Whew, what a mouthful! Our titles these days are much shorter, with fewer syllables, easier to remember. To remember this, I simply refer to it as Penny Merriments, a tome I found in a bookstore and considered a great find. It has all sorts of wonderful information, like recipes to make one beautiful, or a recipe for the newest way to roast a hare. It sends me right back into the era of my choice....
17th century England opened with traders going to far distant shores, but the cost was enormous. Spices were gathered through the Levant Company (owned by noblemen and gentlemen of quality) and the fledgling East India Company. As the century progressed, their ships went to lands already taken by the Spanish and Portuguese.
The Dutch East India Company (VOC) began at about the same time as England’s, but they weren’t hampered by the religious upheaval and civil wars England endured during the first half of the century. The Dutch VOC had a leg up on English merchant shipping until Cromwell decided enough was enough and went to war with Holland in what is known as the First Anglo-Dutch War (1652-54), and which was fought entirely at sea. These wars were over trade and who could monopolize which ports in the East and West Indies.
With that said, the recipes below show an inordinate number of spices which were very costly. During the reign of King James I, a fight to near death took place between VOC and English Merchantmen in the South Seas that decimated the crops of nutmeg on Pulo Run Island in the Banda archipelago.
Through the Levant Company, citrus fruits, dates, pepper, cotton cloth, and other fruits and spices were trekked across the desert sands to ports the Levant Company held in the Mediterranean, then imported via ship to London. (I won’t even mention the pirate contingent that upped the cost of goods.) Once these commodities hit the London markets, they proved expensive for the middling English household.
The below recipes can only come from later in the 17th century, and were directed to the more well-to-do. Middling folk who could read, enjoyed the thoughts of these though....
To Roast a Shoulder of Mutton with Oysters the best way.
Take one not too fat nor too lean, open it in divers places, stuff your oysters in with a little chopt penny-royal [of the mint family], baste it with butter and claret wine, then serve it up with grated nutmeg, yolks of eggs, ginger, cinnamon, butter and red wine vinegar.
To Stew a Leg of Lamb the best way.
Slice it and lay it in order in your stewing-pan, seasoned with salt and nutmeg, adding a pound of butter, and half a pint of claret, with a handful of sliced dates, and the like quantity of currants, and make the sauce with the yolk of two eggs, a quarter pint of verjuice [acid juice from sour or unripe fruit—very sour], and two ounces of sugar. Boil them up, and put them over the meat, serving up hot together.
The Art of Beautifying the Hands, Neck, Breast and Face: Harmless and Approved, with other Rare Curiosities.
To make the hands and arms white, clear and smooth. Take a quarter of a pound of sweet almonds, blanch and bruise them, with a quarter of a pint of oil of roses, and the like quantity of betony-water [plant of the mint family]: heat them over a gentle fire; and then press out the liquid part, and it will serve for either hands or face anointed therewith.
To take away Freckles, Morphew (scurfy skin) or sunburn.
Steep a piece of copper in the juice of lemon till it be dissolved [can copper dissolve?], and anoint the place with a feather morning and evening, washing it off with white wine.
To take off any scurf from the hands and face.
Take water of tartar, that is, such wherein calcined [burnt to a powder] tartar has been infused, anoint the place, and wash it as the former [with white wine].
And now, for the final and most excellent recipe....
To sweeten the Breath, and preserve the Teeth and Gums.
Boil a handful of juniper berries, a handful of sage, and an ounce of caraway seeds in a quart of white wine, til a third part be consumed: strain it and wash your mouth with it morning and evening, suffering a small quantity to pass down: you may whiten the teeth by rubbing them with pumice stone.
So, who wants to try one of these recipes and let me know how it works? I’d especially like to know the results of whitening your teeth with pumice stone. Or should I do a disclaimer? Don’t do this without the guidance of a professional!
