Surrey, Earl of (1517?-1547), is usually linked in literary history with Sir Thomas Wyatt. They are considered the two greatest English poets at the dawn of the English Renaissance. Surrey, a courtier during the reign of Henry VIII, introduced blank verse into English literature. He and Wyatt also imported the Italian sonnet form into English poetry. The poems of Surrey and Wyatt were first published in The Book of Songs and Sonnets (1557), a text usually called Tottel’s Miscellany. Surrey was beheaded on Jan. 19, 1547, on a charge of high treason. His full name was Henry Howard.
