John Frampton of Bristol mastered Spanish in the course of his career as a merchant in the Seville trade, a career that exposed him to the changing fortunes of his Anglo-Hispanic relations. In due course he would be arrested by the Inquisition, tortured, tried and compelled to endure the confiscation of his ship and goods. Forbidden to return to England he nevertheless made his escape. From merchant he turned translator, and produced for English readers six distinguished works ranging from Monardes’ study of the herbs and medical samples brought back from the New World to the travels of Marco Polo. He was the Elizabethan traveller-translator par excellence . Many of the most incisive insights into his adventures survive in the records of the Admiralty Court to which he made an application for damages in later years.