\V

THE ACTIVmES OF THE OFFICE
OF THE REVELS: 1547-1558

Thai: [for the Dew“ 0f M. A.
MICHIGAN STATE UNWERSITY
Robert Gale Skinner
1961

LIBRARY

Michigan Stan
University

 

ABS TRAC T

THE ACTIVITIES OF THE OFFICE OF THE REVELS; 1547 - 1558

by Robert G. Skinner

Shortly before the death of Henry VIII in 1547, the Office of the
Revels was established as a department of the royal household, and was
charged with the responsibility of making the costumes, properties, and
scenery necessary to most court entertainments, principally the masques
held during Christmas. Sir Thomas Cawarden, a Gentleman of the
Privy Chamber, was made Master of the Revels, and three lesser Offi-
cers were appointed to keep accounts of expenses and to supervise the
work of tailors and other craftsmen. For three-quarters of a century
the Office flourished as a costume and property'workshop in the Crown's
service.

During the nineteenth century, a few short studies of the Revels
Office were made, but a major work on Revels activity did not appear
until 1908. In that year, Albert Feuillerat, a French scholar of the
Elizabethan age, published in facsimile all the extant expense accounts
of the Office under Elizabeth I, and in 1914 published a similar volume
of the accounts made during the reigns of Edward VI and Mary I.
Feuillerat's publications were, however, sources for others to work
from. His notes and glossaries, while valuable, were brief and incom-
plete, and, because it was not his purpose, he had made little attempt

to interpret the sixteenth-century accounts. Although the Office of the

 

ninu

...\\

 

 

Robert G. Skinner
Revels is mentioned in almost every history book of English theatre, no
major study of its work has appeared to date. This analytical interpre-
tation of the accounts of the Revels Office under Edward VI and Mary I,
as edited by Feuillerat, is designed to add to our present knowledge of
pre-Shakespearean dramatic production and stagecraft.

Several facets of the Office are studied: its origins and history
prior to official establishment; the Officers, craftsmen, and tradesmen
who served the Office; and its location and operating practices. Of
principal concern are the pr0perties and costumes which were made,
the materials and fabrics used in them, and the construction methods
and techniques employed. From this foundation, several conclusions
are proposed regarding the nature of mid-sixteenth century masques
and plays, and a chronological reconstruction of court entertainment
is presented.

Such objectives have required a complete study of life in London
and the English court in the first half of the sixteenth century. Innes'

England Under the Tudors, and Stow's A Survey of London have been

 

 

particularly excellent sources for this material. For defining hundreds
of unfamiliar terms, several lexicons have been necessary, the most

valuable of which has been Halliwell-Phillipps' Dictionary of Archaic

 

and Provincial Words. Collier's HistorLof English Dramatic Poetry to

the Time of Shakespeare and Annals of the Stage to the Restoration, and

 

Robe rt G. Skinner

Chambers' Notes on the History of the Revels Office under the Tudors

 

have supplied much of the material for a history of the Office. Linthi-

cum's Costume in the Drama of Shakespeare and His Contemporaries

 

and Strutt's Dress and Habits of the People of England have both proved

 

to be excellent sources for the descriptions of cloth and costumes.

 

THE ACTIVITIES OF THE OFFICE OF THE REVELS; 1547 - 1558’

Robert Gale Skinner

A THESIS

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Department of Speech

1961

 

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am grateful to several persons and institutions for their
aid and encouragement: to Dr. Orville K. Larson, formerly of the
Department of Speech, Michigan State University, who first intro-
duced to me the Office of the Revels, and whose encouragement and
aid has been most appreciated; to Dr. John A. Walker, Associate
Professor of Speech, Michigan State University, whose patient en-
couragement, many suggestions, and kind help have been very much
appreciated; to Dr. William Van Lennep, Curator of the Theatre
Collection, Widener Library, Harvard University, and Dr. James G.
McManaway, Curator, Folger Memorial Shakespeare Library, Wash-
ington, D. C. , for their permission to use very rare material in their
care; to the staff and personnel of Michigan State University Library
and the Boston Public Library for their help in supplying precious
material.

Without the help and time of these people, this study could

not have been completed.

iii

 

CONTENTS

Page
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iii
LISTOFTABLES.................... v
LIST OF FIGURES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vi
LIST OF APPENDICES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Chapter
I. INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . l
H. ENGLAND AT MID-CENTURY . . . . . . . . . . . 8
III. HISTORY AND FUNCTION OF THE REVELS OFFICE . 26
IV. THE OFFICERS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
V. PERSONNEL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
VI. THE BLACKFRIARS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
VII. CONDUCT AND PRACTICES . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
VII. MATERIALS, TOOLS, AND PROCESSES . . . . . . . 72
IX. CLOTH, TRIMMINGS, AND SEWING TECHNIQUES . . 83
X. MASQUES AND PLAYS . . . . . .- . . . . . . . . . 104

XI. THE EARLY YEARS: FEBRUARY, 1547 TO JUNE, 1551 112
XII. THE LORD OF MISRULE: DECEMBER, 1551 TO JUNE,
1553....................... 130
XIII. THE YEARS OF MARY: SEPTEMBER, 1553 TO NOVEM.-
BER, 1558 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
XIV. THE WORK OF THE REVELS . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218

iv

LIST OF TABLES

Table Page
1. Comparative Man-Days Worked by Tailors in Each
Period of Activity: Edward VI; Mary I. . . . . . . . 43-44
2. Comparative Cost of Each Period of Activity: Edward

VI;MarYIooo000000000000000.00000070-71

LIST OF FIGURES

Plate Page
I. SurveyoftheBlackfriars................. 52
II. MapofLondon,c_i_r£a1600................ 163

HI. Male Dress of the Sixteenth Century . . . . . . . . . . . 186
IV. EarlyFools'Attire..........-.l......... 202
V. Religious Habits of the Sixteenth Century . . . . . . . . 209

VI. Sixteenth Century Weapons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

vi

 

LIST OF APPENDICES

App endix pa g e

I. ProcedureofaDisguising. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

II. ADisguising withaPageant Wagon, 1511 . . . . . . . . . 225
III. The Interlude of the Triumph of Love and Beauty. . . . . 227
IV. Articles and Ordinances of the Office of the Revels . . . 229

V. Letter from the Lord of Misrule, 1552. . . . . . . . . . 233

VI. APlaybyWilliamBaldwin................ 236

vii

CHAPTER I

INTRODUC TION

The Office of the Revels was the first organized workshop of
designers, costumers, propertymakers, and painters devoted exclu-
sively to serving the theatre in England. Their function was akin to that
of any stage workshop or costume loft today: to design, make, and de-
liver on time the scenery, costumes, and properties necessary to a
dramatic performance. To the Revels, the season generally ran from
Christmas to Ash Wednesday; the producer was the royal court; the actors
were members of the court; the audience consisted of other courtiers; the
theatre was the great banqueting hall of the royal palace; and the perfor-
mance was almost always a masque, a fancy promenade and dance by
disguised courtiers costumed in rich and strange attire.

Conceived early in the sixteenth century and officially established
during the last years of Henry VIII, the Revels Office flourished through-
out the reigns of Edward VI, Mary 1, Elizabeth I, and James I providing
the furnishings for masques, plays, and other courtly entertainment. But,
as the public theatre grew during the last quarter of the century, the

Office assumed the responsibility of licensing plays and gradually declined

 

as a scenery and costume shop.

Even before its establishment as a permanent department of
the royal household, accounts were kept of expenditures for goods and
services used in entertainments. Those made by the Office during the
reigns of Edward VI and Mary I were first brought to light in the early
part of the nineteenth century when a muniment room in the manor of
Loseley was opened. In it was a treasury of Tudor history: manuscripts
and documents bearing signatures of every English ruler from Henry VIII
to James I and dealing with every conceivable matter of state in the Tudor
period. To scholars of English history the discovery was one of the most
important of the nineteenth century.

Loseley (or Lothesly, as it is sometimes spelled) was an ancient
manor dating from the Saxons and lay near the borough of Guildford in
Surrey County. Early in the sixteenth century it came into the hands of
ChristOpher More, grandson of Thomas More, Lord Chancellor under
Henry VIII. In 1549, it became the property of his son, William More,
who, ten years later, was Executor of the Will of Sir Thomas Cawarden,
first official Master of the Revels. As he left no heirs other than More,
all of Cawarden's papers were locked in the muniment room at Loseley.
The bulk of this material was the accounts of the Revels Office under
Cawarden's tenure.

Alfred Kempe was the first to publish the findings at Loseley.

In 1835, The Loseley Manuscriptsl appeared, and in typical nineteenth-

lAlfred John Kempe, The Loseley Manuscripts (London: John
Murray, 1835).

 

 

century fashion he had included only what he felt was interesting or
curious, had paraphrased and corrected misspellings in the accounts,
and had made little attempt at chronological arrangement. His volume
was, however, stimulus for further research on the Revels.

Abstracts 9f the Revels accounts and copies of much of the
material were found in the State Paper Office, the Harleian MSS. , the
Cottonian MSS. , and in other collections of ancient documents. The
prolific historian of London, Peter Cunningham, published some of this
material in 1842, 2 but it, too, was sketchy and incomplete. In 1879,
John Payne Collier included interesting aspects of Revels activity in the

second edition of his three—volume work, History of English Dramatic

 

3 .
Poetry . . . and Annals of the Stage . . . , but such a large undertaking

 

could only include a cursory glance.
Sir Edmund K. Chambers added considerably to the history of

the Office in 1906 when he published Tudor Revels. 4 The work covered

 

only the history of the Office, however, and the accounts of Revels activ-
ity were not included.

Two years later the full story of Revels activity was started.

 

2Peter Cunningham, Extracts from the Accounts of the Revels at
Court in the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and King James (London: The
Shakespeare Society, 1842).

 

 

3
John Payne Collier, The History of English DramaticPoetry to
the Time of Shakespeare and Annals of the Stage to the Restoration (3 vols. ,
2nd ed. rev.; London: George Bell and Sons, 1879).

 

 

.4Sir Edmund K. Chambers, Notes on the History of the Revels
Office Under the Tudors (London: A. H. Bullen, 1906).

 

 

4

Albert Feuillerat, an Elizabethan scholar, published the Revels accounts
made during the reign of Elizabeth I, 5 and followed this volume in 1914
with another which covered the reigns of Edward VI and Mary I. 6 Both
volumes included every important extant document relating to the Revels
work. In truly scientific fashion Feuillerat translated the Middle Eng-
lish script into Modern English type, made no corrections of misspel-
lings or omissions, annotated and indexed each volume, added glossar-
ies of unfamiliar terms, and printed the accounts as close to facsimile
as possible. Although he recognized the earlier works of Kempe, Cun-
ningham, Collier, and Chambers, Feuillerat's purpose was different
from those of his predecessors: he wished to bring together all the scat-
tered material pertinent to each particular period, thus making available
to scholars everywhere single source books covering the activities of the
Revels Office, sources hitherto available only in locked English archives
and accessible only to the most proven scholars.

Feuillerat's second volume, the primary source for this present
study, consisted largely of the Loseley MSS. from which he transcribed
two ledgers made by a clerk around 1560 of all the accounts between 1550

and 1558. For the years 1547 to 1549, he printed the most perfect copies

 

5
Albert Feuillerat, ed. , Documents Relating to the Office of the
Revels in the Time of Queen Elizabeth (London: David Nutt, 1908).

6Albert Feuillerat, ed. , Documents Relati‘ngto the Revels at
Court in the Time of King Edward VI and Queen Mary I (London: David
Nutt, 1914). Although volumes were planned to cover the reigns of
Henry VIII and James I, they were never published.

 

 

 

of accounts available and noted their variants with other copies. His
service to theatre historians is obvious; his name is found in the bib-
liography of every major work of English theatre history published in the
last half-century. While valuable, Feuillerat's work was not a history
of the Revels Office, however. His notes and glossary were brief and
incomplete; little was included about the Officers, the location of the
workrooms, or the nature of scores of materials and services used in
making costumes and properties. Subsequent historians have included
the most important and interesting elements of Revels activity in broad-
er studies, but to date no work has been published which deals exclu-
sively with the Office of the Revels and covers all of their activities.
This comprehensive study of the first eleven years of the Revels Office
is designed to fill that need.

Three general areas appear: (1) the story of the Office itself,
its history, function, personnel, and location; (2) the Operation of the
Office, its conduct and practices, materials and tools used, the kinds of
cloth and trimmings which were used in the costumes, and the costumes
themselves; (3) a chronological reconstruction of the masques, plays,
and other entertainments which the Revels served. In the first area,

Collier‘s Annals of the Stage and Chambers' Tudor Revels have been par-

 

 

ticularly helpful for the history of the Office. Tudor Revels also supplied

 

much material for biographies of the Officers; the accounts themselves

yielded most of the material for the chapter on personnel; for locating the

6

workrooms at the Blackfriars, I have relied primarily on Blackfriars

7
Records. In the area covering Office operation, the chapter on Office

 

conduct has come mainly from the Revels accounts. Although several
lexicons have been used to define hundreds of unfamiliar terms encount-

ered throughout the accounts, Halliwell-Phillipps' Dictionary of Archaic

 

8
and Provincial Words has been most useful. Linthicum's Costume in

 

 

9
the Drama of'Shakespeare and Strutt‘s Dress of Engandlo have both

 

 

proved to be excellent sources for descriptions of cloth and costumes.
For reconstructing the court entertainments and the reigns of the Lord
of Misrule, I have depended largely on the Revels accounts as well as

11
Innes' England Under the Tudors, Stow's Survey of London, 12 and ex-
13

 

 

cerpts from Machyn's Diary.

 

 

7Albert Feuillerat, ed., Blackfriars Records, Vol. 11, Pt. I of

Malone Society Collections (2 vols.; Oxford: The Malone Society, 1911-31).

8J. O. Halliwell-Phillipps, ed. , Dictionary of Archaic and Pro-
vincial Words from the Fourteenth Century (London: J. R. Smith, 1887).

 

 

 

 

9M. Channing Linthicum, Costume in the Drama of Shakespeare
and His Contemporaries (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1936).

 

 

10Joseph Strutt, Dress and Habits of the People of England (2 vols.;
London: J. Nichols, 1799).

11Arthur D. .Innes, England Under the Tudors (London: Methuen
and Co. , Ltd. , 1911). ’

 

 

12John Stow, A Survey of London, ed. Charles L. Kingsford
(2 vols.; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1908).

 

13Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 276 and 281.

 

I have sought to maintain Feuillerat's adherence to sixteenth-
century spelling and phraseology, for frequently the lack of punctuation
allows diverse interpretation. Two exceptions to this are: (1) personal
names, where the modern or most common spelling is used, and (2)
numbers, where I have used Arabic, rather than the Roman numerals of
the accounts. Where Roman numerals id_o_ occur in this study, it will be
noticed that in numbers ending with the digit one, ”j” was substituted
for Roman numeral ”1". This was a sixteenth-century practice designed
to terminate the number and discourage its alteration.

The reader should remember that a pound sterling (£) was, and
still is, equal to twenty shillings (s.), and a shilling equal to twelve pence
(d.). Obolos, used in Middle English for the Half-penny, 14 was short-

15

ened in the accounts to "ob", and dimidius, meaning half, to ”di".

 

14Joseph T.. Shipley, Dictionary of Early English (New York:
Philosophical Library, Inc., 1955). p. 465.

 

15113161., 216.

CHAPTER II

ENGLAND AT MID-CENTURY

The National Scene

Between the reign of Henry VIII, which ushered out the Middle
Ages, and the reign of Elizabeth I, which introduced the Golden Age of
England, lie the reigns of Edward VI and Mary I. Embracing first
six years of figurehead rule by a sickly boy, more a tool of his vain-
glorious protecters than a king, then five years' reign of a tragic woman
whose noble efforts brought only scorn to herself and despair to her
subjects, the years 1547 to 1558 were certainly the weakest of the Tudor
sovereignty,

Upon the death of Henry VIII in January of 1547, the leader of
his Council of Regency, Edward Seymour, was made Lord Protector,
Duke of Somerset. In his hands was placed the trust of the ten-year-old
Edward, his blood nephew, and the responsibility of the realm. With
barely any dissention he was given the right to act without consulting
other members of the Council: virtually all the powers of the king. Had
his skill in promoting his aims been as great as the aims themselves,

the reign of Edward might have been a much more noble one for England.

9
The Reformation, born in the reign of Henry, grew rapidly
during the tenure of Somerset. He was a liberal reformer and together
With only one other member of the Council had the right to grant
licenses to preach, a right which he used extravagantly to favor Protes-
tantism. Further harrassment of Catholicism came in 1549 when
Parliament adopted the Prayerbook of 1549 and forced its uniform use

L

by clergy of the realm.

Somerset's brother, Lord Seymour of Sudeley, and Admiral of
the Fleet, was extremely jealous of his brother's guardianship of Edward.
His principal ally, Sharington, Master of the Mint at Bristol, abused his
office by debasing the coinage and sharing the profits with Seymour.

Thus supported, Seymour established an armed following and early in
1549 was discovered in a scheme to unseat Somerset. Although given a
chance to plead, he was denied an open trial and in March of 1549 was
executed, a significant example of the chaos into which English justice
had fallen.

Throughout that year Somerset‘s troubles mounted. Introduction
of the new Prayerbook met with violent 10pposition, particularly in the
West. Insurrections swelled in rural areas, growing both from Somerset's
ag ricultural reforms and the innovations in religion. Both of these griev-
ances were associated with further dissolution of the monasteries, an act
of the Reformation which affected the entire population. Former wealthy
rrlonastic houses were being turned over to titled persons, men who, in

the eyes of the lower classes, were wealthy already and consequently

10

considered enemies of the old ecclesiastical system. But as the Poor
Man's Friend (the image he had tried to adopt for himself), Somerset
openly sympathized with the farmers and peasants and publicly admon-
ished the new monastic landlords. This only served to infuriate the
nobility, leading them, too, to turn against him. In the words of Innes,

He was driving the country faster than it was prepared to

go in the direction of religious innovations; he was attacking

the privileges which the new landowners had usurped; . . .

he was further alienating all but a few of the nobility by his

increasing arrogance of demeanour and disregard of advice,

as well as by an assumption of powers which had no pre-

cedent; he was giving a handle to his enemies by the pro-

fusion of his household, his appropriations of clerical

lands and even of the fabric of consecrated buildings to

his own use; and finally his conduct of foreign affairs had

been so incompetent that . . . y the end of September

war was declared with France.

The Council decided the protectorate should end, and, though
Somerset fled to Windsor with the ailing Edward in October, 1549, he
surrendered to the Council a few weeks later upon promise of his life.
He was sent to the Tower for a few months and was released in February,
1550, having been relieved of most of his holdings and all of his political
power.

The deposition of the Lord Protector had come none too soon,
for at the beginning of the second half of the century, England was at
the brink of disaster. Debasement of coinage had continued, and the

economic situation was growing worse with the fall of silver throughout

EurOpe as a result of the wealth pouring into Spain from the Americas.

1Innes, 200

 

11
The treasury was nearly empty and was maintained only by borrowing
from foreign bankers. The ruling class, instead of turning their spoils
of the Church to the public need, rewarded themselves. The lesser
nobility, landowners, merchants, and manufacturers, taking their cue
from their peers, were engaged in rapid money-making at the expense
of their traditional integrity. Religious factions, while not openly
clashing, were still wrangling. The country .had lost its moral balance.

French efforts to reclaim Boulogne on the English Channel the
preceding autumn had failed, and, though the city was held, the hostil-
ity of France had been rekindled. Scotland allied with France, and
border disputes seemed imminent. The Council realized that recon-
ciliation with France could only be accomplished by the evacuation of
Boulogne, but with France holding the whip their concessions would be
small. Accordingly a treaty of peace was signed in March, 1550;
England withdrew from Boulogne and from forts still held in Scotland
and cancelled most of the money claims held against France.

In February of 1550, John Dudley, then Earl of Warwick, was
made President of the Council and Lord Great Master of the Household
to succeed Somerset. No events of great magnitude mark his first
eighteen months as President, and no serious attempts were made to
deal with any of the existing causes of disorder and uneasiness. Warwick's
Primary concern was his own aggrandizement, and in the summer of 1551,

the deposed Somerset began to worry him. Although he lacked the ca-

pa city to organize an opposition to Warwick, his well-meant efforts

12
among the commoners had made him popular, and with these people
behind him he could become a threat. In October of 1551, Somerset
was arrested on the trumped-up charge of plotting the deaths of several
members of the Council and a subsequent armed revolt. During the
autumn he was tried, found guilty, and in January of 1552 executed with
only token demonstrations in his favor made by the populace, who re-
fused to believe that the sentence would actually be carried out.

With the advancement of Lutheranism and other ultraprotestant
movements on the continent, the Reformation continued to grow in Eng-
land. Warwick's anti-clerical attitudes were even greater than Somer-
set's had been, and in a 1551 meeting of Parliament an act was passed
for the removal of Images which the Protestants had long claimed were
being used not as symbols of faith but as 'idols of worship. Early in 1552,
another revision of the Prayerbook was sanctioned which involved a change

of the terms priest to minister, and altar to table, with complete elimin-

 

ation of the doctrine of Transubstantiation. An unsuccessful attempt was
made to eliminate the instruction that the Sacrament was to be received
in a kneeling position, a position, the Protestants felt, which implied an
act of adoration. With the revision of the Prayerbook, Parliament passed
a second Act of Uniformity, this time imposing penalties on laymen for
non-compliance.

Warwick, now Duke of Northurnberland, while not a beloved

President of the Council, was considered effective by his fellow Coun-

Qilor‘s, and, with Somerset gone, no schemes for his replacement were

13

threatening. He enjoyed his power, found no dissentions from Edward,
and was troubled by only one factor which might disturb his position:
the probable early death of the King. Edward's health had continued
to fail during the winter of 1552-53, and by March the end looked near.
Northumberland had one recourse: to see that the succession to the
throne laid down in Henry's will was not carried out, and that Edward's
successor would be someone over whom he could hold a firm hand.

First in line according to the will was Mary, Henry's
daughter by Catherine of Aragon, and second was Elizabeth, his
daughter by Anne Boleyn. Both had been declared illegitemate by the
courts, a stroke of good fortune for Northumberland who felt they would
be passed over if their illegitemacy was contested strongly enough. Next
in line was Mary Stuart Whom he knew the country would not take. Finally
there was Lady Jane Grey, granddaughter of Henry's second sister, Mary.
By marrying her to his son, Guildford Dudley, Northumberland would
secure his dominating influence over her and thus retain his superior office.

Several factors stood in the way of his scheme. First, the entire
realm from the Council down had unhesitatingly pledged its adherence to
Henry's will. Mary, a fervent Catholic, had proved herself a dignified
and courageous person, and the treatment dealt her by Northumberland
had made her the object of popular sympathy. Lady Jane, on the other
hand, had no organized following. The only way that his aim could be
achieved, he felt, was to persuade the King to declare his own successor,

just as his father had done, gain approval of this cabal from the Council,

14

and thus secure his post.

In May, 1553, the marriage of Lady Jane Grey to Guildford
Dudley was accomplished and the King's approval of her as his successor
obtained. In June, Northumberland presented the pr0posal to the Council,
with which it found little favor, but, out of fear for their lives, the
Councilors granted approval subject to approval of Parliament. The
Judges unanimously declared it unconstitutional without Parliamentary
authority, but finally gave way under the dying King's persuasion.
Sanction to the new letters patent was given, although the entire affair was
kept secret, and by the end of June preparations were being made to

support the coup d' etat by arms if necessary. On the 6th of July, Edward

 

died, and on the 10th Lady Jane was proclaimed Queen.

Within nine days the plot had collapsed completely. Mary, on
her way to London on the 6th, was told of her half-brother's death and
warned of the plot. She fled for her life, barely escaping Northumber-
land's party sent to secure her. Jane Grey, sixteen-year-old bride of a
few days, astonished the Council by defying its right to proclaim her Queen
and refusing completely the notion that her husband should be crowned King.
Two of the Duke's sons, pursuing Mary, fled when their entire force
acclaimed her Queen. Northumberland himself decided to go for her.
With a force he mistrusted and through a country almost in arms, he set
out only to receive news that the entire fleet had declared for Mary; his
force followed suit. With Northumberland away, the Council quickly re-

leased several of its members from the Tower and reinstated William

15
Paget, who declared for Mary and demanded Northumberland's arrest
as a traitor.

The sweeping acclaim for a Catholic Queen by a large Protestant
populace can only be explained as the country's unswerving devOtion to
Henry VIII and obedience to his will. Edward had been but a weak figure-
head bending to the whims of his protectors, more to be pitied than loved.
Lady Jane was unknown and had been the central figure in an outrageous
conspiracy, however innocently. But Mary had been a persecuted martyr
to a cause, and her courage was admirable.

' Two pressing issues were foremost in the minds of the people
and the peerage when Mary took the throne in early October: her dedi-
cation to Catholicism, and a probable marriage. Her attitudes and
actions on these points could make her either an extremely popular figure
or one who would cause more unrest. Had she been a woman more poli-
tic and less conscientious, she might have become the figure her sister,
Elizabeth, was to become a few years later.

The majority of the population wanted toleration of Protestantism
within reasonable limits; its growth in the past six years had been too
swift-for wholehearted acceptance. Mary frankly professed her desire
that reconciliation be made with Rome and religion returned to its position
at her father's death. This she wanted only with Parliamentary sanction,
and in its first meeting in November, 1553, all ecclesiastical legislation
of the preceding reign was repealed and the religious position at Henry's

death restored.

16

National sentiment demanded Mary's union with an Englishman,
preferably one of two representatives of the House of York: Edward
Courtenay or Cardinal Reginald Pole, the latter being eligible to marry
since he had never taken priest's orders despite his cardinalship. Mary,
however, inclined toward Philip of Spain, son of Holy Roman Emperor
Charles V, King of Spain. Against strong opposition in Parliament and
even stronger opposition of the populace, a marriage treaty was signed
in January, 1554. Almost immediately there was an uprising in Devon,
the Courtenay country. This forced prematurely the hand of Sir Thomas
Wyatt who was planning a larger-scaled attempt to dethrone Mary,
marry Elizabeth to Courtenay, and proclaim her Queen. Forced now to
play out his embryo scheme, Wyatt marched to London where his weak
force was quickly captured and the rebellion thwarted. The lenience
which had been shown toward Mary's declaimers the summer before could
not be repeated. Lady Jane Grey, still a possible center for plots, was
executed together with her husband and his father Northumberland. Wyatt
was beheaded, and a hundred of his rebels hanged. Both Courtenay and
Elizabeth, suspected of having knowledge of Wyatt's scheme, were com-
mitted to the Tower but were released two months later. Despite con-
tinued Opposition to the Spanish marriage, the treaty was ratified in April.
Philip, however, did not feel it safe enough to enter England immediately,
and it was not until July that the marriage was completed.

In November, 1554, Cardinal Pole, named by Mary a year before

as legate to Rome, returned to England, and Parliament hastily restored

17
the nation to communion with the Church. Large numbers of the population
confessed their sins and declared their loyalty and repentance to the
Church; since loyalty and repentance did not involve restitution of Church
property, such declarations were not difficult to make.

One word defines the last four years of Mary's reign: perse-
cution. With the reconciliation made with Rome, Parliament also re-
stored the Acts of Heresey which had been restricted under Henry VIII
and abolished under Somerset. With this restoration began the burning
of over three hundred martyrs who would not recant their beliefs in
Protestantism to save their lives. The immediate practical effect was
that every martyrdom brought fresh adherents to Protestantism and in-
tensified Protestant sentiment while extending the conviction that perse-
cution was part and parcel of the Roman creed, the last result that Mary
or the Church wanted. That Mary herself was the chief instigator of the
persecutions is only conjecture, but she was morally convinced that it
was her duty to stamp out heresy and almost fanatically believed that only
Catholicism could save the souls of England.

