The Description of a Monstrous Pig, 1562

Good God, WHERE IS ITS FACE? This is the most awful picture I've ever seen, and I've seen some gross pig pictures in my day. This one comes courtesy of Robert Martin, a London farmer who had a sow that gave birth to seven normal piglets and one horribly deformed monster, "more monstrous than any that hath bene seene before this time, as you may see by this picture." I'm inclined to agree.

According to the text, the piglet "hath a head contrary to all other of that kynd, it hath a face without a nose or eyes, saving a hole standing directly betwen the two eares which eares be broad and long, lyke the eares of a bloude hound, and a monstrous body, lyke vnto a thing that were lean, without heare. It hath feet very monstrous, with y^e endes of them turning vpwards, lyke vnto forked endes." It died two hours after birth.

Fortunately, there was a reason for its disfigurement and death: "let vs be assured that these straunge monstrous sightes do foreshew vnto vs, that [God's] heavy indignation wyl shortly come vpon vs for our monstrous livyng."

I think the same logic can be applied to swine flu, don't you? God's just trying to tell us that unless we clean up our polluted and diseased minds, we will probably die from an incurable virus. Thanks, Renaissance. Glad we cleared that up.

(And thanks to Geoff at Michigan State University for pretty much this entire post. Well done.)

But seriously, WHERE IS ITS FUCKING FACE? It looks like it imploded! Pigs are messed up.

Walter Raleigh was on The Simpsons!

I don't normally tune in to The Simpsons, but last night I was flipping through and saw that the first 5 minute vignette of this episode was about Queen Elizabeth and Sir Walter Raleigh! Homer is Raleigh and Marge is Elizabeth Throckmorton. It was fantastic! Here's the clip:

I have always pictured King Phillip of Spain that way. Also, he had the best lines, like this one:

"Guard, take him away and put things inside of him."
"Nice things?"
"No, not nice things!"

A true relation of the admirable voiage and trauell of William Bush, 1607

Full title: A true relation of the admirable voiage and trauell of William Bush gentleman who with his owne handes without any other mans helpe, made a pynace, in which he past by ayre, land, and water: from Lamborne, in Barkshire, to the custome house key in Londen.

So, this pamphlet (written by Anthony Nixon) chronicles Bush's party trick of traveling by water, land, and air in a boat. Wait . . . what? This calls for research!

According to The Folger Library: Two Decades of Growth, An Informal Account (1968), by Louis B. Wright, the document is "important as one of the earliest examples of journalistic reporting." He describes the image as, "Mr. Bush guiding his pinnace down a rope contraption from the top of the tower, to give it the appearance of a flying machine. His stunt in traveling by air, land, and water created a sensation at the time, and Nixon's book is a landmark in the history of reporting" (57).

The actual text is in black letter and is pretty hard to read, but I gather that Bush's trick was pretty impressive. It strikes me as kind of lame though, like this was something he did on a dare to show up some other gentleman. It has a certain aren't-I-clever vibe, don't you think?

Anyway, apparently if you're a journalist you should be glad the Mr. Bush made a "flying" ship and Nixon wrote about it.

Happy Birthday Shakespeare!

Today is William Shakespeare's birthday! And death day! Party at my house -- we'll hold a feast in great solemnity.

I sort of love Harold Bloom's The Anxiety of Influence. It makes me feel better about reading and critiquing poetry, mostly because it gives me a reason for being snarky and calling things "derivative." I especially like calling everything derivative of early modern poetry, which is the best poetry ever. In all honesty, Shakespeare the poet is the specter that haunted everybody's work (especially Keats') for the next 200 years, and he's still causing poets plenty of anxiety today. Bloom initially said that influence was not an issue for Shakespeare, but later he admitted that Shakespeare was working through his own anxieties caused by the success of Christopher Marlowe.

In other news, did you know that Shakespeare is SUPER SEXY AND HOT now? Well, he is. Happy 445th birthday!

Sir Francis Drake Revived, 1653

Sir Francis Drake is interesting to me. Not because he defeated the Spanish Armada, or because he circumnavigated the globe or anything boring like that. He interests me because he is one of Queen Elizabeth's 4 main boyfriends--which is so scandalous!! I've dealt with the famous Essex before, and of course Robert Dudley was her first love. However, she definitely went through an "exciting world explorers" phase, which featured Drake (he's kind of hot, isn't he? He's no Essex, but not bad) and my personal favorite and most crush-worthy royal boyfriend, Sir Walter Raleigh . Incidentally, when I'm not writing copious important notes, I am drawing beautifully nuanced and sophisticated portraits like this in my notebook:















I am a very good artist.

