Easter Sunday traditions ... are based on pagan superstitions, which of course is why the Puritans didn’t celebrate the holiday. (The Puritans didn’t like Christmas, either.) For the early Puritans, celebrating the Lord’s Day 52 times a year was quite enough. https://newenglandhistoricalsocie…
The Habsburgs were one of Europe's most formidable – and durable – dynasties, ruling over swathes of the continent for centuries. Speaking to Spencer Mizen, Pieter Judson tells the story of this powerhouse of a family on History Extra, from their championing of Catholicism to the disastrous effects of their incestuous marriages.
Pineapples, sometimes known as “king’s fruit,” were one of British society’s most sought-after status symbols for 250 years. They were often displayed at dinner parties on special plates but typically weren’t eaten. Hosts saved thousands of dollars by renting pineapples instead of buying them — one pineapple cost a whopping £60 (around $17,000 today) in the mid-17th century.
The fruit earned its luxurious reputation during the 16th century, when it was first imported from the Caribbean, and by the 18th century, growing pineapples became a pastime of the upper class.
If you'd like to see how the Doge lived -- apartments fit for a King -- and pictures of Venice and info on how life was there in Shakespeare's time, I recommend a documentary: NOTHING IS TRUER THAN TRUTH
It lasts 75 minutes and is on ROKU now -- March 2024. It's about the Bard and his pals, Elizabeth I and James I, Oxford and Southampton, and is a visual representation of the book, "Shakespeare By Another Name" by Mark Anderson https://www.amazon.com/Shakespear…
The British -- not that they called themselves that -- avoided Antwerp because it was in the Catholic Spanish Netherlands. It was also in what they referred to as Flanders. And it was a center for fine art.
In the late 16th and 17th centuries, Antwerp was a design studio for the world. The port city, in what was then the Habsburg Spanish Netherlands, suffered from the religious conflicts of the time, but weathered sack and damage from armies on both sides of the long wars of religion to reinvent itself as a center of art, engraving and publication. Antwerp was also a hub of typography and printing, especially after the establishment of the mighty international firm of Officina Plantiniana in 1555.
The city’s artists excelled in many spheres, but especially in the arts of drawing and design: Antwerp prints travelled throughout the Habsburg realms and beyond. Designs derived from them can be found in mission churches in the Andes, on tombstones in remote Scottish graveyards, on Chinese ceramics made under Jesuit auspices, and on metalwork and title pages throughout the early modern world.
‘Bruegel to Rubens: Great Flemish Drawings’ at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford until 23 June, 2024 offers a glimpse of the multiple possibilities and uses of drawing in Flanders, and takes a broad view of what might be defined as a drawing.
Preparatory studies for grand paintings are represented here, as in Rubens’ casually massive charcoal study of a nude male torso, which reappears in his Raising of the Cross (1610–11) in Antwerp Cathedral.
There are delicate, sardonic pages from friendship albums; designs for tapestries, title pages, stained glass; jewel-colored studies of tulips, roses and insects painted on vellum by Joris Hoefnagel; delicate watercolor landscapes, glimmering like enamel, that are finished works in themselves, such as The Fall of Icarus (1590) by Hans Bol.
Re Vincent and bubbles, on wondering whether Sam knew about the tulip bubble of 1637 ...
I expect Pepys knew many rich people lost money buying tulip bulbs when the market crashed 25 years ago -- and he must have enjoyed looking at tulips in rich people's gardens. But whether he, or anyone else, appreciated what a bubble was/is, probably not. He did observe, for instance, the problems with obtaining mourning clothes when everyone in the nation went into mourning at the same time. That's a form of bubble.
An unusual look at some of Wren's work -- the view from the rooves (or roofs if you prefer) and some historical notes from his major works: https://londonist.substack.com/p/…
Over the next 8 years there will be many discussions about what pain killers were available. I consolodated many of them into a long post in the OPIUM section of our Encyclopedia: https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…
No they are not spoilers: Pepys has a stone feast every year, so every year we confront the same awful realization of how much courage having this operation took.
And you did click through on "cut of the stone," didn't you ... more gruesome details there.
And you're right: No malpractice insurance, because 99 per cent of what the doctors did would be considered malpractice today. You were better served by the apothocaries and herbalists, and that could be an adventure too! But you can die of the stone as well as from the operation to remove it. Take your pick.
