links her to Elizabeth Throckmorton Ralegh: she was teaching the Princess Elizabeth while Jane Murray was her governess; in letters to the countess, she mentions receiving money from Lady Alice Hastings Clifton; she must have known of the prophet Lady Eleanor Douglas who was publishing her own work, however mad those pamphlets seem by twentieth-century standards; the countess's daughter Lady Elizabeth Hastings :Langham was certainly learned and had Makin as her tutor. But An Essay never mentions these women: Ralegh, Murray, Clifton, Douglas, or Langham. Makin may have had other pupils as well. Scholars have suggested that Makin might also have taught Elizabeth Fisher Bland, who knew Hebrew, and Elizabeth Birch, who spoke Greek and Latin (Salmon, 314-315); or "Elizabeth Drake -- mother of Elizabeth Robinson (Montagu), known as queen of the Bluestockings, and Sarah Robinson (Scott), the novelist" (Ferguson, 128). Both sisters, Elizabeth Robinson Montagu and Sarah Scott, were members of Astell's circle (Perry, 112, 242), as was Lady Elizabeth Hastings, daughter of another of Makin's pupils, Theophilus Hastings, seventh earl of Huntingdon (104,260). Makin taught, knew, or knew about many learned women; she even taught learned men. Sorting out the category in which an individual belongs is impossible and finally unnecessary. What is important is recognizing that while a learned woman might regard herself or be regarded as unusual, even unnatural, she could find others like herself in this period. In identifying other learned women,. Makin and those like her identified a network that supplied patronage and position. What is perhaps more important, that network offered a community. As the correspondence with Anna Maria van Schurman suggests, Makin reached out to women for affiliation as well as support." pp. 89-90
- Regarding An Essay to Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen (1673)
Unlike others who were advocating education for women, Makin supported education for women, even those who would marry, for an educated woman made a better wife and mother. p. 96
"Her catalogs of learned women were not simply thrown together for the occasion of this pamphlet; what we are reading is the product of a lifelong search for other women, like herself, who loved learning and sought it without regard to any personal cost." p. 99
A biographical dictionary follows the text of An Essay This book contains the complete text of An Essay.
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