It became apparent in 1555 that Mary was not going to hear an
heir to the throne and, in fact, that her life would not be long. With this
conviction, Philip left the country in August to ponder how he might best
secure his influence with Elizabeth, whose ultimate accession he regarded
as inevitable. In January of 1556, Charles V abdicated, and Philip became
King of Spain. Later in the year, argument with the new violent-tempered

Pope, Paul IV, involved him in war with Rome, and France took up the

18

Papal cause. In the spring of 1557, Philip paid a final brief visit to his
wife to obtain her aid in war with France. Within a few months, Mary
had her own problems with France when a French-encouraged rebellion
in Yorkshire led to war.

Meanwhile, with a considerable contingent of English tr00ps,
Philip routed the French in Italy, and the Pope, thus deserted, was
forced to a reconciliation. Philip's use of English troops, and Mary's
failure to force Parliament to restore more property to the Church,
enraged the Pope. Cardinal Pole was deprived of his legatine author-
ity, to the great grief of Mary, and the Pope's attitude served only to
intensify English animosity toward the Papacy. When Mary and Pole
bled the already impoverished treasury to pacify him in what they
deemed a pious and supreme duty, the sentiment of the country toward
Rome reached the breaking point.

To make matters worse, Calais fell to the French in January,
1558, the result of a weakened garrison made so by the depletion of the
exchequer to the pacification of Rome. Calais had been a point of mili-
tary honor with the English for centuries, and the loss was a deep and
bitter wound to national pride. For Mary herself it was the bitterest
portion of a cup filled with little but bitterness.

The last months of her life dragged out in a country filled with
despair and gloom. In November she died and was followed in a few hours
by her one trusted friend, Cardinal Pole. Her failure was a disastrous

example of one who, with conscientious and destructive persistence,

l9
aimed at an ideal which her own methods made impossible of attainment.
The trials of her sad life have been summarized by Innes in a short
paragraph:

From the time of her childhood she was exposed
to unceasing harshness; a princess born, she was treated
as a bastard; despite it all her natural generosity survived.
Royally courageous, loyal and straightforward; to her per-
sonal enemies almost magnanimous; to the poor and af-
flicted pitiful; loving her country passionately: she was
blind'to the forces at-work in the world, obsessed with the
idea of one supreme duty, and she set herself, as she
deemed, to do battle with Antichrist by the only methods
she knew, though they were alien to her natural disposi-
tion, facing hatred and obloquy. She whose life was one long
martyrdom, for conscience' sake offered up a whole hola-
caust: of martyrs: she who thirsted for love died clothed
with a nation's hate. Where in all histogy is a tragedy
more piteous than that of Mary Tudor?

London and the People

London grew rapidly during the first half of the sixteenth
century and, with the purchase from the Crown of the borough of South-
wark in 1550, was the largest city in Eur0pe, with a population estim-
ated at a quarter-million. Because of her size and proximity to West-
minster, she was invariably the first to feel the effects of government
action. Continued suppression of the religious houses during Edward's
reign was filling the city with men lacking either trade or craft and
forced to beg, a situation which brought widespread suffering to all. The

influx of foreigners and rustics during the early years of the century was

 

2'Ibid'. , 242

20

now swelling the guilds and companies. Threatening unionism, which
would have made large numbers of skilled men idle, was thwarted in
1547 by Parliamentary abolition of all the craft guilds in England (except
the London companies and a few in the larger towns) and provision that
artisans might work where they pleased. 3 London, more so than the
rest of the country, was feeling the effects of rapid growth.

The city was divided into twenty-six wards (including South-

4 each governed by a freely elected Alderman. The Lord Mayor,

wark),
elected each year from among the Aldermen, began his term in late
October, assisted by forty immediate subordinates and two Sheriffs,

each of whom maintained law and order throughout the city with a staff

of Sergeants, Yeomen, and Clerks.

The backbone of the city in both men and money was the city
companies. Well over 125 were recognized in London although the most
powerful were limited in number to twelve, the Great Livery Companies
of Mercers, Grocers, Drapers, Goldsmiths, Fishmongers, Salters,
Vintners, Skinners, Haberdashers, Merchant Tailors, Clothworkers, and
Ironmongers. Like the rest of England, most were continually in a state
of change, absorbing smaller or allied guilds, founding new companies

as fashions and styles dictated, and fluctuating to increasing import,

swelling ranks of journeymen, and the favor shown them by the Crown.

 

3Sir Walter Besant, London in the Time of the Tudors
(London: Adam and Charles Black, 1904), p. 219

 

4 .
See Map Of London, P1. 11. p.163. Southwark was later
called Bridge Ward Without.

21
Roughly, the companies were divided into three groups: the Merchants,
who were the wealthiest; the Craftsmen, who were the most numerous,
and, in effect, the great middle class; and the Laborers, the lowest
in both numbers and wealth.

As the companies grew, so did their recognition by, and re-
sponsibilities to, the city and the Crown. The Lord Mayor gained
greater authority over the companies as the need grew for new forms of
regulation, easier governing for revenue and police purposes, and out-
side judgement in company disputes. Assessments likewise grew, pri-
marily as loans which were never repaid. By mid-century most com-
panies maintained their own armories as the burden of supplying mili-
tiamen fell more and more to them. In 1547, many companies were put
in difficult circumstances as chantries and endowments for memorial
services made to. parish churches were seized by Edward, for in many
cases the funds were invested in lands and pr0perties. But, despite
increased government demands, the guilds and companies came through
the Reformation with better organizations, more beneficial regulations,
and greater wealth than they had ever known.

Suppression of the religious houses had a doubly harsh effect

on the city: it threw unskilled men into the streets with neither trade

1

 

George Unwin, The Gilds and Companies of London
(New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1909), pp. 352-53. Ironically,
the last group included the Watermen, the oldest and largest com-
pany, and the most loosely organized until 1555 when eight over-

seers were selected from their number by the Mayor, and their fares
set by the city. (Ibid.)

 

22

nor craft, and did away with many refuges for the poor and the sick.
The sweating sickness appeared in 1550, and thousands died before it
subsided six months later. 6 0f ten hospitals for the poor and sick be-
fore Edward's accession, seven were suppressed before his death, and
it was only by shaming the government into generosity that the city was
left in 1553 with five foundations: St. Bartholomew's for the sick, St.
Thomas' for the permanently infirm, Christ's Hospital for the mainten-
ance and education of children, Bridewell for the vagabonds and unem-
ployed, and Bedlam for the mad. 7

Education likewise suffered as a result of the Reformation,
though unintentionally. The impoverished government could no longer
endow the secular high schools and colleges as heavily as the over-
zealous Henry had done; the grammar schools could expect nothing, and
the dissolution of chantries and guilds outside London in 1547 had over-
thrown a large number of schools maintained by them.8 In London and
Westminster, however, four survived: St. Paul's, St. Peter's, St.

Thomas', and St. Anthony's; a fifth was added at Christ's Hospital in 1553. 9

 

6
Besant, 47

7A. L. Rowse, The England of Elizabeth (London: Macmillan

and Co., Ltd., 1950), p. 198

8
Ibid. , 489

 

9Stow, I, 74-75. Of these, Stow recalled, the boys of St.
Anthony's were the most frequent winners of the yearly debates for
which they received silver bows and arrows donated by the Gold-
smith' 3 Company. (Ibid.).

 

23
These were schools for the children of Gentlemen, however, who had
to be able to read and write Latin before admission; the great majority
of children were educated at home or went uneducated until old enough
to work.

Although the times were difficult, both nobility and the common
man found time for sport and play. It is perhaps by watching the Lon-
doner in his frivolous hours that we see him best. John Stow, in his
twenties during the reigns of Edward and Mary, left memorable accounts:

Cockes of the game are yet cherished by diuerse men
for their pleasures, much money being laide on their heades,
when they fight in pits whereof some be costly made for that
purpose. The Ball is vsed by noble men and gentlemen in
Tennis courts, and by the people of meaner sort in the Open
fields and streets. . . . I haue also in the Sommer season
seene some vpon the riuer of Thames rowed in whirries,
with staues in their hands, flat at the fore end, running one
against another, and for the most part, one, or both ouer-
throwne, and well dowked.

On the Holy dayes in Sommer, the youthes of this Citie,
haue in the field exercised themselues, in leaping, dauncing,
shooting, wrestling, casting of the stone or ball, etc.

And for defence and vse of the weapon, there is a
speciall profession of men that teach it.

The youthes of this Citie also haue vsed on holy dayes
after Euening prayer, at their Maisters doores, to exer-
cise their Wasters and Bucklers: and the Maidens, one of
them playing on a Timbrell, in sight of their Maisters and
Dames, to daunce for garlandes hanged thwart the streetes,
. . . as for the bayting of Bulles and Bears, they are till
this day much frequented, namely in Bearegardens of the
Banks side, wherein be prepared Scaffolds for beholders
to stand vpon. Sliding vpon the Ice is now but childrens
play: but in hawking and hunting many graue Citizens at
this present haue great delight, 1%nd doe rather want ley-
sure then good will to follow it.

 

10
' Ibid., 93-95.

24

Games of chance were forbidden in London; in 1550 and 1553
the Mayor and Sheriffs broke up bowling alleys and dicing tables in
Aldgate Ward and at Paul's Wharf. 11 Brothels were rampant in
Southwark, and, though Parliamentary regulation suppressed many
in 1546, they continued into the reign of Elizabeth.

From very early days, Londoners were fond of spectacles and
processions, and by the mid-sixteenth century were highly skilled in
pageantry. Decorated land floats carrying several pe0ple and fire-
barges lighting up the Thames had been common a’ hundred years be-
fore. 12 These were primarily the responsibility of the city companies
which built and stored their pageant wagons in Leaden Hall, a great
stone building in Limestreet Ward owned by the city. 13 The workman-
ship and decorative detail of these floats was probably somewhat better
than that of the Revels, for the companies were able to spend much more
time and money on them. But techniques and materials were probably
just the same, and it is not unlikely that several of the artisans employed

by the Revels during the Christmas season worked on the company

pageants earlier in the year.

 

11
Ibid., II, 294.

12 .
Unwin, 273, One of the most common processions dating

from the thirteenth century was the Midsummer Watch, a muster and
parade of mounted and marching militiamen, morris dancers, jugg-
lers, tumblers, and giants. Usually held on the eves of St. John's
Day (June 24) and St. Paul's Day (June 30), the last authentic Watch
was seen in 1548. (Stow, I, 103).

1
31bid. , 159-60.

25

One of the principal processions for which these floats were

built was the Lord Mayor's progress to Westminster for his instal-

lation ceremony each October. Although these had not reached the

zenith of magnificance seen in the seventeenth century, they were quite

colorful; the diarist, Henry Machyn, described the parade of 1553:

First were two tall men bearing two great streamers of the
Merchant Taylor's arms, then came one with a drum and a
flute playing, and another with a great fife, all they in blue
silk, and then came two great 'wodyn' armed with two great
clubs all in green and with squibs burning, and with great
beards and side hair, and two targets upon their backs, and
then came sixteen trumpeters blowing, and then came men

in blue gowns and caps and hose and blue silk sleeves, and
every man having a target and a javelin to the number of
seventy, and then came a devil, and after that came the bach-
elors all in livery and scarlet hoods, and then came the pag-
eant of St. John Baptist gorgeously with goodly speeches, and
then came all the king's trumpetours [sic] blowing and every
trumpeter having scarlet caps, and then the crafts, and then
the waits playing, and then my Lord Mayor's officers, and
then my Lord Mayor and two good henchmen.

I

Such was London in the mid-sixteenth century; an overcrowded

and bustling metropolis beset with many problems common to modern

society - insufficient housing, lack of educational facilities, unemploy-

ment problems, corruption in the national government, disease, pov-

erty, and intolerance - but in the midst of times out of which would bloom

the Golden Age of England.

 

1.

14Quoted by Unwin, 274-75. The 'wodyn' were probably woodmen,

e., lunatics. (Shipley, 732).

 

CHAPTER III
HISTORY AND FUNCTION OF THE REVELS OFFICE

In August, 1538, John Farlyon, Sergeant of Pavilions and
Tents, received a patent from King Henry VIII as "Yeoman or Keeper
of the King's vestures or apparel of masks, revels and disguisings,
and of apparel of the trappers of horses, for jousts and tourneys. "
His wage was fixed at 6d. a day and‘he was given a livery coat of the
Household yeomanry. With this appointment the Office of the Revels
technically came into existence as an independant office of the Royal
Household. It had been almost fifty years in the making, and, al-
though the Yeoman Tailor was always an important figure in Revels
activity, his superior, the Master of the Revels, held the principal
position.

During the reign of Henry VII and the greater part of the reign
of Henry VIII, the appointment of a Master of the Revels was one of
temporary tenure. At first he was probably chosen from among minor

officials of the Household, but when Henry VIII came to the throne he

 

1
Chambers, 7.

26

27

was more often a member of the court and of noble birth. As his title
suggests - and later documents show - it was the obligation of this
Master to organize and supervise the Christmas entertainment and
other court festivities. Such entertainment included, from time to
time, plays, interludes, masques, triumphs, and pageantry, but dis-
guisings seem to have been his most frequent responsibility.

The first mention of a Master of the Revels appeared in an
Order for Sitting in the King's Great Chamber, dated December 31,
1494, in which it was stated that “if the master of the revells be there,
he may sitt with the chapelyn or with the esquires or gentlemen ushers, "
surely not a position of very great rank. Possibly during these early
years the Master was, in fact, a chief tailor to the King, someone famil-
iar with the materials and costumes necessary to a disguising or play.

In 1492, Walter. Alwyn received .614. 13s. 4d. "in full payment
for the disguysing made at Xmas, " and in 1493, £13.6s.8d. "for the
Revelles at Cristmas, "4 extraordinary fees for the time considering

that two groups of players who performed those same years were given

 

2Collier, I, 50-54, 11. 1. Interludes were short plays or
dialogues presented between other, longer performances. A triumph
was usually a mute dramatization, often of a Greek or Roman myth, in
which one god triumphed over another. (Enid Welsford, The Court
Masgue (Cambridge, England: University Press, 1927], p. 147). (The,
word also meant a tournament of jousts; see Chap. XII, p.133). A
disguising was an early form of the masque. (See Chap. 1, p. 1; Chap.
x, p.104; and App. 1, pp.223-24 for more complete definitions).

3
Chambers, 4.

4
Collier, 50, n. l.

28
only 61. each. Such payment suggests, that, as in later years, the fee
included the cost of materials used and wages of other workmen whom
Alwyn supervised and paid. In the following two years, Jakes Haute
was paid about the same for disguisings, 5 then, with Alwyn, dis-
appeared from the records until 1511, when he was appointed, with
William Pawne, to assist in the preparations of "disguisings and some
Moriscos" (or Moorish dances) for the court, ”whereof they shall
have warning by the Lord Chamberlain. ”

The person whom they assisted was Henry Guildford, and the
"Moriscos" which they prepared were for the first of several years of
revelry of which Guildford was to be Master. The preceding year,

1510, the Mastership had been held by Edward Guildford, Earl of Essex,
and Henry's half-brother. 7 Together with nine other men dressed like
Robin Hood's band in Kendal green coats, and a woman representing
Maid Marion, the Guildford brothers surprised the Queen in her cham-
ber to her great amusement. 8 Undoubtedly Henry Guildford was well-
known in court to be so familiar with the Queen, and since he was then
twenty-one, just two years older than the King, they were probably good

friends. In his first year as Master, Guildford devised for Twelfth-

 

SIbid., 51, n. 1.
‘6

Ibid., 66, n. 1.
7

Chambers, 5.

8
Sir Leslie Stephen and Sir Sidney Lee, eds. , DictionarLof
National Biography (63 vols. ; London: Oxford University Press,

1921-22), VIII, p. 767.

29
night a glistening mountain which moved the length of the hall toward
the King, at which point it opened to reveal morris dancers who danced
around the hall as the'mountain retreated. 9 A year later the masque
was introduced in England, 10 and Guildford probably had much to do
with its introduction. He was knighted that year for his fighting with
Dorset in Spain, and in 1513 was created Knight Banneret after the
winning of Tournay in France. 11 In 1515, he was made Master of the
Horse and, at a later date, Comptroller of the Household. 12 His final
activity came in 1526, when, with Sir Thomas Wyatt, he superintended
the building of a magnificent and costly banqueting house at Greenwich
for the entertainment of the French Ambassadors then visiting Eng-
land. Four Italian painters decorated it, and a "Maister Hans"
painted a representation of the siege of Terouenne. Whether "Maister
Hans” was Hans Holbein or not is uncertain, but, from the fact that he
painted portraits of Sir and Lady Guildford the following year, 14 it
seems likely.

An extant list of materials and costs of the "Triumph of Love

and Beauty, " presented in 1514, was in the handwriting of one Richard

 

C’see App. 11, pp. 225-26.

loCollier, 67-68. (See Chap. x, p.104, for details).
11

Stephen and Lee, 767-70.
12

Chambers, 5.

13COIller, 99-1030

14Stephen and Lee, 1x, 1000-1004.

30

Gibson who named himself as their purchaser.15 Obviously he was
Guildford's right-hand man: the foreman who carried out Guildford's
plans, kept accounts of expenditures, and supervised the tailors, paint-
ers, carpenters, and embroiderers who worked on the costumes and
properties of the entertainments. Early in the reign he had been
appointed "Yeoman Tailor" to the King, and his detailed lists of ex-
penses accounted for several years up to 1527.16

Gibson's dual position as "Serjant . . . of the reyvells, and
of the Kynges tents” was a practice which continued‘among all officers
of the Revels at least until the reign of Elizabeth. The ancient Office
of the Tents, dating from the twelfth century, was charged with main-
tenance of the King's tents, pavilions, banqueting houses, and horse
regalia, all equipment for outdoor entertainment. 17 Since jousts and
tournaments were primarily summer sports, and plays and masques
indoor, winter activity, the Officers could be kept busy throughout the
year attending first to one, then to the other. H In Gibson's time, the

Office of the Tents was at Warwick Inn, north of St. Paul's Cathedral,

and the masqueing costumes were kept in the Great Wardrobe near

 

15Collier, 70-71. (See App. III, pp.227-28, for details of the
"Triumph of Love and Beauty").

Ibid. In an unrelated document of 1512-13 he was "Serjant
Gybsun, 52753111: of armes, and of the reyvells, and of the Kynges tents. "
(Ibid. , 68). Collier frequently mentioned, but never printed, these
lists. They would doubtless yield considerable information about the
early Revels, and were, probably, materials which Feuillerat had

planned to publish.

17Chambers, 6.

31

Baynard Castle, but, under Farlyon in 1538, they were stored with the
tents at Warwick Inn. 18

Christmas revelry during Henry's reign grew to such an ex-
tent that he finally considered it worth the appointment of permanent
officials. An idea of the extent of his last entertainments can be gath-
ered from the first inventory recorded by the Revels after his death:
among masqueing garments for men and women were costumes for
Almains (Germans), Egyptians, Turks, Moors, Italians, pilgrims,
friars, falconers, an d men of arms, most of them insets of eight, as
well as forty pairs of footwear, twenty-four dozen visors or face masks,
with and without beards, and over six hundred yards of various fabrics.
Such a vast wardrobe was undoubtedly outgrowing the care it could be
given in the Great Wardrobe, hence in 1538 the duty fell to Farlyon to
assure its preservation.

Farlyon was succeeded by John Bridges, who received a patent

2
on October 27, 1539, appointing him Yeoman Tailor of the Revels, and

 

18Ibid. , 13. Chambers believed the Tents were moved at least
twice before being reunited with the Revels at the Blackfriars in 1546-47.

19
Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 9-21.

 

0Chambers, 7. Collier believed Farlyon was appointed Yeoman
at a much earlier date and spoke of "a Booke of the Kings Revell stuff,
being in the charge of John Farlyon"'dated in the early part of the reign of
Henry VIII. (Collier, 79-80). Boas believed he was appointed on Novem-
ber 20, 1534. (Frederick Boas, Queen Elizabeth in Drama [London:
George Allen and Unwin, Ltd. , 1950], p. 38).

21
Feuille rat, 259.

32

on March 11, 1545, two patents were granted to Sir Thomas Cawarden

of the King's Privy Chamber; one appointed him Master of the Revels

and the other Master of the Tents. 22 On the same day, John Bernard
was granted a single patent as Clerk-Comptroller of both the Tents and
the Revels.23 Fourteen months later, on May 7, 1546, Thomas Philipps,
likewise under a single patent, was named Clerk of the Tents and Revels,
and the offices of the Revels were filled.

Establishment of the Office probably evolved from several needs.

In Italy and France, masqueing among nobility had been very fashionable
for many years, 25 and with many foreign visitors Henry doubtles sly
wanted impressive entertainments presented. Also, as the wardrobe of
costly properties and costumes grew, so did their need for safekeeping
and protection from pilferage and spoilage, But certainly behind these
factors was the fun-loving King himself, whose early fondness for
spectacle and gay, good times continued throughout life. An Office of

the Revels could not have been created in a court of austerity; it is en-

tirely appropriate that it should develop, as it did, under Henry VIII.

 

22Chambers, 9. The full title of the office was Ma ister
Iocorum-Revelorum et Mascorum omnium et singularium nostrorum
vulggriter nuncupatorum Revells and Masks, and the annual fee was 610.
According to a report of the Office made in 1573, one Travers was "Ser-
geant" of the Revels prior to the appointment of Cawarden. (See App. IV,
p.230 ). I have been unable to find any details of him or his‘office.

23Feuillerat, 256 .

24
Ibid.

 

25Welsfo rd, 137- 38.

CHAPTER IV
OFFICERS

Thomas Cawarden was originally a mercer, having been
apprenticed in 1528. Somehow he came to the attention of- the court,
and throughout the next decade gained the favor of Henry VIII who, in
the early forties, granted to Cawarden and his wife, Elizabeth, the
manors of Ullicote and Loxley in Warwick County. 1 In June, 1543,
he was appointed Keeper of Donington Castle, and two months later
was pardoned for aiding a heretic. This was a minor incident, how-
ever, for in December he was made a Gentleman of the Privy Chamber,
and was appointed with others to take inventory of the masqueing gar-
ments stored at Warwick Inn. 2 In March, 1544, he became Keeper
of Nonsuch, the fantastic Gothic-Renaissance palace in Surrey started
by Henry in 1539 and finished just prior to Elizabeth's accession twenty

3
years later. In September that year, he was knighted at Boulogne,

 

1Collier, 133.
2
Feuillerat, 256.

3
Alfred W. Clapham and Walter H. Godfrey, Some Famous
Buildings and Their Story (Westminster: Technical Journals, Ltd. ,

1914), pp. 3-5.

4
Chambers, 9. 33

34

and the following spring took on his new duties as Master of the Revels.

When the Revels masqueing garments were moved from War-
wick Inn to the Blackfriars in 1546-47, Cawarden acquired an official
lodging for himself in the precinct and, a year later, property of his
own, by taking a lease for twenty-one years of a house or kitchen with
a yard and gallery. He undoubtedly retained his favor with the new
court, fOr in the spring of 1550 he obtained a considerable grant in free
burgage from the Crown, which included not only his own leasehold but
also all that area of the Blackfriars not in the use of the Tents and Revels. 5

As a Protestant, Cawarden found less favor from Mary and the
new Council. His adherence to Mary was mistrusted, and when the news
of Wyatt's uprising reached the court on January 26, 1554, Cawarden was
arrested. After interrogation by the Council, he was set free with an
order to arm himself and men in his service to march against Wyatt.
Preparing himself and riding the next day, he was apprehended again,
by Lord William Howard, who held him until January 29th then re-
stricted him to the precinct of the Blackfriars for a month. Whileunder
arrest, Cawarden's armory was seized at Blechingly, another of his
pr0perties, and eight horses and seventeen cart-loads of armor and
munitions were carried away "to the Queen's use. " On his return to
Ble chingly, Cawarden requested restitution of his property, but only four

cart-loads of weapons were returned, and his horses, he claimed, were

 

5See Chap. VI, pp.53-55.

35
so spoiled as to be good for nothing but husbandry, draught, or burden.
Further requests for his property apparently went unanswered.

Cawarden was again harassed in July, 1555, when he was sum-
moned before the Council on the charge that he was indebted to the Queen
for £1000, an accusation probably of politico-religious origin.

In 1557, Nonsuch Palace was granted to the Earl of Arundel,
although Cawarden, still as Keeper, was living there. In August, he was
given three weeks to move by Lord Lumley, son-in-law of Arundel, and,
apparently not doing so, was evicted. He charged the Earllwith unjustly
invading his rights by forcibly ejecting his servants from the mansion
house and driving his cattle out of pasture. 8 Apparently his charges
were upheld, or at least satisfied, for it was at Nonsuch that Cawarden
died, just two years later on August 29, 1559, having lived long enough
to superintend the festivities at Elizabeth's coronation the winter before.
Lady Cawarden died a half-year later, and their estate was left to William
More, who, thirty-six years later, “sold part of his inherited property at
the Blackfriars to James Burbage for his famous theatre.

Sir Thomas Cawarden was no better nor worse than his contem-

poraries. Undoubtedly a shrewd man, he was clever enough to make his

 

6
Kempe, 133-44.

7
Ibid.

 

8
Ibid. , 146-48.

9Chambers. 18.

10
Ibid.

 

36

way from mercer to Gentleman of the Privy Chamber, although his rise
was under an easily-pleased King. As Master of the Revels he seems to
have been capable: he was skillful, and delighted "in matters of devise, "11
and his origin as a mercer no doubt stood him in good stead in the pur-
chase and use of fabrics. His penchant, however, seems to have been
for amassing a sizeable estate; Cawarden was, if anything, an opportunist.

The Yeoman of the Revels was second‘in command and importance
in the Office. John Bridges was succeeded in April, 1547, by John Holt, 12
who acted as deputy until receipt of a patent in July, 1550.13 Both before
and after joining the Revels, Holt was tailor to King Edward, and remained
with the Office well into the reign of Elizabeth. 14 As foreman and "yeoman
cutter" he laid out work for the tailors, often probably tailoring himself,

bought supplies and materials, occasionally paid and hired workers, and,
at least by William Paget, Mary's champion, was held in high regard. 15
Holt was apparently illiterate, however; where signatures of the other
Officers appeared in the accounts, John Holt's "mark" appeared as a

simple "X. "

 

11Ibid., 2. (See App. IV, p. 229).

12
Feuillerat, 9. The stock of the inventory made at this time

was "delyueryd owte of the Custody of Iohn Briges late yoman of the same
into the Tuycion &Saff keping of Iohn holte nowe yoman. " (Ibid.).

13
Ibid. , 256.

l4Feuillerat, Revel-s . . . Elizabeth, 5.

 

15 . .
Paget directed at least one letter to Cawarden, "and In his

absence to Mr. Holt." (Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 250).

37

The first Clerk-Comptroller of the Revels was John Bernard,
who was granted the office in both the Tents and the Revels at the same
time that Cawarden was appointed. He died in September, 1550, 16 but
had been succeeded earlier that year by Richard Leys, who was granted
a patent on March 17th. 17 As well as keeping the paybooks (as Bernard
had done), Leys occasionally accompanied the masqueing stuff to the court.

Thomas Philipps, whose patent was dated May 7, 1546, 18 was
the first official Clerk of the Revels. His signature as Clerk appeared in
the accounts throughout the reigns of Edward and Mary, yet from the in-
ventory of May, 1547, until the inventory of March, 1555, the name of
Thomas Blagrave appeared frequently along with that of Philipps as per-
forming many services for the Office. 19 He was apparently a personal
servant to Cawarden, 20 who probably used him as an office boy and
messenger when the Officers were busy or another hand was needed.

From December, 1550, to March, 1555, Philipps' name appeared

as the last in all but one of the lists of tailors for each work period, and

Holt's, often as Yeoman Cutter, as the first. During these years,

 

16
Ibid. , 274.

17
Ibid. , 301.

18
Ibid. , 256. He was also Clerk of the Tents.

1
9Both Feuillerat (259), and Chambers (11), referred to
Blagrave as Clerk of the Revels, but neither accounted for his service
simultaneously with that of Philipps. Blagrave became Clerk aft er

Elizabeth's accession, however, in which office he remained imtil 1603.
(Ibid. , 60).

 

20Feuillerat, Blackfriars Records, 52.