Glad to hear you know the drill, MartinVT. In Pepys' defense, Elizabeth only had her period, and inconvenient as it was without acetaminophen pills, she isn't "ill". Food and a hot water bottle (a hot stone or potato in Pepys' day) is all that's necessary. One doesn't feel like socializing.
Oliver Cromwell appears to have delayed Dr. Samuel Annesley DCL’s preferment but, in July 1657, he allowed Annesley a Sunday afternoon lectureship at St. Paul's (at £120 as opposed to his predecessor's £400 per year).
Annesley's importance in the Puritan movement grew. He lectured at St. Paul's Cathedral Dec. 1657-June, 1659, and was presented to St. Giles Cripplegate by Richard Cromwell in 1658.
Dr. Samuel Annesley was made a commissioner for approbation of ministers in 1660, and in 1661 he edited a popular sermon collection, The Morning-Exercise at Cripple-Gate (in 4 editions by 1677). But the Church of England had little room for an unbending Presbyterian and his successor was installed at St. Giles in Nov., 1662.
Dr. Samuel Annesley continued to live in London and, by 1664, was holding conventicles in his house.
In Sept. 1668 Annesley was one of 10 eminent divines, including Richard Baxter and John Owen, nominated to debate whether to seek comprehension or toleration.
In Sir Joseph Williamson's memorable terminology, Dr. Samuel Annesley was a young 'duckling' taking to the 'waters' of separatism, as opposed to the older 'dons' like Richard Baxter (although Baxter was only 4 years his senior), who sought a wider Church of England.
Annesley was one of several London Presbyterians who began erecting new meeting-houses before the 1672 indulgence. His Spitalfields meeting-house was constructed 'with pulpit and seats' in 1669, and he was convicted at least 3 times for preaching there in 1670.
Annesley was a "moderate puritan" according to our first annotation above, and I presume he adopted the Church of England in order to be eligible to become a Commissioner. But that was not true of his cousin:
Samuel Annesley (1620-1696) was born at Haseley, Warks.,and baptized on 26 March 1620, the son of John (d. c. 1629) and Judith Annesley of that parish. He went to school in Haseley and at Coventry grammar school.
His funeral preacher, Dr. Daniel Williams, claimed that his 'parents dedicated him from the womb' to the ministry, and that he read 20 chapters in the Bible every day from when he was 6.
Annesley matriculated at Queen's College, Oxford, in Oct. 1636, graduated BA in 1639, and proceeded Doctor of Civil Law in Apr. 1648.
Anglican critics — Thomas Barlow, Anthony Wood — thought Annesley had little learning and was 'dull, yet industrious', and he may have been somewhat of an autodidact. Wood even claimed Annesley had solicited the DCL [Doctor of Civil Law] when he learned that as incumbent at Cliffe, Kent he was required to keep a church court. Wood also claimed Annesley changed his name to claim a relationship with Arthur Annesley, 1st Earl of Anglesey, although the earl really was his cousin.
Dr. Samuel Annesley married Mary Hill (d. 1646), of Barford, Warks., on 21 July, 1641, at All Hallows, Bread Street, London. They had at least one son, Samuel (1645-1650).
Dr. Samuel Annesley DCL may have been lecturer at Chatham from Dec. 1642.
Annesley was incumbent at Cliffe c. 1644-1652. His ejected predecessor's followers attacked him with sticks and stones, but at his departure many parishioners supported him.
Annesley was ordained by Presbyters on 18 Dec., 1644 as chaplain to the Lord Admiral Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick.
In Aug. 1648, soon after Annesley delivered a fast sermon to the Commons urging them not to treat with King Charles any more, the Commons desired him to attend the lord admiral at sea (and he dedicated the fast sermon 'from abord the George riding of Goree in Holland').
Annesley later claimed he had always 'publicly detested the horrid murder' of King Charles and his frank words against Cromwell had lost him a living worth £200-£300 per year. Critics noted he 'fell in with the rebellious times' and that he took the Engagement.
Between 1646 and 1653 Dr. Samuel Annesley married Mary (d. 1693), probably a daughter of John White (aka Century White), the feoffee for impropriations and parliamentarian scourge of scandalous and malignant clergy. They had at least 7 daughters and 3 sons.
During the interregnum Dr. Samuel Annesley probably held the London living of St. John the Evangelist, Friday Street, and in 1655 published 2 sermons preached at St. Paul's Cathedral and another preached at St. Lawrence Jewry.
For a picture of a Pepys' era Bill of Exchange -- with his signature on it! -- and information about how they are used, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/indept…
"At noon I found my stairs quite broke down, that I could not get up but by a ladder; and my wife not being well she kept her chamber all this day."
