LOL Manuscripts!

A Worthy Example of a Vertuous Wife, who Fed her Father with her own Milk, 1686

2011-06-14T19:26:00.005-04:00

a.k.a. Renaissance, you're so gross! Part II

Father's day is coming up, so figured I'd disturb the holy hell out of you this year.

You probably want to send this to your dad:

That's right. And apparently this is a thing.

Anyway, the story here is that a man is arrested and sentenced to starve to death in jail. His daughter gets permission to visit him every day, but she's searched so she can't sneak him any food. Then, she has a terrific idea:

"No Meat nor drink she with her brought
to help him there distrest,
But every day she nourisht him,
with Milk from her own Breast.

Thus by her Milk he was preserv'd,
a twelvemonth and a day,
And was as fair and fat to see,
yet no man knew which way."

Now I get the whole Roman Charity/act of selflessness thing, but...no and gross.

I recently read about some genetically modified cows making "human" breast milk, which is also sort of upsetting. Although, comparatively, not so much. You know, because of the thing I was talking about before. About the lady breastfeeding her own father. That thing.

Happy Father's day!

The Wonderfull Battell of Starelings,1622

2011-01-07T17:14:00.012-05:00

Today in topical dead bird news:

With all the dead birds falling from the sky lately (a.k.a. "the Aflockalypse"), I was reminded of this pamphlet I've had saved for a while. Suddenly, it's relevant!

In Cork, Ireland on October 12-14, 1621, it was raining starlings! But this wasn't just some boring dead bird situation -- these starlings were at war. Hordes of birds reportedly converged in such numbers that "the ayre was obscured and darkened by them." The birds, "mounting up into the Skies, encountered one another with such a terrible Shock, as the Sound amazed the whole City and the Beholders," until “there fell down in the City, and into the Rivers, Multitudes of Starlings or Stares, some with Wings broken, some with Legs and Necks broken, some with Eyes picked out, some their Bills thrust into the Breast and Sides of their Adversaries.” Damn. Can I just say that 400 years ago birds knew how to die with some pizazz! These 21st century birds just flop down on the ground without putting on a show of any kind.

After it was over, the amount of dead birds "was so great, that they were taken up with shovels, and swept together with besomes, that bushels were filled with them." The author seems to think this is bad, but I bet the starving Irishmen were pretty stoked, right?

What did it all mean? Well, like everything else bad that happened in the 17th century, "it doth prognosticate either God's mercy to draw us to repentence, or his justice to punish our sinnes and wickednesse, if we do not make haste to repent in due time."

But what about these recent bird deaths? Surely they are a message from God? A sign of the apocalypse? Well, renowned theologian and former Growing Pains star Kirk Cameron says: no! Don't be stupid. Case closed.

Shepherd's ingenuity: or, The praise of the green gown, 1688

2010-05-01T12:50:00.011-04:00

May is International Make-out Month*! It's true! I'll explain: May 1st, or May Day, is a traditional celebration welcoming the coming of Spring. Originally a pagan holiday, "going a-Maying" was embraced by people in medieval and Renaissance cultures, and still remains an important holiday (it's kind of like Labor Day for everyone except Americans. Lame.).

Anyway, it has a sexy history! Celebrating the "Rites of May" was supposed to be about running around in the fields all night to ostensibly gather flowers and greenery and maypoles or whatever, but really you could use it as an excuse for getting trashed and hitting on people. Many Protestants opposed these celebrations on account of all these unchaperoned young people doing who-knows-what in the woods. Phillip Stubbes thought it was the worst, citing May Day's potentiality for moral bankruptcy and sexual hedonism in his Anatomie of Abuses:

"I have heard it credibly reported (and that viva voce) by men of great gravitie and reputation, that of fortie, threescore, or a hundred maides going to the wood over night, there have scarecely the thirde parte of them returned home againe undefiled" (Ch. XIII).

Really? Wow. Robert Herrick liked it, though. The author of Shepherd's ingenuity seems to like it too, explaining the joys of woodland make-out sessions and "green gowns," a phrase alluding to the ruined dress a girl would receive from rolling around in the grass with her lover. To be said to have a "green gown" eventually came to mean a woman was promiscuous. In addition to the super-hot picture, the ballad has some terrific advice for getting ladies:

"Some for to gain their Ladies Love,
will give them Chains and Rings,
Some gives them Fans and Fancies too,
but these ate foolish things;
If you wou'd fain her Love obtain,
let this be your endeavour,
To give her a fair Gown of Green,
and then she's yours for ever. "

See, it's easy! And today is the only day you can act like a 'ho and say it's "historical research!"

*Unofficial, and mostly made up by me.

Oh, and in other sexy news, I did an Andrew Marvell makeover.

A systeme of anatomy, 1685

2010-04-02T06:30:00.004-04:00

It's Easter! Bunnies and Candy time! I think Jesus may be involved in some fashion, too.

A systeme of anatomy, treating of the body of man, beasts, birds, fish, insects, and plants was written by Samuel Collins (1619-1670). This guy was apparently hot stuff in the medical field, and famously served as the personal physician to Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich. Modern doctors still write about his contributions to neurology! Anyway, when he busted up this rabbit's skull, he wrote some really flattering things about it, like this:

"The Hemispheres of the Brain of this Animal are beautified with many Prominencies, adorned with various shapes and sizes."

Beautified? Adorned? Seems like pretty flowery language to describe a brain. The only satisfactory explanation is that Dr. Collins was a zombie. Seriously, dude was way in to cracking open skulls and looking at brains...braaains...braaaaaains! And yet I think the worst part about the pictures is that he drew in the little bunny whiskers--it's like 10 times creepier because of that. Well, that and the fact that they look like the Donnie Darko nightmare rabbit. Happy Zombie Easter, I guess.

Now, as a bonus Easter present to you, I offer up this holiday-themed Long S from 1 Henry IV:

Whoa. Easter just got real.

English military discipline, or, The way and method of exercising horse & foot according to the practice of this present time,1680

2010-03-21T10:45:00.014-04:00

Whenever people ask me if I had a good day, I think to myself, "did I have to use my A.K.?" That's a pretty good litmus test for the quality of day I had. Ice Cube agrees with me.

English Military Discipline is a short publication about how to use your sword, pike, and ~~AK-47~~ musket. It's devoted to instructions about military formations, organizations of ranks of soldiers, and strategies on how you should utilize firearms and other weapons during a battle. The basic thrust is that everyone should stand in lines or squares. Tactics! Basically I just liked the pictures of the guns. Here are some more:

I gotta say it was a good day.

The Husband's Instructions to his Family, 1685

2010-03-06T14:40:00.012-05:00

Okay, so the sign really said "A Family well Govern'd is, like a Kingdom, well Ruled," but this is essentially the same thing. Read it and weep, sis.

The husband's instructions to his family:, or, Household observations fit to be observed by vvife, children, and servants is such a useful publication. In three instructive poems, we hear a husband's great ideas about how his wife, kids, and servants should behave. Just go to the column that represents the oppressed group to which you belong, and read what a rich white man thinks about you. TONS of good advice in here for all! We learn, for example, that a wife shouldn't wear makeup, or talk too loud, or nag nag nag her husband all the time he's the one making all the money around here for crying out loud what more do you want?!! The advice for servants is mostly about how they shouldn't steal or gamble. It also contains these immortal lines:

I hate a slut, too. And don't even get me started on saucy knaves! Good servants are so hard to find these days. Basically the entire thing is reinforcing that patriarchy through the magical medium of poetry. Together at last.