 

38
Philipps, although he was Clerk, may have worked as a tailor while re-
ceiving payment as Clerk according to his patent.
Some notion of the duties of the Officers may be obtained from
the following document, drawn up at some time between 1545 and 1553:

Constitucions howe the King's Revells ought to be usyd:

Fyrst, An Invyntory to be made by the Clarke controwler
and the Clarke, by the Survey and apowentinge of the mastyr
of the Revells, Aswell of all and singular masking garments with
all thear furnyture, as allso of all bards for horsis, coveryng
of bards and bassis of all kynds, with all and singular the
appurtenances, which Invytory, subscribyd by the yoman and
clarke, ought to remayne in the custody of the Master of the
Offyces and the goodes for the saeffe kepyng.

Item, that no kynd of stuff be bowght, but at the apowyent-
ment of the Master or his depute Clarke controwler, being
counsell therin, and that he make mencion therof, in his booke
of receot which ought to be subscribyd as afforsyd by the Master.

Item, that the Clarke be privey to the cutting of all kynds
of garments, and that he make mencion in his booke of
thys suing owt howe moche it takyth of all kynds to every maske,
revelle, or tryumph, which boke ought to be subscrybyd as
afforseyd by the Master.

Item, that the Clarke kepe check of all daye man working
on the premisses, and to make two 1yger boks of all wags and
provisions of all kynd whate so ever, the one for the paye mas-
ter and the other for the Master.

Item, that no garments forseyd, bards, coveryng of bards,
bassis, or suche lyck, be lent to no man without a specyall
comaundment, warrant, or tokyn, from the Kyng's Maiestie,
but that all be leyd up in feyr stonderds or pressis, and every
presse or stonderd to have two locks a pece, with severall
wards, with two keys, the one for the Master or Clarke, and
the other for the yoman, so that non of them cum to the stuff
without the other. '

As Master, Cawarden received an annual fee of£10, and 4s.

 

1This might also be borne out by the Constitution above,
which states that ”the Clarke be privey to the cutting of all kynds of
garments. "

22
Chambers, 12. (Found among Cawarden's papers).

39
a day as ”dieting Charges allowed allweys to thofficers during suche
Busynesis."23 Holt's fee as Yeoman was £9.25.6d. , and 25. per diem.
The other Officers were paid only dieting charges: the Clerk-Comp-
troller received 23. a day, and the Clerk, 18d. a day until November,

.1554, when it was raised to 25. a day.

 

23Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 30. Chambers (7) claimed
incorrectly that his dieting wages were one pound per day.

 

CHAPTER V
PERSONNEL

Thirty-eight trades were represented by over four hundred
and fifty persons who sold goods or services to the Revels between
February, 1547, and June, 1558.

Tailors were by far the most numerous employees of the Office;
over two hundred worked at some time over the eleven-year period, but
only twenty-one of these men worked during more than three periods of
activity. One tailor, Thomas Claterbocke, worked almost every season
over the years, 1 and another, Robert Batersbe, probably second in
command to Claterbocke or Holt, almost always worked the maximum
number of days that the Office was active.

Some effort seems to have been made to use particular talents.

Peter Fleming and Leonard Mascal, 3 apparently better tailors of head-

 

1During Christmas, 1549 and 1550, he served as "foreman" at
10d. a day, but for several years thereafter, received only 8d. a day,
the standard tailor's wage. With the exception of two periods, he worked
the maximum time that the Office was active.

2His last season was Shrovetide, 1555.

3Although Mascal worked during only three seasons, he received
an annuity of £6. 13s. 4d. from Cawarden for several years after 1555.

(Feuillerat, 290) .
40

41
pieces, frequently worked on these when they were needed. Two other
tailors, Henry Roulande and Reynold Salamson, served occasionally
in other capacities; Roulande often accompanied costumes and properties
to the court, and Salamson held some little authority during the removal
from Warwick Inn to the Blackfriars.

Until Shrovetide, 1555, tailors were paid 8d. a day and 8d. a
night for their work. 4 On two occasions this wage was changed: during
Christmas, 1549, the night wage went down to 4d. , and during Christ-
mas, 1551, when the tradition of the Lord of Misrule was being revived,
the day wage was raised to 12d. The latter increase may have been made
in order to find tailors for this particularly busy season, but it was more
likely made in an effort to balance a severe devaluation of money that had
taken place the summer before.

In June, 1555, both the day and night wage was increased to 12d. ,
and an interesting change of tailoring personnel took place. Five tailors
who had worked rather steadily were not hired again, and five who had
never worked for the Revels before were hired. Together with three
tailors who were carried on, they worked almost every period there-

after. Whether the wage increase was the cause or the effect of the

 

Wages for night work actually represented "double time, " for
it is assumed that, as in 1573, a day of work consisted of ten hours and
a night of work, six hours. (Chambers, 38).

5
Stow, I, 56-57.

42
personnel change is not apparent, but it meant more steady employment
for fewer men.
Fourteen hosiers, including Hugh Eston, ”the kynges hosyer, "
were hired by the Revels during four work periods. Specially made
gloves were ordered from three glovers on three occasions, and three

7
buskinmakers worked several times. A cordwaIner was hired once,

 

 

as was a capper or hatmaker.

The Revels traded with many merchants in purchasing the
dozens. of varieties of goods and fabrics needed for making and trimming
costumes. Ten mercers supplied them with satins and sarcenets,
taffetas and velvets, visors and girdles. Two drapers supplied the
cheaper kersey, cotton, and friseado. Three rnilliners sold them caps,
gloves, visors, felts, rolls, flax, tow, ribbon, cotton, lace, feathers,
and thread. One, ChristoPher Milliner, apparently specialized in
masqueing attire, having on one occasion sold the Revels partial cos.-

tumes, and, on another, rented them six complete masqueing garments.

The only women merchants to the Revels were the silkwomen, three of

 

whom supplied trimmings such as filoselle, fringe, tassels, buttons,

lace, ribbon, and flowers of silk. Haberdashers8 carried an extensive

 

 

6See Table I, pp.43-44 which shows the relation of the number
of tailors hired to the amount of time they worked in each period over
the eleven years.

7A shoemaker.

8One haberdasher, Christopher Harbottell, was the husband of
Margaret Harbottell, a silkwoman.

43

Table I - Comparative man-daysa worked by tailors
in each period of activity - Edward VI

 

 

No. of No. of Man-
Days Men Days
Activity Period Worked Hired Worked
Coronation 1547 Feb 1 - Feb 28 28 46 2774';
Christmas 1547 (Details Omitted)
Shrovetide 1548 Feb 5 - Feb 15 ll 31 .210
Christmas 1548 Sep 26 - Oct 5(?) 10 _ 13 69+
Shrovetide 1549 (Dates Omitted) 4 8 26
Christmas 1549 (Dates Omitted) 12 21 190
Shrovetide 1550 (Apparently no entertainment)
Christmas 1550 Dec 24 - Jan 7 15 15 104
Shrovetide 1551 Feb 3 - Feb 11 9 9 63
Airing 1551 Jun 3 - Jun 9 7 7 42
Christmas 1551 Dec 12 - Jan 7 27 46 519
Shrovetide 1552 (Apparently no entertainment)
Airing 1552 Jun 1 - Jun 7 7 7 35
Christmas 1552 Dec 17 - Jan 7 22 45 605
Shrovetide i 1553 Jan 8 - Feb 16 40 12 207+
Easter 1553 Feb 28 - Apr 1 33 9 139
Airing 1553 May 31 - Jun 7 8 6 24

 

aThe sum of each tailor's number of working days.
A night, six hours, is figured here as a half-day.

44
Table I - Comparative man-days worked by tailors
in each period of activity - Mary I

 

 

No. of No. of Man-
Days Men. Days

Activity Period Worked Hired Worked
Coronation 1553 Sep 22 - Sep 28 7 8 40
Christmas 1553 Dec 21 - Jan 6 4 4 l6
Shrovetide 1554 (Apparently no entertainment)

Airing 1554 May 31 - Jun 6 7 6 24
Hallowmas 1554 Oct 17 - Oct 21 5 8 28
Michaelmas 1554 Nov 23 - Nov 30 8 6 24
Christmas 1554 Dec 13 - Jan 6 25 19 147+
Shrovetide 1555 Jan 26 - Feb 26 32 20 111
Airing 1555 Mar 9 - Mar 26 18 7 70
Airing 1555 Jun 18 - Jun 28 11 7 70
Christmas 1555 Dec 11 - Jan 8 29 7 182
Candlemas 1556 Jan 9 - Feb 2 25 7 111
Shrovetide 1556 Feb 3 - Feb 25 23 7 120*
Airing 1556 May 31 - Jun 12 13 7 70
Christmas 1556 Dec 11 - Jan 8 29 10 227+
Candlemas 1557 Jan 9 - Feb 2 25 7 112
Shrovetide 1557 Feb 3 - Feb 15 13 9 116+
St. Mark's Tide 1557 Apr 9 - Apr 26 18 19 245
Airing 1557 May 31 - Jun 12 13 7 70
Christmas 1557 Dec 11 - Jan 10 31 7 217
Candlemas 1558 Jan 11 - Feb 3 24 7 112
Shrovetide 1558 Feb 4 - Mar 4 29 7 143
Airing 1558 May 31 - Jun 12 13 7 70

 

45

stock of harder goods; eleven supplied the Revels with linen, canvas,
lockeram, lawn, tags and points, pins, needles, bodkins, thimbles, tape
and thread, paper and paste board, inkhorns, dustboxes, counters, V
standishes, scissors, shears, knives, brushes and shoe horns, wax and
cering candles, felts, handkerchiefs, silk flowers, mirrors, enameled
jewelry, buttons, feathers, bells, tennis balls, and leather bags. Mer-
chants were often also "makers, " such as feltmakers, feathermakers,
and Skinners.

Until Christmas, 1551, only three painters had worked for the
Revels, but with the revival of the Lord of Misrule that year, thirty
painters were hired at 12d. a day and 8d. a night. The following
Christmas twenty-eight were again hired: twenty-three at 12d. the day
or night, four paint grinders at 8d. the day or night, and a ”Warden, "
Godfrey Johnson, at 25. the day. Preparations for Shrovetide began
immediately after Christmas, and thirty painters worked under Johnson
again, at the same wage distribution. Several painters worked "by
great, ” i. e. , by piecework, during these terms, and a few were hired
during the winter of 1554-55. Thereafter only three painters were hired:
Richard Bossom as Warden, at 20d. day or night, his brother, George,
at 12:1. day orinight, and John Radvyrge at 8d. After March, 1557, no
painters were hired again until the accession of Elizabeth.

Probably the most notable person who worked with the Revels
was Anthony Toto, Sergeant-Painter to the King. Toto was the son of

Toto de Nunziata of Florence, an artist and sculptor of some note.

46

Anthony was a student of the painter Ghirlandajo until 1531, when he was
engaged by the sculptor Pietro Torrigiano to come to England to work on
a proposed tomb for Henry VIII. The tomb was never executed, but he
entered the service of the King as a painter and received letters of
naturalization in 1538. He is believed to have been one of the principal
architects of Nonsuch Palace, and, in 1543, succeeded Andrew Wright
as Sergeant-Painter. By 1546, he was a member of the Painters' Com-
pany and was probably the "Mr. Anthony, the kynge's servaunte of
Grenewich" mentioned in the will of Hans Holbein.

In the Revels accounts his name first appeared during Shrove-
tide, 1551, and in every paybook thereafter until Shrovetide, 1553.
Although he occasionally painted or gilded particular properties and cos-
tuInes, he was most often credited with preparing thepainters' work by
"tracynge and setting owt woorkes and patrons to them. "10 During Shrove-
tide, 1553, he was paid for drawing paper patterns or sketches of costumes
and properties "for syte 8: shewe of the forme in colours before the woorke-
manshipp began. "11

In all, sixty-seven painters or grinders worked for the Revels at

one time or another, painting, making patterns, buying painters' supplies,

 

95tephen and Lee, XIX, 1001. Unfortunately, none of Toto's
work exists.

10Feuillerat, 132. ‘

1llbid.

 

47

or working in other capacities.

Carpenters were first employed by the Revels Office in the

 

summer of 1550, when two banqueting houses were built near Hampton

12

Court for the entertainment of foreign dignitaries. In 1551, a carpen-

ter supplied the materials and built several pr0perties for the Lord of
Misrule, and the following Christmas five carpenters were hired, again
for the Lord of Misrule's properties. Like those of the painters, their
wages were 12d. , 10d. , and 8d. Four turners supplied the Revels with
globes, bowls, staves, wooden buttons, clubs, and wooden weapons over
the years. Two sawyers worked only once, during the preparations for
Edward's coronation at 12d. a day. Twenty-nine joiners were employed
during the same period at.6d. , 7d. , 8d. , 9d. , and 12d.. the day, but
only one worked again for the Office. Jasper Arnold, a basketmaker,
worked several times at 12d. a day, and five other basketmakers worked
occasionally. Carvers (or plaster molders) worked on two occasions

13
early in Edward's reign. Bricklayers and plasterers were employed

 

in building the banqueting houses at [Hampton Court in 1550, at 12d. and

11d. the day, respectively.

Thomas, a blacksmith, supplied the Revels with various iron-

 

ware several times before 1550 and may have been identical with Thomas

Blage, a smith, who made many pieces of iron hardware for the Office

 

12See Chap. XI, pp. 127-28.

13In December, 1552, "karvers" were credited with cutting
cloth; here the word was a synonym for cutter.

48
thereafter. John Sturgion was a haberdasher in 1547, when he sold

glue and nails to the Revels, but was called iron monger in 1548 and

 

1550, when he made similar sales. A coppersmith served the Revels

 

once, as did a wireman. A wire drawer, perhaps the same as a wire-

 

man, sold them various iron and wooden ware on two occasions, three
coopers supplied hoops, and a goldbeater sold imitation gold and silver
to the Office several times between 1553 and 1555. The wares of wax-

chandlers, a coffermaker, and a horner were purchased over the years,

 

 

and John Lyon, a rocer and London Alderman, who became Lord
Mayor in 1554, 14 sold pigments and painters' supplies to the Office at
least twice. Various other merchants, whose trades were not recorded,
were credited with many sales of goods to the Revels.

_At least three men served the Revels as laborers and extra
hands around the Office. Nicholas Germaine, who worked several times
between 1550 and 1555, was apparently a tailor by trade, but also made
wigs, built properties, and ran errands. Another man-of-all-work was
Thomas Bocher, who bought supplies for the Office, took masqueing
stuff to Greenwich, sewed, painted, and fetched painters' tools. Certainly
the most faithful person to the Revels was Hurnfrey Horsenaile, who worked
almost every time the Office was active, from Christmas, 1551, to the end

of Mary's reign, as a painter, tailor, and porter, and made many trips

 

1' 4:Feuillerat, 285 .

15It is often difficult to determine whether certain things were
bought or sold by those named.

49
between the Office and the court. When working as a painter or tailor,
he received the standard wage, but when running errands it is doubtful
that he was paid little more than a token fee and the gratitude of Cawarden.
The most interesting work at the Revels Office was that done by

the propertymakers, John Carowe and Robert Trunkwell. Carowe came

 

to work for the Revels in February, 1547, as a joiner, at 9d. a day.
During the winter of 1550-51, he made and mended masqueing weapons
and armor, and in the following two Christmas seasons, cut cloth for
tailors, painted, and made many properties for the Lord of Misrule and
the masques. During Shrovetide, 1553, as ”Karver or propertymaker, "
and with his own materials, he made most of the armor and weapons for
one masque, patterns for the properties, costumes, and headpieces of
three other masques, and tools for the Office. In the winter of 1554-55,
he made headpieces, weapons, and armor, but the amount of work indi-
cated that he had helpers. The following Christmas he was assisted in
making weapons by ”his boy, " (receiving 18d. a day for both himself and
his boy) and two months later was paid 18d. a day himself, "George his
mann" receiving 14d. a day. He worked for the last time during Christ-
mas, 1556, again at 18d. Idaily. Apparently Carowe lived in Southwark
where he did most of the work, for he traveled across the Thames several

times, "as well with properties redy made as nott fynisshed to shewe

l
the state therof. " 6

 

16
Feuillerat, 140.

50

Robert Trunkwell (alias Aras) first appeared in the Revels
Office during Christmas, 1551, when, for working on properties "from
time to time as he was called, ” he received 65. 8d. The following Christ-
mas he was made Warden to four joiners at 23. a day. During Shrove-
tide, 1553, he set out work for four basketmakers, but, as their Warden,
was paid only 12d. a day. In November, 1554, he made wooden weapons
and, during the winter of 1555-56, acted as Warden to joiners and car-
vers at 20d. a day. During the same winter he was rewarded for a
pattern of a device for a masque and parts to the same, and for two pat-
terns or sketches of masques. In 1557, Trunkwell made properties
which he leased to the Revels and, in the following December, worked
at his home in Westminster with his own men on some of the Master's
devices. Like Carowe, he sometimes came to the Office and did "cer-
ten Iobbes of woorke concerninge the Revells” during the Christmas
season of 1557.

Over fifty trips up and down the Thames were made to the var-
ious courts and back, over the eleven-year period, but the names of only

three watermen or bargemen were recorded, that of William Cleye most

 

frequently .
Of more than four hundred and fifty men who worked for or
served the Revels, only half did so more than once, and, of those, al-

most one hundred and fifty were employed fewer than three times. There

 

17Trunkwell worked for several years during Elizabeth's reign

as a patternmaker. (Ibid., 235).

51
is no indication that the Officers even thought very much of returning
to the same merchants or hiring the same men a second or third time;
fewer than a dozen men worked or sold goods repeatedly over the eleven-
year period. Certainly the seasonal nature of the work accounted pri-
marily for this sporadic employment, and the increased activity during
Christmas, 1551 and 1552, when the Lord of Misrule appeared, accounted
partly for it. Perhaps, too, wages or conditions in the Office were be-
low common standards (payments were not always prompt we will find);
perhaps few men could satisfy Cawarden; perhaps the situation was not
unnatural to London and the hectic times. 18 Only a more thorough study

of the reigns of Edward VI and Mary I might reveal the reason.

 

8I have found no hint, in the accounts or elsewhere, as to
how workmen were hired or merchants selected.

Equally vague is the relationship of the Revels and the city
companies. Most company charters embraced the twenty-six wards
of London and the suburbs, but there were large areas exempted,
among them the Blackfriars, according to Unwin (244-45). He did not
explain the nature or time of these exemptions however.

 

CHAPTER VI
THE BLACKFRIARS

At some time before 1539, the costumes and properties of
the Revels were moved from the Great Wardrobe north of Baynard
Castle to Warwick Inn, a royal "mansion or hospice" north of St. Paul's
Cathedral. Here they remained until 1546—47 when, together with the

Tents, they were moved to the Blackfriars, where they stayed until the

accession of Elizabeth. The monastery of the Blackfriars, or Preach-

Ing FrIars, a particularly fine religious hosplce In the southwest cor-

ner of walled London, was suppressed by Henry VIII in 1538 and the

property taken to the Crown's use. Tenements were granted to various

persons of rank, and the conventual church was demolished, but a chapel

was left standing to serve the parish of St. Anne. 3

1Chambers, 1 3.

2The Blackfriars were monks of the Dominican order who had
begun the monastery in 1279. According to a long passage in the four-
teenth-century Pierce the Ploughman's Creed, believed to allude to the
Blackfriars, their buildings were exceptionally beautiful. (Clapham and
Godfrey, 255). The monastery was fine enough at least to house meet-
ings of the Council in the reign of Henry VI, Parliament in 1450, 1523-24,
and 1529, and Emperor Charles V in 1522, as well as divorce proceedings
of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon in 1529. (Ibid. , 256).

3
Chambers, 14. 52

53

Part of the precinct must have been used for royal storage,
for in July, August, and December, 1545, Hugh Losse, Surveyor of
the King's Works, made "reparaciouns of the kinges store howsis at
the late Black Fryers in London, "4 probably in preparation for the Tents
and Revels. Cawarden turned out the parishioners of St. Anne's Chapel
on the plea that it was required ”to laye in his Maties pavylyons, tentes,
maskes, and reuels, "5 and used the Frater, south of the Cloister, as a
storehouse.

In April, 1548, Cawarden himself leased much of the south-
west area of the precinct, and within two years was granted, in free
burgage from the Crown, all the area he had leased as well as much of
the rest of the monastery; he now owned the Upper Frater, the Duchy

Chamber, St. Anne's Chapel, the kitchen yard, the kitchen and buttery,

 

41bid. In 1914, Alfred Clapham published a reconstructed plan
of the Blackfriars (Pl. 1) based primarily on the same surveys edited
by Feuillerat in Blackfriars Records, and partly on general plans of
monasteries of the Middle Ages, discovered ruins, and foundations upon
which modern streets and buildings have been laid. (Clapham and God-

frey, 254, Fig. 105).

5Chambers, 14. If Clapham's plan is correct, this would seem
to be borne out by a survey taken by Losse in March, 1548, in which he
described "a howse called the vpper frater . . . [abutting] . . . Northe
to a hall where the kinges revells lyes at this p'sente. " (Feuillerat,

Blackfriars Records, 7).

6Part of the stock in the inventory of May, 1547, was listed as
being T'in the greate stonderd in the ffrayterys, " (Feuillerat, Revels at
Court, 260) and more "in the Lesser blake cheste in the said store 119351593"
(Ibid. , 19). The workrooms, perhaps, were in the chapel; a second sur-
vey made by Losse in 1549-50 (almost identical to the one of 1548) again
placed the Revels north of the Upper Frater. (Feuillerat, Blackfriars

Records, 12).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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55

a gallery, the Guest House and Hall, the Porter's Lodge and Gallery,
the Cloister, the ruins of the Preaching Nave and Lady Chapel, part of
the Choir, the Tower, the Cemetary or Churchyard, the rent or "ferme"
of the Anchoress, and the gardens of two other tenants. 7 The Frater,
being used as a storehouse, was not included in this huge grant.

Sometime between 1550 and 1552, Cawarden, on the strength
of his grant, defaced St. Anne's Chapel and pulled down the roof, 8 after
apparently establishing a work area for the Revels in the Frater. It

was here that most of the Revels work was done until 1560, although

 

7Ibid. , 8-12. Cawarden's large grant and his subsequent

action can only be understood in today's terms as political shrewdness.
The grant, Chambers (15) suggested, was probably obtained through

the good offices of his neighbor at Baynard Castle, Sir William Herbert,
and most likely did not include any part of the precinct occupied by the
Revels and Tents, although Cawarden tended to regard it all as his own.

Feuillerat, 2-5. In a document drawn in 1555-56 in answer
to the parishioners' petition for construction of a new church, the plea
was so much in Cawarden's favor that abject poverty was implied.
After its destruction, Cawarden had apparently begun building a church
for the parishioners which, for some reason dissatisfied them, for
they made him "leave his good purpose 8: stand to thanswering of
there slawnderous reportes before the queenes most honorable Cown-
cell. " (Ibid. , 5). The Council declared in Cawarden's favor and
offered the parishioners land and material if they would see the work
done, but nothing was accomplished. Cawarden, again ”being forced
to find a church to the inhabitants, allowed them a lodging chamber
above a stair, which since that time, to wit in the year 1597, fell down. "
(Peter Cunningham, Handbook of London, Past and Present (London:

J. Murray, 1850], p. 13). Chambers' statement that Cawarden "pulled
down the walls of the church, built tennis courts on the site, put a car-
penter's yard and sawpit and other tenements in the churchyard, "
(Chambers, 15) is somewhat exaggerated, for, although he did build
tenements, he only rented to a tenant who built a tennis court, and to
another who was a carpenter. (Feuillerat, 110).

 

56
Cawarden rented parts of the Frater to private tenants in 1553 and 1554. 9
Cawarden's own residence in the Blackfriars was probably in
the guest buildings west of the Cloister.10 Philipps also lived in an apart-
ment in these buildings until 1552, when Cawarden moved him to the
Anchoress and let the space to Blagrave, who found it too small and took
other quarters in the precinct. 11 John Bernard, until his death in 1550,
lived in the “square Tower, ” and, though there is no supporting evidence,
Leys, his successor, may have taken over these quarters. 12 John Holt
lived north of the Churchyard by 1549-50. 13

At some prompting in May, 1556, Cawarden began charging

the Crown rent for "the woorke and store howses of the revells and

 

9At some time during 1553, Cawarden let out the eastern part
of the Frater to Sir John Cheeke, who vacated his quarters in September,
1554, to travel abroad, though he had paid his rent until 1557. (Ibid. ,
116). Revels stuff was probably moved into his quarters, for about the
same time the area over the kitchen and buttery was let to another
tenant. (Ibid. , 15).

10In a suit of 1572, involving the location of a fencing school,
Blagrave testified that Cawarden, in 1546, had the "whole vse of the said
howse now the scole of ffence, " and further stated that Philipps dwelt
there until 1552. (Ibid. , 52-53). From another document (Ibid. , 115),
we know that in 1552, Philipps lived in the western area of the Nave, the
only indication that the fencing school had been the Guest House, and
Cawarden's quarters, for at least a few years. Another tenant in the
Blackfriars, Mr. John Portinary, also testified at the same proceeding
that Cawarden had lived at the present fencing school and had invited him-
self and others there to see a play. (Ibid. , 52).

1 1
Ibid.

12
Ibid., 107.

13.Ibic1., 11.

 

57
lodginges and Mansion howses of Thofficers. "14 In a "Declaration of
the Tents and Revels, " rents of each of the houses of Leys, Philipps,
and Holt weret3. 6s. 8d. per year, Cawarden's was £6.13s. 4d. , and
the Revels Office, 556. l3s.4d. These, it was declared, were overdue
since November, 1549, four months before Cawarden's grant.
Apparently Cawarden collected, for the rents continued to be entered
in the last paybook of each year until the end of Mary's reign. They
were raised, however, with that for the houses of the minor Officers
increasing to five pounds yearly, and that for Cawarden's house to ten
pounds. 17 Since Philipps, Leys, and Cawarden held the same positions
in the Office of the Tents, their rents were divided between the two

Offices. In addition, Cawarden charged the Crown 26s. 8d. a year for

 

14Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 210.
15

 

The Office for which Cawarden asked rent consisted of "fyve
greate roomes within the blackfryers for the woorke and Store howses
of the Revells. " (Ibid.). These were the chambers let to Cheeke; in
1560, William More (Cawarden's heir) leased to Sir Henry Neville,
”fforre Romes lately called or knowen by the name of Mr Cheks lodginge
8: sythence vsed by Sr Thorns Cawarden knight Deceased for the office
of the Quenes Maties Revells. " (Feuillerat, Blackfriars Records,
19-20). The fifth room, Feuillerat believed, was a large cellar also
leased to Neville ”vndr the said house 8: lodginge called Mr Cheks
lodginge above. " (Ibid.). Although the total length of the four rooms
(158 feet) compares favorably with Clapham's plan (total length of the
Frater, kitchen, and buttery is 156 feet), the breadth and direction do
not; in the lease it was given as over 21 feet in the south end and over
24 feet in the north end. In Clapham's plan the building is 32 feet broad

on an east-west axis.

16
Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 300-301.

”Ibid., 210, 230, and 242.

58
Leys' livery, overdue since November, 1550 (when Leys succeeded
Bernard), because, he implied, he had not yet seen Leys' patent, and
had been supplying the livery himself. 18 Today, such action would be
considered flagrant graft, but in sixteenth-century England it was mor-
ally legitimate.

Situated just 200 yards from a docking place on the Thames,
the Blackfriars was located most conveniently for traveling to the Royal
residences. Probably, too, the rooms which housed the Revels Office
were as fine as any in the seventy-five-year history of the Office.
Though it is beyond the scope of this study, in 1560 the Revels were
moved for some reason. It is not inconceivable that Cawarden himself
initiated the move by slowly crowding the Office on all sides with paying

tenants .

 

18Ibid., 210.

 

CHAPTER VII

CONDUCT AND PRACTICES

The Office of the Revels was a department of the Chamber,
presided over by the Lord Chamberlain from whom Cawarden took his
orders. These were almost always given verbally, for, as a member
of the Council, Cawarden was in close touch with the court and needed
only a simple directive to put dozens of men to work. Occasionally,
however, such directives were in the form of letters or warrants from
the Council when great expense was foreseen or the entertainment was
to be unusual.