The Life and Death of Griffin Flood, 1623

Griffin Flood was a rogue, con-man and informer who scammed a bunch of people out of their money (and was a tattletale). He specialized in targeting foreigners and apprentices. He is characterized as being "churlish" and loud-mouthed quite often in the pamphlet. Eventually he stabs a constable and a vintner, is caught, and because he won't admit his guilt is sentenced to peine forte et dure, which equates to death by pressing. Apparently the guy didn't even have any property to save, so I guess his refusal to plead was just more churlishness. Luckily, Newgate Prison had it's own "Pressing Yard" for just such occasions. He even wrote his own epitath:
"Here lyeth Griffin Flood full low in his grave,
Who lived a Rascall and died a Knave."

Mars in his field, or, the exercise of arms, 1625

No you fucking don't. He'll cut you so bad you'll wish he didn't cut you.

By the way, if you are presenting your drawn sword higher than your face (as appeareth) you are doing it totally wrong. Where did you take swashbuckling lessons, anyway? Just look at how intimidating you'd look if you knew how to exercise your arms properly.

Vermiculars destroyed, 1690

The full title is: Vermiculars destroyed with an historical account of worms, collected from the best authors as well ancient as modern, proved by that admirable invention of the microscope: with directions for the taking those most famous medicines, intituled Pulvis Benedictus, etc.: also diagnostick signs of worms and signs of health in children, with the various causes of vermiculars.

There are three editions of Vermiculars destroyed, which is initially made up of accounts about various worms people saw coming out of various body parts. But it's also an excellent example of how the microscope made everybody paranoid about invisible worms (or "vermiculars") that could be crawling around on everything you touch giving you the plague. It's actually pretty interesting, because the author (a doctor) goes through a number of experiments in which he looks at rotting substances at different stages and sees these "vermiculars." Then he goes on to write about people who have had vermiculars inside of them and how they were cured of the disease or vermicular infestation (much of the science is still based in humoral theory, though). Then he gets really paranoid about getting vermiculars on or in him, and presents us with the "Causes of Worms," which seem to consist of everything:




















Yes, it seems that all food and drink and also air and imagination and oversleeping and emotion and God will give you worms. I especially like how he admits to some opposition about the "supernatural causes," but a Bible quote proves that God totally gives you worms.

The Anatomy of Human Bodies Epitomized, 1697

Thomas Gibson (1647-1722) wrote this anatomy book, and I choose this particular heart for my valentine because a.) it's a pretty good drawing of a heart, and b.) he used the heart of a "10 year old boy" as a model for the drawing.

First published anonymously in 1682, The Anatomy of Human Bodies Epitomiz’d was probably the most successful English anatomical textbook published to date – it was ultimately issued in eight editions. Gibson, the Physician-General to the English army, based his comprehensive text on Alexander Read’s Manual of Anatomy. However, the content was so extensively revised and supplemented Gibson claimed authorship. Gibson listed his principal sources (some 33 titles by 27 authors) which was an uncommon practice at the time.[source]

Guystarde and Sygysmonde, 1532

This is the english translation of Boccaccio's Decameron's day 4, tale 1, in which Tancredi, Prince of Salerno and father of Ghismonda, slays his daughter's lover, Guiscardo, and sends her his heart in a golden cup: she pours upon it a poisonous distillation, which she drinks and dies. C'est l'amour.

I've dealt with the cutting out of hearts before, so pick the one you like and send it to your valentine. They'll love the message of sacrificing your life for the thing you most desire.

Mikrokosmographia, 1615

"The fruit which it [the gallows] produces,
Doth seldom serve for profitable uses:
Except the skillful Surgeon’s industry
Do make Dissection of Anatomy…
That what it bears, are dead commodities."
--John Taylor, “The Description of Tyburn” (1630)

You know, I did my thesis on the social and political place of the dead/executed body in early modern society--specifically in Jacobean drama and printed materials. I discussed the anatomy theaters at length, so I'm going to learn you up good about this so you get the joke:

A body’s use in an anatomy lesson was frequently the final chapter of a tragedy that began at the public gallows. In 1540, Henry VIII allowed the Barber-Surgeons’ Company access to four corpses of executed criminals each year, and in 1565 Elizabeth did the same for the College of Physicians. By 1583, Physicians’ Hall began hosting official anatomy lectures that could be attended with a special invitation, and the same practice soon followed at the Barbers-Surgeons’ Company. Initially, the public anatomies were held in the large hall of the company, and temporary seating was built to accommodate the growing number of spectators. The gory spectacle that the viewers confronted was reminiscent of both public executions and the bloodier aspects Jacobean theater (so of course it was super popular).