Finally, for good measure, a pretty funny Long S from the instructions for children poem to add to the collection:

Great set of instructions, husband! I'm off to wash off my makeup and work on my humility and modesty.

Loves Lamentable Tragedy, 1680

2010-02-14T09:30:00.000-05:00

Love's Lamentable Tragedy, in this case, refers to the pain of lost love. From the title page:

"When cruel lovers prove unkind, great sorrows they procure; and such strange pains the slighted find, that they cannot endure."

I liked the image, because the woman doesn't die in the ballad--she's just super sad that her boyfriend left her. So the use of the iconic image of death (the ol' Skeleton with hourglass and arrow standby) is a metaphor for heartbreak. Poor lady.

Anyway, if you want a more traditional Valentine image, check out the previous posts, featuring cutting out of hearts, hearts being cut out, and early modern heart anatomy. You know, romance.

A true discourse Declaring the damnable life and death of one Stubbe Peeter, 1590

2010-01-23T17:04:00.010-05:00

The full title: A true discourse. Declaring the damnable life and death of one Stubbe Peeter, a most wicked sorcerer who in the likenes of a woolfe, committed many murders, continuing this diuelish practise 25. yeeres, killing and deuouring men, woomen, and children. Who for the same fact was taken and executed the 31. of October last past in the towne of Bedbur neer the cittie of Collin in Germany.

Werewolves were a huge social problem in 16th century Europe. They were everywhere! Germany seemed to be especially afflicted. Apparently, this fellow Peter Stubbe, "careles of saluation, gaue both soule and body to the deuil for euer." Problem was he didn't really want riches or fame. He was a total asshole/serial killer to start with, and he only asked the Devil to make it so that he might "woork his mallice on men, Women, and children, in the shape of some beast, wherby he might liue without dread or danger of life." Long story short, SHABLAM! WEREWOLF! Dude started killing everybody, and "oftentimes the Inhabitants found the Armes & legges of dead Men, Women, and Children, scattered vp and down the feelds." It was the worst.

Anyway, some folks finally see Peter Stubbe and arrest him for suspicious werewolfy-type stuff. Then they tortured him on the rack and surprise surprise! He confessed everything! Werewolves absolutely hate torture, but then the townsfolk killed him (and his daughter and the town gossip, whom he implicated) in a fairly torturous fashion anyway. One point for God. P.S., if you'd like to read more about this fairly famous case, I recommend this article from Early Modern Whale. It's pretty interesting.

Can you honestly say you're "Team Jacob" now? I didn't think so.

(By the way, in the vein of Pride and Predjudice and Zombies, which I read and really liked, I think that Wuthering Heights and Werewolves is an obvious next step. Heathcliff is basically already a werewolf anyway. Someone get on it!)

The Tears of the Indians, 1656

2009-11-25T09:08:00.005-05:00

It's that time of year again. Turkey and stuffing and cranberry sauce and a side of pondering the oppression of native peoples. Also sometimes there's pumpkin pie!

Bartolomé de las Casas (1484-1566) wrote this happy little book. It's about Spain's mistreatment and eventual genocide of Indians in Central America and the Caribbean. His father accompanied Columbus on two of his trips to the New World, bringing back Bartolomé a Taino slave, which was nice for him. He and his father immigrated to Hispanola in 1502, where his witnessed firsthand how much it sucked to be a native in the Caribbean. He felt super-bad about all the genociding, so he became a priest and an advocate for abolishing the enslavement of Indians. He was sort of successful, but when Spain was all like, "but we need people to work for us and we don't want to pay them!" de las Casas came up with the perfect solution . . . African slaves! Because they don't count. Everybody thought this was a ~~racist~~ ~~abominable~~ ~~hypocritical~~ great idea.

So while he's pretty cool for being nice to Indians, he totally sucks for contributing to one of humanity's greatest horrors -- black slavery in the New World. Even-Steven? Not really, no. So happy Thanksgiving and American Indian Heritage Month, with respective apologies to Turkeys and Indians.

The Seaman's Secrets, 1626

2009-10-15T20:24:00.010-04:00

John Davis (c.1550-1605) was a successful explorer during the reign of Elizabeth I. He discovered the Falkland Islands, where his crew killed like 100,000 penguins and the meat spoiled and most of the sailors died of worms, and the Davis Straight, which he named after himself. Basically, he sailed all over the place (maybe even with Raleigh!). Then he invented some sort of quadrant called the Backstaff that was pretty cool. Anyway, he published The Seaman's Secrets, a navigation guide, in 1594.

Tragically, he was killed by Japanese pirates off of Sumatra in 1605. RIP, John Davis. Maybe if you REALLY knew how to navigate properly you would've made it to someplace cool like Atlantis or something.

What is the next necessary thing to be learned?

ps -- Do you know what a Googlewhack is? Because apparently this website has one! With two amazing words, I might add: http://bit.ly/1z2TQY

Chirologia, or the Naturall Language of the Hand, 1644

2009-07-30T11:01:00.001-04:00

John Bulwer was a medical practitioner and, essentially, an early linguistic theorist who explored the idea of the physical human body as a medium of communication. With Chirologia, Bulwer created one of the first English books on deafness and the education of deaf-mutes. Chirologia comprehensively catalogs the meanings of hand gestures and emphasizes the value of manual gestures for speech, oration, and acting. His catalog of gestures is not based on a set "sign language," but rather his own observations and other classical texts. However, Bulwer did advocate for special schools for the deaf, although he was really more interested in devising ways of teaching the deaf to speak than in designing, describing, or using any sign language they might have of their own. [source, source]

Bulwer argued that gestural language was universal and primary, while spoken language is just one more tool in the complex scheme of communication. His idea related to the contemporary interest in the notion of universal languages, as well as supporting what would later be known as the gestural theory, which proposes all language evolved from gesture.

You can find more information on the book at the Folger Shakespeare Library and an you can check out an excerpt included in the 2001 book Imagining Language: An Anthology, which is a collection of writings that "demonstrate the continuum of creative conjecture on language from antiquity to the present." So apparently, what I first thought of as funny Renaissance gang signs turned out to be a pretty important step for the instruction of the deaf and a prescient take on linguistic evolution. This makes me feel slightly bad for making a handjob joke.

The Description of a Monstrous Pig, 1562

2009-05-21T08:40:00.004-04:00

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!

2009-05-11T08:30:00.009-04:00

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 episode:

The Simpsons 2020 - Four Great Women and a Manicure
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

2009-05-06T22:31:00.015-04:00

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 that Mr. Bush made a "flying" ship and Nixon wrote about it.

Happy Birthday Shakespeare!

2009-04-23T07:00:00.001-04:00

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

2009-04-16T18:17:00.019-04:00

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

2009-03-16T13:27:00.009-04:00

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

2009-02-18T08:28:00.002-05:00

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

2009-02-16T22:50:00.010-05:00

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

2009-02-13T12:00:00.000-05:00

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

2009-02-12T18:59:00.004-05:00

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

2009-02-11T21:08:00.009-05:00

"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

2009-01-29T16:24:00.006-05:00

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

2009-01-29T11:45:00.001-05:00

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

2009-01-27T12:37:00.004-05:00

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

2009-01-15T12:29:00.008-05:00

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

2009-01-13T10:02:00.004-05:00

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!

