The following biography of the Marques de Villa Flores et Avila, Don Pedro de Zuñiga (also Cuñiga, Quñiga) is copied from Alexander Brown’s The Genesis of the United States, vol. 2, pp. 1067–8.

Zuñiga actively engaged in espionage while serving as ambassador to England, sending various reports and maps concerning the English colony in Virginia to the Spanish court, many of which are our sole surviving record of contemporary events. On 8 November 1608, we find Zuñiga writing from London to Philip III, carefully advising his majesty to put an end to the English enterprise in Virginia:

It is very important, Your Majesty should command that an end be put to those things done in Virginia; because it is a matter of great importance — and they propose (as I understand) to send as many as 1500 men there; and they hope that 12,000 will be gotten together there in time. It is a matter which it might be well should be clearly understood.

Zuñiga’s intense interest in the Virginia colony and related espionage would be continued by his successors, Don Alonso de Velasco, Ambassador from Spain to the court of London, 1610–13, and Don Diego Sarmiento de Acuña, Count de Gondomar, Spanish ambassador from 1613–1618.

Zuñiga, Velasco, and Acuña were all three colorful figures and celebrities while in London. Zuñiga was caricatured in Ben Jonson’s popular play, The Alchemist. A Comoedie. Acted in the yeere 1610. By the Kings Maiesties Seruants. And we know that Gondomar’s engraved portrait was stocked and sold in London by the Commonwealth print dealer, Thomas Jenner, active from 1618–1672.

“‘On the morning of November 5, 1605, the news of the great deliverance from the Gunpowder Plot ran like wildfire along the streets of London,’ and it was necessary to take prompt measures to protect Zuñiga from the fury of the people. He seems to have kept very close afterwards; I [i.e., Alexander Brown] do not find his name in the Calendar of State Papers, 1605–10. The celebrated Italian jurist, Alberigo Gentilis, was advocate to the Spanish embassy from the autumn of 1605 to his death, June 19, 1608. Zuñiga was succeeded by Velasco about May, 1610. Some time after his return to Spain he was created ‘Marques de Villa Flores et Avila.’ In 1612 he was sent as ambassador extraordinary to James I., with private instructions, if he saw fair prospect of success, to offer the hand of Philip III. (then a widower) to the Princess Elizabeth of England; but ‘he found that the marriage with the Elector was irrevocably decided upon.’ He had his first audience with James I. on July 6, 1612. He was soon dismissed; but continued to linger in England, which was not much liked. On July 22, 1612, Archbishop Abbot wrote to James I., ‘The lingering in England of the Spanish ambassador, Zuñiga, is very suspicious. He has secretly dispersed £12,000 or £13,000 already in England, and tampers by night with the Lieger ambassador from France. He was in England at the time of the Powder treason, and God knows what share he had in that business.’ (See also Abbot’s letter of August 3, 1612, in sketch of Velasco.) George Calvert wrote to Sir Thomas Edmondes on August 1: ‘Zuñiga is yet here, no man knows why, for he hath taken his leave of the king. But to show that he is unwelcome, as he was riding in his carrosse with his six mules over Holborn Bridge the other day, with his great lethugador about his neck and coming upon his elbow, at the side of the carrosse, comes a fellow by him on horseback; and whether de guetapens or otherwise, I cannot tell, but he snatches the ambassador’s hat off his head, which had a rich jewel in it, and rides away with it up the street as fast as he could, the people going on and laughing at it.’ Chamberlain says, ‘The ambassador, observing a well-dressed cavalier approaching his carriage, pulled off his hat out of the window, which was enriched with a handsome band and Jewel, when the fellow snatched it out of his hand and rode off.’ James I. instructed [Sir John] Digby to find out the reasons for his stay [item CCXXVIII. in Brown]. He was still in England in the first part of October, 1612, when he was complaining ‘of the opening by the custom-house officers of a chest of his.’ He probably left soon after.

“Our [i.e., U.S.] histories do not mention him; but it can be safely said that the English would never have succeeded in establishing Protestant colonies in America, if the matter could have been controlled by Don Pedro de Zuñiga.”

Ambassador from Spain to the court of London, 1610–13. August 3, 1612, George Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote from Croydon to King James: “Zuñiga has removed to the house of the Lieger Ambassador, Alonzo de Velasquez, in the Barbican, that he may more freely transact his secret business. Velasquez [Velasco] has been more free with his masses, having a bell rung and holding several in the day. He sends scandalous reports of English affairs to Spain and Italy. The King of Spain has an advantage in England, because he can avail himself of discontented Catholics. The proffered courtesies of the Queen of France should be received with suspicion, as she is guided by Villeroy and Sillery, both under Spanish influence.”