Elizabeth didn't want to be scaling ladders while she had cramps -- I can't blame her. But I hope Jane and Pall weren't fellow sufferers as they took breakfast, lunch and dinner up to her -- climbing a ladder while balancing a tray of hot food isn't easy. And then they had to bring the chamber pot and the tray back down without breaking the china.
And those marine carpenters were probably checking out their ankles and making obscene comments while they were juggling the impossible.
Maybe Wayneman stood at the bottom of the ladder and passed things to Pall half way up, who passed them up to Jane who knelt on the first floor at the edge of the hole (that's the second floor if you're American). Going down, reverse the procedure.
The Easter witch tradition survives in Sweden today, in a different form. On Maundy Thursday or Easter Sunday, groups of young girls dress up in aprons and kerchiefs and visit neighbors or relatives, singing songs or giving out drawings in exchange for sweets or money. Much like bunnies and baby chicks, they are adorable, a far cry from the wild Easter witches of yore.
Easter Witches as Pseudo-Ostensive Action By: Fredrik Skott Béaloideas, Iml. 82 (2014), pp. 67–84 An Cumann Le Béaloideas Éireann/Folklore of Ireland Society https://daily.jstor.org/the-easte…
I wonder how they REALLY thought about and celebrated Easter in the 1660s in England.
Our 21st century ideas of what Easter means should be put aside. Different things were normal in different places. For instance, in Sweden:
[Author Fredrik] Skott traces the idea of the Easter witch to the 16th century, when a fear of witches as agents of Satan arrived in Sweden.
In witch hunts of the 1660s and 1670s, several thousand people were tried for allegedly making pacts with the devil. Hundreds were executed.
One story Swedes told at that time was that witches flew to a location called Blåkulla to commune with Satan on witches’ Sabbaths, often said to occur on Easter. The means of transportation could be brooms, poles, cows, or even people — as long as they were greased with ointment stored in horns provided by the devil himself. In Blåkulla, the ordinary world reversed: witches sat around a table facing outward, old people became young, and women took men’s roles.
The belief in Blåkulla survived for centuries. In the mid-19th century, Swedish Easter was many things: a sacred Christian holiday, a festive work-free day celebrated with pranks, and a time of real fear of witches. People lit bonfires and painted tar crosses on barn doors to ward off evil. Many people in western Sweden also began dressing as witches.
In the Easter witch tradition, teenagers and young adults donned worn clothes turned inside out. Cross-dressing was common: Boys might appear as old witches while girls could play the role of male trolls. Participants painted their faces or wore cloth or paper masks, often with hair and eyebrows made of moss. Some carried brooms, horns, or coffee pots symbolizing the feasts of Blåkulla.
The costumed witches traveled around town, playing tricks in an effort to convince people that real witches were roaming the land. That might mean knocking over wagons, riding other people’s horses and leaving them sweaty and tired, or climbing onto roofs and pouring ash down chimneys. They might also stop at houses, begging for something to eat or for a drink of schnapps.
Often, the masked witches and trolls anonymously delivered “Easter letters,” sometimes by throwing them at a house along with a log of wood and fleeing before they could be caught. The letters usually held a painting of a witch and often a verse inviting the reader to join the witches’ Sabbath. The verses might simply be playful, or they might contain an insult to a recipient believed to have done something wrong.
Pepys does his bit for poor children, 徽柔, but if I answer your question I'll be posting spoilers, so you'll just have to read on. 9-)
REALITY: the world is a violent place. Always has been; probably always will be so long as there are wild animals, volcanoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, not to mention wars over food and water and greed. We are living more closely together these days than ever before in history, so we have a culture that says it frowns on it -- which is enlightened self-interest. But turn on your TV every night and there is a never-endling litany of who hurt who (the nightly news), followed by dramas, movies and documentaries about people behaving badly (often murdering their spouses).
Pepys was realistic about violence. He did not want to fight: he was only too happy to have an excuse not to be out protecting his neighborhood at night from Venner's Uprising in January. He's happy to order the ships and gunpowder, but don't ask him to be on a ship during wartime. The beating the child singer received was not unusual for the times.