The Master seems to have been responsible for devising or plan-
ning most of the masques, though he no doubt received suggestions from
all sides. In costuming plays and interludes, however, he was probably
advised by their authors, to whom he gave suggestions when such were

needed. Frequently the entire matter of outfitting was left to his dis-

 

1
Chambers, 52.

Several were sent for the revival of the Lord of Misrule in
1551 and 1552. They may have been demanded by Cawarden as a kind
of contract.

Sketches were often made by Toto, Carowe, or Trunkwell
"after the Masters device. " (Feuillerat, 132).

59

60

cretion. 4 Although patterns or sketches were often made, this was not
yet an established procedure as in later years. 5 For the mo st part,
Cawarden probably described to his Officers and Wardens what he had in
mind, then followed the progress of the work as the costumes and proper-
ties were made. Tailors may have copied a model costume made by
Holt or Claterbocke, and undoubtedly simple properties were left to the
discretion of their makers.

Cawarden seldom bought more materials than were needed; ex-
cess would only have taken space and encouraged spoilage and theft. 6
Several artisans, such as basketmakers, glovers, and Skinners, fre-
quently supplied their own materials and were paid only for the finished
goods or work. Cawarden reused much stuff by recutting, repairing, and
altering old garments and properties to fit new needs; almost every pay-
book prefaced the accounts with "charges aswell for the translating of
sondry masking garmentes as also making of . . . new maskes.” At
least twice Cawarden was given many yards of fabrics from the Great
Wardrobe, 7 and at other times he rented masqueing garments from a

haberdasher which he altered to his own purposes. Although the Office

was apparently not restricted to a budget, Cawarden was obviously fru-

 

4see Chap. XII, p.158, 11. 147.

SChambers, 30-42.

6During several work periods, extra materials had to be sent
for to finish costumes or properties.

7Feuillerat, 289 and 302.

61
gal and some economy measures may have been taken after 1554. 8
Costumes and properties were kept in hampers, chests, and
standards (or large chests), several of which were refitted with hinges,
hasps, and locks in 1549, 1551, and 1553. In December, 1551, four
great hampers were bought for carrying masqueing gear to and from the
court, and a year later four more, as well as a basket, were bought for
the same purpose. Two months later, three more hampers and a ”cloce”
hand-basket were purchased for carrying apparel and fetching supplies.
Early in 1553, much hardware and several locks were bought for the
chests and hampers, as well as for two doors and a window in the store-
house, perhaps the result of recent thefts.9
Heat and light were necessary for cold winter nights, as well
as for drying painted and molded properties. Coal was frequently used;
a sack of ”horse" coal cost 8d., and a ”Iurney" (journey?lo) of horse
coal, 8s. A load of "busshe small cole" cost lOs.8d. , a load of coal,

15s., and a load of "great" or "carte" coal, 188. "Tallwood" was also

burned, a load of which cost 43. , as well as faggots, at 38. 4d. and

 

8See p, .68, below.

9Feuillerat, 139. These purchases, along with the Clerk's
unique purchase of two almanacs at the same time, might have coincided
with the adoption of the Master's Constitution, which required security f
of the stored costumes and the Clerk's maintenance of two ledgers. See

PPO

10
In the Middle Ages, a journey was a day's travel or twenty
miles. (John P. Bethel, ed. , Webster's New Collegiate Digionary
(Springfield, Massachusetts: G. and C. Merriam Co., 1949] . p. 456).

62
3s. 8d. the hundred, and on one occasion fifers, or kindling, was pur-
chased. For light, the Revels most often used candles which cost be-
tween 23. and 33. the dozen, or "cotton" candles at 2d. the pound.
WOoden candlesticks were a shilling a dozen, later 13. 6d. Links, that
is torches made of tow and pitch, 11 frequently served for illumination
but were slightly more expensive than candles: 3s. 4d. , 4s. , and 53.
a dozen. Sizes, that is bougies or wax candles, 12 were bought a few
times for 10d. and 12d. , and a dozen staff torches at 23. apiece were
bought once. There was a single purchase of two pairs of snuffers at
6d. a pair.

Rushes and billets were purchased several times "to Strowe
the office ffor woorkemen to sytt on 8: to throwe garmentes abrode. ”
Rushes cost 3d. the "burden" and a little less by the bundle; billets
were 83. a thousand.

When the costumes and properties were finished and packed in
the hampers, they were carried to the Blackfriars Stairs, the dock on
the Thames. There, Holt, or another Officer hired a Wherry, 13 boat,

or barge for the trip down to Greenwich or up to Westminster. Until

 

11
Bethel, 489.

12Halliwell-Phillipps , 745 .

3 . . .
Wherries, i. e. , long, light rowboats, were the most common
vessels on the Thames; some 2000 were in use at this time. (Stow, 12).

63
1555, few standard fares were in effect, 14 and trips often involved
waiting at the court until late at night to return the stuff to the Black-
friars, as well as often loading and unloading the vessel. 15 Beginning
in October, 1554, the hire of a barge with eight oars became consistent
practice, 16 but fourteen months later an agreement was made with
William Cleye, a bargeman, "to wayte and carry stuffe and menn from
the blacke fryers stayre to the courte and whome ageane . . . when
soeuer he were called. ” 7 He continued to serve the Revels during
Christmas and Shrovetide for at least two years and probably until the
end of Mary's reign. There was a single instance of land carriage by
”Care" (probably cart) to Westminster, 18 and several occasions of
horse hire.

Usually one or more of the Officers accompanied the costumes

to the court. After February, 1555, a boat was always hired especially

 

All

14See p.21 n. 5, above. Boat hire for a round trip between the
Office and Greenwich ranged between 11d. and 20d. The same trip by
wherry cost between 20d; and 3s. , and by barge, around 93. A round
trip between the Office and Westminster by boat ranged between 8d.
and 20d.; by wherry, the trip cost 10d. The only consistent fare was
that for a trip across the river to Southwark; 1d.

15On only one occasion were porters hired specifically to carry
costumes and properties from the Office to the boat and then from the
boat to the great hall. They were paid 2d. (Feuillerat, 76).
16Ibid. , 162. A round trip to Westminster by this type of barge
cost between 63. and 103.

17 I

Ibid., 202. His fee was set at 333.4d. for any number of trips

made during the twelve days of ChriStmas, and 203. for the three or four
days of Shrovetide.

18Ibid. , 43.

64
to carry "thofficers and dyvers others, " the latter probably tailors who
went along to assist in dressing and fitting the masquers. During Shrove-
tide, 1553, six dozen pairs of gloves were bought for the masquers as
well as the "mynisters that attyre and make them redye, "19 and there
were frequent instances in 1554-55 of tailors "workinge and attendinge
vpon thappereling of the garmentes 8: dressing of the maskers. ” Three
shoe horns bought in December, 1552, would have been useful only to
persons dressing, and as early as Shrovetide, 1548, 3000 pins were
used in "making Redy maskers. "

From 1551 on, the final activity of each year was the airing,
conducted during the first few days in June. The costumes were taken
from their chests and hampers and spread in the warm sunshine of the
kitchen yard or the Cloister to air out. They were sponged, wiped, and
brushed off, holes and tears were mended, and the garments folded and
layed again in the chests of the storehouse. Until 1555, an airing lasted
five or six days, with the Officers and six or seven tailors in attendance;
thereafter it lasted ten days, always with seven tailors working with the
Officers. To prepare for an inventory held in March, 1555, a special
airing took place, as well as the regular airing just three months later.
During each airing, rubbing brushes, hand brushes, thread, and needles

were often bought.

Artisans who did special work for the Revels no doubt presented

 

19Ibid. , 136.

65

a bill when the work was delivered, but only two instances of such
practice were recorded in the accounts. Early in 1547, Nicholas Mo-
dena, representing twenty-two carvers or molders, presented a bill for
£13 for their wages, his own, and many materials. 20 In December,
1552, Robert Rolf, "beinge page of honour to the said lorde of misrule
was appointed to make his gear abrode and [was] paid vpon his bill,"
83. 1d. 21

Rewards, or bonuses, were occasionally given for particular
work or services. A basketmaker, for acting as Warden to others, re-
ceived 103. in 1553, which was "agreed therfore with him by great as
in Reward."22 Bossum, the painter, and Trunkwell, the propertymaker,
often received rewards for making patterns for masques or for "doinge
certen Iobbes of woorke. " During Christmas, 1549, five drummers and
fifers were given 103. each ”for that thye Restored theyr garmentes the
[two] nightes that the maskes [were presented] ."23

Working for the Office of the Revels in the sixteenth century was

not easy; days and nights were long, and while work was in progress

 

20Ibid. , 8. Listed as "Nycholas modena stranger, " he was
probably an Italian sculptor (the job was molding a large property), and
represented other Italian sculptors who could not speak or write English.
He worked the following year making wigs and visors, and was again
styled "straynger. "

Ibid. , 98. This was the cost of the materials; he was
apparently not paid for his time.

 

22 ,
Ibid. , 103.

23Ibid. , 43.

66
there were no holidays. 24 Probably one reason for the large labor
turnover during Edward's reign was the difficulty workmen encountered
in collecting their pay. The expenses of Edward's coronation and of
moving from Warwick Inn to the Blackfriars were apparently met imme-
diately, but no payments were made again until January, 1550, when
debts had accrued to almost £215. 25 The expenses for Shrovetide,
1551, amounted to £33. 113. 2d. , but this debt was not paid until late
December, 1552, twenty-two months later.2§ Christmas work started
in mid-December that year, and very likely Cawarden had difficulty in

finding workmen and getting credit for goods. 27

 

24According to a memorandum of the Office drawn in 1573

(Chambers, 31-42), and perhaps in effect at this time, one of the Clerk's
duties was to enter in his books "all the woorkemans names, to call
theym moornynge and eveninge and other tymes of the daye by name, to
note their absence, to make the Clerke Comptroller privie to their de-
faultes, whereby he maye checke theym of their wages accordinge to
their desertes. " (Ibid. , 35).

25
Feuillerat, 270. An unsigned warrant from Westminster dated

January 6, 1550, ordered payment of 3214.183. 6d. to Cawarden for the
five preceding work periods; a duplicate of the document dated two days
later gave the amount as £218.183. 6d.; an abstract of the five periods
gave a total of £215. 183. 6d. for the first four periods. Actually the sum
of the five periods totals £214. 183. 6d. , but mistakes in addition or
translation are frequent throughout the accounts.

26Ibid. , 274.

7At least one workman was determined to be paid. In a letter
to Cawarden during Christmas, 1551, the busy Lord of Misrule wrote:
"and touching the stafmaker to avoyd exclamacion I wyll see hym conten-
ted so that I may be allowed agayn of the same. " (Ibid. , 61). He kept his
word, though not immediately, for a letter to Cawarden in March, 1552,
stated: "Sr I praie you see this bearer caulled Richard Rogers to be con-
tented and paied for Lx. staves which wer deliverred and spent at the
Iustes of the hobihorses on newyeres daie last after xxd the staffe the sum
of - vli" (Ibid. , 94). The letter was endorsed, "pd the xxijt1 daye of

marche in the presens of toto. "

67

The total costs of outfitting the Lord of Misrule and other
entertainments during Christmas, 1551, was £469. 163. 6d.‘?‘8 Part of
this must have been paid or written off, for when the festivities were
over Cawarden wrote to the Council begging for a warrant authorizing
payment of £328. 63. to the creditors. 29 On January 18, a warrant
came from Greenwich directing payment of this amount, and a second
warrant was sent to the Exchequer two days later authorizing the same
(payment. 30 Despite these warrants the bill was not paid. A year later
Christmas costs reached £389.43. 9d. ob. , which was added to the debt
of the previous year (£328. 63.) for a total of 6717.103. 9d. ob. , "the
hole dette dewe to be paid by ye kinges maiestie to the creditours and

"31 An undated warrant

workemen of theis charges this yer 8: the laste.
was sent to Sir John Williams, Treasurer of the Court of Augmentations,
ordering him to pay Cawarden "for the charges of the Lorde of Mysrule
at Christmas last, the summe of £377. , "32 an amount somewhat short

of that year's debt, which must have been final. The debt of the preced-

ing year must also have been paid that January, 1553, for work was

 

28Ibid. , 76. In the accounts the sum was £509.9d.

The sum recorded was "ixC xxviijli vjs" or £928. 63. (Ibid. ,
279), certainly a mistake for £328. 63.

30Ibid. , 287. Probably the first was from the King, and the

second from Thomas Goodrich, Bishop of Ely, who, the day before, had
been made Lord Chancellor. (Stephen and Lee, VIII, 135).

31
Feuillerat, 125.

321bid., 287.

68

started immediately on five strange masques for Shrovetide and Easter.
Costs of court entertainment during Mary's reign did not decrease, 33
but workmen and merchants were apparently paid more promptly.

Several operational changes occurred throughout 1555, with
no discernible cause. In June, the length of the annual airing was ex-
tended to ten days, and five new tailors were hired at an increased wage.
Thereafter, they, together with three tailors (who had worked many
times before), three painters, two propertymakers, and a porter were
almost always the only artisans hired. Beginning in the Christmas

"34 perhaps

season, materials were frequently bought for "reddy monye,
indicative of the establishment of a petty cash fund. Arrangement was
made with Cleye for the hire of his barge at a fixed rate during the same
season, and his services were retained for several years. Even the for-
mat of the paybooks changed; names of the masques were no longer en-
tered, nor were descriptions of materials used or work accomplished. 3

Primarily these changes suggest considerable reorganization

within the Office for more efficient operation and/or greater economy,

 

33see Table II, pp. 70-71.

34Feuillerat, 201. Likewise, lists of purchases from January,
1555, onward were often noted: "by this Accomptaunt bought 8: prouided";
Cawarden's Constitution held that "no kynd of stuff be bowght, but at
the apowyentment of the Master or his depute Clarke controwler, being
counsell therin, and that he make mencion therof, in his booke of receot. "

(See p.

35After 1558, the old format was resumed, with all particulars

recorded.

69
. . , , 36
rather than a decline in Revels activ1ty. Although the last three years
of Mary's reign were the leanest of the sixteenth century, court enter-

tainment continue d.

 

36Expenses during seventy-seven months of Edward's reign were
6506. 83. 10d. (not including those of the Lord of Misrule, over $700),
while those during sixty-three months of Mary's rule were £528.63.

70

Table II - Comparative cost

of each work period - Edward VI

 

 

Period Item Cost Yearly Totals
£. 3. d. S. d.
February 1547 Masques/Moving 65. 18. 8 1547 65. 18. 8
Christmas 1547 Masques 79. 16. 6
Shrovetide 1548 Masques 77.16. 1548 157.12. 6
Christmas 1548 Masques 11. .14
Shrovetide 1549 Plays 8. 2. 1 1549 19. 3. 3
Christmas 1549 Masques 8: Plays 34. . 2
Shrovetide 1550 (No entertainment) 1550 34. . 2
Christmas 1550 Masques 8: Plays 45. 6. 6
Shrovetide 1551 Masques 8: Plays 33. 11. 2
June 1551 Airing 4. 6. 1551 83. 3. 8
Christmas 1551 Lord of Misrule 299. 5. 5
Triumph 89.13. 9
Masques 81. 17. 4
Shrovetide 1552 (No entertainment)
June 1552 Airing 4. . 4 1552 474. 16. 10
Christmas 1552 Lord of Misrule 342. 2. 4
Triumph 47. 2. 5
Masques 47. 5. 5
Shrovetide 1553 Masques 8: Plays 138.10. 6
Easter 1553 Masques 8: Plays 23.15. 8
June 1553 Airing 2.13. 6 1553 601. 9.10

 

71

Table II - Comparative cost
of each work period - Mary I

 

 

Period Item T Cost Yearly Totals
.6. s. d. 8. s. d.
September 1553 Play (Started) 4. 3. 3
Christmas 1553 Play (Completed) 6. 12.
Shrovetide 1554 (No entertainment)
June 1554 Airing 13. 18. 9 1554 24.14.
Hallowmas 1554 Masque 8. l9. 1
Michaelmas 1554 Masque 15.19. 7
Christmas 1554 Masques 8: Plays 44. 4.11
Shrovetide 1555 Masques 49. 14. 2
March 1555 Airing 7. 6. 8
June 1555 Airing 9.11. 7 1555 135.16.
Christmas 1555 Masques 8: Plays 45 6. 9
Candlemas 1556 Masques 8: Plays? 25. 7. 1
Shrovetide 1556 Masques 8: Plays ? 28. . 3
June 1556 Airing 9.14.10 1556 108. 8.11
Christmas 1556 Masques 8: Plays 40. 17. 3
Candlemas 1557 Masques 8: Plays? 20. 6.10
Shrovetide 1557 Masques 8: Plays ? 16. .13
St. Mark's Tide 1557 Masque 42.11.
June 1557 Airing 9.14. 9 1557 129.10.11
Christmas 1557 Masques 8: Plays 36. 4.
Candlemas 1558 Masques 8: (Plays ? 19.12. 7
Shrovetide 1558 Masques 8: Plays ? 25. 8.10
June 1558 Airing 9. l4. 3 1558 90.19. 8

 

CHAPTER VIII
MATERIALS, TOOLS, AND PROCESSES

Cloth was the principal material of the Revels who were,
primarily, costumers, but many harder goods were also necessary
for hand properties and scenic elements. Such materials were not new
to the art of stagecraft, for the guilds and companies had led the way
for two hundred years in costuming and outfitting their mystery and
miracle plays. 1 Innovations and new techniques must have appeared
in the Revels work, however, for the subject matter of court masques
required costumes and properties quite different from those used in
religious presentations. 2

Wicker, because it was pliable, lightweight, and cheap, was
frequently used to form a mesh frame for large properties. Wooden
barrel hoops were first bent and tied together with cord or packthread

to form a basic framework, then wicker, twigs, and osiers were woven

 

l
Hardin Craig, English Religious Drama of the Middle Ages
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955), pp. 124-25.

2 . . .
It is an interesting comment on the development of stagecraft
to note that nearly all of the Revels materials are to be found as basic
materials in today's stage workshop.

72

73
over this structure to support canvas or other cloth with which the
piece was covered. Wicker was also used for making chains, shackles,
baskets, and hampers. "Asshen hoopewood" was used once for the
frames of headpieces, and ”pynaple bowes" (boughs?) may have been
properties themselves.

Several large purchases of nails would indicate the use of much
wood for properties, yet only one board, 3 three planks, and five square
pieces of wainscot4 were bought over the eleven year period. Finished
lumber was expensive, however, and "tymber, " probably smooth, dry
saplings, served just as well. ”Tymber" was frequently used for
making weapons, as was ”tree, " of which buttons were often made. On
two occasions shields were made of "shellboard. "

The Revels used a few of several metals common to sixteenth-
century England. Four dozen (sheets?) of tin foil were bought once at
three for a penny for an unstated use, and on other occasions, four
latten chains, 5 "flaggen fasshyon, " and another, of copper, were pur-
chased. Iron was the most common metal of the age and many ready-
made iron products were available in London. In 1547, the Revels pur-

chased over 9000 nails, including: 2000 one-penny nails at 10d. the

 

3A one-inch elm board eighteen feet long was bought for 16d.
in 1552. (Feuillerat, 108).

4Three planks and a square piece of wainscot cost 113. in 1558.
(Ibid. , 236). Wainscot originally meant a fine imported oak. (Shipley, 714).

5An inferior brass or tin alloy beaten into sheets or wire.
(Halliwell-Phillipps, 507).

74
thousand, 2200 two-penny nails at 14d. the thousand, 2200 three-penny
nails at 20d. the thousand, 1500 four-penny nails at 23. the thousand,
700 six-penny nails at 43. 2d. the thousand, and 600 "single" ten-penny
nails at 63. 8d. the thousand. A year later, 100 six-penny nails were
bought, and in 1551, more than 1200 nails of different sizes were used
on the large properties of the Lord of Misrule. The following year,
1000 two-penny nails, 500 five-penny nails, and 500 "garnishing" nails
were used in constructing his properties. Six-inch staples were used
to hold axletrees to the body of one pageant wagon built by the Revels, 6
and smaller staples were used on various properties several times.
”Englyshe" tacks were bought once.

Four pounds of iron wire at 5d. the pound, and five pounds of
latten wire at 6d. the pound were used on one occasion for making head-
pieces. Fourteen yards of large English wire at 2d. the yard were used
on a large property in 1552, and pieces of small wire were used a few
times for making flowers. Long, square, and "single white" plate-iron
was used in pr0perties a few times. Iron hooks were used in some man-
ner on weapons twice, and for a pageant wagon an ironmonger supplied
axletrees and "plates for the whelis. "

For making headpieces and crowns, several qualities of paper
were used. Colored paper, available in red, green, gray, "syniper"

(red ochre), gold, and silver, cost about 2d. a sheet and was generally

 

6See Chap. XI, pp. 113-15 for details.

75
bought in quantities of one to three dozen sheets. Flock paper was
purchased twice at a slightly higher cost. Paste board and paste paper
was often bought in white, and sometimes "gyldyd with ffyne golde, " at
3d. and 4d. a sheet. 7 Paper bought by the ream or quire was most
likely for the Clerk's use.8 A ream of ”ryall" or "great" paper cost
between 8d. and 12d. the quire, and "small" paper was 4d. the quire.
Brown paper and "bace" (or low grade) paper cost 1d. and 2d. the quire,
respectively.

Several purchases of painting materials, which were always
bought in small quantities as they were needed, lend some enlightenment
to early scene-painting techniques.

Size was the most common binder used by the Revels and by
the wall and mural painters of France and England. 9 Parchment cut-
tings or scrapings were soaked in water until soft, then boiled in fresh
water until they dissolved into a gelatinous solution. 10 The Revels
bought it ready-made, however; a pan of size from the grocer cost a

penny until late 1554, when the price doubled. On one occasion, the

 

7Paste board was a common foundation for everyday hats, some
of which were called "pastes." (Shipley, 284).

8From December, 1555, on, the Clerk frequently bought such
paper. (Feuillerat, 201-42).

9Daniel V. Thompson, The Materials and Techniques of Medieval
Painting (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1956), p. 73. It resem-
bled in working properties the mixtures used by painters of stage scenery
today. (Ibid.). ‘

10Ibid., 59.

76
Revels borrowed size from Toto "for the paynters woorkes. "

Glue was frequently purchased from grocers but apparently had
nothing to do with size as it does today. It cost 3d. a pound in 1547, but
6d. a pound thereafter.

Gum arabic was purchased a few times, particularly when
Anthony Toto was in attendance. Dissolved in water to which sugar or
honey was later added, it produced a flexible, gelatinous binder for water
colors well known in the Middle Ages. With an excess of the gum, a rich,
dark, and often shiny color was attained. 11 Toto used it with saffron
pigment "to dropp cloth of silver, " that is, to spot the cloth with shiny
yellow drops. 12

For painting names and mottoes on garments the Revels apparently
made their own iron ink, a common writing material of painters in the
Middle Ages. On one occasion, fine black pigment, gum arabic, galls,
and swanquill pens were bought "to write vpon sylver 8: sylk names poses
8: tracynges." 3 Galls, the nut-like swellings on oak trees, were soaked
in water to produce acids which, when‘mixed with a solution of iron salt,
produced a black ink to which gum arabic was added for a binder.

Earlier, the Revels purchased ”colours whighte and blacke with gomme

 

11
Ibid. , 56-57.

12
The cloth was used in women's garments, later described as
"stayned with droppes of gowlde. " (Feuillerat, 186).

13
Ibid. , 138.

14Thomp son, 81 .

77

and lyke necessaries for the payntinge of the posies written in the
skertes [of horse regalia] ."15

Paste and cement were almost always used for molding weapons
and armor. Paste was made in the Office of flour. and vinegar, 16 or
flour and white wine, and sized flour was purchased once to cover pro-
perties, probably as a better ground for painting. Eggs, also bought
once, may have been used for egg tempera, an almost waterproof and
very durable medium. 17 On one occasion, clay, plaster of Paris, ce-
ment, flour, glue, wax, and hair were used (in an unexplained process)
for molding a large property.

Oil mediums were seldom used. A pound of ground white lead

19

was bought once for 8d. , and seven pounds of ceruse, at the same
rate, at other times. A penny's worth of red lead, and a quart of "oyle"
which cost 7d., were each bought once. "Rosen" (sometimes ”roset”),

frequently bought at 8d. a pound, was probably resin, a basic ingred-

ient of oil varnishes used in the sixteenth century.20

 

15Feuillerat, 83.

Vinegar was used as a preservative in egg tempera, and, no
doubt, for the same purpose in paste. (Thompson, 64).

17%. 63. The eggs were bought with pans of size, flour

for paste, and vinegar. (Feuillerat, 110).

18 .
See Chap. XI, pp. 113-15 for details.

19
An early name for white lead. (Halliwell-Phullipps, 238).

20 Thompson, 6 7.

78
Colors were bought a few times in small quantities and were
comparatively expensive. Like other painting materials, these pigments
were supplied by grocers, who sold them by weight as powders, although
some, perhaps, were sold unground.Zl
Among the reds, vermillion was bought twice at 23. a pound.
A total of two quarts of pink was bought a few times at 4d. a quart. An

. . . 22
unstated amount of "sanng ‘draconis, " literally, dragon's blood, was

 

bought once for 14d. Sinoper, a red ochre, 23 was purchased once, as
was camphire, a reddish-orange dye, 24 one of the most expensive of
all colors, at 53. the quarter-pound.

Even more expensive was saffron, bought twice, at 43. 6d. for
three ounces. Toto's use of it on garments has already been noted; it
may have been used a second time to imitate gold, its primary medieval
use.25 A pound of "oker decrowse" (undoubtedly an ochre) was bought
for 12d. , and an unstated amount of yellow ochre for 6d. Massicot

(sometimes spelled "masticote") was bought several times at 33.4d. a

pound. This was most likely a pale, fairly intense yellow pigment also

 

1Paint grinders were hired twice, but the amount of pigment
bought did not seem to warrant their special employment; they were
more likely paint "mixers. "
22 . . . ”
Ibid., 125. This was another name for Cinnabar, the red
resin used in the Middle Ages for improving the color of gold, or for
glazing metals to imitate told.

23
Ibid., 98. Originally, a choice red earth from Sinope, Italy.
It was not related to Cinnabar.

24
Camphire was a name for henna. (Bethel, 385).

25Thomp son, 184.

79

called giallorino. 26 Sape green, an olive color still found as a water

 

paint, was bought once, and verdigris, literally, the green of Greece,
was bought several times at 23. the pound.
27 .
Florey was the most common blue pigment used by the Rev-
els painters and was rather expensive at 63. 8d. a pound. Turnesole,
a brilliant blue, was purchased three times, twice at 6d. the "quarterne"

(or quarter pound), and once as ”ffyne turnesall" at 12d. the half-

 

2
dozen. 8 Blue bice, a bright blue, was bought a few times at prices

 

ranging from 43. to 83. a pound. Litmus was purchased twice in un-

. . 29

stated forms and quantities.
Black was bought very frequently in various qualities. Spanish

black, the most commonly purchased, was a pigment obtained by burning

cork, 30 and sold for both 1d. and 10d. a pound. Black chalk was bought

once for 2d. a pound and may have been actually carbon, the universal

black in medieval painting. 31 Carbon, or charcoal in stick form, pro-

 

26Ibid. , 180.

27This was a dye made from woad, an herb of the mustard
family, similar in color to indigo. (Ibid; , 138).

28
This may have been bought in the form of limed linen cloths

dipped in the vegetable juices known as turnsole, then dried until needed,
a common method of preservation among medieval painters. (Ibid. , 141) .

Two other colors were mentioned in the accounts but not as
pigments. Arrows were "garnysshed with asure, " i. e. , blue, and a chain
"overgylded and newe burnyshed with cytrene colour, " i. e. citron or
lemon color.

OJohann Beckmann, History of Inventions (London: G. and
W. B. Whittaker, 1823), p. 292.

3J’Thompson, 75.

80
bably accounts for black once having been bought by the dozen, three
dozen (sticks) of which cost 33. Spanish white was purchased as fre-
quently as Spanish black, and also cost 1d. and 10d. the pound. Onone
occasion, simply "white" was bought at 6d. the pound.