2009-01-09T08:28:00.017-05:00

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

2008-12-10T12:38:00.005-05:00

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 civiladministration that had done so much to restrict what was admissibleas 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 soldiersare recorded for 1643. Everywhere the fact that Parliamentwas at war with the king ‘gave an entirely unprecedentedtangibility to the workings of Satan’, and raised thedevil'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

2008-10-03T14:23:00.005-04:00

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

2008-09-22T17:58:00.006-04:00

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

The Complaynt of the Soul, 1532

2008-06-19T20:50:00.013-04:00

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

2008-06-18T21:55:00.007-04:00

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

2008-06-14T14:56:00.019-04:00

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

2008-06-08T11:44:00.005-04:00

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

2008-06-02T16:44:00.001-04:00

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

2008-05-31T18:41:00.012-04:00

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

2008-05-26T11:19:00.005-04:00

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

2008-05-21T18:33:00.019-04:00

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

2008-05-17T22:49:00.013-04:00

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

2008-05-14T21:40:00.013-04:00

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?

The Lamentable Burning of the Citty of Corke, 1622

2008-05-14T10:36:00.004-04:00

Where's Jesus when you need him? The townspeople must not be praying and/or lamenting hard enough. Anyway, I liked this pamphlet because the city of Cork apparently had some bad mojo in the 1620s. A year earlier a bunch of Starlings all flew in and committed some kind of mass suicide (there's a ballad on that, too). Then lightning strikes and the city goes up in flames. I blame the Catholics...17th century disasters like this can usually be traced back to them.

The art of distillation, 1664

2008-05-08T15:56:00.016-04:00

Methamphetamine is, I think, the most unglamorous drug around. I was in rural northern Florida over Christmas, and we thought we stumbled across an old campfire, but there were all these burnt cans of lighter fluid and glass jars and parts of a rusted grill scattered around, and we realized that it was probably a place where someone was cooking meth. (I watch Breaking Bad. I know what goes on.) It's a real problem in shitty, middle-of-nowhere places. And did you ever see those awful Montana Meth Project ads? They scared me straight! But until I came across this publication, euphemistically titled "The art of distillation, or, A treatise of the choicest spagyrical preparations, experiments, and curiosities," I never knew it was a problem in Restoration England.

The Chancellor's Resolution, 1689

2008-05-04T10:00:00.005-04:00

I'm really glad I will never have Cholera. It's like the worst disease you can get, for sure. I really liked the images in this ballad, but I can't make out the text at all. I imagine that it's standard stuff about the Chancellor coming to terms with his mortality. And I love that image of death...he sort of has an uncomfortable expression on his face (skull?) that spoke to me. It's like he's trying to be positive about the whole business, but he can't quite pull it off.

A pleasant Countrey new ditty, 1625

2008-04-27T20:30:00.002-04:00

The Full title of this ballad is A pleasant Countrey new ditty, merrily showing how to drive the cold winter away. I know that this is exactly what I do in the winter. . . just hang out with a few buds and eat porridge and one chicken leg.

Now that I'm getting older, I occasionally get invited to "dinner parties," which are just like regular parties, except lame. A spoon-fellator, however, would improve just about anything. But I hear you have to book them way in advance.

Make sure you RSVP!

The Myrrour of the Chyrche, 1527

2008-04-26T18:55:00.011-04:00

This is an early Renaissance printing of the writings of St. Edmund of Abingdon, 13th century Archbishop of Canterbury. Since it's Catholic, much of the writing is about how bad hell will be for us all. Oh well! I did a throwback to my days of lolcat gags for this woodcut illustrating what's going to happen to all us sinners when we're damned.

I like the animal-demons a lot, athough it would probably be pretty terrifying to be fed to a giant bulldog by an anthropomorphized cockatoo.

The English Irish Soludier, 1642

2008-04-24T17:41:00.016-04:00

Typical anti-Irish invective in this broadside, but the picture is too hilarious to pass up. The poem shows us how the Irish soldier would "rather eat than fight," and if he does fight in England's wars it's only so that he can pillage. He got some pretty sweet stuff though: a pot that doubles as a cool helmet, two fowls, a "bandaleer" of canary bottles (wine), sausages, and an artichoke. The final stanza suggests that if it weren't for all the stealing and booze, you'd never get the Irish to commit to anything. I know I couldn't pass up a good artichoke if I saw one just lying around after a battle.

Really, the more I think about it, the more I realize that pillaging is one of the only reasons I'd enter into military service. To be fair, the whole idea of stealing post-battle was one of the main recruitment tools for potential Medieval and Renaissance soldiers. Our military men are really getting a raw deal when compared to mercenaries of yore...what happened to all the perks of fighting foreign wars? Anyone remember all of those Crusades? All those wars with the Turks? Now that was the time to be battling Saracens! Those guys got all kinds of good stuff. I think this poster could reopen that particular recruitment tool. Say goodbye to boring, accusatory Uncle Sam and hello to Uncle Paddy McDrukenthief! Where do I sign up?

Ye Greatest and Meruelous uisyoned Batayle, 1518

2008-04-23T19:29:00.013-04:00

In honor of Shakespeare's birthday, I have tackled the debate about Shakespearean authorship. The Oxfordian Theory suggests that Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, actually wrote the plays and poems attributed to Shakespeare. Much of the "evidence" is either ridiculous, circumstantial, or tainted with class issues -- specifically the notion that a merchant's son could never have produced such great literary works. It's bullshit, of course, but I was shocked by how many people actually call themselves anti-Stratfordians. Losers--especially Orson Welles and Derek Jacobi. WTF guys?

Shakespeare up, Oxford down. But I do think that the anti-Oxfordian battle flag I made is pretty sweet. In other Shakespearean news, you should watch the trailer for this movie: Hamlet 2. That's right. And it has ♥Steve Coogan♥ in it! I'll bet he's a Stratfordian.

The True Fortune Teller, 1698

2008-04-21T20:10:00.009-04:00

IM UP IN UR GRILL, PREDICTIN UR FUCHUR

Astrology, palmistry, divination, and other crazy prognosticating systems were pretty popular in the Renaissance, but I'd never heard of Metoposcopy until I came across this. I guess it's sort of like Phrenology, using wrinkles to try to divine a person's future or tell their fortune instead of the shape of the skull. The book I took the image from is a how-to guide for reading palms and faces, understanding astrological signs, and interpreting dreams.

Oh, Renaissance. Why did you love this stupid shit so much?

The Ages of Sin, 1635

2008-04-19T17:16:00.009-04:00

Turtles will give you salmonella. It has been proven. Do not touch them. Ever.

Anyway, The Ages of Sin pairs certain (non-deadly, as far as I can tell) sins with an illustrative metaphorical image and explanation. Something about this one spoke to me, maybe because I do think turtles are like walking buckets of disease, maybe because I like that the man seems to have a deep-seated vendetta against them, and maybe because this very scene has most likely been played out many a time, "'cause turtles is goooood eatin'. "

In other news, Seamus Heaney got my special treatment over at Literary Makeovers!!!

The Prouerbs of Lydgate, 1510

2008-04-17T17:03:00.006-04:00

John Lydgate (c.1370-c.1451) was an English poet and priest. He wrote ridiculously long poems and quite a few hagiographies. I don't know much about him, although I've read a little of his work. He is credited with advancing the language quite a bit, coining new words (he's ALWAYS in the OED...I dare you to look something up and not see his name) or writing the earliest versions of now-cliched phrases like, "All is not golde that shewyth goldishe hewe." I'm positive that the antecedent of Tag Team's immortal "Party over here!" is somewhere in his book of proverbs, but I'm not going to read the whole thing, so I wrote it for him.