The lectures were held four times a year, undoubtedly occurring after the quarterly assizes but also creating the equivalent of an “anatomy season” when bodies were available. The anatomical subject was at the center of a set of commercial relations that defined the body of the criminal as a consumable object, inspiring John Taylor’s characterization of the bodies at the gallows as “dead commodities.” There was a lot of corpse-stealing going on as well (but in the name of SCIENCE! Don't feel bad about it).

Anyway, there was a problem with the whole "desecration of a corpse" thing that the medical schools appeased by only dissecting criminals (who were lost causes anyway). Issue: circumvented! Take that, church!

Would you like to read further on this? Probably you do!:
Jonathan Sawday’s The Body Emblazoned: Dissection and the Human Body explores the connections between the new science of anatomy, a curiosity about the workings of the human body, and the poetic and rhetorical tropes associated with discovery. Hillary M. Nunn’s recent study, Staging Anatomies: Dissection and Tragedy in Early Stuart Drama, builds on Sawday’s assertions, and approaches the issue of anatomy’s influence on the early Stuart stage. She traces the role of public dissection in London’s anatomy theaters and the representations of dissected bodies on stage. These studies provide insight into the way the body of a criminal was viewed.

Now you know...and knowing is half the battle.

President Rochester, 2009

President Wilmot would probably spend all our tax money on booze and hookers, but that's not too far removed from what most politicians do anyway. In fact, I think he'd have to come up with some new deplorable behaviors to even register on the CNN ticker...maybe like texting sexual messages to his young male intern while doing crystal meth and auto-erotically asphixiating himself in an airport bathroom as he waits to sell senate seats on the black market.

I don't even know what's scandalous anymore. In the 17th century all you had to do was write a funny epigram.

Internet Rochester, 2009

Build your own Blingee

YES! This is the best picture ever.

Awhile ago I started a series called Rochester Through the Ages, but this trumps it. Big time. It was so fun that I'm going to start another series in which Rochester embodies abstract ideas or states of being, but for now I think we should just enjoy this. Needless to say Internet Rochester would have the blingest myspace page ever.

A statute for swearers and drunkards, 1624

The moral of this ballad is that you shouldn't get sloppy-ass drunk and say dirty words, which is pretty standard stuff on the early-modern moral front.

I think what makes it special is that the guy, even though it's a pretty crude woodcut, really does look sloppy-ass drunk. He's got his booze and his pipe and his nagging wife, and I can't tell if that's supposed to be a fashionable kerchief or vomit running down his front (I'm going with vomit). Also, is he straddling a chamber pot? If so, that's kind of awesome.

But then that wife of his is coming in all like, "quit drinking!" and harshing his buzz and making threats. Party-pooper. She used to be cool.

Actually, the more I look at it, maybe that's not a ladle, but another pipe, and the wife's pissed because her husband smoked her stash. This is a very complicated picture.

A New Voyage Round the World, 1697

The explorer William Dampier made this map, but it's pretty useless without all my notes and insider tips. That's probably why Dampier was kicked out of the Navy...the whole story about dropping some guy he didn't like off in a Brazilian prison is just a red herring.

(p.s.-- I did two sweet Literary Makeovers you should probably check out.)

Ouer-throw of an Irish rebell, 1608

If there was ever a contest for "most pwned race in history," I think the Irish might win.










This pamphlet tells the story of Sir Cahir O'Doughterty, an Irish lord who resisted the English presence in Ireland. O'Dougherty is offended when George Paulett, the English Governor of Derry, punches him in the face and threatens him with a death sentence. So O'Dougherty sneaks into Derry, kills Paulett and almost everybody else, and destroys the settlement. Then he marches with rebel forces to a few more English plantations and fortresses and burns them down in a fairly rash and unorganized rebellion. Finally, he gets shot, and the English stick his head on a pike. The End.