"Paynters tooles of diverse sortes" were bought on five separ-
ate occasions for less than 23. Large and small painters' pots were also
bought five times, and once, a dozen bladders, the common medieval
vessels for mixed paints, were purchased. 32

Illuminators and panel painters of the Middle Ages were pre-
occupied with the use of gold, 33 a practice which continued in the crafts
of the Revels. Although they did no gilding, several imitative materials
were used for embellishing costumes and properties. Among these was
parti-gold, bought a few times before 1553 from a grocer, and several
times thereafter from Sothewood, the goldbeater. No unit of measure or
weight was given; it was bought as 1000 "of partye gowlde, " and in other
multiples of 250, always at a rate of 26s. 8d. the thousand. Probably it
was sold in small leaves or pieces, but despite the high price, it is

doubtful that it was actually part gold. Silver was purchased the same

way, that is, without a unit of measure, at first from a grocer, later

 

Two items among mediums and colors in the accounts cannot
be defined: "mouthe glewe, " bought once with size and flour for 4d. ,
and six "canes, " also bought once with the same goods for 20d.

33Ibid. , 174-84. Thompson gave many names and recipes
for gold and silver substitutes used in the Middle Ages, none of which
corresponded to those of the Revels.

81

from a goldbeater, and always along with parti-gold. It cost 103. the
thousand, and the Revels bought more of it than of parti-gold. Both
materials appeared most often among painters' colors, and were used
"for the sylveringe [and] gylding" of properties and costumes. Several
headpieces and weapons listed in the inventory of 1555, which were des-
cribed as ”gylte 8: sylvered with lease gowlde and sylver, " had probably
been decorated with parti-gold and silver. 34

Gold and silver in other forms occured infrequently. Six dozen
(sheets?) of gold foil (along with green foil and tin foil) were bought once
at two for a penny. This was probably very similar to gold and silver
paper, which was bought many times for trimming girdles, headpieces,
and crowns, at from 1d. to 3d. a sheet. Gold "skynnes" were bought
once (with gold and silver paper) for trimming costumes at a total cost
of 7s. 8d. 35 Coifs and headpieces were occasionally trimmed with Ven-
ice gold, a very expensive gold lace, at 43. the half ounce. Probably
Cologne gold and Cologne silver were very similar; these materials were
used for trimming costumes but were less expensive than Venice gold,

Cologne gold cost 12d. an ounce, and Cologne silver, 15d. an ounce.

One of the most interesting materials used by the Revels was

 

34Feuillerat supposed ”lease gold" was gold lace (Ibid., 311),

but "lease" meant "to lie, " from the Old English ”lgas, " meaning
"false, " (Walter W. Skeat, A Glossary of Tudor and Stuart Words
[Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1914] , p. 227). It seems more likely,
therefore, that lease gold was simply false gold.

 

35Considering the price, the skins may have been pieces of
gilded parchment.

82
arsedue (also spelled horseydie, horsedew, horsdew, and orsedewe).
It was bought several times from grocers for 3s. and 3s. 4d. the pound,
generally in two-pound lots, and along with painters' colors. Used once
for garnishing arrows, it was probably similar to, if not the same as,
orpiment, a sulphide of arsenic (hence the name), "a regular ingredient
in most of the many compound colours elaborated in the Middle Ages for

36 In its

painting, and especially for writing, in imitation of gold. "
natural state as a stone, it had a mica-like sparkle similar to the lustre
of metallic gold, and it was probably in some granular stage between

the stone and ground powder that the Revels used arsedue to sprinkle on

surfaces made sticky with glue, where it would sparkle and richly glitter.

 

36Thompson, 117. Feuillerat defined it as an alloy of copper
and zinc (Ibid. , 311), and as an inferior kind of gold leaf. (Feuillerat,
Revels . . . Elizabeth, 479). The lexicographer, Wright, defined several
things which may have been akin to arsedue: arsedine, assady, and
assidue. The first (also spelled assaden, assady, orsady, and orsden),
was a kind of ornamental tinsel. (Thomas Wright, Dictionaryof Ob-
solete and Provincial English [Londonz Bell and Daldy, 1869] . p. 102).
Assady was gold tinsel, and the word frequently occured in fifteenth-
century accounts of expenses for decorations; it was bought with colored
papers and as a paper itself. (Ibid. , 110). Assidue was defined as
" a word used in Hallamshire, . . . in the county of York, to describe
a species of yellow tinsel much used by the mummers at Christmas, and
by the rustics . . . as part of their fantastic decoration. " (Ibid. , 113).

 

 

 

CHAPTER IX
CLOTH, TRIMMINGS, AND SEWING TECHNIQUES

By the middle of the sixteenth century, scores of different
cloth materials were available in England, many of which were im-

ported from the continent.

Of Dutch and Germain Merchants they buy Fustians, Linnen
cloth; of Italians - all kinds of silke weares, velvettes,
wrought and unwrought, Satins, Damaskes, Sarsenettes,
Milan fustians, clothe of gold and silver, Grograines,
Chamlettes, Satin and sowing silke, orgazine; of Low
Countrie Merchantes - handwork not made in Englande,
Tapestrie, Buckrams, white thread, incle, Linnen clothe
of all sortes, Cambrickes, Lawnes.

But of the many available, the Revels used comparatively few.
Several hundred yards of cloth of gold, cloth of silver, tinsel, velvet,
satin, damask, sarcenet, and lawn were left from the reign of Henry
VIII, 2 but when this stock was depleted they had to buy more, fre-
quently the richest that could be had. Throughout the eleven-year per-

iod, the most commonly used materials of the Revels cost more per

 

1
Linthicum, 60 .

zFeuillerat, Revels at Court, 18-21.

 

83

84
yard than a tailor working on them could earn in a week.

Baldachin (spelled "bawdkyn" in the accounts) was a rich,
embroidered cloth, the warp of gold thread and the woof of colored
silk thread. 4 It was used occasionally for hose, capes, and sleeves,
and very extensively in December, 1552, for robes, coats, footwear,
and other garments for the Lord of Misrule and his band. Colors in-
cluded red, crimson, white, and blue, and it was described once as
"damaske bawdkyn. ” It sold generally for 163. a yard, but a par-
ticular length of red cost 203. a yard.

In the sixteenth century, buckram was a coarse linen (or
cotton) material resembling canvas, and used principally for lining
rich materials. 5 The Revels used red, yellow, and black, at 8d. a
yard, for lining coats, and a coarse, stiff buckram (probably starched)
for the foundation of a crown.

Canvas was used quite frequently for properties which were
then painted; probably, like today's canvas, it received paint well. It
was also used for doublets, hose, breeches, and footwear, the last made

of "carnacion" canvas, possibly an allusion to the color. The price of

 

3Cloth was measured by the thirty-six-inch yard or fractions
thereof, and sometimes by the English ell of forty-five inches. Costs
were recorded often enough in some cases to establish definite prices,
but in other cases were so infrequent that a mistake by the scribe or
editor could present a false estimate.

4Shipley, 87.

5Linthicum, 103-04.

85
canvas, recorded once, was 11d. an ell.

Cloth of gold, the rich fabric of medieval royalty, was the
finest fabric available in the sixteenth century, but is unknown today.
Scholars disagree to its exact nature, but it is generally believed to
have been tissue-like, with a warp of colored silk and a woof of gold
thread. 6 Its cost, listed once for plain yellow cloth of gold, was
£1. 133. 4d. per yard. 7 It was used extensively by the Revels in almost
every kind and part of garment, and occurred in many forms and pat-
terns; flat, plain, raised, embroidered, with works, with chevrons,
and with "churche woorke. " It was probably often woven into or upon
other cloths, for it was described as ”damaske, " "dornyxe, " "vppon

satten venice, " "antique, " and as "pannus Adauratus glaucus damaske. "

 

Various colors included red, crimson, yellow, green, blue, purple,
tawny, and black.

Cloth of silver was very similar to cloth of gold. It was re-
corded as being ”counterfett, " flat, plain, brocaded, with works, and

as ”pannus Argentatus Albus damaske, " and appeared in many garments

 

as the basic cloth, or as trimming for other rich fabrics. It was used

less often than cloth of gold, and the only colors recorded were white,

 

6Ibid. , 114-15. Strutt (II, 253) called it "cloth of gold or of
tissue, " and in Antony and Cleopatra it was called "cloth-of—gold of
tissue." (William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra, ed. George
Lyman Kittredge [Bostom Ginn and Co., 1941] , p. 150). In the ward-
robe of Henry VIII was a doublet of "cloth of gold of baudkyn. "
(Strutt, 351). Linthicum (115) believed baldachin, tissue, and tinsel
were all varieties of cloth of gold.

 

 

7It was seldom purchased because over 150 yards were left
from the reign of Henry VIII. (Feuillerat, 18).

86
green, and purple. Both cloth of gold and cloth of silver were once
painted.

Very little cotton was used by the Revels, but it was bought
occasionally for linings. An undescribed variety cost 7d. a pound,
white and red were 12d. a yard, and Welsh cotton, bought once, cost
6d. a yard.

Sixteenth-century damask was probably very similar to modern
damask, a rich silk of floral or geometric pattern. Until Elizabeth's
reign, it was found only in the wardrobes of royalty, nobility, and
clergy; a statute of 1533 forbade its use by persons of estates under the
value of 100 pounds. The Revels, however, used it for doublets, hose, '
sleeves, gowns, footwear, caps, coats, headpieces, and in masqueing
costumes for Italians, Irish bagpipers, hunters, and a fool. Colors
included white, red, green, tawny, crane color, russet, and yellow.
White damask cost 83. a yard, and russet, 53. a yard, but at this time,
damask ranged in price from 33. to 16s. a yard.

Dornix was a coarse kind of damask, made in Tournay, France,
the Dutch name for which was Dorneck. 10 It was used only a few times
by the Revels for coats, caps, footwear, and headpieces, in the colors

red, crimson, and blue-gold.

 

8Linthicum, l 1 9-20 .

9Ibid.

10Feuillerat, Revels . . . Elizabeth, 480. It was made in

Norfolk by 1552, however. (Linthicum, 93).

 

 

87

Kersey was one of the more common fabrics of the Revels;
a light-weight, narrow, wool cloth named for the town of its origin in
Suffolk. 11 In the fifteenth century it was a fabric of royalty, but by 1550
had lost its prestige, and was used by the Revels as the basic cloth of
the liveries of the Lord of Misrule in 1551, and at other times for hose,
coats, friars' garments, lining, and trimming. Prices varied con-
siderably; gray kersey‘ was 13. 8d. a yard in 1547, and 23. 8d. a yard in
11553. Watchet (blue) and white cost 23.6d. a yard, red narrow, white
narrow, and yellow narrow cost 33. 4d. a yard, and green narrow cost
43. a yard. 12

Lawn, possibly named for Leon, a French city, was a linen of
such fineness that it was often called "cobweb" lawn. 13 It was used
occasionally during this period for headpieces and visible linings, and
had been used extensively in other masqueing garments before 1547. 14
As plain lawn, it was colored white, gold, silver, and "incarnation, "
but was also striped (with gold, orange, red, and blue), "rewed"

15

(rayed? with gold, orange, red, and white silk), checkered (with

raised silk and with white silk), and was recorded once as "changeable

 

11Ibid., 79.

Broad kersey, in white, red, yellow, and green, cost twice
as much.

l3Ibid. , 98-99.

l4Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 9-17.

 

15See p. 100 below.

88
golde Lawne prest 8: narowe. " ”C0per golde” lawn cost 23. a yard in
1547; gold and silver lawn was 83. an ell in 1552.

Sarcenet was the most commonly used fabric of the Revels
Office; a fine, thin, soft, silk material which was made both "light"
and "heavy. "16 It was used in almost every type of garment made,
although it cost between 53. and 6s. 8d. an ell in colors, and 8s. a yard
in gold and silver. Despite this cost and its fineness, it was used in
costumes for all classes; frauen, torchbearers, Irish women, myth-
ological gods and goddesses. It was available in red, crimson, incar-
nadine, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, russet, tawny, white,
black, gold, silver, and changeable. Occasionally, it was described as
corded (that is ribbed or twilled), as tinsel sarcenet, and as from Tours,
France. That from Tours may have been of poor quality however, for
”redd tower sarsenett coorce" cost only 23. 8d. an e11, about half the
price of regular red sarcenet.

Satin was also used extensively for all types of garments. It
was purchased in the same colors (with the exception of purple, russet,
gold, and silver), and was described as with a birds—eye pattern, with
17

figures, from Tours, from Bruges, Belgium, and from Nimeguen,

in the Netherlands. The cost of satin ranged from 43.6d. to 163. a yard.

 

6
Linthicum, 121 .

17
A town famous for its silk. (Kempe, 152). In the accounts,

the name was spelled "newe making. " (Feuillerat, 16 and 23).

89

Taffeta, too, was used by the Revels for many garments.
Price was apparently determined by color; narrow changeable was 23. ‘
a yard, narrow blue was 23. 8d. a yard, broad changeable was 113. a
yard, crimson was 123. an ell, broad blue was 123.6d. an ell, and
white was 143. an ell. Yellow taffeta was also used.

Like baldachin, tinsel was probably a variety of cloth of gold;
a silk interwoven with gold or silver threads. 18 It was used a great

19 but after 1547 was seldom used

deal during the reign of Henry VIII,
for anything but trimming. Gold tinsel cost 203. a yard, and blue,
253. a yard. It was also colored crimson, yellow, green,purple, tawny,
white, and black, and was described as brocaded, antique, and "venice. "
Before 1547, velvet gowns and footwear were made for masque-
ing costumes, but thereafter was used in hose, gloves, breeches, coats,
and for trimming and lining. Colors included red, yellow, green, blue,
purple, russet, and black, and frequently it was "wrought" in some way;
striped with silver (threads ?), purled, checkered, and figured. It was
purchased just once, at 303. a yard.
Many other fabrics were used infrequently in the Office. Bombast,
a cotton-wool material, was carded once by the Revels, but its use was

not recorded. Falconers' bags of white "bustian, " a coarse cloth, 20 were

found in the inventories of 1547 and 1555, although they were not used in

 

18Linthicum, 116-1 7.
19Feuillerat, 9-17.

20
Halliwell-Phillipp s , 222 .

90
masques during this period. A shirt of cambric, a fine, expensive
linen, 21 was also in the storeroom in 1.547. Chamlet thrum was used
with red feathers to make a "fur” for a cap in 1552: Chamlet was origi-
nally a soft, fine fabric made in the Near East of the hair of Chamois, 22

and a thrum was the fringe at the end of a length of cloth, 23

in this case,
the end of a length of Chamlet. Flax was used several times for hair

(or wigs) and headpieces. Irish frieze, used once for an Irishman's
costume, was a woolen cloth with a heavy nap on one side;24 it cost 16d.
a yard. Friseado, a product of Holland at this time, was similar to, but
somewhat better than frieze, 25 and was used twice by the Revels for lin-
ings and Irish garments, at costs of 3s. 4d. to 43. the yard. Holland
cloth was a fine linen named for its country of origin;26 it was used by
the Revels for priests' surplices and head cloths. A cheap grade of
linen which cost 10d. a yard was used once for Irishmen's hose. Lock-

eram, another cheap grade of linen‘27 which cost 12d. an ell, was used

occasionally for garments. Popinjay green,the blue-green of a parrot,

 

21Linthicum, 95

22
Ibid. , 73.

 

2 3Skeat, 40 8 .

24Linthicum, '76 .

ZSIbid. , 76-77.

26Strutt, 208 .

27Halliwell-Phillipps, 525.

91

may have been as much a cloth as a color. It was very fashionable dur-
ing the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth, 28 and was used once by the
Revels; two pieces cost £2.93. Russel, possibly named for the sound
made by its wearer, was a kind of satin, 29 and cost 23. a yard when it
was once used by the Revels for hoods. Silk was used very seldom for
garments,‘ but fringes, flowers, and twisted lace of silk were sometimes
bought. 30 Tissue, used twice by the Revels, was a variety of cloth of
gold. Its threads, in both warp and woof, were twisted, whereas those
in cloth of gold were not. 31 Tow, that is, flax in a coarse state, 32 was
used twice, probably in the same manner as flax. Wedmole, a coarse,
hairy, woolen fabric, 33 was used once to make hose. Six yards of red
and white cost 12d. a yard.

Inexpensive furs, skins, 34 and feathers were frequently used by
the Revels for trimming costumes. Black goatskins, at 10d. each, were

bought for making hose and gloves for Moors in 1547, and later, small

lambskins, at 5d. each, were used in the same way. In 1552, thirty-two

 

28Linthicum, 33.

2
9Shipley, 268 .

3
0See pp.

31Linthicum, 11 7.

32Bethel, 899.

33Ibid. , 959.

3"ltThe term leather was used once to mean skin; the name of

the animal from which a skin came was usual.

92
lambskins, at 2d. each, were bought to make caps and "furred heades";
probably these were used with the wool dressed outward, that is, as
"budge. "35 Budge had been used earlier this way to make caps for Moors
and shave crowns for priests, in both cases undoubtedly in an attempt to
imitate hair. Twelve sheepskins, which cost 8d. each, were bought in
1550 to make six pairs of boots, and six dozen grey conyskins, at 16d.
a dozen, were used in 1553 to cover paste figures in imitation of apes.
Ermine was probably never used, although there was an instance of
trimming skirts with "whyte Sarcenet armyn, " and another of furred
velvet36 resembling "powdred ermyns. " In the inventory of 1547 was a
frock with edges furred with genet33.7 and cats, and a garment was made
for King Edward furred with leOpards' tails.

Feathers were often used for trimming headpieces and for making
plumes. White and black capon feathers, at 63. 8d. and 13s. 4d. the dozen,
were used with red feathers on hats, headpieces, and "sett in great brode
plumes shellwise, "38 For one masque, eight "double white fethers
very faier and large" were bought for 12d. each, and eight "tuftes of

blacke fethers" were bought for 8d. the tuft. Plumes of pheasant and

 

3
5Halliwell-Phillipp s , 2 1 6 .

36Any material which resembled animal hair was called fur.
In addition to furred velvet was a fur of "drakes neckes, " and "redd
fethers 8: charnlet throm."

3”Small animals allied to civet cats. (Bethel, 345).

38Feuillerat, 135.

93

capon tails once cost 12d. each, and plumes of crane feathers trimmed
with spangles were 20d. each. Probably the most elaborate plume made
during this period was one for the Lord of Misrule in 1552; it was of
capon and peacock feathers trimmed with spangles and cost 53. At
least seven pairs of wings of white feathers were made for Cupids at
different times. White feathers used in helmet plumes cost 203. to 303.
a dozen in 1549.

All but the meanest clothing was decorated in some way during
the sixteenth century. The Revels used several kinds of trimmings and
ornaments on the elaborate masqueing costumes for the court.

39

Bells, anciently associated with the costumes of fools and
the trappings of jousting horses, were used in other ways as well.

Twelve dozen bells bought to "hange at the skyrtes" of Moors' garments
in 1548 were probably quite small for they cost only 5d. a dozen.40
Twenty-four dozen bells were bought in 1552 to decorate the trappings of
hobbyhorses; somewhat larger, they. cost 10d. a dozen, and two "great"
bells for the same hobbyhorses were 20d. each. Among stuff bought for

41

the costumes of William Sommers the year before were six dozen bells

at 28. a dozen, and for a canopy made the same year, the Office bought

 

39see Chap. XIV, P1. IV, p.202.

4”There were eight Moors in this particular masque, i. e. ,
eighteen bells per skirt. (Feuillerat, 31). ‘

41Sommers was the favorite fool of Henry VIII (Stephen and Lee,
XVIII, 667-68), and cavorted with the Lord of Misrule in 1551.

94
four dozen "fox" bells at 23. a dozen, and three dozen "chyme" bells
at 63. a dozen. Twenty "symball" bells, at 4d. each, were used on
properties for an interlude in 1553.

Although Edward VI was credited with establishing the mode of
the button and buttonhole, 42 the Revels used buttons more for headpiece
decoration than for fastening purposes. Round and long wooden buttons
were bought at prices ranging from 12d. the hundred to 14d. the dozen,
then foiled or painted in the Office. Silk buttons were often sold to the
Revels (together with fringe and tassels) at 12d. and 18d. the ounce.

A particular variety "garnyshed with gowlde" cost 53. the ounce.

Fringe was used several times for trimming costumes and
headpieces. Red silk fringe cost 10d. and 12d. an ounce, silver fringe,
23. 6d. an ounce, purple satin fringe, 23.4d. an ounce, blue and green
silk fringe, 23.8d. an ounce, and Paris silk fringe, 8d. an ounce.
Cologne gold fringe, at 33. an ounce, and Venice gold fringe, at 43. an
ounce, were probably varieties of flat lace.

The openwork fabric type of lace was used often by the Revels,
for it was, at this time, very popular on all dress. Two varieties were
predominantly used: purled lace and passement lace. The former was
a narrow, needle-made lace of silk, silver, or gold threads, with deep
scallops or "peakes. " 3 The Revels bought it in several varieties of

silk and gold at about 23. an ounce. Passement lace, also an openwork

 

42
Linthicum, 2 78 - 79 .

43
Ibid. , 141 .

 

95

44 and

fabric of silk or metallic threads, often had a core of parchment,
was used for edging coats and girdles. It generally cost 23. a yard, but
was sometimes sold by the ounce. "Round" lace was purchased twice;
Cologne silver, at 13. an ounce, and black and white, at 23. 6d. an
ounce. A half ounce of "gold" lace, bought once, cost 43.

Lacings, that is, lengths of braid or cord, were an essential
part of male hose in the sixteenth century. A row of short lacings was
sewn around the waistline of the hose, and a corresponding row of eye-
lets or holes were made in the waistline of the doublet. Once the gar-
ments were put" on, the lacings were drawn through the eyelets and tied,
thus holding the hose and doublet together. 45 Originally, the points of
the lacings were simply the metal collars on the ends, 46 but around this
time, the term "point" began to encompass the lacings as well. Many
gross of fine and coarse ”threden" points, as well as simple "points, "
were bought over the years by the Revels, at from 13. 8d. to 23. 8d. the
gross.

Imitation pearls of wood were occasionally bought from a
haberdasher then painted or covered with false silver by the Revels and

used to adorn visors and headpieces. These cost 23. 8d. per hundred;

wooden "roundes to be foyled 8: sylvered lyke countefetpearles" cost 13.

 

44tFeuillerat, Revels . . . Elizabeth, 481.

 

45 Linthicum, 282 .

4’(DThere was one purchase of eight "laces tagged," i. e. , with
metal collars. (Feuillerat, Revels at Court, 110).

 

96
a dozen, and were apparently somewhat better.

Spangles were used several times during this period for trim-
ming headpieces, plumes, visors, and other garments. On one occasion,
12, 000 were purchased at 18d. the thousand. 4

Tassels were very commonly used on costumes, headpieces,

48 or Cologne gold

and horse trappings. Made of strings and crewel,
and silver, they cost between 12d. and 18d. an ounce. Labells were simi-
lar. They were made of sarcenet, lawn, satin, and cloth of silver, and
were hung from the shoulders, skirts, or sleeves of garments, and were
sometimes used on coifs and headpieces.

Several other ornaments were used at various times.

Aiguillettes were any small ornaments attached to laces or fringes;

 

those used by the Revels were "counterfect like mother of pearle. "49
Eight thousand "amells" (that is, enamels), 50 at 23. per thousand, were
bought for the costumes of one masque, and were "of glas and stone hol-
owe counterfett lyke bace stones. " For friars' garments, almost two

hundred "greate beades stones coloread" were supplied by a turner, and

 

47In 1514', the Revels used spangles "of Flanders makyng, called

setters [and] hyngers, of latten and coper." (Collier, I, 70).
48Linthicum, 74.
49Ibid., 282.

50Halliwell-Phillipps, 54.

97

were undoubtedly of wood. Bullions (or metal studs), 51 at 2d. each,
were once used to decorate headpieces; clasps "sett with lytell gar-
netes" enhanced neckpieces at another time. Glasses, or little round
mirrors, were sometimes used to ornament garments, and cost a penny
each. Caddis fringe was used to trim shirts once, and netting was used
to dress visors. On a few occasions, flowers made of silk shreds were
bought for decorating headpieces, and small wire, "to make flowers of,"
was also used.

Black thread was the most frequently used, and was almost
always bought by the bolt, at from 23. 4d. to 43. 6d.; on one occasion a
pound cost 23. White thread was always bought by the pound, "fine" at
13. 8d. , and "coarse" at ls.4d. and 23.4d. Gray thread cost 23. 10d. a
bolt; later, 43. a bolt. Brown thread ranged inprice from 33. to 43.6d.
a bolt, red, from 33. 4d. to 43. a pound. 'Yellow was 33.4d. a pound,
and blue, 23.8d. "Pecing" thread, bought twice in red, tawny, blue,
green, yellow, black, and white, was 23.4d. and 23.6d. "Grete" thread,
”byndinge" thread, and "sealinge" thread each cost 43. a pound, "pack"
thread was 6d. and 8d. a pound, and coarse "paris" thread was 6d. an
ounce. Wax and cering candles, bought concurrently with thread on
three occasions, were probably for waxing thread.

Inkle, the most common kind of tape used in the costumes, was

52
a cheap linen variety, and was purchased several times at 20d. a pound.

 

51Ibid., #217.

52Linthicum, 99.

98
Caddis, a worsted tape, 53 was used once. An unnamed kind of tape,
at from 3d. to 12d. the "piece, " was available in red, white, and nar-
row, and was frequently used. White and blue ribbon was used twice.

Needles were of various sorts and prices. Small needles cost
6d. per hundred, and large needles, 8d. per hundred. Packneedles were
bought for 4d. a dozen and 16d. per hundred. Fine packneedles cost 6d.
a dozen, and square packneedles, 12d. a dozen. Bodkins and ring thim-
bles were a penny each, and pins, seldom purchased, were 7d. the
thousand.

Scissors were bought on two occasions. At one time three pairs
were bought at 6d. a pair, later seven pairs of "barbors sysars" cost
6d. a pair, six pairs of scissors "for cappers" cost 8d. a pair, and two
pairs of "large forcepps sheares" cost a shilling a pair. In 1551, four
"payer of knyves" (possibly scissors) were bought at 6d. the pair, and
six "penknyves to cutt 8: to pinck" were bought for a penny each. A year
later, five "paire" of "cuttinge and paring knives, " and two penknives
cost 43.10d. A month later, three more penknives were bought for 4d.
each.

Brushes were bought several times at 6d. and 8d.) "Rubbyng"
brushes cost a penny or two, and "hand" brushes, 10d.

In 1552, John Carowe, the carver and propertymaker, made or

bought two "rowlinge gynnes [at a shilling each] to wynde packthrede vpon

 

53Ibid. , 71.

99
for the ready vsage of the woorkemen 8: occupiers of the same as well
abowte thattyre of maskeheddes as for dyvers and soondry nedefull
behofes of that office. "54 At about the same time, a turner made three
headblocks to fashion and trim hats upon. They cost 8d. each, and
three years later, a "moldinge blocke" was turned for 16d. , probably
for the same purpose.

Cutting and sewing techniques of sixteenth-century tailors
were probably no different from those employed today despite the change
in style and terminology. Some terms persist, but many were taken
from heraldry, a long forgotten art.

Probably more attention was given to the borders and edges of
garments than to any other area. The most common method of treating
the edges of masqueing costumes was with guards, that is, bands or
borders of a material different in texture and color than that of the cos-
tume, and sewn around the edges of the skirt and/or sleeves. 55 In the
accounts they were found in several styles; cut, scalloped, embroidered,
and "engrede" (or engrailed, ornamented with a pattern indented on the
edge). 56 Guards were horizontal and vertical, narrow and wide, of many

types of materials, and on several kinds of garments. Frequently they

 

54Feuillerat, 138.
55Linthicum, 150-52.‘ At this time, many large guards on one's
clothing were a mark of wealth and station among nobility. (Ibid.).

56Feuillerat, 310.

