The censorship and revision of both editions of Raphael Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland looks different from the recall of Gascoigne's Poesies or the suppression of Stubbs's A Gaping Gulf since for both the 1577 and the 1587 editions of the Chronicles, the Privy Council gave orders to stay their sales until “they shall be reviewed and reformyd.” That the texts were “reformyd” and not suppressed, even that the Chronicles' 1587 edition was printed under a royal privilege, suggests that they enjoyed a status quite different from other texts censored by Elizabeth's government, and further, that the offenses' kind and degree differed markedly from the offenses (or supposed offenses) of Gascoigne and Stubbs. The Chronicles enjoyed considerable status as cultural capital, and their censorship and revision – particularly of the 1587 edition – represents an effort on the part of the government to construct a favorable domestic and international image. This was not a wholesale propaganda effort, but rather, a response to specific materials that the government – or members of the government – felt would jeopardize England's international image. Their censorship argues that Elizabeth's government regarded them as instrumental in offering to an international audience an account of a national government in England respectful of justice and law, and of the sovereign rights of neighboring countries.

The 1577 edition of Holinshed's Chronicles appeared as part of a deliberate movement to elevate the stature of England, English letters, and English language through writing and publishing maps, histories, national epics, and theoretical works on English poetry – what in Forms of Nationhood Richard Helgerson refers to as “the Elizabethan writing of England.”