The Scent of Lavender
by Lauren Gilbert
I have loved the scent of lavender since I was a teenager in the ‘60s when Yardley’s English Lavender became a popular fragrance (at least, it was new to me!). Light, fresh, clean and sweet, lavender has an ageless appeal. It is almost impossible to pick up a Regency novel without a mention of lavender, whether it is scenting the hero’s immaculate white linen (a suitably masculine blend, of course), or wafting ever so subtly from the heroine’s lace-edged handkerchief.
Lavender is an ancient herb, long associated with healing. Its Latin name Lavandula latifolia, appears to be derived from the Latin verb lavare, meaning “to wash” and the Romans used it to deter flies and sweeten the air, as well as to clean and dress wounds. The ancient Egyptians used lavender in embalming and in scented unguents.
It was widely used in Tudor England, where lavender was placed in linens (not only making them smell sweet but discouraging insects!); sewn into little bags, it could be tucked amongst clothing or into one’s bosom. Queen Elizabeth found lavender tea soothing for migraines and used lavender perfume as well.
In the Georgian era, the perfumers D.R. Harris made a popular lavender water for gentlemen, and Floris used lavender in potpourris and perfumes for ladies. (Both are still in business today.)
Down through the centuries, lavender has been long considered something of a miracle herb. In Nicholas Culpeper’s herbal (1653 edition), he says it cures “all griefs and pains of the head and brain that proceed of a cold cause…” and also recommends its use for dropsy, heart ailments, liver and spleen obstructions, tooth ache, and more.
Even today, herb guides discuss its antiseptic and painkilling attributes. (Mine says it can be used to soothe insect bites, burns, sore throats and headaches, and is a relaxant when used in the bath, among other medicinal uses!) I know from personal experience that it works wonderfully to deter moths and other insects from my linen closet and pantry—how many modern insect repellents work well, smell wonderful, and have no poisonous effects?
Among many old recipes including lavender that I ran across, two seemed good to include. The first is not adapted for modern preparation, other than the list of ingredients:
Lavender Wine (1655)
1 bottle of Sack, 3 ounces of sugar, 2 ounces of lavender flowers, and ambergris
Take 2 ounces of dryed lavender flowers and put them into a bottle of Sack, and beat 3 ounces of Sugar candy, or fine Sugar, and grinde some Ambergreese, and put it in the bottle and shake it oft, then run it through a gelly bag, and give it for a great Cordiall after a week’s standing or more.
—Derived from a recipe from The Queen’s Closet Opened, by W.M., Cook to Queen Henrietta Maria. (From A Sip Through Time, by Cindy Renfrow)
The next recipe contains the old version, and an adapted version so that one can make it if desired:
Martha Lloyd’s English Lavender Water
To one quart of the best rectified spirits of wine put 3/4 oz. of essence of Lavender and 1/2 a scruple of ambergris; shake it together and it is fit to use in a few days.
Modern Equivalents:
To make Lavender water, put 3 handfuls of dried Lavender flowers into a wide necked screw top jar and add 1 cup of white wine vinegar and 1/2 cup Rose water.
Leave the mixture in the dark for 2-3 weeks and shake the bottle frequently.
If flowers are not available, use essential oils. Mix 25 drops of essential oil (traditionally lavender, rose or neroli) with 2 fl oz (50ml) ethyl alcohol (or is
opropyl or vodka). Shake them together in a screw-top bottle. Leave the mixture to settle for 2 days then shake again. To store, pour into a dark bottle with a tight fitting lid and leave almost no air space.
—This recipe is from the Jane Austen Centre Bath website, posted by Laura Boyle 1/3/2002, in its entirety. This is a fascinating website, and well worth a look!
Sources
Boyle, Laura. “English Lavender Water.” Posted January 3, 2002. Jane Austen Centre Bath. http://www.janeausten.co.uk/english-lavender-water/
Bremness, Lesley. Herbs. New York: Dorling Kindersley, 1994.