100
involved little more than sewing a strip of cloth of one color onto a gar-
ment of the same cloth but of another color. Such occurred in 1551,
when ninety-three yards of red and white kersey were cut into almost
eight hundred yards of "guarding" for white and red liveries for the Lord

5
of Misrule's men. 7

 

Not all garments were trimmed with guards, however. There
were girdles "edgyd" with gold passement lace, a cape "perfylde abowte"
(that is, purfled, embroidered along the edge), 58 garments with "tuffing
Rownde aboute the bordures" (that is, tufted or gathered?), and gar-
ments "welted aboute" (or sewn with a cord or fold in the border).

Sewing stripes, wide or narrow, into or onto the basic material
of garments was a common practice, both among the fashionable and in
the Revels Office. Usually the stripes were of another color and a finer
material, and several heraldic terms were used to describe their di-
rection. In the inventory of April, 1547, were garments guarded "bend-
wyse, " that is, with diagonal stripes, 59 "palywise, " or with vertical

stripes, 60 and "barrwyse, " or with horizontal stripes. 61 Several gar-

2
ments were "rewed" (that is, "iayed, " or "rowed")6 with gold, and some

 

 

57Ibid., 67.
58$kean 313.
59

J. R. Planche, History of British Costume (London: George
Bell and Sons, 1881), p. 165, n. 1.

60
Ibid.

61Ibid.

 

 

 

62Strutt, 213, n.2,

101
were guarded with cloth of gold "wavyd wyse, " or in waves. Occasion-
ally,chevrons, lozenges, or leaves, cut of one cloth were sewn onto
garments of another.

Other terms are more difficult to understand. Costumes of
cloth of silver were once "skayled ouer" with black velvet on the breasts
and backs. At another time a skirt of blue satin was "fflamyd vpon"
with cloth of silver. , "Shadowed" probably meant shaded or painted;
there was an instance of coats with "flowers of yolowe damaske at the
Skyrtes Shadowed, " and another of bodices "shadowed harnes wyse on
the Brestes for men of Armes, " that is, painted like armor. There
were also horse trappings "emboderyd with the ffaucon 8: ffettyrlock
imbossid with Rosis of clothe of Syluer imbossid"; since all embroid-
ery is embossed, the word probably meant embellished. In contrast to
its meaning today, raised fabric was formerly that with the pile cut
close. There were several instances in the accounts of cloth "reysed"
with silk; ”rayed" was probably intended inasmuch as silk has no pile.

Panes were popular at this time, particularly in sleeves and
hose. These were

long ribbon-like strips of material set close and parallel End.)
produced (1) by slashing the material for the whole length,
leaving only the t0p and bottom joined, or (2) by separate

strips, joined above and below . . . thrOIfh the gaps the
shirt or a bright lining was 'drawn out. '6

 

63

 

Feuillerat, Revels . . . Elizabeth, 481.

64C. W. and P. Cunnington, Handbook of EnLlish Costume in the

Sixteenth Century (London: Faber and Faber, Ltd. , 1954), p. 13.

 

 

102
In the accounts there were sleeves "paned vpon" with cloth of gold,
twenty-three "panes of Reade clothe golde . . . onned to Ewenty-five]
panes of blew cloth golde," sleeves "cutt 8: drawen with Sarcenet, " gar-
ments "paned drawen owte with whyte Sarcenet, " and sleeves "pulled
owte with white sarsnett. ” Vents were probably the same as panes;
there was a cape with "the ventes lyned with whyte Sarcenet" and coats
"puffyd with whyte Sarcenet 8: ventyd with the same. " Several "puffed"
garments simply had linings pulled out through the panes or vents in
puffs. Sleeves of tinsel "all brokyn lyned with whyte Sarcenet" were
most likely paned, and several garments with "party panes" had linings
of two colors.

Many times one cloth was "cut upon" another. This may have,
been similar to an instance of gowns of cloth of silver "chekeryd vpon
with Red Sarcenet with Squares of grene Satten in the same. " Garments
were also often pinked, or perforated with small slits.

Occasionally the cutting of garments was recorded. Suits and
capes were sometimes scalloped, a coat was made "with greate Compas
quarters, " and a material cut "compas wyse, " or round. Two garments
were "paned clock wyse" (like a cloak?), and a coat was made with
"greate and longe pleyghtes. " There were also skirts, sleeves, and
collars "overthwarte with clothe of golde, " long "pendente" sleeves

and long sleeves "hanging by, " sleeves "endentyd lyned with grene Sat-

ten, " and hats "withe longe Endentyd flappes to euery syde, " (that is,

103

indented, fixed in). 65

The sixteenth century was predominantly the age of embroid-
ered costume in England although it was not until Elizabeth's reign that
the mode reached full flower. 66 Many embroidered garments, or gar-
ments with "works" were recorded in the accounts, but the Revels did
no embroidering; the short work periods did not permit anything so
time-consuming. Garments with "works, " or embroidered figures,
recorded in inventories of 1547 had probably come from the Great Ward-
robe; such works included stolework, callwork, churchwork, chequer-
work, "moryke" work (also called "moryskewoorke"), and materials
with "clocks, " Simple needlework which would have appeared very or-
nate to spectators was limited to guards and borders which were quickly
worked. Cloth of gold was the most frequent basic material.

Powderings were "small pieces of fur powdered or sprinkled
on others, resembling the spots on ermins."67 The Lord of Misrule's

robe, of "furred vellet like powdred ermyns, " has already been noted.

In 1548, painters were credited with "powdring of viij Roobes lynynges. "

 

65Halliwell-Phillipps, 334.

66 . ,
Linthicum, 146 .

67Halliwell-Phillipps, 641.

CHAPTER X

MASQUES AND PLAYS

On twelfth-night, 1513, King Henry VIII and eleven gentle-
men of the court were

disguised after the manner of Italie, called a maske, a thing
not sene afore in England: thei were apparelled in garmentes
long and brode, wrought all with golde, with Visers and cappes
of gold; and after the banket doen these Maskers came in with
the sixe gentlemen disguised in silke, berying staffetorches,
and desired the ladies to daunce: some were content, and
some that knew the fashion of it refused, because it was not

a thing commonly seen. And after thei daunced and commoned
together, as the fashion of the maskes is, thei toke their
leave and departed; and so did the Quene and all the ladies.

The masque was not a great deal different from the older disguising;2

it simply added the innovation of social intercourse with the spectators.

 

The object of the masquers was to choose each a lady out of

the assembled company, and to entertain her with dancing and
gallant conversation. . . The real novelty lay in the intro-
duction of a new element of gallantry and intrigue. The masque,
in fact, was the notorious masquerie, which became fashionable
first in Modena and Ferrara, then spread to the whole of Italy
and France, and finally reached England in 1512. [pi—c] . 3

 

 

1Collier, 67-68. (From Hall's Chronicles).

 

2See App. 1, pp.

3
Welsford, 135 -38 .
104

105

Sir Edmund Chambers believed the difference was a matter
of costume, particularly the use of face-masks and, perhaps, make-
up. However, the use of face-masks or vizors in disguisings and
mummeries was at least two centuries old at this time, 5 and the
term "maskers" descriptive of those who wore them. It is extremely
doubtful that the new masque in 1513 had anything to do with an inno-
vation of face-masks, make-up, or fancy costumes.

By 1547, the masque, as a promenade and dance in which
spectators participated, had apparently reverted to an entertainment
more like the old disguising, though? it retained the name of masque.
Several costumes and properties made by the Revels seem to have been
too cumbersome to have even permitted their wearers to walk, much

less dance, and it is unlikely that gracious courtiers would have danced

 

4Sir Edmund K. Chambers, The Medieval Stage (2nd ed. rev.;
London: Oxford University Press, 1948), I, p. 407. He examined the
word etymologically: "Skeat derives through the French masque, mas-
qger, masquerer, and the Spanish mascara, mascarado (Ital, 133.3-
cherata) from the Arabic maskharat, a buffoon or droll (root sakhira,
'he ridiculed'). The original sense would thus be 'entertainment' and
that of 'face-mask' (larva, 'vizard,' 'viser') only derivative. But
late Latin has already masca, talamasca in this sense; . . . And the
French masque is always the face-mask and never the performance;
while se masquier, masquillier, maschurer, are twelfth- to thirteenth-
century words for 'blacken, ' 'dirty.' I therefore prefer the derivation
of Brotanek, 120, from a Germanic root represented by the M. E.
maskel, 'stain'; and this has the further advantage of explaining
'maskeler, ' 'maskeling, ' which appears, variously spelt, in documents
of 1519-26. Both terms signify the performance, and 'maskeler' the
performer also. . . . Face-masks were de riegueur in the mask to a
late date." (Ibid., 402, n. 2).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5Among costumes used for the Christmas festival of Edward
111 in 1348 were forty-two vizors; fourteen for women, fourteen with

beards for men, and fourteen heads for angels. (Strutt, II, 305).

106

with such figures of Edward's masques as medioxes, satyrs, or
baboons, or even Irishmen, hermits, or Moors! These were, however,
peculiar only to Edward's reign, and probably just for his amusement;
those of Mary's years were a more noble and beautiful sort, as were
those thereafter. If audience participation declined, it did so only
for a few years. I

To the Revels, the word "masque" was a broad term which
encompassed the entertainment at court, the garments and properties
used for the entertainment, and the masquers themselves. 6 Although
Edward's masques were more similar to disguisings, the mid-century
masque may be described as a promenade of six or eight courtiers
dressed: (l) as foreigners or mythological figures in elaborate cos-
tumes, (2) as allegorical characters representing religious or mili-
tary figures, or (3) as grotesques representing real or mythological
animals or beings. The masquers were accompanied by six or eight
torch bearers and generally a drummer and fifer (or other musicians)
all dressed in less elaborate, though often similar, costumes. Dan-
cing was almost always involved, both among the masquers and with
the spectators, but was not a requisite.

The performance of a masque probably lasted less than an

hour, and there were several evenings when two, three, and even four

 

6The word was used only twice to mean face-mask; both
times in conjunction with "vizors. " (Feuillerat, 14 and 30).

107

masques were presented. 7 Costumes and properties were loaded
aboard wherries or barges in the afternoon and often were not unloaded
again at the Blackfriars after the performance until very late at night.
Certainly dressing the masquers must have taken as long as the per-
formance, for the costumes had to be fitted and, in some cases, sewn
on the masquers. Brief rehearsals may have been held, and the Inas-
quers were probably ready long before the audience had assembled. 9
Staff torches were apparently provided for the torchbearers at the
court; none were bought or made by the Revels. The masquers kept
the gloves they wore as souvenirs of the evening. 10 Often during the
reigns of Henry and Edward a masquer's costume was given to him
after the performance as a reward for his services. This practice was
apparently stopped during Mary's reign. ll

Certainly many more interludes, dialogues, and plays were

presented during this period than were recorded in the Revels accounts.

These entertainments were the concern of special groups, such as the

 

7On Twelfth-night, 1552, there was a play, a dialogue, two
masques, and a banquet. (Ibid. , 278).

8Ibid., 162, 165, 170, and 177.

9On one occasion, the entire evening's entertainment of
masques and plays was cancelled after the barge arrived at the court.

(1331., 170-71).

10
Of over two hundred and fifty pairs bought by the Revels

during this period, none appeared in the inventories.

11

\

The word "fees" occurred before several garments in the
1547 inventories, but before no garments in the 15 55 inventory which

had been used in the masques of Mary's reign. (Ibid. , 261).

108
King's Players, who were on salary from the court, 12 and the Children
of the Chapel, or of St. Paul's, who were rewarded with a fee when they

performed. 13

The actors generally provided their own simple costumes
and properties, but the Revels made a few pieces for them occasionally.
William Baldwin, John Heywood, and Nicholas Udall were each
served by the Revels on occasion. Baldwin, "parson of St. Michael at
Paul's Gate, "14 and Heywood, at this time singing-master of the boys
of St. Paul's, 15 both presented plays before King Edward which were
outfitted by the Revels. 16 Udall, whose plays had been seen in court
before 1554, was extended full use of the Office by Queen Mary her-

self for plays which he presented in December that year. 17

Sir Thomas Chaloner, diplomat and author under Edward VI,

 

12Ibid. , 280. John Birch and John Brown were two of at least
six players in Edward's service. Many had been discharged by Somer-
set early in the reign. (Collier, 136). Mary employed eight players of
interludes and over one hundred musicians and minstrels at a cost of
over £2233 during the first year of her reign. (Ibid. , 162).

13Feuillerat, 288 .

 

Stow, I, x. He was to have helped Stow write his Survey of
London,but died before working on it. The synopsis and dramatis per-
sonae of another play by Baldwin, possibly produced during Christmas,
1556, is in App. VI, pp.236-40.

15John Gassner, Masters of the Drama (New York: Random
House, 1940), p. 158.

 

 

 

 

16Feuillerat, 288.

17
Ibid. , 159.

18Stephen and Lee, III, 1366-67.

109
was probably the author of the Dialogue of Riches and Youth presented
early in 1552. 9 The only "dialogue" in the accounts, it was described
as "a talk betwen one that was called Riches, and th'other Youth, wither
of them was better. "20 A mock joust and apparently some allegory was
involved. The dialogue was probably a variation of the interlude, a
short play presented between other, longer entertainments. 21 Only one
interlude was recorded in the accounts as being costumed by the Revels
during this period;22 the primary entertainment of the courts of Edward
and Mary was the masque.

Almost nothing remains of the banqueting houses and great
halls of the Plantagenets and Tudors. These magnificent buildings,
usually the largest in the palace complex, were scenes of hundreds of
banquets and festivals, royal receptions and entertainments, Christmas
revelry, and indoor jousting. Great balls were two to three times
greater in length than width with a dais at one end for royalty, and two

wide portals at the other for entrances. Usually these portals were in

 

19Feuillerat, 60 .

20
Ibid., 278. See p. 143 for details.

 

The Dialogue of Riches and Youth was presented between a
play and masques. (Ibid.).

22Performed by John Birch and John Brown in 1552. No de-
tails of it were noted in the accounts. The dramatis personae of
another interlude, possibly presented during Christmas, 1549, were
printed by Feuillerat, 245.

 

23The reign of the Lord of Misrule, and one triumph, are
discussed below; Chap. XII.

110

a "screen" or false wall, behind and above which was the musicians'
gallery. In one side wall there was often a huge fireplace flanked by
doorways to a kitchen and other chambers. The walls were hung with
tapestries and antlers. 2

The old palace of Placentia at Greenwich, and Westminster
Palace were the favorite residences of Edward VI, at least during the
Christmas season. Of the former, situated on the Thames a few miles
east of London, almost nothing is known. 25 At Westminster, the great
hall of the palace, though rebuilt several times, had been used for
festivals and banquets for almost five hundred years when Edward came
to the throne. 26 It was rebuilt in 1397-99 and measured inside, at that
time, sixty-eight feet wide by two hundred and thirty-eight feet long.
The entire building was ninety feet high. 27

Whitehall Palace, the "new palace" acquired by Henry VIH

from Cardinal Wolsey in 1529 (when it was called York House), 28 was

 

24
Sir Banister Fletcher, A History of Architecture (London:

B. T. Batsford, Ltd., 1946), p. 413.

 

z5Two aerial views (wash drawings, ca. 1500-20) appear in
John Harvey, An Introduction to Tudor Architecture (New York:
Pellegrini and Cudahy, n.d.), p. 80.

2
6Stow, II, 113-17.

2
7Fletcher, 449.

 

28Stow, 89. This was an "intermediate" Whitehall. Fire
consumed another Whitehall, the "old palace," in 1512. Inigo Jones'
Whitehall, a banqueting house, was not built until 1619-21.
(Fletcher, 799).

111

in the city of Westminster. Masques and entertainments were held
here several times during these eleven years, although Mary preferred
the palace of St. James in the Fields nearby. 29

Edward spent his first Christmas as King at Hampton Court
Palace in Middlesex, the only residence mentioned in the accounts
which stands today. Started by Wolsey, many buildings were added by
Henry VIII, including the great hall, which is forty by one hundred and
six feet inside and sixty feet high. 30

Probably both Edward and Mary saw masques and plays pre-
sented in the great halls of their other royal residences, but to the

Revels (at least to the scribe) such places were most often simply "the

court. " Their concern was to get the costumes done on time.

 

29Stow, 374.

30
Fletche r, 41 4.

CHAPTER XI
THE EARLY YEARS: FEBRUARY, 1547 TO JUNE, 1551

On Friday, January 28, 1547, the great Henry VIII died.
The death of England's colorful and vigorous monarch for thirty-eight
years was made public on Monday, 1 and the following day, Februaryl,
the Revels began preparing for the coronation.

On the tenth of February several garments were lent to the
city of London for characters in the tableaux which Edward was to see
on the nineteenth when he rode through the city. 2 Among these were
two coats for henchmen, and a "spyre"3 for Astronomy who, as one of
the seven liberal sciences with Grammar, Logic, Arithmetic, Rhetoric,
Geometry, and Music, stood under Sapience (wisdom) at the fountain in

Cheap. Four women's garments may have been for Grace, Nature,

 

1Innes, 187.

zFeuillerat, 304.

3This was either a "sphere" or globe of the earth, or a

"spyer, " i. e. , a telesc0pe, both appropriate symbols of Astronomy.

4Ibid., 305.

112

113

Fortune, and Charity, who pronounced a benediction upon the King at
the conduit in Cheap. 5

On the day after the royal procession, Shrove Sunday, Feb-
ruary 20, young Edward was crowned in Westminster Abbey, and the
coronation festivities began.6 That afternoon, jousts were held7 and
several noblemen were titled. 8 But the principal entertainments were
the masques and plays presented Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday nights,
for which a hundred men had worked at the Revels Office during the
previous three weeks.

The most important project in the Office was the "mount, "
a large pageant wagon used in at least two entertainments. 9 The fact
that it was the only large pageant wagon built during the eleven-year
period, and that it was built in fewer than twenty days, suggests that
it may have been planned for Henry's entertainment and thus started
earlier.

The chassis was of "tymber worke" to which seven axletrees
were fixed with six-inch staples. Six and a half bundles of green hoops

and bows were woven into a dome or mountain shape and the ends glued,

 

5Ibid.

 

61bid., 255.
7Collier, 139.
8Stephen and Lee, VII, 942.

9Feuillerat, 7-8.

114

bound, and nailed to the chassis. Over this network, clay, plaster,
of Paris, cement, white paper, flour, glue, wax, and hair were used
to mold a finished mountain. Coal fires were burned to aid in drying
this molded work and, once dry, it was painted. Four poles with cross
pieces were used to pull the mount, probably two in front and two in
back; once rolled the length of the hall it had to be rolled back, and it
is doubtful that the axletrees were mounted so as to permit turning
corners.

The incompatibility of such materials as cement and'wax, and
the fact that it was assembled and disassembled three times within a
few days, 10 suggests that the entire wagon was built in sections. Wax
spread over a plaster or cement surface would have prevented the ad-
dition of any other material11 and kept adjacent sections separated
while the mount was being built, but it might just have possibly been
used for waterproofing the finished piece. Certainly if the Revels had
been forewarned that the mount was to be used in different places on
successive nights, as they must have been, careful assembly and dis-
assembly procedures would have been planned.

Over fifty men worked specifically on the mount (including,
apparently, Italian sculptors), 12 and it was probably somewhat more

complex and elaborate than the accounts indicated. Almost 9000 nails

 

10Ibid., 6.

11A common practice of medieval painters. (Thompson, 47).

leee Chap. V11,p. 65, n. 20.

115

were used for building and rebuilding it, and costs reached £35. 13

By Shrove Sunday or Monday the mount was finished, dis-
assembled at the Blackfriars, and carried in three cart-loads to the
Sanctuary at Westminster. 14 There it was reassembled and used either
Sunday or Monday night in a masque. The next day it was taken apart
again and carried by the King's watermen to Whitehall where it was used
on Tuesday night for the story of Orpheus. 15 On Wednesday it was re-
turned to the Office by the watermen and reassembled for storage and
possible reuse. 16 It was not used again, however, and was probably
soon dismantled.

Almost fifty tailors worked on the costumes for the masques
and plays, but scant information was recorded in the accounts regarding
the entertainments they served. The Gentlemen or Children of the Cha-

pel probably presented the story of Orpheus and were perhaps in other

plays. 17 The dramatis personae included a doctor, a prophet or king,

 

friars, priests, cardinals, the p0pe or a bi3h0p of Rome, and an Ital-

 

1 3Feuillerat, 8.

14Ibid. , 255. Despite the unlikelihood that it was used in the
sacred precinct of Westminster Abbey, this seems to have been the case.
However, St. Peter's Sanctuary, a square chapel 75' X 75' very near the
Abbey may have been meant. (Besant, 136).
15Feuillerat, 255. In the story of Orpheus, the inside of the
mount may have been used for the infernal regions and the outside for
Mount Olympus.

16Ibid., 6-8.

17Ibid. , 256.

116
ian. Three garments seem to have been made for King Edward

19

himself, one of which was a priest's vestment. Mr. Robert Stone,

a Gentleman of the Chapel, was also a priest or cardinal, 20 and other

players included Edward's friends, Henry Brandon and Henry Stanley. 21
The strangest costume made for a play during Shrovetide was

a coat, cap, and "skabart" of white and green checkered velvet trimmed

with scallop shells, crossed keys, and eyes, tongues, and ears.22

White and green were the Tudor colors, 23 scallop shells were the sym—

bol of pilgrims who had traveled to the Holy Land, 24 crossed keys were

25
the keys of Rome, a symbol of the Papacy, and eyes, tongues, and

ears were the symbol of Lady Fame, the medieval goddess of report

 

18Ibid.

 

1 91b1d.

 

20Ibid. , 12 and 259-60.

 

21Ibid. , 256. Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, was twelve years old
and being tutored with Edward. He died in 1551. (Stephen and Lee, II,
1130). Stanley, called "Lord Strange, " was sixteen years old and was
knighted at the jousts on Sunday. He became a Gentleman of the Privy
Chamber to Edward, and later, Philip. (1212. , XVIII, 957).

zzFeuillerat, 262.

23Sir Samuel Meyrick, Critical Inquiry Into Ancient Armor
(London: Henry Bohn, 1842), III, p. 10.

 

24Strutt, 319.

25Ibid.

 

117
and rumor. 26 How a costume with such contradictory symbols was
used is not apparent. Certainly none of the symbols was vague, and
they would not have been mistaken by sixteenth-century spectators.
Yet they could only be displayed by a person representing allegiance
to many diverse elements, perhaps by the King himself.

Three wherries were hired on each of the three nights to
carry the costumes to and from the court. Officers and workmen were
in attendance at the Revels Office for twenty-eight days, and a total of
.3565. 183. 8d. was spent on the coronation entertainments, a rather
small amount considering subsequent expenses.2‘7

During April, 1547, John Holt succeeded John Bridges as
Yeoman of the Revels, and an inventory was necessary. 28 Started on

March 26, when Holt received many masqueing garments from Philipps,

29
the Clerk, it continued into April when the remainder was turned

 

26William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, ed. George
Lyman Kittredge (Boston: Ginn and Company, 1941), p. 102. Cf. also
Titus Andronicus, II, 1,: "The Emperor's court is like the House of
Fame, The palace full of tongues, of eyes and ears. "

 

 

27See Table H, pp. 70-71. Part of this amount was spent in
moving from Warwick Inn to Blackfriars though probably not much
since the places were close. Part, too, was spent for gilding and re-
pairing the "Roopes 8: braunchis in the hall. " (Feuillerat, 6-7). (One
document has "Roopes for the branchis. " Ibid. , 258). These were
probably the chandeliers hung by ropes and pulleys in Whitehall.
(Bethel, 102).

28Feuillerat, 9-17.

 

29Ibid., 258.

118

over to the new Yeoman by Cawarden and Bernard, the Clerk-Comp-
troller. These were the masqueing costumes of Henry's last few years,
and included male and female garments for Germans, Egyptians, Turks,
Moors, Italians, friars, pilgrims, falconers, and men of arms, as
well as rich coverings for jousting horses. 30

The following month, Sir Walter Mildmay, newly-created
knight and Revenue Commissioner, 31 took another very detailed in-
ventory of the cloth and odd garments in the standards and chests stored
in the frater. 32 This included 175 yards of sarcenet, 152 yards of cloth
of gold, 120 yards of tinsel, 110 yards of lawn, and several yards of
cloth of silver, satin, velvet, and damask. 33

Edward's first Christmas as King was spent at Hampton

Court, where he saw masques and plays (the latter probably performed

34
by the Children of the Chapel). A tower resembling the "Tower of

 

Descriptions of most of these costumes are included in
Chapter XIV.

31
Feuillerat, 261.

32Ibid., 18-21.

33A second list was found by Feuillerat which was a rough
draft of a rear account, probably made in anticipation of the May in-
ventory. It included the same kinds of cloth and quantities which re-
mained in the Office at the time of the last inventory taken under
Henry VIII. Marginal notes indicated that part of the material was .
used in garments for Edward's coronation. (Ibid. , 22-24 and 263).
Another inventory was taken by Mildmay in September, 1547, of
small objets d'art in the Jewelhouse at Hampton Court in Cawarden's
care. None of the items concerned the Revels or the masques. (Ibid- . 25)-

34Ibid. , 26 and 266. The only extant document concerning this
Christmas was an abstract of the accounts.

 

119
of babylon" was made for a play given at some date during this sea-
son, possibly a play of the building of the Tower of Babel by the child-
ren of men, a structure which reached to the heavens. 35 A masque of
Prester John may also have been presented, 36 as well as a masque of
friars. Costs for Christmas entertainment were almost $80. 37
For Shrovetide, 1548, the court moved to Greenwich. There,

on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, February 12-14, were

great justs and warlike feates done in the parke. . .. . where

was a castle or fort of turnes, besieged and assaulted, to

shew the king the manner of Warres, wherein hee had great
pleasure. 38

 

35Gen. 11.

36Feuillerat, 266. Prester John (John the Presbyter) was a
fabulous legendary monarch of Asia who united the offices of King and
Christian priest. He figured in Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, written
1515-1533, and was mentioned in Shakespeare's Much Ado About Noth-
ing, 11, 1. William Rose Benet (ed.), The Reader's Encyclopedia
Tfiéw York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1948), p. 877.

37The Protector Somerset and Sir William Paget, Comp-
troller, apparently presented masques in their own households this
Christmas. From the Revels, Somerset borrowed complete costumes
for eight masquers and six torchbearers. Paget borrowed six Turkish
costumes for masquers and four friars' costumes for torchbearers.
All were taken from the storehouse. Although they were probably
for their personal use, the gentlemen may have used the strength of
their offices to borrow for friends.

 

 

 

38John Stow, Annales of England (London: Richard Meighan,
1631), p. 595. Also from Edward's Journal: "2 yere. A triumph
was wher six gentilmen did chaleng a1 commers at Barriers iustes
and tornay and also that thei wold kepe a fortresse with thirty with
them against an hundred or under wich was don at Grenwich. "
(Feuillerat, 267). Pikes, lances, and other necessaries were ob-
tained for this triumph through Sir Thomas Darcy, Master of the
Armory, on January 28. (Ibid.).

 

120

Part of this daytime entertainment included a band of tumblers who
performed in the park, "his grace loking out vpon them. "39

The Revels work for Shrovetide involved the outfitting of four
masques, one of Young Moors, one of Men, and two of Women. 40 The
first, presented on Shrove Sunday night, included the King as one of
the masquers. 41 Beginning just seven days before, the Revels rrade
eight long, black, velvet gloves which extended to above the elbow,
six pairs of black goatskin gloves, and fourteen pairs of black goat-
skin hose. This endeavor to achieve realism was applied in their caps,
which were made of coarse budge, 42 in imitation of tight curly hair.
Visors were trimmed, colored, and lined, wooden darts (or long
spears)4:3 with broad heads and silver feathers were made, and twelve
dozen bells were bought to hang. at the skirts of their costumes. What
the costumes themselves were like was not recorded, which suggests
that they may have been taken from the storehouse and refurbished.

Of the other masques less is known. Masquers in the Masque

of Men apparently wore robes with powdered linings and carried painted

swords. 44 Each of the Masques of Women included six masquers and

 

391251; They were given 403. in gratuities.

4°Ibid., 29-32.

41Ibid. , 33.

42Lambskin with the wool dressed outward. (Halliwell-
Phillipps, 216).
43See Chap. XIV, p. 211.

44Feuillerat, 31.

