Archive for the tag "fashion"
THE PRIVY PURSE ACCOUNTS OF HENRY VII 1491 to 1505
Is there anyone else like me who enjoys a good nosy around someone's privy purse accounts. They can tell us so much about that person. For example, Henry VII's Privy Purse Accounts. From them we can glean, for example, how did Henry spend his time relaxing , after doing a hard day's usurping? Well it would seem Henry liked DANCING Not himself , of course, but watching others..for example:
September 5th 1493. 'To the young damoysell that daunceth £30' . She must have been good, £30 being an outrageously inflated amount..and indeed,
this young lady fared rather better than 'a litelle madden that daunceth' who received a mere £12 on the January 7th 1497 – but still, nice work if you can get it, considering that on June 8th 'the maydens of Lambeth for a May' received a measly 10s to share out between themselves. Henry's enjoyment of watching dancing was just not limited to damsels and maidens for he also enjoyed Morris dancing – well if you can call it dancing – for on January 4th 'for playing of the Mourice dance' earned the participants £2.
MUSIC – Another favourite way of whiling away the time for Henry. Numerous payments for 'mynystrels' are recorded including on February 4th 1492 including 'a childe that played on the record' received £1 and the 'mynystrels that played in the Swan' received 13s and 4d. Interestingly Richard III 's mother, Cicely Neville's minstrels, received the sum of £1 and to 'children for 'singing in the gardyn' at Canterbury 3s and 4d.
BLING.. Henry evidently was a man who loved bling – paying out £3800 for 'many precyous stones and riche perlis bought of Lambardes for the 'garnyshing of salads, shapnes and helemytes', 27th May 1492. Henry certainly had a thing for decorating his armour and helmets for in June 30th 1497 £10 was paid to the Queen to cover her costs of 'garnyshing of a salet'. Now whether the Queens attempts were not up to scratch or perhaps she tired of the project for a few days later on August 9th John Vandelft, a jeweller was paid £38.1s.4d for the 'garnyshing of a salett'. Was this the same salet, I know not, and how many salets would one man require? No doubt he looked a sight for sore eyes unfortunately no details survive of said salets however may they have looked something on these lines except more blingy..
or this…. or perhaps something more modest ?
Your guess is as good as mine dear reader.
Of course Henry liked jewellery in general and not just for adorning his armour. This would have been silly because it could have got damaged if he had found himself in the midst of a battle without a convenient pike wall to hide behind as well he would have stood out like a sore thumb but I digress… On June 12th 1495 a further payment of £2560 was made to 'Lumbards' for 'diverse juels'. In June 1498 a payment of £2000 was paid for 'Delivered and sent over the see for sertayn juels of gold, £2000'. On 30 July of the same year a further payment of £2648.9s 'for sertayn jules bought in France'. However he was not always so extravagant paying out smaller sums now and again, for example, June 24th 'for an ouch sett with Perle and stone £100' and May 16 to Robert Wright for a 'ring with a diamond £20'.
Henry, it is said, loved greyhounds. He had two favourites…
a descendant of one of Henry's favourite greyhounds..Morton
Bray…from the same litter… these dogs predecessors liked nothing more than fawning around their Master..as dogs do.
Henry loved his greyhounds so much so he would pay damages for any destruction caused by said pets…..hence on 13 March 1495, 4s was paid to 'Rede for a colt that was slayn with the Kings greyhounds'. Details of greyhounds purchased include a payment of 14s 4d to 'Cobbe of the stable for a grey hounde'. And 'to the one that brought the king a whit greyhound from Brutan, £1'.
Henry also liked birds, Popinjays are mentioned several times so they must have held a certain appeal for him paying 'Richard Dekon for a popyngchey £6 13s 4d' on 14th January 1498.
A popinjay descended from Henry's favourite bird who was known as Buck. Buck was not very bright but brightly coloured and flamboyant..