The French Monstrous Beast, 1692

2008-04-15T09:47:00.008-04:00

I only know one French sentence: "Ou est la bibliotheque?" That's always the very first sentence they teach you in a foreign language...I guess so if you can't communicate, you can go learn how in the library. I will say that the French monstrous beast is not quite as scary as Rome's monstrous beast, as far as monstrous beasts go.

Also, you should check out this makeover of Thomas Wyatt.

The Writing School-Master, 1620

2008-04-06T16:53:00.007-04:00

This comes from a workbook written by John Davies for teaching children how to write in fancy Renaissance script. I, however, have taken a nice manual about penmanship and dragged it through the mud. But I do like the idea of a Ben Jonson figurine...I think couples would have fought over that during a break-up.

p.s. -- I've done makeovers of Rimbaud and Coleridge that are pretty spectacular over at Literary Makeovers!!!

Now I actually have to learn photoshop

2008-04-01T18:07:00.010-04:00

You know, my blog is pretty good, but I've always held myself to the gold standard of hilarious, literature-based satire: Katie Burgess' Literary Makeovers!!! That's how it's done, folks.

But now, I am excited to announce that I have been invited to do some literary makeovers of my own for National Poetry Month. FINALLY I am a part of the Literary Makeovers team! Dreams do come true!

With respect to my Renaissance roots, there's really only one poet worthy of being made over. I bet you can't guess who I did. (But I will say that the photoshopping is pretty damn good...at least for me.)

Thanks Katie!

The Dreadfull Character of a Drunkard, 1663

2008-03-31T19:35:00.007-04:00

It seems like there are always a ton of birthdays around this time of year. In order to celebrate, I have made this LOL Manuscript Birthday Card™, which I encourage you all to print out to give to your grandmothers or ecclesiastical officials (just to show them that you care). I think the vomiting boar in the lower left hand corner is what really makes this special. Although the belligerent lion and the staggering monkey come in a close second.

The pamphlet is standard Puritan propaganda about the evils of drink, written by "Andrew Jones, a lover of sobriety." Apparently it went through ten editions, although England is not necessarily known for people abstaining from "this swinish and abominable sin."

I think for my next birthday party I'm going to try to recreate this scene, vomit included.

The Four-Legg'd Quaker, 1664

2008-03-28T20:11:00.014-04:00

I don't really know what to say about this one. At first I thought that the order of images couldn't be narrative, but I was quickly proven wrong. The ballad actually is about bestiality, believe it or not, and it doesn't omit any of the gory details. Basically this Quaker, Ralph Green, "caught a foal and mounted her," but not, shall we say, in the normal equestrian fashion. When the horse's owner catches him in the act, Green tries to bribe him, but the owner replies, "dost think it lawful for a piece / a filly foal to bugger?" Well, there's really no way to answer that question, so Green is sent to jail. Then it seems he marries the horse because it can't be proven that he raped it, or something like that, and the final stanzas call for the gelding of all Quakers because if they joined the army they would give all their fellow soldiers "the staggers," which I take is some venereal disease.

This ballad reminded me of a movie that I heard about last year, Zoo, which I am too afraid to see. Also, is the Quaker lecherously sticking out his tongue? And I don't even want to think how many animals and animal-human hybrids had to have sex with each other to create the figure on the far right. That's a lot of bestiality! Although he may be a cast member from an early modern Island of Dr. Moreau.

This ballad is indicative of a strand of Royalist writing during the Interregnum that used bestiality as a metaphor to satirize religious, political, or social disorder. Apparently, Cavaliers really hated Quakers, who they viewed as sexually perverted, horse-loving, incestuous freaks. It seems like the real concern, however, is that the Quakers would join the army or otherwise gain lots of power in Parliament. The author of the ballad, Sir John Berkenhead, wrote many such satires. The Four-Legg'd Quaker was included in a collection of Royalist poems, ballads, jokes, satires, and bits of poesy called The Rump, published in the 1660s. This just goes to show us once again how much fun the Cavaliers were! I love the idea of them all roving around during the English Civil War writing dirty satires about Puritans fucking horses.

Would you like to learn more about bestiality metaphors in Reformation satire? Of course you do! I suggest Mark R. Blackwell's "Bestial Metaphors: John Berkenhead and Satiric Royalist Propaganda of the 1640s and 50s." Modern Language Studies. 29.1 (Spring, 1999): 105-130.

Samuel Peeps, 2008

2008-03-23T00:11:00.010-04:00

Yet another amazing photoshop job, just in time for Easter! I think it may be some of my best work. At least this might remind people how to pronounce "Pepys" correctly.
----------------------------------
A page from the Diary of Samuel Peeps:

22 March:

Today encountered terrible traffic at the assembly line, where many a candy rudely shoved me aside to pass. My Lord Cadbury arrived with his carriage, and we to his house to assist him in some matters of business. God help him! never man was so confounded, as all his concerns lie with his sales figures. I fear, however, that his melancholy stems from his status as an individually-wrapped confection, whilst I lay in a row with my wife and fellows. I perceive he envies me in it, but I think that will do me no hurt, so if it did I am at a great loss to think whether it were not best for me to let it wholly alone, for it will much disquiet me and my business of marshmallow-y deliciousness.

Thence from Cadbury's to sup with my wife. After dinner and doing some things in my closet (as noble a closet as any man hath), I with my wife to the playhouse to see a revival of Il Piccolo Joust di Peep, which pleased me mightily, although my wife displayed some snappishness due to my diversions with a few tasty-looking ladies sitting nearby. However, chatting a great while afterwards, good friends again.

Tonight, then, to the Easter Basket.
-------------------------------------
(I'm kind of an idiot.)

The Hunting of the Conney, c. 1620

2008-03-22T17:35:00.005-04:00

It's Easter at LOL Manuscripts! Break out the Cadbury Eggs and ignore the pesky religious affiliations in order to eat candy! That's what I do.

About this illustration, I would just like to say that is the biggest fucking rabbit I have ever seen.

Mikrokosmographia, 1615

2008-03-20T14:12:00.018-04:00

My doctors and dentists always sent me postcards when I was due for another appointment, but they always had pictures of frogs or kitties dressed as nurses, or a dancing molar, or some other such false advertising. I think early modern doctors would have just put it out there without all the sugarcoating.

The Mikrokosmographia is an anatomical textbook written by Helkia Crooke. I've used it in past projects...it's a great resource for insight into the way people understood the body in early modern Europe. Here's an even better picture of the image from the Schoenberg Center, which is maybe my new favorite website (although nothing will ever replace EEBO in my heart).

Here's what's on the table, according to the book: "Razors of all sortes, great, small, meane, sharpe, blunt, straight, crooked, and edged on both sides; Sheares or Sizers; round and large long Probes of Brasse, Siluer, Lead; a Knife of Box or of Iuory, Pincers of all sorts; hooks, Needels bent rather then straite, Reeds, Quils, Glasse-trunkes or hollow Bugles to blowe vp the parts, Threds and strings, Sawes, Bodkins, Augers, Mallets, Wimbles or Trepans, Basons and Sponges; the Figures of all which wee haue heereunder delineated, together with a Table whereon to lay the dead, or binde the liuing Anatomy, with the rings, chains, cords, & perforations fit for that purpose."