121
six torchbearers. Six headpieces for women were made of hair and
flax and lined with black sarcenet; six more wigs were bought; six felts,
together with flax and tow, were bought for headpieces; and rolls45
were made for six other headpieces. The wigs of a ”hole maske" of
women were colored or dyed, and twenty-four bodices or ne ckcover-
ings were made. Fifty ells of white, blue, and yellow sarcenet were
used for lining, tufting, and guarding their garments, and gloves were
bought for all the masquers except the Young Moors.

The King's Players called on the Revels for an oven which
was used in a play given during this Shrovetide. This unique property
was made of a wood frame over which canvas was stretched and held
with 500 tacks, 46 the only description in the accounts of construction
methods similar to those of today. Ten days were spent working on
the masques by the Officers, thirty-one tailors, and two painters, but
costs were only 578.

Only two masques seem to have been presented during Christ-

47

mas, 1548. For one, unnamed, nine ells of red, white, yellow, and

purple sarcenet were bought for bordering the masquers' tissue gar-
ments and the torchbearers' red satin garments, all of which were

taken from the storehouse. For the other masque, six yards of red

4E‘See Chap. XIV, p, .205.

46Feuillerat, 31 .

47Ibid. , 34-35.

 

122
and white wedmole was used to make five pairs of hose for Germans.
Probably much more masqueing stuff was used unaltered from the
storehouse, for two wherries were engaged to carry one of these
masques, and two wherries and a barge used to carry the other. Both
were presented at Westminster Palace where, on New Year's day, the
Children of the Chapel received a reward for their play or plays.48
Thirteen tailors and the Officers worked on the costumes over a per-
iod of ten days at a total cost of only eleven and a half pounds.

During Shrovetide, 1549, at Westminster, the King's Players
presented a play, apparently of the Apocalyptic Dragon. 49 John Holt
made a dragon with seven heads and "all necessaries to it" for thirty
shillings. Part of these necessaries may have been a dozen "heares
and beardes. " Other pieces bought and made included a king's crown,
a "terypped"50 crown, six priests' caps or wigs made like shave

crowns of hair and budge, albs, surplices, and headcloths of Holland

51
cloth for priests, and seven hermits' heads. Such strange properties

 

48Ibid., 268.

49Rev. xiii.

OPossibly "tripled" was intended, i. e. , the triple crown of
the Pope. (Feuillerat, 269).
51Ibid. , 39-40. Hermits, anchorites, or beadsmen were
"poor dependants supported by a patron for whom they were bound to
pray for bounties received. " (Shakespeare, Macbeth, ed. Kittredge,
119). In Pl. V, p.209 , the left figure is possibly a hermit and the
bottom figure is an anchoress, or female anchorite.

123
and garments strongly suggest an allegory concerning the State, the
Roman Catholic Church, and the Antichrist. 52

The Christmas festivities of 1549 were again held at West-
minster Palace. 53 Both plays and masques were presented, the lat-
ter on two nights, and, although parts of costumes were made for five
different groups of masquers or players, no complete costumes were
newly made for any of them. Garments and properties were made for
Germans, Lance-knights, Friars, Pilgrims (or Palmers), 5 and Her-
mits, some of which may have been identical.

For the Germans, four pairs of "showes" were bought, and
for the Lance-knights, eight feathers, presumably for plumes. Twelve
falchions (or broad-bladed swords)55 and twelve "holmaces" which
were made and painted were probably for one of these two groups. For
the Friars, nine girdles (or sashes) were colored, the only record of

this group in the accounts. Eight staffs with iron hilts were made for

 

It also seems more than‘coincidental that at this time there
was a painting in Westminster Palace of Henry VIII with a sword in his
hand, standing upon a mitre with three crowns, out of which came a
seven-headed dragon. (Feuillerat, 269). .

53Ibid. , 41 -43.

54Properly, a pilgrim who had visited the Holy Land.
(Halliwell-Phillipps, 600).

55
See Pl. V1, p. 213.

56See Chap. XIV, p. 197.

124

the Pilgrims, and 1:_e_1_i_were painted; probably two were taken from the
storehouse. 57 One hundred and eighty "greate beades stones coloread"
were probably for the Pilgrims. 58 Nine felts were bought and covered,
apparently with russel cloth, for the Hermits' hoods. These seem to
have been decorated with tassels and buttons; whip cord and paste were
bought for their "eares" (hairs, that is, wigs ?). The Hermits carried
lanterns and straw-filled bags on which pieces of canvas were sewn
bearing someword or motto. The assignment of other properties and
garments can only be surmised. Nine globes were made and painted;
nine and a half ("ix di. ") little bowlles" were bought and twenty-two
gilded; gold and silver paper, as well as four and a half ells of sarcen-
et, were bought for girdles. Three of the masquers and a drummer
and fifer were given 103. each because they "restored theyr garmentes"
the second night of the masques.

The cost of the entire Christmas entertainment was only £34.
This fact, and the scanty record of costumes that were rmde, seems
to indicate that Cawarden was drawing more and more from the store-
house in an attempt to maintain the elaborate pageantry which he, and
the court, had known under Henry VIII. Masques and plays were be-

coming less important in the royal household, due in part certainly to

 

7Pilgrims' staffs, javelin staffs, and sheephooks were in-
cluded in the inventory of April, 1547.

58See Pl. V, p.209 . The Pilgrims and Hermits may have
been identical. 1

125

the change in rule of a strong, fun-loving monarch to that of a weak,
boy king, but due even more so to the tight rein which Somerset held
on the Exchequer. He had made a considerable reduction in the ser-
vices of musicians and players, 59 and had probably kept a check on the
expenses of the Office of the Revels. At this time the debts of the Office
had not been paid for three years, 60 and no doubt Cawarden was having
trouble finding tailors and tradesmen who would extend credit.

The year 1549 was particularly troublesome for Somerset
with insurrections throughout the spring and summer and war with
France in September. In mid-October he was sent to the Tower for his
arrogations and, when released in February, 1550, divested of his power
and pr0perties. 61 It was probably for this reason that there were no
Shrovetide entertainments at court.

Just before Christmas, 1550, the court moved from Green-
wich, 63 where at least two masques were presented, one of Moors and
one of Irishmen. 64 The first, in which the King and his young lords

may have participated, included six masquers and six torchbearers who

 

59Co111er, 136.

60Feuillerat, 269-70 .

éllnnes, 200-201.

62 .
Feuillerat, 270 .

63
Ibid. , 274.

641:1)1d. , 47-490

126
wore long black gloves made of small lambskins, lambskin caps
(probably made like those in 1547, with the wool dressed outward),
and sheepskin buskins or soft boots. 65 Twelve falchions and holmaces
were taken from the storehouse and repaired for their use.

An Irish bagpiper was hired for Twelfth-night, and it was
probably then that the Masque of Irishinen was presented. A single
canvas doublet67 and pair of hose were no doubt for the bagpiper. Six-
teen wigs (eight of flax and eight of horsehair) were made for the
masquers and torchbearers over which they wore headpieces of paste-
board. Their hose was of linen, and they carried Irish swords and
shields. A garment was painted for the fool, William Sommers, who
apparently had a part in the entertainments. 68 The expenses sur-
passed £45.

Shrovetide entertainments were presented at Westminster for

 

65$ee Chap. XIV, p.194 . Only six pairs of buskins were
made, these probably for the masquers.

.Twelve falchions and holmaces made during Christmas,
1549, were probably reused at this time. See p. 123.

67
See Chap. XIV, p. 184.

68Several other items mentioned in the accounts are not
attributable to either of these masques and were probably for a
play or plays presented: two women's wigs, thirty-eight felts (for
hats?), six copintank hats (see Chap. XIV, p.200 ), four yellow
handkerchiefs, and twenty yards of lockeram painted flesh-color,
which may have been for the Moors' or Irishmens' garments. Thirty-
two Irish swords were made; the Irishmens' Masque may have been
twice as large. Eight gads, or spears, and one halberd were also
made. (See Chap. XIV).

127
69

four nights. These may have included another masque or play of
Irishmen, a masque or play of Irishwomen, and the antics of William

Somers. These entertainments, however, may have taken place in

July, 1551, at Hampton Court, where the Marechal de France,

 

Jacques D'Albon de St. Andre, and members of the French Embassy
were visiting King Edward. 70 There, on July 16, they "dined with
[the King] , and talked after Diner, and saw some pastime and so went
home againe. "71 For the visit, and probably for this "pastime," the
Revels, together with the Surveyor of the King's Works, built two
banqueting houses, one in Marybone Park and one in Hyde Park. 72
Construction began on June 27, and they were demolished by August 2.

The house in Marybone Park was forty feet long, and that in

Hyde Park fifty-seven feet long by twenty-one wide with a dais or

 

69Feuillerat, 54-55. Little can be established about the

Shrovetide entertainments: in the accounts, costumes and properties
made for them were indiscriminately entered with those made for the
entertainments in July (see above ), and particular assignment is im-
possible. For both periods the Revels made lrishwomens' smocks,
girdles, and rolls of forty-five yards of yellow sarcenet, forty-eight
pairs of buskins of lockeram and satin, fifty-eight Irish darts which
were painted, gloves and hose for Somers, and whips of cord. They
bought: thirty felts, eighteen visors, six dozen bells. They painted:
twenty-five targets or shields, twenty falchions, twelve gads, six-
teen holmaces, and eight Irish swords. A reward was given to a bag-
piper. For particular definitions of these items, see Chap. XIV.

70 ,
Feuillerat, 2 74.

71Ibid.

 

72Details of these were recorded by Kempe (96-97), but not
by Feuillerat.

128

gallery over which a "type"73 or turret was erected. 74 The walls of
both were "framed, made and wrought of tymber, brick, and lyme. "
Near each of the buildings were three "standings" (tableaux?), eight
by ten feet, trimmed with boughs and flowers. Payments were Trade
to: basketmakers for working upon windows, tailors for sewing roofs
and borders, painters for painting furniture, Anthony Toto for molding
"antique heads" (busts ?), and to a turner for turning six great bases
for pillars. Two loads of scaffold poles were required, and boughs,
rushes, flags, and ivy were cut in the Hyde Park woods. Construction
took twenty-two days, and the total cost of the houses was £169. 73. 8d.

Between June 3 and 9, 1551, the first recorded airing took
place at the Blackfriars. 76 Seven tailors, together with the Officers,
worked six days at a cost of (4.63.

These early entertainments of Edward, with the frequent in-
clusion of religious figures or themes, were probably more for Somer-

set's moralizing purposes than for the young boy's pleasure. Certainly

 

73'A canopy. George R. Kernodle, From Art to Theatre

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1944), p. 95.

74Kempe reads: "with a halpace staier (a step for the dais
or haut-pas) conteyninge in bredth the one way 60 foote, and the other
way 30 foote, and over the same a type or turret garnished." (96).
This suggests that the entire house was built on a large platform, and
that the type, turret, or canopy was, in fact, the roof, probably made
of canvas.

 

75Ibid.

 

76Feuillerat, 53. See Chap. VII, p_,,.64,

129
masques and plays would have been excellent media for establishing
his doctrines in the minds of his nephew and his Council. When con-
trasted with court entertainment of Edward's final two years, which
Somerset had nothing to do with, it is safe to assume that he had had

much to say about what was presented during these early years.

CHAPTER XII

THE LORD OF MISRULE: DECEMBER, 1551 TO JUNE, 1553

In October, 1551, Somerset was sent to the Tower charged
with a plot to murder several members of the Council. In December
he was condemned for felony, and in January, beheaded.l Before
Christmas it was decided that

to recreat and refresh the troubled spirits of the yoong king,
who . . . seemed to take the trouble of his Uncle somewhat
heavilie, it was devised that the feast of [Christmas] . . .
should be solemnlie kept at Greenwich, with open household
and franke resort to Court (which is called keeping of the
hall) what time, of old ordinarie course, there is alwaies
one appointed to make sporte in the Court, called commonly
Lord of Misrule: whose office is not unknowns to such as
have been brought up in noble mens houses, 8: among great
housekeepers which use li berall feasting in that season.
There was therefore, by order of the Councill, a wise gen-
tleman and learned, named George Ferrers, appointed to
that office for this yeare; . . . Which gentleman so well
supplied his office, both in shew of sundrie sights, and de-
vises of rare inventions, and in act of diverse interludes,
and matters of pastime, plaied by persons, as not onlie sat-
isfied the common sort, but also were well liked and allowed
by the Councill, and other of skill in the like pastimes; but
best of all by the yoong king himself, as appered by his
princelie liberalitie in rewarding that service.

 

1Stephen and Lee, XVII, 1247-48.

2Collier, 146. (From Holinshed's Chronicles).

 

130

131

Although the tradition may have been older, the first mock
king of sport and pastime seems to have been one Ringley, called Abbot
of Misrule in the Household Book of Henry VII, who was given ‘5 in
late October, 1491, probably to defray the expense of his costume.
Ringley appeared again in 1494, and thereafter an unnamed Abbot,
later Lord, of Misrule was engaged in 1502, 1504, 1505, 1506, and
1507. During the final Christmas of Henry VII, in 1508, William
Wynnesbury was Lord of Misrule. Throughout the reign the fee was
never more than $6.133. 4d. 3

During the first twelve years of Henry VIII, a Lord of Mis-
rule served the court every Christmas but one, that of 1517, when
pestilence was prevailing. Wynnesbury held the position for six or
eight.:of these years, 4 and the fee was riased to £13.6s.8d. , with a
reward of £2 generally given him on New Year's day. 5 Thereafter
the tradition apparently fell off until its revival in 1551.

George Ferrers was about fifty years old at this time. He was
a lawyer of Lincoln's Inn, a Member of Parliament in 1542 and 1545,

and as a part-time historian had published an English version of the

Magna Charta of 1215 in 1534. As a poet he was to share with

 

 

3Ibid., 50-55, n. 1. A Lord of Misrule may have appeared

in 1500 and received £1 from the Queen.

4
Richard Pole hald the post in 1516, Edmund Trevor in 1518,
and William Tolly in 1520. (Ibid. , 76-79, n. l).

5
Ibid. Princess Mary apparently had her own Lord of Mis-
rule in 1522. (Ibid. , 90-92).

132

William Baldwin the honor of writing the Mirror for Magistrates,

6

 

published in 1559.
On November 24, Cawarden received a warrant from the

King at Westminster directing him to prepare horse trappings for

four challengers who were to joust before His Majesty during the

Christmas holidays. 7 On the twelfth of December, the Officers, three

saddlers, and ten tailors began work which was to go on every day and

many nights before the Christmas festivities were over on January 7. 8
Cawarden was probably warned of the revival of the Lord of

Misrule tradition early in December although the first official war-

rant did not come to him until December 21. From the President of

the Council, Warwick (now Duke of Northumberland), it advised him

to confer with Ferrers regarding his needs, and to prepare such

9

accordingly.

The Christmas festivities were held at Greenwich where,

 

6Stephen and Lee, VI, 1247-49.

7Feuillerat, 62.

8In all, forty-three tailors, eleven hosiers, thirty painters,
three saddlers, a carver, a joiner, a basketmaker, and probably many
others were employed by the Revels over the Christmas season.
(Ibid., 62-86).

9Ibid., 56. Most subsequent warrants and letters from
Ferrers or the Council were sent to Cawarden less than twenty-four
hours before the costumes or properties were needed. (Ibid., 56-63).
In some cases it seems highly improbable 'that the things could have
been made on such short notice. It is more likely that Cawarden pre-
pared most of Ferrers' needs after their conference but required a
warrant from the Council before he would deliver them.

133

on December 25, the King's players presented a play outfitted by the
Revels from costumes in the storehouse. 10 Eight days later, on
Saturday, January 2, there was a "dronken" masque given by the Lord
of Misrule at night for which the Revels furnished eight Visors and
eight wooden swords and daggers. 11

The next day the challenge that had been made six weeks
before was fulfilled. The Earl of Warwick (John Dudley, son of
Northumberland), 12 Sir Harry Sidney, Sir Henry Nevel, and Sir Henry
Gates challenged all comers at tilt, the exercise in which two riders
attempted to unhorse each other. 13 Eighteen defendants met the
challenge and ran six courses each. 14 For this joust, termed a
"triumph, " the Revels made complete sets of trappings for twelve
light and twelve heavy horses, three of each for each of the four chal-
lengers. The heavy or "great" horses were equipped with bards, that .
is, leather breastplates, 15 and the light horses with caparisons,

1
lighter ornamental trappings. Coverings for the bards and coverings

 

10
Ibid. , 57.

11
Ibid. , 59.

 

 

12Stephen and Lee, VI, 109.

13Bethel, 889.

14Feuillerat, 279 .

15Meyrick, H, 202. In the accounts "bards" and "barbs"
were used interchangeably and were synonymous.

16Bethel, 122.

134
for the caparisons (called baces)l7were made of what could be found.
Six bard coverings and six baces of cloth of gold with borders in-
scribed with the "kinges woorde"18 were taken from among several
in the storehouse which had been inventoried in April, 1547. The re-
mainder, in red and blue cloth of gold, were taken from hangings also
in the storehouse which had been used in the banqueting houses of
Henry VH1. Apparently in an effort to simulate the embroidered bor-
ders of the other twelve coverings, black and white paint was used to
inscribe the motto. Saddles and poitrals19 were decorated and plumes
provided for the bridles. Anthony Toto painted twelve pieces of cloth

20

of gold and twelve pieces of cloth of silver for "bandes, " and the

challenge was accomplished. The costs were almost $90.21
According to his letter sent the previous day, the Lord of
Misrule planned to attend the triumph and to follow it with a joust of

his own, on hobbyhorses. 22 This mock joust was to be part of a Mid-

summer Night, probably a parody of the ancient celebration held

 

17Meyrick, 2 1 4.

8Probably Dieu et mon droit, the royal motto.

 

19
Part of the bard. Ibid. , 202.

2‘:’These "bandes" may have been part of the trappings but
were more likely banners or streamers for lances, from the Latin
bandum, or the Italian banderuola or bandiera. (Shipley, 77).

21Feuillerat, 66-67 and 82-84.

221bid., 59.

 

135

usually on the eve of June 23, the Vigil of St. John the Baptist. 23
Ferrers asked for, and apparently got, six hobbyhorses with harnes-
ses and weapons although these were not recorded in the Revels
accounts. 24 Hobbyhorses were generally made of a light wicker frame
which was fastened to the waist of the "rider" whose legs were con-
cealed by long baces and trappings. 25 Probably this joust was a mim-
icry of the triumph held that afternoon, and may have had some relat-
ion to "a devise by the kinge for a combat to be fought with William
Somer. " A harness of paper boards and three masqueing garments

were made for this "devise, "26 and its similarity to "a momery made

2
of white paper" 7 the following year suggests a mock battle on hobby-

 

23The Midsummer Night had many forms. Kittredge (A Mid-
summer Night's Dream, ix) regarded it as a magic time, "when spirits
might well appear and mislead. " Stow (Survey of London, I, 101-103)
described one in London during the reign of Henry VHI which involved
a great marching watch at night of militiamen, liverymen, pageants,
and grotesques. The last one of the sixteenth century, he stated,
was held in June, 1548.

 

 

The only indication that they were furnished was contained
in a letter which Ferrers sent Cawarden in March, 1552, to settle a
final payment to a staffmaker. The man was paid ‘5 for sixty staves
"deliverred and spent at the Iustes of the hobihorSes on newyeres
daie last. " (Feuillerat, 94). Despite the incorrect date, the jousts
of hobbyhorses were held.

25Halliwell-Phillipps, 452. An excellent picture of a hobby-
horse of this type appeared in Francis Douce, Hlustrations to Shaks-
peare (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, 1807), H, Pl. IX.

26Feuillerat, 73. Another document had: "one harniss bor-
des 8: iij other harnesses of paper made for William Somer to fyghte
in." (Ibid., 279). '

 

27Ibid. , 106. Another document had: "a harnes of white
paper made for the shewe of a midsomer sight. " (Ibid. , 285).

 

136
horses between the fool, Somers, and the Lord of Misrule, with the
former attired in paper armor.
The principal event of the Lord's reign was his ride through
London on Monday, January 4. 8 Early that morning a great scaffold

29

was built near the cross in Cheap, and by eight o'clock the Lord's
barge had docked at Tower Wharf. 30 There he was met by two Foot-
men or Gentlemen Ushers in yellow satin coats and caps lined with
purple sarcenet, 31 fifty or more mounted liverymen in green coats
trimmed with yellow32 over which hung baldrics, or shoulder sashes33

of green and yellow, another fifty or more mounted Tallmen of the

Guard in red and white coats and hoods, 34 and his eight Councilors in

 

28Ibid. , 59.

29Ibid., 276. (From Machyn's Diary). Although this scaf-
fold was not mentioned in the accounts, an undated letter of the period
sent to Cawarden by Ferrers asked that: "Imedia[tely] apoun the
sight hierof you send vnto vs so many carpenters and paynters as you
maye spaire / ffor of very necessitie, and as tyme requireth, we
moste have theame. " (Ibid.). This hasty plea strongly suggests that
the forgotten scaffold, perhaps an afterthought, was built by the Rev-
els: (1) none of the Lord's other activities would have required these
workmen outside the Office, and (2) the Revels did build the scaffold
the following year. —

30Ibid., 59. See Pl. II, p. 163 for route.

 

 

 

3l‘Supplied from the Revels storehouse. (Ibid. , 78).

321bid., 64.

33See Chap. XIV, p. 197.

34Feuillerat, 80.

137
gowns and caps of blue and changeable taffeta. 35 There the Lord
mounted his palfrey (outfitted by the Revels with a saddle and capari-
son trimmed with buttons, four rows of fringe, and fifty-two long and
short tassels), 36 and the entourage made its way up Tower Hill, 300
yards from the river. A standard of yellow and green silk bearing the
figure of St. George37fiwas ordered, and was greeted by the crowd with
a salute of guns and squibs, 38 trumpets, and bagpipes, drones and
flutes. After many declarations of the greatness of the Lord of Misrule,

the party moved out in parade to the cross in Cheap Street. First came

 

351bid, , 69. Cawarden had to make a second livery for the

Councilors. Two days before, Ferrers saw or heard about the costumes
which had been sent to the men .who were to be his Councilors. Some-
what disturbed, he wrote: "it seemeth vnto vs that as towching the
Apparel of our Counseilloures you have mistaken ye persons that sholde
were them as Sir Robert Stafforde 8: Thomas Wyndeham with other
gentlemen that stande also apon their reputacion and wolde not be seen
in London so torchebererlyke disgysed for asmoche as they ar worthe
or h0pe to be worthe. Therfore we referre to your discrecion the
better ordre of ye matter, which was not of our device but of ye Coun-
seills appoyntement. " (Ibid. , 59). In a warrant from the real Council,
Cawarden had merely been directed to furnish silk apparel for eight
Councilors "in suche sorte as you thinke mete" (Ibid. , 58), and had
probably taken old masqueing garments from the storehouse which he
considered suitable. They were returned, however, and a warrant
arrived from the Council upholding Ferrers' wishes, and Cawarden was
obliged to make new costumes.

36Ibid., 80.

 

 

37kg. , 276. (From Machyn's Diary). No mention of this

standard was in‘the accounts.

38The Revels made a hollow club in which to burn squibs.
(Ibid. , 67). These powder-filled paper balls were stuffed into the
cIuE and burned, often exploding with a crack. They are still known
today. (Bethel, 822).

 

138
morris dancers39 dancing to a taboret (a small, single-headed drum)
and probably many pipes and flutes. Following the dancers were his
Councilors, "lyke sage men" in their blue and changeable taffeta gowns.
Next came the Lord of Misrule himself. He wore a suit of cloth of gold
and green velvet trimmed with silver and green velvet. Around his
waist was a girdle or sash of sarcenet and crimson velvet decorated
with gold rings. Over this he wore a coat or gown of cloth of gold and
green velvet trimmed at the border with a double fringe of red silk, and
faced with a fur of drakes' necks and tails. Around his shoulders was a
cape of drakes' tails and on his feet a pair of buskins. 40 A capper chain
which had been "dubble gylded" hung from his neck probably bearing the
badge of his office, 41 and he carried a mace bristling with spikes.

At his side hung a sword or falchion.

 

39Three sarcenet garments were made for dancers of the

trenchmore, a boisterous dance to a lively tune in triple time.
(Halliwell -Phillipp s , 8 8 7) .

40Feuille rat, 77.

41Ibid. , 73. The badge was not recorded in the accounts.

42Ibid. See Chap. XIV, p. 214. Two maces were made.

 

43The Lord's "Amurye" consisted of a "sklavoy blade fawchon, "
probably a mistake for Slavonian bladed falchion, i. e. , a curved sword
made in Slavonia, and a "bilboe bronde, " literally, é. Bilboa sword from
Spain, athin, fine-tempered sword used by "bilbo-men" (later, billmen)
in the sixteenth century. (Halliwell-Phillipps, 175). The scabbards of
both weapons were painted and gilded, and the total cost of weapons and

work was only 63. , which suggests that they were not real. (Feuillerat,
80).

139

Attending the Lord, probably walking beside his horse, were
three Pages in coats of white birds-eye satin paned with crimson sat-
in, 44 a Tumbler in a tight garment, a Juggler in a coat of green and
yellow satin with sleeves of cloth of gold and a pair of slops (or baggy
breeches)46 of cloth of gold trimmed with black chevrons, 47 and pos-
sibly a Minstrel or Irish bagpiper in a garment of russet damask. 48
Certainly close by the Lord was his F001, William Somers. Of four
costumes made for him, he probably wore a suit of crimson satin and
silver sarcenet fringed with red silk, and a multi-colored cap of silk. 49
Around his neck was a copper chain like the Lord's which probably dis-

played a comical badge or escutcheon. He carried a gilded mace, and

at his waist wore a "vyces dagger. "50 Also made for him, and pro-

 

44Ibid. , 78.

 

Such a garment was requested but not mentioned in the
accounts. (Ibid. , 56). It was probably taken from the storehouse.
46
See Chap. XIV, p..l93.

47Feuillerat, 79.

48Ibid.

 

49Ibid.

 

50Another document (Ibid. , 279) had: "One poyneado of wood
turned, " i. e. , a wooden poniard, or slender dagger with a square or
triangular blade. (Bethel, 656). It cost about 13. 6d. to make and was
probably somewhat fancier than the "dagger of lath" found often in the
hands of Shakespeare's fools and players.

140

bably carried in this parade, was a ladle with a hanging bauble.

Following the Lord of Misrule was his Master Of Ordnance
(or Artillery) in a suit of crimson satin trimmed with cloth of silver52
and undoubtedly mounted. With him were fifty Tallmen of the Guard
in red and’white coats and hoods, and thirty Harquebusierss3 dressed
in canvas coats painted to resemble mail armor and canvas helmets
which resembled morions. 54

Behind this company of guards was a cart or carts carrying
55

a pillory, gibbet, heading-axe and block, stocks, and a "little-ease, "

all complete with "prisoners. " The pillory was a frame with holes

 

51Ibid. , 73. This was a combined form of two older elements.

The bauble, an inflated bladder or eel-skin, was an ancient toy of the
fool, often attached to the end of a stick or comic mace and used for
belaboring himself or his tormentors. (Douce, 318). The ladle was
simply 'a large wooden spoon used in the morris dance to collect money
from spectators. Usually it was fixed in the mouth Of the hobbyhorse,
a principal figure in morris dancing. By this time, however, the fool
had taken over the duty of the hobbyhorse and attached his bauble to
the Opposite end of the ladle, probably to use on uncharitable spec-
tators. (Ibid. , 468-70). Somers most likely used his ladle for col-
lecting coins for himself or the Lord of Misrule.

52Feuille rat, 78 .

Foot soldiers armed with harquebuses, firearms similar
to muskets. (Bethel, 377). See P1. VI, Fig. 13, p. 213. The Rev-
els did not supply these weapons.
54Feuillerat, 67 and 279. The morion was a narrow-brimmed
and conical helmet, the standard head-armor Of the time. (Planche,
296). See Pl. VI, Fig. 2, p. 213.

55Feuillerat, 81 .