SENSE OF FAIR PLAY
Henry, despite what his traducers say, did possess a sense of fair play. Yes he did. For example he paid out in February 27th 1495 , £15.19s for Sir William Stanley's burial at Syon. This was as well as the £10 that was given to Sir William 'at his execution' on the 20th February. You cannot say fairer than that. It should also be remembered that he paid for a 'tombe' for King Richard III on the 11 August 1495, the not to be sneezed at amount of £10 1s. This was only a third of what had been paid to the young damoysel that daunced its true, but why be petty? On Dec 8th 1499 'Payed for the buriell of therle of Warwick by iiij bills, £12.18s 2d'. I can find no trace of a payment for the burial of Warbeck, perhaps he was simply cast in a hole or mass burial site (1). Henry could hardly have been expected to shell out for every traitors burial.
Austin Friars from an original study by John Preston Neale 1801
THE QUENES DEBTS
Another misconception is that Henry was an indifferent and cold husband. This is not on. Perhaps he was merely cross having regularly to either pay off the Queens debts, mostly incurred through gambling or give her loans. On November 30th 1493 'delivered to Master Chaderton by thanks of William Hungate to pay the Quenes detts £1314 lls 6d'. He also lent her £100 at Shene on the 2 April 1494. A further £2000 was 'delivered to the Queen's grace for to pay her detts which has to be repayed' on 1 February 1497. I should think so too!.
FASHION SENSE.
Several mentions are made of purchases of clothing. January 6th 1494 'for an ostrich skin for a stomacher £1 4s. This is the only mention of an ostrich skin being used for that purpose. So Henry was definitely a fashion guru. No depiction survives, unfortunately, of the said stomacher but I have found a picture of an ostrich skin hat which may provide a clue as to what the garment may have looked like:
All the above I have gleaned from Excerpta Historica Samuel Bentley. There are many interesting examples of the expenses, too many to mention here. Having said that that I cannot close without mentioning:
January 6 1494 for 'clothing mad for Dick the fole £1.15s.7d' (Dick or Dikks the foule gets several mentions)
February 10 1492 'to a litell feloo of Shaftesbury £1
January 20th 1495 the 'immense bribe' of £500 that was 'delivered to Sir Robert Clifford by thand of Master Bray '(who else!) for basically payment for the betraying of Sir William Stanley. Further to this £26 13s 4d paid to William Hoton and Harry Wodeford 'for the bringing of Sir Robert Clifford in rewards' i.e. this was a reward given to the persons who had so successfully negotiated with Clifford (2)
And finally I would love to know what happened regarding the 6s 8d paid for 'the burying of a man that was slayn in my Lady Grey Chamber' 27th May 1495?
(1) Perkin Warbeck's body after it had been separated from its head, was taken to Austin Friars Church, where it was buried with 'other gallow birds on the west side of the nave' Perkin, a Story of Deception Ann Wroe p499. (Austin Friars Church was later destroyed by a bomb during the 2nd World War and hardly any traces remain save for a small garden area).
(2) Excerpta Histórica: or, Illustrations of English History Samuel Bentley pp 100.101
Posted by sparkypus in anniversaries, humour, sources and tagged "Perkin", armour, birds, burials, dancing, Edward of Warwick, Elizabeth of York, Excerpta Historica, executions, fair play, fashion, greyhounds, Henry VII, household accounts, jewellery, John Vandelft, Lambeth, Leicester Greyfriars, loans, music, parsimony, pets, pike wall, Privy Purse, Reynold Bray, Richard III, Sir Robert Clifford, Sir William Stanley, Syon
You will have seen him if you have been to Richard III's final resting place. There are eight small statues on the main entrance (the Vaughan Porch, left) of St. Martin's Cathedral but only one of them is wearing a doublet and hose, showing him to have lived a century later than the others. This is Lord Henry Hastings, as he was during his education alongside Edward VI and participation, with Northumberland's daughter Lady Catherine Dudley in the triple marriage of May 1553. He was still Lord Henry as he served in the household of his great-uncle Reginald Cardinal Pole, travelling to Calais and Flanders and escorting Phillip II to England for his marriage to Mary I, whose succession had been aided by Lord Henry's father, Francis, despite the family's overt Protestant beliefs .