Well, I guess that means I'm off to Home Depot! Apparently with a few household and garden items, I too can set up a medical practice!

PS -- If you're into this stuff, might I suggest Jonathan Sawday's The Body Emblazoned, and although it's a bit later, The Knife Man, about England's first surgeon, John Hunter (1728 – 1793).

The life and death of M. Geo: Sands, 1626

2008-03-16T17:54:00.012-04:00

Cocaine is a hell of a drug. The actual ballad isn't really about drugs, unfortunately. Basically, George Sands steals stuff and rapes some women, and pulls others into his crime ring. Then they're all executed. I still love the image...especially the expression on the "pusher's" face. He's all like, "come on, man, the first hit's free! What do you have to loose?"

I like to imagine Sands' "enormous crimes" were related to his nose candy habit. Blow will make you do some crazy/reckless things. Here's how I imagine George Sands at the height of his power:

Early Modern Scarface! But no matter how glamorous cocaine seems, and even though all the cool kids are doing it down at the discotheque, LOL Manuscripts officially says "no" to drugs. We get high on life and early modern print culture.

(Man, I am really good at photoshop.)

A Most Execrable and Barbarous Murder, 1642

2008-03-13T22:57:00.008-04:00

I almost made the caption simply say, "NOBODY PUTS BABY IN A CORNER!" I think that's actually funnier. Anyway, I thought the illustration was terrific, especially the way the corpses are all aligned in perfect and symmetrical rows. Those are also some pretty sweet daggers the "East-Indian Devil" has. Too bad he got [spoiler alert!] caught and executed.

Deliciæ Musicæ, 1696

2008-03-11T08:15:00.005-04:00

Daniel Purcell was the younger and less significant brother of Henry Purcell. Daniel composed for the theaters, and the play this mentions, The Indian Queen, is pretty interesting. It was partially written by John Dryden, and is about the conflicts between the ruling houses of the Incas and the Aztecs. It was expanded with music 30 years after it's original production in 1664, becoming something more like an opera.

I like to think the brothers had a feud not unlike Ray and Dave Davies of The Kinks. Case in point: Henry wrote most of the music for The Indian Queen, but he died (in 1695) and the theater hired Daniel to finish the score in his place. Daniel's fifth-act music probably sort of sucked compared to big bro's, and I imagine that it dawned on him that he only got the gig because of the family connection. His big break again overshadowed by Henry, even in death. Maybe Daniel was the self-destructive alter-ego of Henry, and they hated each other because in some backwards way, they needed each other to be complete. Tragic! Also, completely speculative. It would be terrific if it was true, though. (And I am aware that no amount of historical background or invented psychological complexity can detract from a Vanilla Ice reference. I apologize.)

Cantus, songs and fancies, 1666

2008-03-09T13:35:00.011-04:00

I took this from a songbook written by John Forbes. It seems to be a beginning manual for teaching children how to play and sing simple songs, but the first few pages are full of complicated diagrams and charts. This illustration is called a Guidonian Hand, and is supposed to teach you about tones and octaves and other useless crap. I searched some of the terms written on the parts of the hand, and they're Latin words for the types of tones (e.g., molle is soft, durum is hard).

That sort of stuff is definitely what you should start with when you teach kids about music. Children love to hear about hexachords. It introduces them to atonality early on, and you know how much kids love to challenge preconceived notions about melodic construction.

Update: I just remembered this viral video from a few months ago featuring a 21st-century version of the Guidonian hand.

An embassy from the East-India company, 1673

2008-03-06T22:21:00.015-05:00

This publication seems to be a travel narrative-ish thing with an emphasis on trade (mostly Dutch trade, it seems) with China. There are quite a few pictures of Chinese palaces, gardens, and people. This pretty lady spoke to me, though, because she seems so unaware of her future plight and the avalanche of Orientalism that proceeds from the activities of the East India Company. But at least British people got tea. That's something, I guess. And I suppose we wouldn't have Coleridge's "Kubla Kahn" either. And Edward Said wouldn't have had a career. Actually, the more I think about it, colonialism was awesome!

Plantarum historiae universalis Oxoniensis, 1680

2008-03-04T19:18:00.007-05:00

Botany can be fun! This is from a book on plant life in England by Robert Morison, early modern drug czar.

I don't know how I feel about Latin jokes and puns, but I made one anyway. Actually, I do know how I feel about them . . . I feel terrible.

The Wandring Jews Chronicle, c. 1660

2008-02-29T15:07:00.014-05:00

Have you ever wondered about Medieval and Renaissance English monarchs? Well, look no further: it's a special LOL Manuscripts history lesson! I've helpfully glossed each ruler with a word I feel best describes their reign. Print it out to cheat on your next history exam, or use it to quiz people at cocktail parties!

This is part of a giant ballad about British kings...I don't know what any of this has to do with Jews, but the speaker sort of travels through time and sees a bunch of them crowned. For some reason, there's no Henry V (wtf?), and if the date's right, that last Mary can't be Mary II, but I'm not sure what else to do with her.

But how did the English Monarchs die, you ask? Awesomely, that's how:

My favorites would have to be Henry I, who died from eating a bad batch of lampreys, and Edward II, because you have to appreciate literalism. And what's up with the two "accidental" arrow shots? I fear foul play.

The true report of the forme and shape of a monstrous childe, 1562

2008-02-28T13:02:00.006-05:00

Another monstrous birth, because I love them and they're all over EEBO. I had a public service announcement poster in mind for this one, so I decided to make it flashy and colorful. I will note that this little fella looks mysteriously like a Thalidomide baby.

I think there would be less fetal alcohol syndrome if the Surgeon General used illustrations like this. Here's a poorly photoshopped version of that future:

The Whipster of Woodstreet, 1690

2008-02-25T20:40:00.010-05:00

I think mine would be "albatross." Or "Xanadu." Coleridge would definitely be alluded to in some fashion, because he always makes me think of weird sexual exploits (see: Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy, and their creepy friendship/obsession with each other and Coleridge). Actually, upon further consideration, maybe I'd go Foucauldian and pick "panopticon," because I think Foucault was actually into this kind of stuff. Oh, it's such a difficult decision!

Anyway, this ballad is about these women who beat their servant Mary Cox to death. While that's pretty grim, I'm most unsettled by the little boy casually juggling in the doorway. And I'm still not sure what all is lying on the ground. I can see the basket and the dress, but what is that thing in between them? A frozen turkey? That Mary Cox was into some kinky stuff.

Memento Mori image, 1690

2008-02-22T12:12:00.012-05:00

This image is repeated through quite a few broadsides in the later 17th century. For the record, I think it's pretty fantastic, and would make quite a harrowing lower-back tattoo.

P.S. -- You are going to die, you know. Tick-tock.

P.P.S. -- I just found out people actually get memento mori lower back tattoos! All this time I thought they were relegated only to butterflies, but I've been proven wrong. Maybe reminding people of their mortality is easier to take if it's peeking out from low rider jeans. I imagine a typical scenario would go like this: "Oh dude, check out that chick! Wait, does she have a sexy tattoo? Try to read it!" [Reads it. Becomes depressed. Ponders the choices he's made in his life.]