Renaissance, you're so gross!

We all know the Renaissance had its share of perverts and dirty messages, but I think my delicate sensibilities have finally been tested in this initial installment of "Renaissance, you're so gross!" I give you the following images of early modern ass kissing.

The first image comes from Strange Nevvs from Newgate and the Old-Baily: or The Proofs, examinations, declarations, indictments, conviction, and confessions of I. Collins and T. Reeve (1651). The pamphlet describes crimes of two clergymen (and others) accused of blasphemy and partying too hard on Sundays. I've included the accompanying text that describes the terrible (actually it's pretty funny) blasphemy above the image of the two men engaged in such "uncivil behavior as the kissing of one another's breeches, more lively represented by this figure:"

Wow. I don't know what's worse, the ass kissing or the whole thing about drinking the Blood of Christ and then pissing out God.

The pamphlet is full of descriptions of blasphemous and sexual acts, but the author certainly seems to revel in telling us all the dirty details for, uh, "educational purposes."

The next image is from A letter to Mr. Marriot from a friend of his: wherein his name is redeemed form that detraction G.F. Gent. hath indeavoured to fasten upon him, by a scandalous and defamatory libell, intituled "The great eater of Grayes Inne, or, the life of Mr. Marriot the cormorant" (1652). John Ben Marriott was a lawyer known as "the great eater" who's name became a by-word for gluttony. He was the subject of several coarse pamphlets like The Great Eater of Grayes Inne, which described at length how he ate a banquet set for 20 men, stole dogs and other strange things to cook, and concludes with a few gross recipes. Basically, he was a fatty. Here's the frontispiece of A Letter, his answer to the attacks:








Burn! That'll show 'em.











I especially like how the publisher felt he could show a picture of an ass, but not spell out the word "arse". Because that would just be crude.

For good measure, I'll include one more dirty thing from the 17th century-- the best "long s" ever published:

Whew! I'm officially grossed out.

A Most Certain, Strange, and True Discovery of a Witch, 1643

Did you know that one time in 1643, some people killed someone for surfing! The story goes like this: some Parliamentarian soldiers are walking along and see a tall woman walking on water (like Jesus? No, not like Jesus at all!), but as she nears the soldiers see that she is actually standing on "a plank overshadowed with a little shallow water." One soldier says that he's heard of men saved by the providence of God after a shipwreck by clinging to broken boards (so God saved this woman from drowning? Wrong, because she's a woman, and is therefore evil). Anyway, they see her give the board a push and she surfs to the shore. It probably looked a lot like this:


The soldiers decide surfing is proof of her witchcraft and satanism, so they all decide to shoot her in a most un-tubular fashion. The men open fire, "but with a deriding and loud laughter at them she caught their bullets in her hands and chew'd them." Now the soldiers are really convinced she's a witch, so one guy walks up and, so he's sure he won't miss, "discharge[s] a pistoll beneath her eare, at which she straight sunk down and dyed, leaving her carcass to the worms," never to hang ten again. Wipeout.

Isn't that a good story? A young surfer persecuted for her thrill-seeking spirit by a bunch of uptight puritans who don't understand the freedom of riding the waves. Then there's a bodacious showdown where the surfer dies for daring to dream. Now is it just me, or has a certain film already mined this 350 year old pamphlet for script ideas?:






















Damn you Keanu Reeves! Point Break is so obviously A Most Certain, Strange, and True Discovery of a Witch reworked. Swayze is the witch, Reeves is the doubting soldier, and the giant wave at the end that kills Swayze is intolerance and injustice.

But seriously, I was reading an article by Malcolm Gaskill that discussed this pamphlet briefly, and he tells us all about so-called "witch hunts" carried out by soldiers during the English Civil War. He says that the war "disrupted the civil administration that had done so much to restrict what was admissible as evidence. Worse, people took the law into their own hands. In some regions a military presence had a brutalizing effect, and at least two lynchings of suspected witches by soldiers are recorded for 1643. Everywhere the fact that Parliament was at war with the king ‘gave an entirely unprecedented tangibility to the workings of Satan’, and raised the devil's profile in discourse and debate."
"Witchcraft and Evidence in Early Modern England" (Past & Present 2008 198(1):33-70.)

There you go...surfing was only evidence of witchcraft when roving military bands catch you. Although I don't condone killing surfers, I do feel that white people with dreadlocks who wear stylized floral prints and listen to Jack Johnson are asking for a bullet in the head.

