The Triumphs of Oriana

The Triumphs of Oriana is a book of English madrigals, compiled and published in 1601 by Thomas Morley, which first edition has 25 pieces by 23 composers (Thomas Morley and Ellis Gibbons have two madrigals). It was said to have been made in the honour of Queen Elizabeth I. Every madrigal in the collection contains the following couplet at the end: “Thus sang the shepherds and nymphs of Diana: long live fair Oriana” (the word "Oriana" often being used to refer to Queen Elizabeth).

Recently, the attribution of "Oriana" to Elizabeth has come into question. Evidence has been presented that "Oriana" actually refers to Anne of Denmark, who would become Queen of England alongside James VI of Scotland (later James I of England) in an apparently failed early attempt to remove Elizabeth in order to restore England to Catholicism. In his book 'The English Madrigalists', Edmund Fellowes, one of the leading madrigal scholars of the 1940s declared this theory to be false.