In 1562, two years after succeeding to the Earldom of Huntingdon, he was considered by some for the throne had Elizabeth I not recovered from a bout of smallpox. By 1576, on the death of his mother Catherine (nee' Pole) he was the senior post-Plantagenet, barred from the succession maternally only by the Clarence attainder but he had a junior claim through his grandmother Anne Stafford, w hose father and brother both had their attainders posthumously reversed.
From 1572 to his death in 1595, Huntingdon was Lord President of the Council of the North, a position previously held by Richard as Duke of Gloucester and then by the Earl of Lincoln, in which he ruled the part of England north of the Trent from the King's Manor (above), formerly home to the Abbot of York. During this tenure, he re-established royal authority in the region after the Northern Earls' Rebellion failed, attended Mary Stuart's trial, ensured good relations with James VI and his regents, the Earl of Morton in particular, also helping to prepare defences against the Armada. For his long service for more than half the reign of the last "Tudor", Huntingdon deserves to be remembered alongside Lord Burleigh and his brother-in-law the Earl of Leicester, although his Calvinist beliefs set him apart from them and their Queen. During his time, in 1586, the recusant Margaret Clitherow was pressed to death at York.
As Claire Cross points out in her iconic biography The Puritan Earl, Huntingdon took his role as head of the family seriously. We can read how his assets shrank during his lifetime and how his 42 year marriage was childless, such that his brother Sir George succeeded him as Earl, with senior descendants still alive in Australia, as Jones has shown. He died eleven days before Christmas 1595 and was connected to all four later "Tudor" monarchs but his strongest connection was to Elizabeth I. Just like her, he had been imprisoned at the outset of Mary I's reign, probably because he was Northumberland's son-in-law, although his father's loyalty soon extricated him from this.
Posted by super blue in anniversaries, buildings, genealogy, religion and tagged Anne Stafford, Armada, Ashby St Ledgers, attainder, Calais, Calvinism, Catherine Dudley, Catherine Pole, Claire Cross, Earl of Leicester, Edward of Buckingham, Edward VI, Elizabeth I, fashion, Flanders, Francis Baron Hastings, George Duke of Clarence, Henry Earl of Huntingdon, Henry of Buckingham, James Earl of Morton, Jane, John Dudley Duke of Northumberland, John Earl of Lincoln, Leicester cathedral, Margaret Clitherow, Mary I, Mary Stuart, Michael K Jones, Northern Earls' Rebellion, Phillip II, Plantagenet descent, recusants, Reginald Cardinal Pole, Scotland, Sir George Hastings, smallpox, statues, Vaughan porch, William Cecil
The Black Prince's jupon recreated….
The BBC is renowned for its amazing documentaries, and one of the latest series is titled A Stitch in Time, in which fashionable clothes from the past are recreated by modern crafts. The episode that really interested me was the one about the Black Prince's jupon, i.e. the tight-fitting, brightly-coloured tunic he wore over his armour. The original was for centuries displayed above his wonderful tomb in Canterbury Cathedral, but as it was slowly disintegrating, a replica put in its place.
Amber Butchart, the programme presenter, was permitted to see the original, which is rarely exposed. It was sadly faded, and gave no idea at all of what it must have looked like when worn by the Black Prince. The replica gives more of an idea, because it has colours, but even so…how did Edward of Woodstock, Prince of Wales, appear when wearing it?
The programme had included armour as well as the recreation and stitchwork of the new replica, and at the end we were treated to a view of the finished garment. It was absolutely fabulous, and so brilliant that only a prince or a king could have possibly have worn it. I have snipped the following picture from the programme, and it doesn't do justice to the completed jupon, which was astonishing—breathtaking—and a feast for the eyes.
I cannot speak for the rest of the series, but for me, this episode alone made it all worthwhile. Recommended viewing!
Posted by viscountessw in art, television reviews and tagged A Stitch in Time, Amber Butchart, armour, BBC4, Edward the Black Prince, fashion, tunics
Richard in Flares????