Certaine Prophesies presented before the Kings Majesty, 1642

I'm pretty sure the prophesies concerning "The University" go something like, "Your advanced degree shall be utterly useless very soon."

Also, I was unaware that Trinity College in the University of Cambridge offered a degree in Prophesizing and Prognosticating. Now that's something useful.

He[re] Begynneth an Interlocucyon, with an argument, betwyxt man and woman, 1525

Even monks think so. That's why they illuminated their copies of ancient texts with sexy pictures.

The Complaynt of the Soul, 1532

Crowns are shiny, and I hear absolution and peace are overrated anyway. And is it just me, or do the demons sort of look like they'd be a lot more fun to hang with than the Saints?

Anyway, due to a move and cross-country drive, I won't be updating for awhile. I will leave you with a link to the Proceedings of the Old Baily, which has transcriptions and digital scans of all the criminal court proceedings from 1617-1913. I searched my name and nothing came up...but my dad's did:





















I always suspected he was a thief! My metal seals and brass keys are always turning up missing. But my favorite has to be the one about a case of bigamy that is dismissed because...wait for it...one of the "men" Katherine Jones married was a HERMAPHRODITE! There needs to be a Law and Order episode based on this case immediately, especially now that it's legal in at least a few states for two women to marry. Anyway, the database is big fun. Amuse yourselves for a while why don't you?

P.S. --I almost forgot...have you seen this commercial that uses Henry V's "St. Crispin's Day" speech to sell...um...video games? I kept hearing snippets of it on television and doing double-takes before I finally caught the whole thing. Somewhere Kenneth Branagh is crying. (Let's all watch his version to cleanse our palates. ) I'm not sure if I'm offended by this use of the speech or not. (Wait--yes I am...it's not even advertising a Henry V video game, because against all reason, there has never been a Henry V video game!) It is possible, however, that I'm merely embittered because my own video game proposal has garnered so little attention from the Playstation people.

John Fowke...makes constant-stream'd engines for extinguishing fires, 1726

In my quest to trace everything back to the Renaissance, I have once again discovered the antecedent of a popular rap lyric (here is the last one I did). I found this one in none other than Shakespeare. Although he doesn't quite capture the simple exuberance and delicate lyricism of Rock Master Scott & the Dynamic Three's "the roof (x3) is on fire!", this speech Hamlet gives is pretty okay too I guess. In the 1603 quarto, Rosencrantz actually interjects to tell Hamlet to "let the motherfucker burn" in an effort to restore his mirth, but being the "bad quarto" scholars have largely ignored it.

I can't find much out about the John Fowke this publication mentions, but he made a super awesome water pump and apparently everyone was very impressed. The text read like an advertisement for the pump, but the illustrator gains bonus points for accurately representing the "foul and pestilent congregation of vapours."

The Expert Midwife, 1637

People often ask me, "Sarah, what were the worries and anxieties of early modern peoples?" The answer: Pretty much everything. Early modern peoples not only had to deal with weird stuff that they couldn't explain, when they did get an explanation it usually went something like "God hates us and we're all going to hell because you are all dirty dirty sinners." The best example of this situation is an old favorite on LOL Manuscripts: monstrous births.

The Expert Midwife, or and Excellent and most necessary treatise on the generation and birth of man is a manual teaching people how to assist with pregnancy, labor, and delivery. The best parts of the book are the illustrations of contorted babies in wombs. The "cure" for all these problematically positioned fetuses is usually something along the lines of "just yank it out." The book closes (as should all books about pregnancy) with Chapter III: "of Unperfect children, also of monstrous births." Here is the explanation that accompanies the above image:

"In the yeere 1512 at Ravenna a monster was borne, which had a horne on his head, two wings, no armes, a crooked foot with talons, like a ravenous bird, an eye on his knee, of both sex, in the midst of his breast he had the forme of the Greeke letter Ypsilon, and the Figure of a Crosse. Some interpreted this thing after this manner, That the horne did signifie pride, the wings ficklenesse and inconstancy, the want of armes to signifie a defect of good workes, the ravenous foot, rapine, usury, and all kinde of covetousnesse, the eye on his knee, to portend a respect and regard alone to earthly things, and that hee was of both sex, to signify filthy Sodomy. Moreover, that at the time Italy was so afflicted with the ruines and miseries of warre, because of these sinnes" (158).

