Kit Marlowe’s murder may have been a royal hit:
After years of intensive research Francis Hamit is satisfied that he
knows exactly how and why the Elizabethan poet and playwright
Christopher Marlowe died on May 30th, 1593.“It was a hit,” Hamit
said, “A political assassination for reasons of state, ordered by Queen
Elizabeth herself. Marlowe professed atheism, which would have been no
big deal if he had not been the most famous and popular playwright of
the Elizabethan stage. His fame meant that the deed had to be done
secretly. Marlowe was also one of her spies and worked for the Secret
Service under Sir Francis Walsingham and Sir Robert Cecil. The other men
in the room with Marlowe at the time of his death were all friends of
his and long-time agents for the Crown.”“Marlowe infiltrated the
Jesuit Seminary at Rhiems as a spy in 1585, and probably did other
missions. He was part of Sir Walter Raleigh’s group of freethinkers, the
so-called ‘School of the Night,’ and gave a lecture about atheism. His
former chambermate and lover Thomas Kyd was arrested for having
atheistic literature and revealed under torture that the documents were
Marlowe’s. Additional accusations from informers got Marlowe arrested by
the Privy Council and he was under investigation and restrictions when
he died.”
I have no idea if it is true or not, but I suspect there is a pretty good novel to be found in the notion.