Perhaps you've heard about the beatings 8-year-old Charles, Lord Spencer, received at school in the 1960's? It was supposed to toughen up children, especially boys, to face the reality of the world we live in. It goes on behind closed doors today, especially when the adults are frustrated, or were abused themselves. https://www.amazon.com/Very-Priva…
I know it's hard not to judge by 21th century standards, and often we've culturally moved on to a totally different understanding of words, manners, standards, grammar, religion, science, and philosophy in the last 400 years -- but please try. It takes some honesty and occasionally painful soul searching; the Stuarts are just less evolved people -- and we're reading the personal recollections of a man being as honest and uncensored as he can be.
Perhaps Pepys gave the child a big tip? -- maybe he will hire him in the future to do something? -- maybe he wrote this because he regretted not doing more? We don't know. We do know that he did take care of poor children -- but you'll have to read on.
Plus in the 1680's Pepys opened a mathematical grammar school for poor but smart boys like himself. I think I can tell you that without being called out for spoilers. https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…
"From midday dinnertime until 11 p.m. is quite a stretch to be partying, especially during Lent."
Martin -- I've answered this at least 3 times this year. Pepys and the gang didn't know what to make of Lent, and the pulpits were still full of Puritan preachers. Apart from Charles II telling them to eat fish, there was a dearth of information on the subject.
Perhaps you are not reading the answers to your posts? It's the first thing I do ever day -- go to RECENT ACTIVITY in the green header above, and you'll learn all sorts of interesting things.
Jeanine did a fine job talking about swearing and Rochester, but didn't explain the role of the Victorians in making bodily functions taboo, when in Stuart times it was irreligious words that were verboten.
This article explains it thus: To understand how swear words change over time, here’s a brief history lesson:
One of the harshest medieval swears you could say was “zounds” In medieval England, lots of the 4-letter words we use to talk about bodies and sex were considered normal descriptive language. In her book "Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing", Melissa Mohr notes that both London and Oxford boasted medieval streets called Grope-cunt Lane (where the brothels were). By a medieval country pond, Mohr writes, “There would’ve been a shiterow in there fishing, a windfucker flying above, arse-smart and cuntehoare hugging the edges of the pond, and pissabed amongst the grass.” (Those are, in today’s sadly unvivid terminology, the birds heron and kestrel; and the plants water pepper, horehound, and dandelions.)
“They were kind of direct words for certain things that you wouldn’t necessarily say if you had an audience with the king, but they didn’t have any extraordinary power. They appeared in schoolbooks.”
What people considered obscene in medieval England was religious swearing. A word like “zounds,” from “Christ’s wounds,” could be genuinely shocking, which is why even today, our vocabulary for talking about profanity is religiously inflected.
We talk about oaths and swearing and cursing because in the Middle Ages, to invoke God out loud meant that God was going to pay attention to whatever you were promising. When you said, “God damnit,” you were swearing before God, and he might damn you to hell if you didn’t deliver.
Mohr argues that bodily words were unremarkable in the Middle Ages because people had so little privacy. In a time of shared bedrooms and no indoor plumbing, defecation and sex happened more or less openly, and there was little point in being delicate about it with language.
As the world grew more private, starting in the 15th century, bodily words grew steadily more taboo. By the 19th century, Victorians had begun to describe pants as “unmentionables.” Religious oaths were losing their edge in the post-Enlightenment age, but “fuck” and its ilk were by now plenty shocking enough to fill the vacuum.
L&M speculate today's performance is by a minor company, probably George Jolly's. George Jolly, or Joliffe (fl. 1640 – 1673) was an actor, an early actor-manager and a theatre impresario of the middle 17th century. The Encyclopedia Brittanica calls Jolly "the leader of the last troupe of English strolling players".
Comments
Third Reading
About Easter
San Diego Sarah • Link
Easter Sunday traditions ... are based on pagan superstitions, which of course is why the Puritans didn’t celebrate the holiday. (The Puritans didn’t like Christmas, either.)
For the early Puritans, celebrating the Lord’s Day 52 times a year was quite enough.
https://newenglandhistoricalsocie…
About Charles II (King of Spain, 1665-1700)
San Diego Sarah • Link
The Habsburgs were one of Europe's most formidable – and durable – dynasties, ruling over swathes of the continent for centuries. Speaking to Spencer Mizen, Pieter Judson tells the story of this powerhouse of a family on History Extra, from their championing of Catholicism to the disastrous effects of their incestuous marriages.
https://www.historyextra.com/memb…
Yes, you need a subscription. They do discount them from time-to-time.
About About fruit and vegetables
San Diego Sarah • Link
More on pineapples ...