The Lamenting Lady, c. 1620

2008-02-20T21:11:00.006-05:00

Full Title:

"The Lamenting Lady, Who for the wrongs done to her by a poore woman, for hauing two children at one burthen, was by the hand of God most strangely punished, by sending her as many children at one birth, as there are daies in the yeare, in remembrance whereof, there is now a monument builded in the Citty of Lowdon, as many English men now liuing in Lowdon, can truely testifie the same and hath seene it"

That's right -- if you're mean to and/or belittle a woman for having twins, God will punish you with a plague of babies. Not laughing now, are you?

Villany Rewarded; or the Pirate's Last Farewell to the World, 1696

2008-02-16T13:36:00.006-05:00

Even though Valentine's Day has past, I was feeling romantic. I suppose I'm just an old softy at heart. Feel free to use this image as a greeting card for your significant other on anniversaries, birthdays, or "just because."

This image is from a ballad about the execution of a pirate. The other image it contains features pirates hanged at the execution dock at Wapping, which is where they were usually hanged and left (covered in tar to preserve them) as a warning to other criminals. Still, we have some quality stuff here: quarters of the body and the head on spikes, the scavenging birds, the disemboweling and burning of viscera, and of course the message of undying love. I guess ladies had to take what they could get in 17th century London.

The Princess' Welcome To England, 1689

2008-02-13T12:04:00.009-05:00

We've dealt with boobs before on lolmanuscripts, but I felt like they needed to make a comeback. Mary looks like she got some bad plastic surgery, though.

I see a sexy calendar in the making! Except instead of hanging on the walls of a Jiffy Lube, my "Naughty Ladies of the 17th century" publication will decorate the interiors of Renaissance departments across the land, thus making it the saddest porn ever created. Umm...Happy Valentine's Day?

Future Rochester!

2008-02-09T16:34:00.000-05:00

Part IV of "Rochester Through the Ages":

The Year 3000: Life on Earth has taken a turn for the worse, so Future Rochester makes an escape to his Moon colonies. As the world he once knew is destroyed, Rochester takes it upon himself to begin repopulating the human race.

He finally starts writing racy poetry again, but this time it's full of puns about "black holes." Civilization is saved, but Rochester's wanderlust gets the better of him. Determined to reach the edges of the universe in order to discover the ever-elusive fifth dimension, Rochester leaves the moon behind to travel further and further into the great unkown. What adventures will the future contain? To know this is even beyond his own powers. Godspeed, Rochester. Godspeed.

Thus concludeth "Rochester Through the Ages." (Is is just me, or have I come dangerously close to Rochester-inspired fan fiction? )

80s Rochester!

2008-02-04T14:37:00.001-05:00

Part III of "Rochester Through the Ages":

80s Rochester is totally rad! I like to think that he was in a hair metal band, seeing as how he pretty much had the most rockin' hair of the 17th century. It takes a lot of Aquanet to look that pretty.

There are theories that Prince was a protégé of 80s John Wilmot's. For proof, I suggest you read the lyrics to "Darling Nikki" and tell me they don't smack of Rochester. They even dressed the same. But watch out, 80s Rochester! Instead of good old friendly Syphilis, this decade has HIV/AIDS, so you should practice safe sex! (Oh, why am I telling you this? You totally won't be safe.)

70s Rochester!

2008-02-01T14:42:00.001-05:00

Part II of "Rochester through the ages":

70s Rochester was super glam! I think he would have been best friends with Glam Oscar Wilde. They would have gone to Studio 54 all the time, hanging out in the VIP Room exploring their sexualities and doing coke off of hookers. 70s Rochester would probably wear roller skates all the time, too. Funkadelic!

60s Rochester!

2008-01-30T20:44:00.002-05:00

Part I of "Rochester Through the Ages":

Pop Wilmot was so far out! He also seems like someone Warhol would/should have been obsessed with. Because he was crazy and gross, and Warhol was kind of crazy and gross too. (PS - fake photoshop that you download for free is sort of the greatest, even if you suck at it. Check out the program here.)

Things you should know about 60s Rochester: He invented Pop Music. He filmed the Kennedy assassination. He was the first man to walk on the moon. He never went steady with anybody, but wooed ladies with his new "free love" philosophy. As has been noted before, the syphilis was also free. He totally did Marylin Monroe, but also Lady Bird Johnson. He singlehandedly ended the Cuban Missle Crisis. He invented the Internet. He died of a mescaline-related hallucinatory accident after reading Huxley's Doors of Perception.

An Open Letter to Black Letter Print, 2008

2008-01-28T15:01:00.000-05:00

Black Letter Print really does suck. Really really hard. They totally had roman typeface by the 16th century too, so I don't want to hear about early print and this bullshit being the only style available.

The Ballad of Luther, the Pope, A Cardinal, & A Husbandman, 1550

2008-01-25T17:18:00.000-05:00

This is a screenshot from my soon to be released video game, Immortal Soul Combat. The concept: the people of the 16th century are suffering from a religious and spiritual crisis, and it's up to you to decide how to solve it! Will you choose to be Martin Luther and insist on vernacular Bibles to spread the word of God, or will you be Pope Leo X and sell indulgences as a way of buying favor? Other characters include John Calvin, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas More, John Knox, "Bloody" Mary Tudor, and Charles V. Who will come out on top, and who will be "reformed"?

A book for beginners, or, A help to young communicants, 1685

2008-01-24T11:43:00.001-05:00

O Yes. If any Man or Woman any thing desire, 1630

2008-01-21T20:50:00.001-05:00

I'm back!
O Yes!

Anyway, I get that the town crier is saying "O Yes" for whatever reason in accordance with his crying responsibilities, but it does look like he's just super stoked about finding the dog. I'm not even sure I needed to do anything to this image at all, as the town crier is really giving that pooch the ol' eye.

The sorrowful Lamentation of a Penitent Sinner, c. 1664

2007-12-18T19:54:00.000-05:00

Christmastime is coming! Jesus wants to remind you of something:

For the record, I think this image would make a pretty bitchin' album cover for like a cosmic heavy metal band. It's sort of trippy, especially with those flying angel heads. And the whole showing off the stigmata sort of makes Jesus look like he's "Raising the Roof!" It's the hippest Jesus ever! Although this might top my Jesus-meets-dated-dancemove-reference. LOL Christ!!!

Merry Christmas everybody!

Hibernation

2007-12-18T18:27:00.000-05:00

It's been a long semester of studying the Renaissance, and LOL Manuscripts has made a name for itself as mildly humorous amongst a small and specialized audience. But as it is the season of Baby Jesus' birthday, there are parents to visit that still have dial up internet. That said, LOL Manuscripts will go into hibernation for the next few weeks of winter, much like the mighty Grizzly Bear.

To satisfy all our desires for captioning, I will direct you to the weekly New Yorker Caption Contest! It's no 17th century woodcut, but it'll do. Below is last weeks contest's image. As a captioner of early modern works, I must admit I am stumped. I can't think of anything but jokes about King James or how evil the papacy is or abortions, which is pretty much my bread and butter for this site. Anyway, here's my attempt:

"Help, I'm trapped in a Piet Mondrian painting! Oh no! How on earth could a thing like this happen? I am frightened and confused!"

Doug pointed out that a pun on "Mondrian" or "De Stijl" is sort of impossible. Or is it? I was talking to Katie once about that Tracy Chevalier art history romance novel/film Girl with the Pearl Earring, which chronicles the sexy sexy history behind the famous Vermeer painting of the same name. She suggested that someone should write a novel on the erotic backstory behind Mondrian's work. I can imagine the enigmatic and tragic romance that inspired Composition with Red, Yellow and Blue.

