The Blake class was a pair of first-class protected cruisers, the first of their rank in the Royal Navy, designed in the late 1880s and built around 1890.

[1][2] Main gun armament was similar to that of the Orlandos, consisting of two 9.2 in (234 mm) Mark VI breech loading guns mounted in single mounts fore and aft on the ship's centreline, and ten single 6 in (152 mm) QF guns, all on broadside, of which six were sited on the ships' upper deck (with light open-backed gunshields) and the remaining four were mounted in armoured casemates on the ships' main deck.

This dispersed arrangement was chosen to minimise the risk of one shell hit disabling multiple guns at once, a feature seen also in the contemporary Royal Sovereign-class battleships (which the Blake class were essentially cruiser counterparts of).

[1] Machinery consisted of 4 three-cylinder triple expansion engines fed by six double-ended cylindrical boilers and driving two shafts.

HMS Blenheim had the more active career, supporting the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force at the Battle of Gallipoli, and repatriating three dignitaries to their home countries after their deaths abroad.