Pineapples, sometimes known as “king’s fruit,” were one of British society’s most sought-after status symbols for 250 years. They were often displayed at dinner parties on special plates but typically weren’t eaten. Hosts saved thousands of dollars by renting pineapples instead of buying them — one pineapple cost a whopping £60 (around $17,000 today) in the mid-17th century.
The fruit earned its luxurious reputation during the 16th century, when it was first imported from the Caribbean, and by the 18th century, growing pineapples became a pastime of the upper class.
https://historyfacts.com/world-hi…
It's the second article on the page.
About Venice, Italy
San Diego Sarah • Link
If you'd like to see how the Doge lived -- apartments fit for a King -- and pictures of Venice and info on how life was there in Shakespeare's time, I recommend a documentary: NOTHING IS TRUER THAN TRUTH
It lasts 75 minutes and is on ROKU now -- March 2024.
It's about the Bard and his pals, Elizabeth I and James I, Oxford and Southampton, and is a visual representation of the book, "Shakespeare By Another Name" by Mark Anderson
https://www.amazon.com/Shakespear…
About Antwerp, Belgium
San Diego Sarah • Link
The British -- not that they called themselves that -- avoided Antwerp because it was in the Catholic Spanish Netherlands. It was also in what they referred to as Flanders. And it was a center for fine art.
In the late 16th and 17th centuries, Antwerp was a design studio for the world.
The port city, in what was then the Habsburg Spanish Netherlands, suffered from the religious conflicts of the time, but weathered sack and damage from armies on both sides of the long wars of religion to reinvent itself as a center of art, engraving and publication.
Antwerp was also a hub of typography and printing, especially after the establishment of the mighty international firm of Officina Plantiniana in 1555.
The city’s artists excelled in many spheres, but especially in the arts of drawing and design: Antwerp prints travelled throughout the Habsburg realms and beyond. Designs derived from them can be found in mission churches in the Andes, on tombstones in remote Scottish graveyards, on Chinese ceramics made under Jesuit auspices, and on metalwork and title pages throughout the early modern world.
‘Bruegel to Rubens: Great Flemish Drawings’ at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford until 23 June, 2024 offers a glimpse of the multiple possibilities and uses of drawing in Flanders, and takes a broad view of what might be defined as a drawing.
Preparatory studies for grand paintings are represented here, as in Rubens’ casually massive charcoal study of a nude male torso, which reappears in his Raising of the Cross (1610–11) in Antwerp Cathedral.
There are delicate, sardonic pages from friendship albums; designs for tapestries, title pages, stained glass; jewel-colored studies of tulips, roses and insects painted on vellum by Joris Hoefnagel; delicate watercolor landscapes, glimmering like enamel, that are finished works in themselves, such as The Fall of Icarus (1590) by Hans Bol.
Photos and more info at https://www.apollo-magazine.com/b…
About Wednesday 27 March 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
Re Vincent and bubbles, on wondering whether Sam knew about the tulip bubble of 1637 ...
I expect Pepys knew many rich people lost money buying tulip bulbs when the market crashed 25 years ago -- and he must have enjoyed looking at tulips in rich people's gardens. But whether he, or anyone else, appreciated what a bubble was/is, probably not.
He did observe, for instance, the problems with obtaining mourning clothes when everyone in the nation went into mourning at the same time. That's a form of bubble.
About Christopher Wren
San Diego Sarah • Link
An unusual look at some of Wren's work -- the view from the rooves (or roofs if you prefer) and some historical notes from his major works:
https://londonist.substack.com/p/…
About Tuesday 26 March 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
"No anesthetics."
Over the next 8 years there will be many discussions about what pain killers were available. I consolodated many of them into a long post in the OPIUM section of our Encyclopedia:
https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…
No they are not spoilers: Pepys has a stone feast every year, so every year we confront the same awful realization of how much courage having this operation took.
And you did click through on "cut of the stone," didn't you ... more gruesome details there.
And you're right: No malpractice insurance, because 99 per cent of what the doctors did would be considered malpractice today. You were better served by the apothocaries and herbalists, and that could be an adventure too!
But you can die of the stone as well as from the operation to remove it. Take your pick.
About Wednesday 27 March 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
Glad to hear you know the drill, MartinVT.
In Pepys' defense, Elizabeth only had her period, and inconvenient as it was without acetaminophen pills, she isn't "ill". Food and a hot water bottle (a hot stone or potato in Pepys' day) is all that's necessary. One doesn't feel like socializing.