Culpeper, Nicholas. The Complete Herbal (1653 edition). Bibliomania. http://www.bibliomania.com/2/1/66/113/frameset.html.
The Georgian Index. “Merchants: Sellers of Perfumes and Other Toilettries.” Georgian London Street and Business Index. http://www.georgianindex.net/London/l_merchants.html.
Lavender Enchantment. “History of Lavender.” http://www.lavenderenchantment.com/History_Lore/history.htm
Lavender Farm. “The History of Lavender.” http://www.lavenderfarm.com/history.htm
Renfrow, Cindy. A Sip Through Times: A Collection of Old Brewing Recipes. USA: Cindy Renfrow, 2008.
Marriage in 17th Century England
by Katherine Pym
Marriage in England during the 17th century was confusing. Due to the various governments playing musical chairs for much of the century, the rules continually changed. Ministers who were safe one moment were tossed out of their vocations the next. These inconsistencies brought about corruption and fraudulent marriages. They left honest couples in doubt.
During the reign of Charles I, marriage ceremonies in the Church with the Book of Common Prayer prevailed. Under the Commonwealth, couples were to be married by their local JP, but too many did not consider this proper or binding. These couples married clandestinely in a home, tavern, prison, and even brothels with an Anglican minister and the forbidden Book of Common Prayer. The couple spoke their vows in the present tense, for to do otherwise could provide a loophole for an unhappy spouse to later invalidate the marriage.
The rules of incest were also confusing. An apprentice could not marry his master’s daughter. A woman could not marry her brother-in-law after her husband died. The laws declared they were family within the fourth degree.
Due to these conflicting rules, good folk joined under the king’s reign did not know if their marriage was legal under the Commonwealth, and vice versa. This doubt gave way to excuses, and unhappy couples separated to marry another. Bigamy was rampant and perjury in the courts flagrant.
In the 1640s clandestine marriages multiplied due to suppression of the Anglican Church. Marriage shops called Peculiars popped up all over London to accommodate this new vogue. Anglican ministers who lost their professions under the Commonwealth and were in debtor’s prison, set up a marriage shop in Fleet Prison chapel. “Ministers” would fill in names of the couple on the certificate otherwise already completed and signed. For a small tip, clerks were called in to witness, the spaces already filled in with names more than likely not their own.
These clerics never asked the couple questions: (1) if they were already married, (2) if one or the other was an in-law, or an apprentice. If the person presiding over the ceremony said he was a member of the clergy, and if the vows were stated in the present tense, the couple considered themselves newly joined in marriage—which only time or a change of heart could put asunder.
In 1660 after Charles II returned from exile, the sanctioned religion again became the Church of England, but the Ecclesiastical Courts were in ruins. It took a while for the churches to reintroduce Anglican accoutrements, and clandestine marriages continued unabated.
The reinstated Anglican officials tried to stop the clandestine marriages but failed. Marriage shops sent criers with fistfuls of ready-made marriage certificates to markets to promote the inexpensive, quick unions that only money could dissolve.
While the Ecclesiastical Courts gathered order and strength, unhappy marital unions would be dissolved by desertion, or public sales of the wife—the price most of the time already settled between the old and new spouse. This marriage auction publicly announced the new union.
The least expensive and easiest way of marriage dissolution was by mutual agreement. The couple would then go their merry way to remarry, again, possibly to another who lived not far away.
Before the Ecclesiastical Courts could gain momentum, the formal method of marital dissolution was at King’s Bench in Westminster. It provided legal separation, but it almost always went harshly for the wife.
Still at Westminster, a less honest practice was to seek out “straw-men”. They lingered in the Hall with straw sticking out of their shoes, showing anyone with a purse of coin they’d perjure themselves during the court proceedings. They would stand before the judge and say anything the purse holder wanted them to say.
This behavior continued through the century. In the 1690s the Crown imposed a Stamp Tax of five shillings for licenses and marriage certificates. It was soon realized (by the lack of income to the Crown) that clandestine marriages continued to prevail. As a result, a series of acts were implemented to shut down the clandestine marriage shops.