Anyway, I'm going to try to win the New Yorker Caption Contest, and then I'll become famous for my captioning abilities and become a millionaire and heal the world with my jokes about preventable diseases and 17th century politics and the pope.

Marmaduke Explained is a pretty funny blog to, if you like Marmaduke cartoons explained to you. Have a nice break, everybody.

The Method of Curing Wounds, 1617

2007-12-17T10:48:00.000-05:00

Ambrose Pare was a famous surgeon in the 16th century. I don't know if he was any good, because it seems that his method of "curing wounds made by gun-shot...arrows and darts" is to stab the patient with even more arrows and darts and swords and knives. Then again, maybe shit like this just happened in the 17th century. There you are taking a leisurely nude stroll, and bam! You've been stabbed 20 times. I almost called this "Early Modern Acupuncture," but I sort of like the Public Service Announcement feel -- spreading the message of Tetanus vaccinations is important . I dream of it turning into an ad campaign; posters hanging in city buses, subway stations, and health department walls, next to less imperative messages about Hepatitis or HIV testing.

I had to get a Tetanus shot a few months ago, and it sort of hurt for a few days, but I imagine it didn't hurt as much as getting Lockjaw.

LOL Manuscripts cares about your health! Have YOU had your Tetanus shot this year? Don't wait--Vaccinate!

Some passages of the life and death of the Right Honourable John Earl of Rochester, 1693

2007-12-12T12:13:00.000-05:00

by Gilbert Burnet

John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester: Disturbing, Disgusting, or Awesome? I still can't decide.

My favoirte story about the Earl of Rochester is that he once claimed that he was drunk for five years straight. What a cad! Also, Johnny Depp played him in a movie, so you know he's important.

In addition to his bawdy and kinda gross verse, he often angered the King and was occasionally exiled from court. To make money, he once advertised himself as Dr. Alexander Bendo, a quack physician who had a great cure for "barrenness (proceeding from any accidental cause, as it often falls out, and no natural defect; for nature is easily assisted)... Cures of this kind I have done signal and many, for the which I doubt not but I have the good wishes and hearty prayers of many families, who had else pin'd out their days under the deplorable and reproachful misfortunes of barren wombs, leaving plentiful estates and possessions to be inherited by strangers." [source] I wonder how he cured so many infertile women? Wilmot died of complications from alcoholism and syphilis in his early thirties.

Let's do one more LOL Rochester:

(Maybe it should have read "Mah Syphilis: Let me show you it.")

The famous Ratketcher, with his trauels into France, and of his returne to London, 1616

2007-12-07T13:17:00.003-05:00

This ballad (sung to the tune of "the Joviall Tinker"--man I love that song) is actually pretty funny at first. The ratketcher walks around carrying
"Full fourty fulsome Vermine" on a pole to advertise his trade, and sings "Rat tat tat." He also seems to be interested in various poisons from around the world, and is lauded for his work. It reminded me of the famous Victorian ratter Jack Black, until I got to this stanza:

"But on a time, a Damosell,
did him so farre intice,
That for her a Baite he layd straight,
would kill no Rats nor Mice...
And on the Baite she nibled,
so pleasing in her taste,
She lickt so long, that the Poyson strong,
did make her swell i'th waste."

That's right, he tries to poison a woman. Ha Ha Ha! Although the "poison" might be semen. Either way, it seems he has to leave town for some reason.

But you know, now that I look at the kitty, maybe it's supposed to be a terrier? And flowers, milk baths, and ringing bells were all real plague "remedies" throughout the 15th-18th centuries.

On the subject of ratcatching, I just saw maybe the most terribly depressing (read: wonderful in every way) movie called Ratcatcher. It's set in Glasgow, Scotland in the 1970s, during a garbagemen strike. Urban poverty? Check. Familial breakdown? Check. Childhood cut short due to tragedy? Double check. It was pretty much perfect in every way. Watch it.

John Seller's The History of England, 1696

2007-12-01T18:10:00.001-05:00

Seller was one of the first great English mapmakers, and one of the first to publish and sell his maps. He's most famous for nautical charts and navigational aides. I think that this map, however, accurately captures a specific topography of 17th century England. And yes, that's the killer rabbit from "Monty Python's Holy Grail." Thanks, Doug.

I should point out that "murther" encompasses all forms, including stabbing, smothering, kissing a poisoned portrait of your husband, or having flaming gold thrown on you .

Behold Rome's monster on his monstrous beast! 1643

2007-11-29T09:31:00.000-05:00

Urban VIII know how to fucking roll! Compare the 1643 version to the notably less terrifying popemobiles of today:

Lame. I definitely prefer the seven-headed beast.

A Mad Crue, or, That shall be Tryde, 1625

2007-11-27T21:46:00.000-05:00

From the pamphlet:

Then to a Tobacco-house, smoking hot
Went I, and call'd for my Pipe and my Pot,
The Weed was strong, but hardly well dryde,
Well, quoth the Horse-courser, that shal be tryde.

Basically, this tells the story of some dudes (the titular "mad crew") trying lots of fashionable things that gallants would have done in th 17th century. I like that smoking was "cool" right from the start, and is still pretty cool today. Although smoking from a gigantic pipe doesn't seem as glamorous.

Also note the smoker's "crazy eyes." That's what happens to me when I smoke. And I think the other guy is a ruler salesman.

Furthermore, it has come to my attention that lolcats have all but lost their influence on lolmanuscripts. I hereby bring them back into play:

Remember this lolcat?

A Dog's Elegy, or, Rupert's Tears, 1644

2007-11-23T16:16:00.006-05:00

Cassidy did another one!:

Apparently Prince Rupert had a magic devil-dog named Boy, who seems to be a 17th century version of Cujo.

(P.S. -- Cassidy can never do any lolmanuscripts ever again. One was bad enough, but this one is too good.)

The beginning and endynge of all popery, or popishe kyngedome, 1548

2007-11-21T22:01:00.000-05:00

We at LOL Manuscripts are happy to have a special guest blogger with us today...in an unofficial Blog-Off!!! My 13 year old cousin and blogging protégé, Cassidy, is a fan of LOL Manuscripts, and her visit coincided with my latest post. I had the image open when she leap'd into my seat and began typing away. I only gave her the seed of my idea, that the Pope is having a secret rendezvous in the woods with the demon.

Below are two versions of the same image: The first by Cassidy, the second by the experienced blogger. The worst part is that hers is sort of better. I have wasted my life. A younger generation has usurped me. Although hers is a little wordy, the spirit of LOL Manuscripts is there in full force. I like her explanatory paragraph off to the right, just in case you couldn't figure out what was going on. My favorite line is about the "special pope-only courtyard":

While mine is pretty funny, I think the humor is mainly derived from the word "snickerdoodle," which is a very funny word.

Hers is better. Dammit.

A brefe chronycle concernynge the examinacyon and death of the blessed martyr of Christ syr Iohan Oldecastell, 1544

2007-11-19T08:12:00.000-05:00

Christian martyrs were totally buff in the 15th Century! Sir John Oldcastle was a soldier and Lollard who was convicted of heresy and escaped from the Tower of London...but then they caught him again after he supposedly committed treason against Henry V, and he was executed.