About Arthur Annesley (1st Earl of Anglesey, Treasurer of the Navy 1667-8)
San Diego Sarah • Link
CONCLUSION:
Oliver Cromwell appears to have delayed Dr. Samuel Annesley DCL’s preferment but, in July 1657, he allowed Annesley a Sunday afternoon lectureship at St. Paul's (at £120 as opposed to his predecessor's £400 per year).
Annesley's importance in the Puritan movement grew. He lectured at St. Paul's Cathedral Dec. 1657-June, 1659, and was presented to St. Giles Cripplegate by Richard Cromwell in 1658.
Dr. Samuel Annesley was made a commissioner for approbation of ministers in 1660, and in 1661 he edited a popular sermon collection, The Morning-Exercise at Cripple-Gate (in 4 editions by 1677).
But the Church of England had little room for an unbending Presbyterian and his successor was installed at St. Giles in Nov., 1662.
Dr. Samuel Annesley continued to live in London and, by 1664, was holding conventicles in his house.
In Sept. 1668 Annesley was one of 10 eminent divines, including Richard Baxter and John Owen, nominated to debate whether to seek comprehension or toleration.
In Sir Joseph Williamson's memorable terminology, Dr. Samuel Annesley was a young 'duckling' taking to the 'waters' of separatism, as opposed to the older 'dons' like Richard Baxter (although Baxter was only 4 years his senior), who sought a wider Church of England.
Annesley was one of several London Presbyterians who began erecting new meeting-houses before the 1672 indulgence. His Spitalfields meeting-house was constructed 'with pulpit and seats' in 1669, and he was convicted at least 3 times for preaching there in 1670.
For the whole of Dr. Sam's life, see https://www.oxforddnb.com/display…
So he's one of the Nonconformists that Pepys complains about.
About Arthur Annesley (1st Earl of Anglesey, Treasurer of the Navy 1667-8)
San Diego Sarah • Link
Annesley was a "moderate puritan" according to our first annotation above, and I presume he adopted the Church of England in order to be eligible to become a Commissioner. But that was not true of his cousin:
Samuel Annesley (1620-1696) was born at Haseley, Warks.,and baptized on 26 March 1620, the son of John (d. c. 1629) and Judith Annesley of that parish. He went to school in Haseley and at Coventry grammar school.
His funeral preacher, Dr. Daniel Williams, claimed that his 'parents dedicated him from the womb' to the ministry, and that he read 20 chapters in the Bible every day from when he was 6.
Annesley matriculated at Queen's College, Oxford, in Oct. 1636, graduated BA in 1639, and proceeded Doctor of Civil Law in Apr. 1648.
Anglican critics — Thomas Barlow, Anthony Wood — thought Annesley had little learning and was 'dull, yet industrious', and he may have been somewhat of an autodidact. Wood even claimed Annesley had solicited the DCL [Doctor of Civil Law] when he learned that as incumbent at Cliffe, Kent he was required to keep a church court.
Wood also claimed Annesley changed his name to claim a relationship with Arthur Annesley, 1st Earl of Anglesey, although the earl really was his cousin.
Dr. Samuel Annesley married Mary Hill (d. 1646), of Barford, Warks., on 21 July, 1641, at All Hallows, Bread Street, London. They had at least one son, Samuel (1645-1650).
Dr. Samuel Annesley DCL may have been lecturer at Chatham from Dec. 1642.
Annesley was incumbent at Cliffe c. 1644-1652. His ejected predecessor's followers attacked him with sticks and stones, but at his departure many parishioners supported him.
Annesley was ordained by Presbyters on 18 Dec., 1644 as chaplain to the Lord Admiral Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick.
In Aug. 1648, soon after Annesley delivered a fast sermon to the Commons urging them not to treat with King Charles any more, the Commons desired him to attend the lord admiral at sea (and he dedicated the fast sermon 'from abord the George riding of Goree in Holland').
Annesley later claimed he had always 'publicly detested the horrid murder' of King Charles and his frank words against Cromwell had lost him a living worth £200-£300 per year. Critics noted he 'fell in with the rebellious times' and that he took the Engagement.
Between 1646 and 1653 Dr. Samuel Annesley married Mary (d. 1693), probably a daughter of John White (aka Century White), the feoffee for impropriations and parliamentarian scourge of scandalous and malignant clergy.
They had at least 7 daughters and 3 sons.