As the English government settled into a more comfortable relationship with the Church of England, so too did the marriage market, but it wasn’t until the Marriage Act in 1753 that it was finally put under control.
For more on this, please read my historical novel, Viola, A Woeful Tale of Marriage, set in London, 1660.
Sources
Stone, Lawrence. Broken Lives: Separation and Divorce in England, 1660-1857. Oxford University Press, 1993.
________. Uncertain Unions: Marriage in England 1660-1753. Oxford University Press, 1992.
Fabulous Fabrics of the 17th Century
by Deborah Swift
In the 17th century all yarn for fabric was combed and spun by hand using a drop spindle and then woven into cloth. The immense amount of work that went into this process is often forgotten. Linen, wool, and silk were all spun and combined in different ways to give different effects.
Coloured fabrics were usually called “stuffs” and were very popular after the Restoration and the end of Puritan rule when bold colours could be worn again. Many English fabrics sought to imitate those of France and Italy and were characterised by elaborate finishing techniques such as glossing, hot-pressing, and watering. Weaving and finishing was a specialised craft operated typically by one or two journeyman-weavers in small, independently owned workshops. At this period blue was not very fashionable as many servants were uniformed in blue. Orange and yellow were in vogue for women’s clothes. Some fabrics were woven and then cut with decorative slashes. Each slash had to be buttonhole-edged by hand to achieve the effect.
Very desirable too were fabrics embroidered by hand, with what came to be known as “crewel” work, the more opulent the better, as long as you were not in servitude to somebody else, in which case you had to obey the “sumptuary laws” and dress according to your station.
A fabric from a 1630s jacket in the V&A museum features a fanciful bird woven in red wool on a linen twill. Later this sort of work was more often seen on furnishings and draperies for the house.
A linen jacket made in about 1610 was lined with coral silk taffeta. The embroidery includes spider-knots, stemstitch, chainstitch, and buttonhole stitches. The edging is silver gilt bobbin lace. Uniquely, on the V&A website you can see a picture of the jacket being worn in a portrait of the wearer (http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O11095/jacket/).
Even handkerchiefs, purses, chemises, and shoes were embroidered, not to mention household linens and drapes for beds and windows.
In portraits too you can see women teaching young girls the art of embroidery and lace-making. One of these displays a lady w
ith a lace-maker’s pad as she is working the pinned individual threads into lace.
Embroidered shoes—I do not know if they embroidered the fabric first and then made up the shoes, or did it the other way around. In any case, they are lovely. I used the shoes as part of the inspiration for my book The Lady’s Slipper, which features beautiful embroidered shoes like the ones in the Northampton Shoe Museum.
Party Clothes in the 17th Century
by Deborah Swift
I wondered if my 17th century equivalent would open her closet and sigh the way I did when someone invited me to a party and I couldn’t decide what to wear. So just what would the fashionable woman about town be wearing in the 17th century?
At the beginning of the 17th century, a woman wore a farthingale and whalebone corsetry beneath her clothes to emphasise a small waist and large hips. So she was probably not as comfortable as she looked. The large amount of gorgeous lace would be hand-made as Elizabethan ruffs gave way to expensive lace collars. Fancy embellished petticoats were now revealed as skirts were hooped back to display them. After the Restoration of the monarchy, women’s clothes were elegant and colourful and made from costly fabrics such as satin and silk.
But what accessories might you choose on your night out—perhaps dining with a courtier, or attending a concert?
Well one of the oddest 17th century accessories was the mask or “vizard”. These were commonly worn by women to protect their skin from the sun when they went outside, particularly for horse-riding or on carriage journeys. Women also wore masks to maintain their mystery or to keep their identity secret, although not many masks survive, and those that do are in poor condition.
Castles, Customs, and Kings: True Tales by English Historical Fiction Authors Page 37
