William Webbe was an English critic and translator. Little is known about him except that he attended Trinity College, Cambridge

Trinity College, Cambridge

Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Trinity has more members than any other college in Cambridge or Oxford, with around 700 undergraduates, 430 graduates, and over 170 Fellows...

, and was a tutor for distinguished families.

He wrote a Discourse of English Poetrie (1586), in which he discusses prosody

Prosody (linguistics)

In linguistics, prosody is the rhythm, stress, and intonation of speech. Prosody may reflect various features of the speaker or the utterance: the emotional state of the speaker; the form of the utterance ; the presence of irony or sarcasm; emphasis, contrast, and focus; or other elements of...

 and reviews English poetry up to his own day. He also translated Virgil

Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...

's first two Eclogues. A letter by Webbe to Robert Wilmot (fl.

Floruit

Floruit , abbreviated fl. , is a Latin verb meaning "flourished", denoting the period of time during which something was active...

1568-1608) is prepended to the 1591 edition of Wilmot's play Tragedie of Tancred and Gismund. The letter, praising Wilmot for having decided to publish the tragedy, acts as a prefacing endorsement of the play.