Elizabeth Knollys

Elizabeth Knollys
Lady Leighton
Portrait of Elizabeth Knollys by an unknown painter after George Gower, 1577
Spouse(s)	Sir Thomas Leighton
Issue Thomas Leighton Elizabeth Talbot Anne, Lady St John
Noble family	Knollys (by birth) Leighton (by marriage)
Father	Sir Francis Knollys
Mother	Catherine Carey
Born	15 June 1549 England
Died	c. 1605 (aged about 56)
Religion	Anglican
Occupation	Maid of Honour Gentlewoman of the Privy Chamber

Elizabeth Knollys, Lady Leighton (15 June 1549 – c.1605), was an English courtier who served Queen Elizabeth I of England, first as a Maid of Honour and secondly, after 1566, as a Gentlewoman of the Privy Chamber. Knollys was the grand-niece of Queen consort Anne Boleyn, which made her a cousin once removed of the Queen. Lettice Knollys was her eldest sister. Elizabeth married Sir Thomas Leighton of Feckenham in Worcestershire in 1578. He served as Governor of Jersey and Guernsey.

She is sometimes mistakenly referred to in documents as "Cecilia", which was the name of her youngest sister.

Elizabeth Knollys was born on 15 June 1549, the second daughter and one of the 15 children of Sir Francis Knollys and Catherine Carey, the daughter of William Carey and Mary Boleyn. This made Elizabeth the grand-niece of Queen Anne Boleyn, second wife of Henry VIII. She had 11 surviving siblings, the eldest of whom, Lettice Knollys, would later be banished from court after secretly marrying Queen Elizabeth's favourite, Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester.

She was brought up in a staunchly Protestant household at Greys Court at Rotherfield Greys in Oxfordshire and Abbey House at Reading in Berkshire. In 1556, three years after the Catholic Princess Mary Tudor had become queen, Sir Francis Knollys and his wife were compelled to seek refuge in Frankfurt, Germany to escape the relentless Marian persecutions against known Protestants. It is not known if Elizabeth accompanied them as her parents took only five of their children abroad, leaving the others behind in England.