Someone posted a link to a teachers' resource where Shakespeare's Richard III is depicted as a storyboard that the students can interact with. Obviously, it's Shakespeare so Richard isn't going to be shown in a good light, but have a look at the main characters! Really, why is Clarence dressed as a sailor? And Edward looks younger than his sons and shorter than Richard. Anne looks like his mother and Richard is in flares! Not to mention the Duchess of York, who seems to be wearing boxing gloves!! I have already emailed them, but maybe others should to protest at this stupid and inaccurate depiction. I dread to think what the younger generation are going to think about Richard!
Just click on the link and see! Click here
Image credit: By iluvrhinestones from seattle, oceania, upload by Herrick 08:08, 7 December 2007 (UTC) (high waisted jeans) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons
Posted by jrlarner in The play's the thing and tagged "Princes", Cecily Duchess of York, Edward IV, fashion, George Duke of Clarence, Richard III, Shakespeare, stature, teachers' resource | Leave a comment
This is not Anne Boleyn
(re-blogged from Lissa Bryan's guest post on The History Geeks, in response to this article)
This "new portrait of Anne Boleyn" has been making the rounds in social media, and now is being publicized in several news articles.
It is not Anne Boleyn.
The sketch that is circulating is a third-hand copy of a painting that used to be in the collection of Horace Walpole. He was given the painting by a lady of the court who identified it as Joan, Baroness Bergavenny. Walpole had no reason to doubt this identification, and added it to his collection. The painting was sold in the 1840s, and has apparently vanished from existence.
Now, a "historian" has identified it as being Anne Boleyn. But there are serious problems with this identification, which I will break down here.
The earliest sketch of the painting looks quite a bit different than the one that is circulating. The necklace is missing the "R" initial that sparked so much excitement. The description of the original painting when it was sold states that the necklace had only the initials "A" and "B.") While that, on its own sounds exciting, we need to remember there were many women of the Tudor court that had those initials. The "R" initial was an invention of the sketch artist who either copied the image incorrectly, or decided to add his own touch of whimsy.
The woman's clothing is completely wrong for an identification as Anne Boleyn. The style of the hood puts the image firmly in the early 1520s. The lappets – the white part of the hood – almost reach the woman's collarbone. In the 1530s, lappets were chin length, as you can see in Anne's portrait medal. They got shorter as the 1530s wore on, and by 1536 when Anne went to the scaffold, they were at about mouth level.
It was also fashionable in Anne's time for the veil to be pinned up to the side of the hood, as you can see in the medal. The sitter in the sketch has a veil hanging straight down. (Look at the portrait medal and see how the veil is clumped on the left side of the head.)
The gown itself dates more to the 1520s, as well. The neckline is square and covers the shoulders. The necklines in the 1530s had gone wider, making them more rectangular and revealing more of the shoulders. The white bands at the shoulders had disappeared by Anne's reign, as well.
Anne Boleyn was known to always be at the height of style and an innovator in fashion. She would not have worn something so out-of-date as queen.
Anne Boleyn was not rich enough in the early 1520s to afford the jewels the sitter wears, nor would she have been able to wear them due to the sumptuary laws. In the Hever/NPG portraits, the most famous and recognizable images of Anne, she is wearing jewels more appropriate to her station. It should be noted that those portraits were painted after Anne's death, but they're thought to be based on a lost original.
Anne was either thirteen years old or twenty years old in 1520 (depending on the birth date you believe.) The sitter in the sketch is clearly a middle-aged woman, not a young girl. Even the description of the painting says the sitter is a middle-aged woman.
The hood has the letter "I" and "A" repeated. The "I" initials are larger than the "A"s. This lady's given name started with an "I" or a "J." "A" was a secondary name, given less importance.There is simply no way to explain the "I" initials in the context of Anne Boleyn.
