Sarah Piers (1649–1719)

Sarah, Lady Piers, née Roydon, was born into a Yorkshire family. She married Sir George Piers, an English baronet and army officer who served as Clerk of the Privy Seal under King William III. The couple had two children. She was a close friend and patron of Catharine Trotter, and the two women maintained a long correspondence. Lady Piers was one of the contributors to the collection The Nine Muses, Or, Poems Written by Nine severall Ladies Upon the death of the late Famous John Dryden, Esq. (1700), published pseudonymously and edited by Delarivier Manley. The contributors each signed their poems with the names of Muses: Manley wrote as "Melpomene" and "Thalia"; Sarah Fyge Egerton was "Erato," "Euterpe," and "Terpsichore"; Mary Pix was "Clio"; Catharine Trotter was "Calliope"; and Lady Piers was "Urania." Lady Piers also wrote a dedicatory poem to Catharine Trotter's play The Fatal Friendship (1698) and a prefatory poem to her play The Unhappy Penitent (1701). In her last known work, George for Britain (1714), she championed the monarchy over republicanism.