From the details of his life, many have drawn parallels between Oldcastle and Shakespeare's Sir John Falstaff. There's even evidence that Falstaff was initially called "Oldcastle," but his name was changed. I think that's for the best...this guy is most un-Falstaffian.

Sir John Oldcastle was burned (alive? probably not) in 1417 and became a martyr to the people. Plus, he was obviously a total ass kicking soldier and had very nice, almost Jesus-like abs which he apparently liked to show off in battle to intimidate his French enemies. Sexiness is very important in a warfare situation. I like how he's dressed like a cast member from 300.

The beginning and endynge of all popery, or popishe kyngedome, 1548

2007-11-16T16:52:00.001-05:00

This pamphlet (by Walter Lynne) is actually full of weird images of the pope paired with animals. I think I might use it again. Here's the caption above the image:

"The Pope thrusteth the lamb through with his sword. And therefore giveth him the Devil the keys, that is, power and might."

I like how the pope just can't seem to commit all the sins at once. I mean, he only has two hands! He has to juggle blighting the harvest and killing a lamb and giving his power over to the devil...he's obviously taken on too much at once. Christianity wasn't destroyed in a day! It takes many many centuries of corruption and deception. Pace yourself, little guy!

I also can't help thinking this is some sort of depraved sex act. I think it's the sword hilt /ball gag situation. As an isolated incident it might be okay, but coupled with that sheep...

An excellent new medley, 1625

2007-11-12T14:53:00.001-05:00

"Yo Mama" jokes have a long and varied history in England.

The Braue English Iipsie, 1625

2007-11-11T09:45:00.000-05:00

Racism and Stereotyping. As old as recorded history, and pretty funny.

The Answer to the London lasses folly: or, The new-found father discoverd at the camp, 1685

2007-11-08T10:11:00.001-05:00

a.k.a. The Sexiest Lol Manuscript ever!

The Sexy Backstory:
This entire ballad is centered around a "London Lass" who finds herself pregnant. Each stanza is her talking about some dude she slept with as she tries to figure out who knocked her up. She was kind of a giant slut, because she goes through all of these men, and each stanza ends with some version of the line "I thought he was the father."

But all is well, because while pregnant she wanders into a military camp, and she sees a soldier who she thinks would make a good father and pretty much tells him he has to marry her. So he does, and everyone lives happily ever after. Inspiring.

A Note on Nudity:
Lol Manuscripts officially condones nudity if it's tasteful and artistic. I would also add that Woodcut representations of boobs are pretty hot. Sex has always sold, I guess, but I really like the idea that this particular broadside was hidden beneath some 17th century adolescent boy's mattress and got him through some confusing times.

November the 5. 1605, The Quintessence of Cruelty, 1641

2007-11-04T18:17:00.002-05:00

It's Guy Fawkes Day everybody! Lol Manuscripts has addressed Guy Fawkes before, but has never given serious attention to the actual Gunpowder Plot. There fore I present The First Annual Guy Fawkes Day Special Edition Lol Manuscript! On November 5th, 1605, some Catholic Conspirators totally tried to blow up Parliament. Don't worry, they were caught! Horray for the government, they win again! Effigy burning at my place!

Anyway, this is a big day for Lol Manuscripts, and to commemorate it, here is a 6 part visual journey that explains exactly what happened:

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Some Notes: Fawkes really did tell people his name was "John Johnson." With a code name like that you're pretty much asking to be caught and tortured to death. Also, I misspelled "barrels" in that image, but I'm too lazy to fix it. I'll just call it an early modern spelling and pretend it was intentional.

Also, I think Guy Fawkes day has waned in popularity over the years. I'm brining it back! Burning men made of straw is something that should never go out of fashion. I'm also sort of pissed that many of the individuals who know who Guy Fawkes even was only know because of V for Vendetta.

Hey, here's a poem:

Remember, remember the Fifth of November,
The Gunpowder Treason and Plot,
I know of no reason
Why Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.
Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, t'was his intent
To blow up King and Parliament.
Three-score barrels of powder below
To prove old England's overthrow;
By God's providence he was catch'd
With a dark lantern and burning match.
Holloa boys, holloa boys, let the bells ring.
Holloa boys, holloa boys, God save the King!

A declaration demonstrating and infallibly proving that all malignants, 1643

2007-11-03T11:02:00.000-04:00

Full Title: A declaration demonstrating and infallibly proving that all malignants, whether they be prelates, popish-cavaleers, with all other ill-affected persons, are enemies to God and the King, 1643 (Bastwick, John)

For some reason I think Sir Percy would be considered an "ill-affected person." And anybody who stands like that is most definitely a "popish-cavaleer." Once again, those roundheads really dropped the ball when it came to sexy fashion. My favorite part of this particular ensemble is the cape. Or is it a capelet?

And in case anyone cares to note: I took the line "I thank your lordship, it is very hot." from the most famous Shakespearean fop -- Sir Osric from Hamlet (5.2.99).

This Horyble Monster, 1531

2007-10-31T07:55:00.000-04:00

Halloween Scariness: The Tale of the Monstrous German Double Pig, or, Everyone in our Village is Going to Hell.

Here's the text that appears in the center of the image. Read at your own peril!

This horyble monster is cast of a sowe in Eestlande in Pruse two myle from Runyngbergh in a vyllage which is called lebe[n]hayn whiche monster hathe had a great wyde mouth, with two eyen, foure eares, no stomacke nor guttes [and] two hertes, viii. fete, and the body was growe[n] togyther from the nauyll vp to the hede, [and] with thys foresayde monster were broughte forth. v. yonge pygges alyue, and these two fygures be cou[n]terfeyted after the facyon of the sayd monster both before and behynde. The yere of our lorde. 1531 [Germany]

Those Germans know how to have a monstrous birth! Although I'm a bit disappointed that no rationale for the monster's existence is provided, I think my approximation is pretty close to what really caused the 2-in-1 piglet. Who wants bacon?

The Witch of Edmonton, 1658

2007-10-30T08:24:00.000-04:00

Witches again! It's almost Halloween after all...and I have a pretty scary one for the actual big day. Here's a manuscript with Elizabeth Sawyer and her familiar, Tom the dog. I sort of like the idea that they were going to kill someone (his name is "Cuddy Banks," it's not the name of the actual bank. Either way, I like it), but then have a sort of change of heart. Still, neither one of them actually wants to get in the river to do the saving. Standoff.

Heraclitus Dream, 1642

2007-10-27T14:22:00.000-04:00

I really have no idea what this broadside is about, but this is at the center of a huge image in which the sheep seem to have captured a shepherd, and other people and animals watch /point / laugh. I have no idea what any of this has to do with Heraclitus, "the weeping philosopher." I'd say it has more to do with Democritus! Because he was known as "the laughing philosopher!" Because it's funny! And mullets are funny! Ha ha ha!

People love my Greek philosopher jokes.

But seriously, according to William Marshall (the author), it's called Heraclitus Dream because it came upon him in "doleful meditation [and] Heraclitus used to weep much." According to Marshall, the Shepherd "signifieth ministers clipped of their good name, fame, and means by rude people, without authority, law, or reason." I like the fact that he had the dream and wrote a poem about it, and then at the bottom offers up a section called "The Author's Intent and Meaning by this Dream." You see, the dream wasn't about sheep at all -- they were SYMBOLIC of the proverbial Christian "fold" or "flock." I never would have guessed.