Anne favored the HA cipher after her marriage. She and Henry put it on everything from her personal jewels to the buildings erected during her reign. If it wasn't "HA" it was "AR" or "ARS" for Anna Regina Sovereign. It's inexplicable for her to revert back to a simple "A" with no mention of her marriage or royal status – via crown jewels or other symbols – anywhere in the image.
The sitter in the sketch is not royal. She's obviously rich and titled, but she has no indications of royalty whatsoever. If this really was a coronation portrait, Anne would have worn some of the crown jewels, such as the "consort's necklace" all of Henry's queens after Anne are painted wearing.
The sitter is holding a carnation flower, which has been said by the historian to stand for "coronation." I know of no other portraits in which that symbology was employed. The carnation generally stood for marriage or betrothal.
The most reasonable interpretation for the image is the one Walpole was given. This is a painting of Joan, Lady Bergavenny, likely painted posthumously. (It was common for posthumous paintings to be styled in the latest fashions. See the portrait of Mary Tudor and Charles Brandon for an example.) The painting was meant to celebrate the union of the Arundel and Bergavenny houses through the marriage of Lady Joan, hence the initials "A", "B" and "I", with the latter being the largest because it identifies the sitter. The carnation then has its usual meaning of marriage.
I cannot say that the identification of Lady Bergavenny is absolutely certain. But I am certain that the sitter in the sketch is not Anne Boleyn.
Posted by super blue in art and tagged Anne Boleyn, art, evidence, fashion, Henry VIII, Horace Walpole, Joan Lady Bergavenny, The history geeks, Weir
Richard and two Sun(ne)s in Splendour….
Here is a link to double reviews of books that are both entitled Sun(ne) in Splendour – Jean Plaidy's and Sharon Kay Penman's.
http://www.encorepub.com/carpe-librum-richard-iii-takes-center-stage-again/
Both works are too well known to Ricardians for any explanation to be needed, so I will confine myself to bewailing Plaidy's abominable cover. How could any publisher impose such a monstrous thing on any author, let alone one of Plaidy's excellence? Cheapskates! Those immensely baggy knee-breeches, or whatever they are, are so laughable that I am sure no prospective reader would wish to be seen reading it on the London Underground! A discreet brown-paper bag would surely be necessary?
The figure on this cover looks like something cobbled together from a dress trunk in Enid Blyton's attic. My fingers are crossed that the cover-artist doesn't have some inside knowledge that Richard & Co really did wear such schmutter!
Posted by viscountessw in Book Reviews and tagged book review, fashion, Ricardian fiction, Sharon Kay Penman
At last, Richard gets a smidgeon of the Renaissance credit he's due….
English Costume from William I to George IV by Dion Clayton Calthrop, published 1937.
I have just received this book, and of course turned immediately to the reign of Richard III. Dismay promptly ensued. Hump-backed Richard! Oh, natch. Then: "The axe of the executioner soiled many white shirts, and dreadful forebodings fluttered the dovecots of high-hennined ladies." Really? Sez who?
Richard's death, predictably, means the burial of winter, while Henry VII's reign heralds the first day of spring. Oh, my, how things had changed when the Tudors' very own 'Winter King' finally turned up his blunt toes. Off we went again, declaring that the winter years were over and a new spring had begun. Erm, with Henry VIII? If ever dovecotes should have been fluttering with dreadful foreboding, this was the time. My, my, we never did learn, it seems.
But not even this biased tome can condemn Richard entirely, although it must have galled the author to concede it:
"It is in the reign of Richard III that we get, for the men, a hint of the peculiar magnificence of the first years of the 16th century; we get the first flush of those wonderful patterns which are used by Memling and Holbein, those variations of the pineapple pattern, and of that peculiar convention which is traceable in the outline of the [hrumph!] Tudor rose."
So Henry doesn't get the credit. And about time too! The first buds of the Renaissance did not appear after Bosworth, but before it, when Richard was king! What a wonderfully enlightened realm England would have been if the last Plantagenet had been given the chance to prove it.
Posted by viscountessw in art and tagged fashion, Hans Holbein, medieval clothes, renaissance, Richard III