Raleigh, Sir Walter cultural definition

An English explorer of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. He is best known for his expeditions to the Americas and for introducing tobacco and the potato, two products of the New World, into England.

• Raleigh is often considered a near-ideal English gentleman of the Renaissance. A well-known legend holds that he spread his coat over a mud puddle so that Queen Elizabeth I would not have to soil her feet by walking through it.