Don't you feel better about the abomination now? It was just a grotesque physical manifestation of the sins of the community! I must wonder what 17th century scholars would make of this real unicorn? (I knew they were real!!1!)

Also, while perusing the book I came across other fun illustrations that I have fashioned into this greeting card. Send it to the next person you find has been inseminated! She'll love the detailed drawings of the birthing stool and various speculums and forceps.
The interior could read: "Here's to a healthy pregnancy and a quick delivery. A baby is such a blessing! But not a flying unicorn bird baby. They do not augur well. Hope you haven't done anything sinful lately."

London's Love, to the Royal Prince Henrie, 1610

I thought this was a pretty sweet picture of a ship. The publication chronicles a royal entertainment of a mock sea battle put on by the Navy on the River Thames:

"Vpon the Princes neere approche, way was made for his best and aptest entertainement, which by multitude of Boates and Bardges (of no vse, but only for desire of sight) was much impeached for a while, Till order being taken for the contrarie, the Princes Bardge accosted the Lord Maiors, where dutie entertayning on the one side, & Princely Grace most affably accepting on the other."

It was sort of like the reenactments that still go on today, but this one seems particularly lavish. Not only is there a battle against pirates and Turks, but at one point some chick is riding on a whale and giving speeches to the Prince, and then there are "verie rare and admirable Fire-workes." All in all, the entertainment was a scurvy-less success.

P.S. -- I did makeovers of Blake and Mayakovsky over at Literary Makeovers!!!

The practise of the new and old phisicke, 1599

Oh, Alchemy. It was so popular in the Renaissance, and it always surprises me to see the types of people interested in it (Thomas Aquinas, Isaac Newton). To be fair, it wasn't all about turning base metals into gold; it had other dumb goals as well. The principles found their way into philosophy, biology, chemistry, spirituality, and even medicine (as seen in this publication. That's just what I want when I'm dying--some magician coming in trying to get me to drink the "panacea" he made in his basement). I think we can all agree that it was pretty stupid. I'd been wanting to do one of the "invisible"-style lolcat jokes for a while now, and when I saw this it was the first thing I thought of. I almost went with "Alchemy: It's Bullshit," because for me Alchemy has always been the early modern version of all the new-agey, pseudospiritual, pseudoscientific crap we still have to put up with now.

Also: I just started watching Blackadder (it's all on YouTube!) and it has a pretty sweet alchemy gag from the Elizabethan series. Why did I never watch this show before now?!

The Armes of the Tobachonists, 1630

I've never been to Amsterdam, but for some reason this is exactly how I imagine it.

Anyway, apparently tobacco, aka the "heathen weed," suffered a bit of a backlash in the 17th century. It was all well and good when Francis Drake brought it to England in 1573, for sure. Drake even got Sir Walter Raleigh hooked in 1585. In 1586 Tobacco arrived in English Society. That July, some of the Virginia colonists returned to England and disembarked at Plymouth smoking tobacco from pipes, which caused a sensation. William Camden (1551-1623) a contemporary witness, reported that "These men who were thus brought back were the first that I know of that brought into England that Indian plant which they call Tabacca and Nicotia, or Tobacco." [source].

A few years later, the Puritans decided that maybe it could get you high and was a devilish practice, what with all that smoke and burning embers and looking cool. This pamphleteer seems to have gotten carried away about the effects of smoking. This may in fact be the worst anti-smoking ad ever, because I have never wanted to smoke so much until this very moment. Although I will admit that the baby scrotum is a bit off putting.

Who knew surrealism was around in 1630? Now we all do. I hereby submit this image to David Lynch (or Luis Buñuel, if he weren't dead, or maybe Aronofsky) as the basis for a new trippy drug movie about a post-apocalyptic future in which everyone can buy psychotropic cigarettes that make you see shit like this. Although baby scrotums might be too much even for David Lynch. I imagine this scene would be scored by the Nat King Cole song "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes," which sounds nice enough to enhance the terrifying nature of the visuals (a la Roy Orbison's "Candy Colored Clown" from Blue Velvet.)