During the interregnum Dr. Samuel Annesley probably held the London living of St. John the Evangelist, Friday Street, and in 1655 published 2 sermons preached at St. Paul's Cathedral and another preached at St. Lawrence Jewry.
About A bill of exchange
San Diego Sarah • Link
Phil has given us a page for FINANCE in general, which also has info on Bills of Exchange.
https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…
About Financial transactions
San Diego Sarah • Link
For a picture of a Pepys' era Bill of Exchange -- with his signature on it! -- and information about how they are used, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/indept…
About Wednesday 27 March 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
"At noon I found my stairs quite broke down, that I could not get up but by a ladder; and my wife not being well she kept her chamber all this day."
Elizabeth didn't want to be scaling ladders while she had cramps -- I can't blame her. But I hope Jane and Pall weren't fellow sufferers as they took breakfast, lunch and dinner up to her -- climbing a ladder while balancing a tray of hot food isn't easy.
And then they had to bring the chamber pot and the tray back down without breaking the china.
And those marine carpenters were probably checking out their ankles and making obscene comments while they were juggling the impossible.
Maybe Wayneman stood at the bottom of the ladder and passed things to Pall half way up, who passed them up to Jane who knelt on the first floor at the edge of the hole (that's the second floor if you're American). Going down, reverse the procedure.
I don't blame Pepys for missing this circus.
About Easter
San Diego Sarah • Link
CONTINUED:
The Easter witch tradition survives in Sweden today, in a different form. On Maundy Thursday or Easter Sunday, groups of young girls dress up in aprons and kerchiefs and visit neighbors or relatives, singing songs or giving out drawings in exchange for sweets or money. Much like bunnies and baby chicks, they are adorable, a far cry from the wild Easter witches of yore.
Easter Witches as Pseudo-Ostensive Action
By: Fredrik Skott
Béaloideas, Iml. 82 (2014), pp. 67–84
An Cumann Le Béaloideas Éireann/Folklore of Ireland Society
https://daily.jstor.org/the-easte…
I wonder how they REALLY thought about and celebrated Easter in the 1660s in England.
About Easter
San Diego Sarah • Link
Our 21st century ideas of what Easter means should be put aside. Different things were normal in different places. For instance, in Sweden:
[Author Fredrik] Skott traces the idea of the Easter witch to the 16th century, when a fear of witches as agents of Satan arrived in Sweden.
In witch hunts of the 1660s and 1670s, several thousand people were tried for allegedly making pacts with the devil. Hundreds were executed.
One story Swedes told at that time was that witches flew to a location called Blåkulla to commune with Satan on witches’ Sabbaths, often said to occur on Easter. The means of transportation could be brooms, poles, cows, or even people — as long as they were greased with ointment stored in horns provided by the devil himself.
In Blåkulla, the ordinary world reversed: witches sat around a table facing outward, old people became young, and women took men’s roles.
The belief in Blåkulla survived for centuries. In the mid-19th century, Swedish Easter was many things: a sacred Christian holiday, a festive work-free day celebrated with pranks, and a time of real fear of witches. People lit bonfires and painted tar crosses on barn doors to ward off evil. Many people in western Sweden also began dressing as witches.
In the Easter witch tradition, teenagers and young adults donned worn clothes turned inside out. Cross-dressing was common: Boys might appear as old witches while girls could play the role of male trolls. Participants painted their faces or wore cloth or paper masks, often with hair and eyebrows made of moss. Some carried brooms, horns, or coffee pots symbolizing the feasts of Blåkulla.
The costumed witches traveled around town, playing tricks in an effort to convince people that real witches were roaming the land. That might mean knocking over wagons, riding other people’s horses and leaving them sweaty and tired, or climbing onto roofs and pouring ash down chimneys. They might also stop at houses, begging for something to eat or for a drink of schnapps.
Often, the masked witches and trolls anonymously delivered “Easter letters,” sometimes by throwing them at a house along with a log of wood and fleeing before they could be caught. The letters usually held a painting of a witch and often a verse inviting the reader to join the witches’ Sabbath. The verses might simply be playful, or they might contain an insult to a recipient believed to have done something wrong.
About Monday 25 March 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
Pepys does his bit for poor children, 徽柔, but if I answer your question I'll be posting spoilers, so you'll just have to read on. 9-)
REALITY: the world is a violent place. Always has been; probably always will be so long as there are wild animals, volcanoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, not to mention wars over food and water and greed.
We are living more closely together these days than ever before in history, so we have a culture that says it frowns on it -- which is enlightened self-interest.
