[3] On 13 February 1590, Berkeley matriculated at Queen's College, Oxford, at the age of thirteen, together with his eleven-year-old brother, Henry.
[4] In the 1590s, acrimonious conflicts between Sir Henry Berkeley's father and Henry Herbert, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, required the intervention of the Queen and the Star Chamber; however, Maurice Berkeley appears to have managed to remain uninvolved in his father's long-standing quarrels with Pembroke.
[5] Berkeley was with Essex in the expedition to Cadiz in 1596, and in January 1598 was to have accompanied his cousin, Sir Robert Cecil, to France, although it is unclear whether he did travel to the continent at that time.
[7] Berkeley married Elizabeth Killigrew, the eldest daughter of Sir William Killigrew (died 1622) of Hanworth, Middlesex, of an ancient Cornish family, a courtier to Queen Elizabeth I and to King James I, whom he served as Groom of the Privy Chamber.
He held various offices in Cornwall and Devon, was a Member of Parliament, was knighted by King James I at Theobalds on 7 May 1603, and in 1605-8 was Chamberlain of the Exchequer.