An exact description of Prince Ruperts Malignant She-Monkey, 1643

I've been researching for this one for a while, because Prince Rupert of the Rhine is maybe my favorite Cavalier ever. Nephew of Charles I, Rupert fought as a general in the English Civil War, and after his banishment was a buccaneer pirate in the Caribbean. During the war, Parliamentarian propagandists published numerous pamphlets about him . He was called "Prince Robber" and "the Mad Cavalier" because of his bravery and cruelty in battle. He was also famous for his Satanic familiars, the most famous being a white poodle named "Boy" (last year, Cassidy did a genius lolmanuscript from a publication about Boy's death at the Battle of Marston Moor, check it out here.)

His other familiar was a "malignant she-monkey," who had magical powers and was able to transform into any shape to spy on the enemy. The Roundheads really loved discussing Rupert's "effeminacy" and sexual deviancy as well, and this pamphlet makes not so subtle hints about Rupert's special "relationship" with his monkey, who gets ridiculously sexualized as a type of courtesan who "tempts the prince by her lascivious gestures." To their credit though, he apparently did dress it up in little skirts and coats and made it ride on Boy's back. I'm still not sure why she's committing hara-kiri in the picture because the original pamphlet is pretty difficult to to read. I guess anthropomorphized monkeys can commit ritualistic suicide to end the pain of living without their master, but in real life she probably just would have throw her own feces at people. The moral of this story: we all need to line up some Satanic familiars asap.

For further reading, check out this awesome looking book, published in 2007: Prince Rupert: The Last Cavalier by Charles Spencer Century.

Why Renaissance Typography Is Awesome Sometimes

The "Descending" or "Long S" is ubiquitous in Renaissance publications; a holdover from Carolingian minuscule handwriting and black letter print. Usually, it just makes reading original texts a bit more difficult, but on rare occasions, when you least expect it, the EEBO Gods will give you a spectacular typographical gift. Therefore, I give you examples of the "long s" paired with variations of the totally innocent word "suck." The results -- outstanding.

I, for one, can't wait to "fuck the abundance of the seas." Can you? And even though it was common to begin words starting with "s" like this well into the 17th century, you know that the typesetters had to have known what they were doing. (Try as I might, I couldn't find the line about the "sucking babe" that began my obsession with the long s, but I remember it made me laugh out loud. In a library. As I was looking at EEBO. It was awesome and depressing all at the same time. At that moment, I came up with this hilarious and soon to be popular insult: "SUCK YOU! WITH A LONG 'S'!" (Man, I'm funny.) I'll leave you with an awesome Shakespearian example:

Whoa, Friar Laurence, slow down! You're a man of the cloth, for Christ's sake!

The School of the Noble and Worthy Science of Defense, 1617

These two gentlemen don't seem to realize that you fight with the pointy ends. I guess that's why swordfighting manuals were in such high demand in the Renaissance. At least the dudes in the illustration for Middleton and Rowley's A Faire Quarrell had their rapiers crossed. And honestly, who's fighting with giant broadswords in 1617? That shit was sooo 15th century.

Nugae Venales, Or Complasent Companion, 1675

The full title of this publication is "Nugae Venales, Or Complasent Companion: Being new jests domestic and foreign, bulls, rhodomontados, pleasant novels, and miscellanies." Basically, it's a bit of light reading for Puritans, and books like these were full of little stories, folk tales, and occasionally bawdy jokes. The Nugae Venales is a jest book (nugae=jokes, venales=for sale), which is a subgenre of this literary trend. Although I'm not sure what dismemberment has to do with jests, I've tried to recontextualize it for a modern audience.

This is my new favorite book. There are some absolutely amazing "jests" contained in here (that's right, real Renaissance lolz!!!1!). Take this zinger: "A gentleman whose name was Church sitting in a chimney-corner drinking a pot of ale asked the question, whether any of the company ever saw a chimney in a church. No (said one) But now I see a Church in a chimney-corner." HAHAHA! There's actually a whole series of jests featuring Mr. Church, and trust me, they're all this sidesplitting. There's another jest that riffs on Ford's 'Tis Pity She's a Whore, where a man has to tell his wife what play is playing, and who's-on-first-esque hilarity ensues. I can't wait to be invited to a dinner party, because I'm going to dazzle everyone with my 17th century topical humor.

If you're interested in such things, check out Jules Paul Seigel's "Puritan Light Reading." The New England Quarterly. 37. 2 (Jun. 1964): 185-199. It just goes to show you that although I lol on some of these publications, the actual Renaissance lolz blow me right out of the water. I mean, a church in a chimney! Can you imagine?