But turn on your TV every night and there is a never-endling litany of who hurt who (the nightly news), followed by dramas, movies and documentaries about people behaving badly (often murdering their spouses).
Pepys was realistic about violence. He did not want to fight: he was only too happy to have an excuse not to be out protecting his neighborhood at night from Venner's Uprising in January. He's happy to order the ships and gunpowder, but don't ask him to be on a ship during wartime. The beating the child singer received was not unusual for the times.
Perhaps you've heard about the beatings 8-year-old Charles, Lord Spencer, received at school in the 1960's? It was supposed to toughen up children, especially boys, to face the reality of the world we live in. It goes on behind closed doors today, especially when the adults are frustrated, or were abused themselves. https://www.amazon.com/Very-Priva…
I know it's hard not to judge by 21th century standards, and often we've culturally moved on to a totally different understanding of words, manners, standards, grammar, religion, science, and philosophy in the last 400 years -- but please try. It takes some honesty and occasionally painful soul searching; the Stuarts are just less evolved people -- and we're reading the personal recollections of a man being as honest and uncensored as he can be.
Perhaps Pepys gave the child a big tip? -- maybe he will hire him in the future to do something? -- maybe he wrote this because he regretted not doing more? We don't know. We do know that he did take care of poor children -- but you'll have to read on.
Plus in the 1680's Pepys opened a mathematical grammar school for poor but smart boys like himself. I think I can tell you that without being called out for spoilers. https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…
About Wednesday 27 March 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
"From midday dinnertime until 11 p.m. is quite a stretch to be partying, especially during Lent."
Martin -- I've answered this at least 3 times this year. Pepys and the gang didn't know what to make of Lent, and the pulpits were still full of Puritan preachers. Apart from Charles II telling them to eat fish, there was a dearth of information on the subject.
Perhaps you are not reading the answers to your posts? It's the first thing I do ever day -- go to RECENT ACTIVITY in the green header above, and you'll learn all sorts of interesting things.
The most historically authentic answer IMHO was
https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…
About Monday 4 July 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
Jeanine did a fine job talking about swearing and Rochester, but didn't explain the role of the Victorians in making bodily functions taboo, when in Stuart times it was irreligious words that were verboten.
This article explains it thus:
To understand how swear words change over time, here’s a brief history lesson:
One of the harshest medieval swears you could say was “zounds”
In medieval England, lots of the 4-letter words we use to talk about bodies and sex were considered normal descriptive language.
In her book "Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing", Melissa Mohr notes that both London and Oxford boasted medieval streets called Grope-cunt Lane (where the brothels were).
By a medieval country pond, Mohr writes, “There would’ve been a shiterow in there fishing, a windfucker flying above, arse-smart and cuntehoare hugging the edges of the pond, and pissabed amongst the grass.” (Those are, in today’s sadly unvivid terminology, the birds heron and kestrel; and the plants water pepper, horehound, and dandelions.)
“They were kind of direct words for certain things that you wouldn’t necessarily say if you had an audience with the king, but they didn’t have any extraordinary power. They appeared in schoolbooks.”
What people considered obscene in medieval England was religious swearing. A word like “zounds,” from “Christ’s wounds,” could be genuinely shocking, which is why even today, our vocabulary for talking about profanity is religiously inflected.
We talk about oaths and swearing and cursing because in the Middle Ages, to invoke God out loud meant that God was going to pay attention to whatever you were promising. When you said, “God damnit,” you were swearing before God, and he might damn you to hell if you didn’t deliver.
Mohr argues that bodily words were unremarkable in the Middle Ages because people had so little privacy. In a time of shared bedrooms and no indoor plumbing, defecation and sex happened more or less openly, and there was little point in being delicate about it with language.
As the world grew more private, starting in the 15th century, bodily words grew steadily more taboo.
By the 19th century, Victorians had begun to describe pants as “unmentionables.” Religious oaths were losing their edge in the post-Enlightenment age, but “fuck” and its ilk were by now plenty shocking enough to fill the vacuum.
https://www.vox.com/culture/24098…
About All's Lost by Lust (William Rowley)
San Diego Sarah • Link
L&M speculate today's performance is by a minor company, probably George Jolly's.
George Jolly, or Joliffe (fl. 1640 – 1673) was an actor, an early actor-manager and a theatre impresario of the middle 17th century. The Encyclopedia Brittanica calls Jolly "the leader of the last troupe of English strolling players".
A synopsis of "All's Lost by Lust" can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All…