141
which held the head and hands of a prisoner in an uncomfortable posi-
tion. The gibbet was somewhat more uncomfortable, consisting of
an upright post with a projecting arm from which the prisoner was hung
in chains. 57 Stocks were similar to the pillory but held the feet as
well as the hands. 58 The "little-ease" was, as the name implies, a
small cage in which the occupant could have very little ease. 59 One
prisoner wore a pair of iron manacles and gyves, chained shackles on
his wrists and ankles, 60 and a Jailor with two dozen keys of various
sizes accompanied this rather gruesome band. 61

When the Lord and his train arrived at the scaffold in Cheap

Street, his Herald and Trumpeter, dressed in garments of blue and

 

56Bethel, 639. This was built by a carpenter for the Revels at
a cost of 4s. and was, perhaps, rather complex; whereas a standard
pillory would require one hinge, one hasp, and one lock, this required

three pairs of hinges, four hasps, four staples, four pins, and two
locks. (Feuillerat, 72).

57Shipley, 300. The same carpenter was paid 20d. for the
gibbet in which he used two long plates and two "squiers" (square
plates?). (Feuillerat, 72).

S'8Bethel, 833. Apparently two pairs of stocks were trade,
one by Carowe, the propertymaker, which was foiled and for some
antic of the Lord of Misrule himself. It cost 63. A second, simpler
one was made by a carpenter for 43.10d. (Feuillerat, 72).

5 9Halliwell--Phillipps, 524. The heading-axe and block cost
20d. to make, but no construction details Of these or the little-ease
were' recorded. (Feuillerat, 73).

60Shipley, 319. These, together with a hanging lock for them,
cost 303.10d. (Feuillerat, 73).

61Ibid., 72.

142

yellow satin lined with red sarcenet, 62 announced his Obvious pres-
ence, and a "doctur of ye law" (probably one of his Councilors) pro-
claimed his dignity, progeny, and great household, certainly all in a
comical vein. The Lord and his Councilors drank a toast from a hogs-
head of wine which had been provided, perhaps through the Revels Of-
fice, 63 and was then tapped so that his entire party and the public
might drink. 64

It was probably at this time, from the scaffold, that the
Lord's Cofferer or Treasurer cast some 9000 counters, in imitation
Of coins, to the crowd. These included 3000 white counters, 3000

66

red counters, and 3000 "lyon" counters in three leather bags.

 

62Ibid., 78.

63A COOPer was paid 23. 8d. for an unstated item, perhaps a
hogshead (Ibid. , 81). The following year the Revels did provide
hogsheads for wine. (Ibid., 107). ‘

4 ,
6 Ibid., 276. (From Machyn's Diary).

65

This event was copied from the Boy Bishops of France, who,
throughout the fifteenth century, minted coins or tokens to be given away
as souveniers Of their reigns. (Chambers, Med. Stage, I, 407).

66

 

Feuillerat, 71. Elsewhere in the accounts (Ibid., 81) the
white counters were called silver "half groses"; the re-d—w—ere called
gold "crusadoes"; and the "lyon" counters were called gold "lyons."

By "half groses" perhaps half groschen was intended, an early sil-

ver German coin of little value. (Bethel, 365). "Crusadoes" were
Portuguese coins, also Of little value. (Halliwell-Phillipps, 284).

Gold "lyons" may have been in imitation of Scottish coins. (Feuillerat,
312). These 9000 counters cost £5. 43.2d. and weighed forty-five
pounds. Probably, for their weight, they were not carried by the Cof-
ferer through the parade, but were taken directly to the scaffold from
the Revels Office in the Lord's "Jewelhouse" (most likely a small chest
or coffer) for which a great "flagon" chain was made and gilded. (Ibid. , 81).

143
Following this event, the Lord with all his men rode to the
home of the Lord Mayor for dinner, then to the Lord Treasurer's at
the Priory of the Austin Friars, and finally to the Tower Wharf where
7
he boarded a barge for Greenwich. 6 The visit to London undoubtedly
required the entire day, certainly an exhausting one for all concerned.
No entertainment took place the following day.
The final day Of the Lord of Misrule's reign, January 6, 1552,
began with a tournament to determine the winners Of the jousts held
68
three days before. That night, there was
first a play, after a talk betwen one that was called Riches,
and th'other Youth, wither of them was better. After some
prety reasoning ther cam in lsix champions of either side . . .
Al thes fought tow to tow at barriers in the hall. Then came
in tow apparelled like almaines, . . . and tow cam in like
friers. but the almaines wold not suffer them to pase til they
had fought . . . After this folowed tow maskes on of men

another of women. lglgen a banket Of 120 dishes. This was
th'end of Christmas.

The play was apparently an interlude presented by John Birch

and John Brown, two of the King's Players, and three of their compan-

 

The Cofferer wore a coat and cap of yellow satin lined with purple
sarcenet. (Ibid. , 78).

67Ibid. , 276. (From Machyn's Diay).

68Ibid. , 278.

 

69% ,The "almaines, " or Germans, were played by the
Earl of Ormand and Jacques Granado; the friars by Mr. Drury and
Thomas Cobham.

144
ions, whom the Revels outfitted from the storehouse. 70 For the
Dialogue of Riches and Youth, the Revels supplied at least one costume,
a frock of crimson satin with green velvet and tinsel undersleeves, and
a loose cape. 71 Probably they also outfitted the "almaines" and the
friars from the storehouse.
At least three masques were presented during the twelve days

of Christmas. 72

A Masque of Argus, the hundred-eyed—monster Of
Greek mythology, 73 was the only men's masque. The two women's
masques included a Masque of Amazons, "women Of warre, " and a
Masque of Moors, "with black skalloppes vpon tynsell, " only one of

which was presented on Twelfth-night..74

 

70Ibid. , 86. Cawarden was given a warrant to furnish their
garments, none of which were recorded.

71Ibid. , 278. The Revels probably also supplied the other
costumes; a warrant was issued for them. (Ibid. , 60). Holder of the
warrant was Sir Thomas Chaloner, a diplomat and author who, in 1549,
translated into English The Praise of Folly by Erasmus. (Stephen and
Lee, 1H, 1366-67).

72Feuillerat, 85.

 

 

Benet, 63. Fourteen dozen glasses, or mirrors, bought at

this time, were perhaps for the monster's eyes.
74 . . .

Feuillerat, 85. Little was recorded in the accounts regard-
ing the costumes of these masques. Twenty-four headpieces were made
by a capper of which eight were for men, eight for women, and eight
decorated with serpents. Eight of the first sixteen were of yellow gold
sarcenet painted with faces. Those with serpents were for a "momery"
(see p. 135) as were 200 buttons used on the "white garmentes." Six
molds were made for the serpents and eleven were wired, apparently
to the headpieces. Six bullions or ornaments for the headpieces of the
momery were bought. Other materials bought or made included ninety-
nine Visors, twenty-four gloves, seven lawn partlets, six suits of lawn

145
The Lord of Misrule's entry into court and presentation to
the King probably took place on December 25, the first day of his reign.
He pretended to have come from the moon, 75 and entered with an Arnbas-
sador dressed in a costume of red dornix and an Interpreter dressed in
yellow satin. 7 The Lord himself wore a suit of carnation-colored
satin striped with silver and trimmed with a double fringe of red silk,

77
a yellow sarcenet girdle, and a cap of crimson satin and silk. He

was probably also wearing a visor which had been gilded for him. 78
The Lord came into court under a canopy which may have been part
of a chariot, or open sedan chair, carried by four of his men, which
was also built for him. The canopy was probably a simple cloth-cov-
ered dome which was trimmed with three dozen "chyme" bells and four
dozen "fox" bells. The chariot, which included a "seate," was de-

81
corated with three silver knobs.

 

partlets with sleeves, and two ells Of red and black sarcenet for the
linings, tyings, and headbands of the visors. (Ibid., 66-73).

75mm, , 89. (From a letter of the following year).

76Ibid. , 79.

77Ibid. , 77.

781618., 66.

791bid., 89.

0Made by a carpenter, of a hoop, timber, and nails. (Ibid. ,
70-72).

It, also, was made of hoops, timber, and nails. (Ibid.).

146

The Lord was attended on this first introduction to the court
by his Pages, Footmen, Herald, and Trumpeter, and possibly his Min-
strel, Tumbler, and Juggler. Certainly his Fool was there in one of
the four costumes made for him: a white and blue baudkin suit trim-
med with red satin, with a frock Of tawny silk striped with gold and
trimmed with fur at the neck; a suit of silver scalloped and fringed with
green silk, with labels of crimson satin and gold, and a hood; and a
suit of red, yellow, green, black, and white velvet with a cap of green
velvet and red sarcenet.

Expenses for the twelve days of Christmas were staggering.
The revival of the Lord of Misrule cost just under £300. The Triumph
of January third and sixth was almost £90. The three masques cost
over £80. Some £470 were spent, 83 probably more than had ever
been spent on an English King's Christmas entertainment before. Yet
the court apparently considered the fun worth the money, for Ferrers

was engaged again the following year to play the Lord Of Mis rule. 84

 

82Ibid. , 79. The fourth costume was worn during the ride
through London. (See p. 139, above).

83Ibid. , 76. The accounts had: Lord of Misrule - £299. 53. 5d. ,
Triumphs -£89. 133.9d. , Masques - ‘80. 17s. 4d., with a "Summa To-
talis" of £509. 9d. However, the first three figures add to only £469.
163.6d.

84According to Stephen and Lee (VI, 1248), Northumberland
paid Ferrers £50 in March, 1552, for his services as Lord of Misrule.
(This payment may have been made the following year however; many
facts in their account of Ferrers as the Lord of Misrule do not agree
with the Revels accounts).

Both Chambers (Med. Stage, I, 405) and Welsford (145) be-

 

147

Between June 1 and June 7, 1552, an airing took place with
four Officers and seven tailors attending. 85

Late in November, 1552, the Privy Council sent a warrant
to Sir John Williams, Treasurer of the Court of Augmentations, 8
directing him to pay George Ferrers £100 towards the necessary
charges of his appointment as Lord of the King's Pastimes. 87 Shortly
thereafter, Ferrers sent Cawarden a detailed letter outlining his
wishes, and on December 17 the Revels began their work. 89

On Christmas Day, the Lord sent an embassy to the King

consisting Of a Herald, a Trumpeter, an Orator, and an Interpreter.

The first two arrived in identical costumes: ruffed-sleeved coats of

 

lievedifriction existed between Cawarden and Ferrers, and that Caw—
arden put every possible difficulty in the way of Ferrers, which neces-
sitated the warrants from the Council. They both mentioned Ferrers
signing one letter "the lorde Myserabell" during his second reign.
(Feuillerat, 93). They may have been right, although Cawarden pro-
bably required the warrants as contracts against the trouble he was hav-
ing in collecting wages and debts from the Crown. Despite the warrants,
however, the debts Of this Christmas were not paid until after the fol-
lowing Christmas. (See pp. 67-68, above).

85Feuillerat, 115.

86
Stephens and Lee, XXI, 413.

87Feuillerat, 280.

88Ibid., 89-90. See App. V. pp. 233-35.

Over a twenty-two day period, forty-six tailors, eleven
hosiers, thirty painters, six joiners, five carpenters, five basket-
makers, three cloth-cutters ("carvers"), a buskinmaker, the four
Officers, and nine others worked days and nights on the costumes and
properties for the Christmas entertainment. (Ibid. , 89-125).

148

red sarcenet, trimmed with gold sarcenet, tufted with white sarcenet,
and lined with red buckram. Their buskins were of green satin and
their caps of red satin. Costumes worn by the Orator and Interpreter
were very similar: the former was dressed in a long-sleeved garment
of crimson sarcenet guarded with gold sarcenet and tufted with white
sarcenet; his headpiece was of white damask fringed with Venice gold
and lined with buckram. The Interpreter wore a red sarcenet coat
trimmed with yellow gold sarcenet, tufted with white sarcenet, and
lined with red buckram. His cap was Of yellow satin. 90

Apparently the Lord's court entry was somewhat grander
this year. The Revels sent a bargeman to decorate the King's brigan-
tine 91 with forty-two yards of watchet (pale blue) and white kersey,
the Lord's colors. On St. Stephen's Day, December 26, 92 he was re-
ceived "beneth the bridge"93 by his Admiral, Thomas Windham, Mas-
ter of the Ordnance of the King's Ships.94 With other vessels in atten-

dance they sailed down to Greenwich where, upon landing, the Lord

 

90Ibid. , 121-23.

91A two-masted, square-rigged ship. (Bethel, 105).

92Benet, 977.

93Apparently London Bridge, the only bridge over the Thames
until the eighteenth century. George Wharton Edwards, London
(Philadelphia: The Penn Publishing Co., 1922), p. 22.

94Feuillerat, 281.

149
was received by Sir George Howard, his Master of the Horse, 95 and
four Pages of Honor dressed in cloaks Of blue taffeta, breeches of
white tinsel and silver sarcenet, and caps of white taffeta trimmed
with wreaths of blue taffeta and silver fringe. 96 One Page carried
his headpiece, a cap of maintenance, or office, 97 of red feathers and
Chamlet thrum with a plume. A second Page carried his shield pro-
bably painted with Hydra, the nine-headed monster slain by Hercules,
which was the chief beast of the Lord's heraldic arms.99 The shield
may also have borne his motto, Semper Ferians, "alwaies feasting

100 101
or keping holie daie. " The third Page carried his sword, and

 

the fourth his axe, a painted wooden property.
For this court entry the Lord asked for garments for, and
may have had with him, six Councilors, a Divine, a Poet, a Philoso-

pher, an Astronomer, a Physician, an Apothecary, a Master of Re-

 

In reality, Howard was Master Of the Henchmen and brother
to former Queen Katherine Howard. (Ibid.).

96Ibid. , 120. One of the Pages, Robert Rolf, was probably a
tailor by trade for he made his own costume and was paid by the Rev-
els for the material. (Ibid. , 98).

97see Chap. XIV, pp. 198-99. This may have been decorated
with holly leaves, the device of the Lord's crest.

98

Not recorded in the accounts.

99

Ibid. Ferrers mistakenly called it "the serpente with
sevin heddes cauled hidra. "

1"Olbid.

 

101Not recorded in the accounts.

150
quests, a Dizard or F001 (John Smith), friars, drummers, and a
Tumbler. The Councilors wore wide-sleeved robes and hats of blue
taffeta. 102 Cloth gowns were made for a Poet, an Advocate (probably
the Philosopher), an Astronomer, a Physician, and an Apothecary. 103
For the Fool, the Revels made three costumes, the first of which may
have been worn at this time: a long coat and hood of white and red
baldachin trimmed with black passement lace, and crimson baldachin
buskins;104 a vice's coat of white and red damask figured with gold
"churchwork" and trimmed with passement lace of black silk and gold,
and hood Of cloth of gold;105 a long coat, hood, and buskins Of cloth of
gold figured with white, red, and green velvet, together with a yellow
sarcenet girdle. 106 Four friars wore hooded garments Of tinsel, 107

108

three drummers wore cloth gowns, and a jerkin and pair Of paned

slops Of yellow and blue satin were worn by the Tumbler. 109 The

 

1021bid., 120.

 

103Ibid., 97.

104Ibid., 119.

105Ibid. , 98.

106Ibid., 119.

107Ibid. . 98. Two other cloth gowns for friars were apparently
used at another event. (Ibid.).

108Ibid. Ferrers had sent Cawarden patterns for Turkish gar-
ments for a kettle drummer, his boy, another drummer, and a fifer,
but only three garments were made. (See App. V, p. 235).

 

l(”Ibid. , 123. Clarence, his Juggler, may have appeared with

151
Herald and Trumpeter who had appeared before the King the previous
day wore great coats of blue satin with ruffed sleeves and waists and
trimmed with passement lace; their caps of blue satin were trimmed

_ _ 110
With white sarcenet.

The Lord entered the court111 wearing a robe Of white balda-
chin trimmed with knots of cloth Of gold. Over the robe he wore a coat
Of fine, flat cloth of silver with embroidery and borders Of leaves of
gold and colored silks. His cloth-of—gold breeches were embroidered
and paned with silver sarcenet, and, over buskins of white baldachin,
he wore mule-like slippers of Bruges satin. A plumed cap Of main-
tenance completed his costume. “2

The Lord spent one of the twelve days in hunting and hawking
with his Councilors. His attire included a coat Of cloth of gold with
undersleeves of white baldachin, and figured with red and green velvet

"checkerwork. " His hat was of plain cloth of gold trimmed with green

satin leaves, and a green silk baldric was slung over his shoulder to

 

the Tumbler; his costume was of the same material and colors. (Ibid.).
(See App. V, p. 235.)

llolbid. , 122.

Just how he entered the court is not clear. He had given
Cawarden his CEO-fie of "under a Canepie as the last yeare, or in a
chare triumphall, or vppon some straunge beast." (Ibid. , 89). The
accounts revealed only that a joined chair was made for his seat.
(Ibid., 102).

112 . . .

Ibid. , 117. Ferrers had asked that, on the first day, all his
apparel be blue, similar to a piece Of velvet which he sent to Cawarden.
Garments matching his sample were made, but were used later in his reign.

152

1 13
hold a hunting horn. The Councilors wore coats of russet damask

lined with red buckram, and with sleeves of crimson taffeta. 114 Their
hats, also of russet damask, were lined with yellow sarcenet and trim-
med with green satin leaves. 115 They carried "mene" hunting horns. ”6
On the night of January first, the Lord of Misrule judged a
joust of hobbyhorses held at Greenwich. Six challengers with horses
in black and yellow trappings met six defendants with horses trimmed
in blue and white trappings; each horse wore a plume and two dozen
bells. 7 A toil, a low net normally used for trapping small game,
was borrowed from the Office of the Tents, and together with chairs,
was set up at Greenwich as a barrier or fence. The jousters fought

11
with truncheons, that is, broken spear shafts, 9 the right comic ele-

ment for a joust of hobbyhorses. The Lord wore a robe and coat Of red

 

113Ibid., 106 and 118.

114Ibid. , 123.

llslbid” 97.

116Ibid. , 106. Either mean (of poor quality), or mene (moan-
ing), (HalliweH-Phillipps, 549) was meant.

Ferrers ordered his hunting attire in a letter of December 27,
in which he twice assured Cawarden that it would be returned later.
This is a fair indication that the other costumes made for his party
would £1_<_)_t_be returned, but would probably be given to their wearers
for their services. None of the costumes made during Christmas 1551
or 1552 appeared in the 1555 inventory.

117The hobbyhorses were made by Carowe (called "karver") at
133.4d. each; the Lord's horse had three heads and cost 33. more.
(Ibid., 107).

118

 

Bethel, 893.

1193keai, 422.

153
baldachin trimmed with an embroidered guard Of purple and silver

cloth and fur. His breeches and hose were of cloth of gold figured

with red and green velvet, and with a cut guard of cloth of gold. 120

His buskins were of red baldachin.121

A "momery" was again held, perhaps on this night, the cos-
tumes for which were made of white paper, white thread, ribbon, tow,
and cotton. 122 It was perhaps identical to "the combat of the lorde Of
misrule, " for which six great wooden "squertes" were turned "lyke
vnto dragons. "123

The Lord's ride through London took place on the fourth of
January He landed at Tower Wharf in the morning where he was met
by a Sergeant Vawce, Lord Of Misrule to John Mainard, one Of the

sheriffs of London, who spent the entire day in his attendance. 124

 

120These breeches were of the same cloth. color, and trimming

as his hunting coat, and were probably of that ensemble. (See p. 152).
121
No costumes for the jousters were recorded in the accounts,
but garments were ordered for the Lord's Almoner, Marshall, Treas-
urer, and Master of Ordnance, who may have had parts in the joust.
(Feuillerat, 91-92). The Revels made a cloth gown for the Almoner,
and blue taffeta gowns for the last three. (Ibid. , 97-98).
122
Ibid. , 106. Another document had: "Armure - harnes of

white paper made for the shewe of a midsomer sight - viijs. " (Ibid. ,
285).
123 .
Ibid. , 107. Another document had: "Squertes of wood
turned . . . in steade of gonnes." (Ibid., 285). They cost 23. each,
and may have been water guns fitted with bladders which, when pressed,
would squirt.
124 . .
Stow, Annales, 608-09. Ferrers may have arrived in the dec-
orated brigantine which had been used nine days before. (See p. 148).

154
Vawce saluted the Lord with his sword, and the procession got under
way. Vawce led the parade followed by his men, each with a blue and
white ribbon around his neck, and probably in simple but identical cos-
tumes.125 The Lord followed in a robe, coat, headpiece, and scapler
of purple velvet ornamented and furred. The coat was lined with a ma-
terial resembling powdered ermine, and all his garments were welted
with blue and gold tinsel. His hat was trimmed with purple velvet
striped with threads of silver. His breeches, of purple cloth of silver,
were welted with purple tinsel and gold, and his buskins were, like the
hat, of purple velvet striped with silver threads. 126 Around him were
morris dancers, singers, pipers, and drummers, as well as two Foot-
men in jerkins and breeches of blue satin trimmed with white satin. 1‘27
On the Lord's shoulder, or with one Of his attendants, was an ape
dressed in the colors of his livery. 128 Following the Lord were his
four "children, " John Smith and three other Fools, dressed in long
coats and hoods of crimson taffeta and white sarcenet which were lined

with gold and silver lawn, and trimmed with gold tinsel and yellow satin. 129

 

125Feuillerat, 281. (From Machyn's Diary). Machyn's
account of this procession gave more details Of the route taken but
fewer of the order Of march, than his account of the previous year.

126Ibid. , 119.

127Ibid., 121.

 

 

1281mm, 99.

129Ibid. , 119-20.

155

His Councilors, in blue taffeta gowns, came next and were followed
by at least ninety Liverymen in coats, jerkins, and hose Of pale blue
and white kersey. 130

Following the Liverymen may have been an Irishman and
Irishwoman. The former was dressed in a long blue satin garment
paned with red satin and lined with black buckram. On his head was a
wig of black flax and a dornix headpiece, and on his feet, buskins of
Bruges satin; he carried an Irish sword. 1‘31 The Irishwoman wore a
yellow buckram smock and a girdle of red sarcenet. A mantle, or
cape, of red satin was paned with blue satin and lined with red buckram.
She, too, wore a wig of flax. 132

At the end Of this procession was the Lord's "prisons, "
probably attended by his Provost Marshall, 133 his Under Marshall,
his Master Of Ordnance, and a Jailor's boy. The Provost Marshall
wore a large coat Of white baldachin with great ruffs trimmed with blue
satin lozenges. His cap of blue satin was tufted with yellow sarcenet

and fringed with blue fringe. The Under Marshall and Master of Ord-

nance wore short coats of crimson satin trimmed with yellow satin,

 

13"Ibid., 99-104.

13lSee Pl. VI, Fig. 3, p. 213.

132Ibid. , 123.

133A Provost Marshall was formerly a prison keeper or jailor.

(Bethel, 681).

156

and hats of yellow satin with rolls of black gold sarcenet. 134 His
prisons included only a pillOry and stocks this year.

The parade136 moved through Tower Street, Mart Lane,
Grace Church Street, and Cornhill to the cross in Cheap Street. 137
There the Revels had erected a scaffold with a canopy138 and equipped
it with ten tuns, or hogsheads139 and a cupboard, which probably held
drinking cups. In a mock ceremony the Lord of Misrule knighted the
Sheriff's Lord, Sergeant Vawce, and many toasts were drunk while the

Cofferer threw coins to the crowd. 140

 

134Feuillerat, 121.
135 . .
The gibbet and little-ease may have been brought from
storage and used again although there is no mention of either in the
Revels accounts or Machyn's Diarj.

 

36Certainly other attendants who had served the Lord during
the previous ten days must have also appeared in the parade. These
included his Herald, Trumpeter, Orator, Interpreter, Master Of the
Horse, four Pages of HOnor, Almoner, Physician, Apothecary, Astron-
omer, Poet, Advocate, four Friars, Juggler, Tumbler, two Gentlemen
Ushers, two Sergeants at Arms, Messenger, and Cofferer.

137see P1. 11, p.163.

138Feuillerat, 107. The accounts had: "a Skaffold . . . and
a tilte for him." The latter was a canopy of a cart or stall. (Bethel,
889).

139 .

Feuillerat, 107. The accounts had: "x tonne of hogges
heades. " Since tuns were hogsheads (Bethel, 916), "of" is probably
a mistake for "or. "
140Feuillerat, 281. (From Machyn's Diary). Only six pounds
of white counters were bought for the event this year; fewer than 1500
"coins. " (Ibid. , 108).

 

157

Following the ceremony the Lord and his Councilors rode to
the home of the Lord Mayor, Sir George Barnes, where they dined;
the remainder Of his company dined at the homes Of various Aldermen
and Sheriffs. The Lord was given a silver standing cup by the Mayor,
and a hogshead Of wine and a barrel of beer set at the Mayor's gate for

14
the Lord's company. 1 After dinner, the Lord paid his respects to
the Sheriff in Wood Street, then with his train rode through Old Jewry
and Lothbury Streets to the Lord Treasurer's at the Priory of the Aus-
. . 142 .
tin Friars, where another banquet was held. From the Priory they
rode down through Bishopsgate Street, past the Leaden Hall, and through
Fenchurch Street to the Tower Wharf. With the Sheriff's Lord still in
attendance and providing torch lights, the Lord Of Misrule boarded his
. 143 . . . .
pinnace, and With a salute of guns and much dancmg and Singing,
, , 144

took leave of London for the final time.

On December 31, the Privy Council sent a warrant to Cawar-
den directing him to provide costumes from the storehouse for a "Tri-
umph of Cupid" which was to be presented before the King on Twelfth

145 146

Night. This had been written by Sir George Howard who was to

 

141Stow, Survey of London, 11. 608-09-
142

 

Feuillerat, 281. (From Machyn's Diary).

 

l4E3A light sailing vessel. (Bethel, 641)“

144Feuillerat, 281. (From Machyn's Diary”

 

145Ibid. , 95.

14:6The same gentleman who served Ferrers as Master Of the Horse.

158

provide Cawarden with a drawing Of what he had in mind. 147 Thus,

in less than six days, the Revels had to prepare properties and cos-
tumes for another entertainment.
. . 148
The chief characters of the Triumph were Venus, the R0-
man Goddess of Love and Beauty; Mars, the Roman God Of War; Cupid,

149

the Roman Boy-God of Love; an "herault cuoeur ardant";

150
rently, the Lord of Misrule and some of his men.

and, appa -

 

151 over which

For Venus, the Revels made a triumphal chair
stood an image of Cupid. Mars' chair was in the form Of a dragon with

a head and mouth of iron plate "with stoppes to burne like fier, " and

aqua vitae was used as fuel. 152 Both chairs were trimmed with tennis

 

147He never did, however. In his letter that followed the war-

rant he stated that, not being an artist, he could only describe the
Triumph, "levenge the hole Device of the thinge to your Desskression. "
(Ibid. , 93).
148H . . . . . . . . .
An imitation of the Italian Trionfi, With their triumphall
chariots full of Greek gods and goddesses." (Welsford, 147).

14c)That is, Messenger of Love?

150Another letter (apparently from Howard) regarding the Tri-
umph began: "My lordes persone [,1 Chauncellour, Treasorer, Comp-
troller, Vizchamberlaine [,1 my lordes Counsaillours arayed in aparel
accustomed [:1 The Marshall and his bande [,1 Those persones be al-
redy furnyshed. " (Feuillerat, 94). "My lordes persone" was probably
the Lord of Misrule, and "Counsaillours" probably his Councilors.
"The Marshall and his bande" probably included the—Provost Marshall,
Under MarshaH, and Master of Ordnance. (See p. 155).

151Chairs for both Venus and Mars were called "pageants" in
the accounts.

152Although the "stOppes" may have been jets through which the
aqua vitae was burned, they were more likely "stupes"; pieces of tow or

flannel dipped in the liquor and used as Wicks. (Skeat, 394).

159

balls and "cimbal" bells. 153

Venus entered the hall first, preceded by her Herald and
Trumpeter, each dressed in gold sarcenet garments and headpieces
trimmed with black purled lace and black gold sarcenet. Her chair
was borne by four men who also acted as torchbearers. Attending her
were two ladies, "Ydelnes and Dalyance, " and two fools in white and
orange-paned coats of satin guarded with green and yellow satin, and
hoods of orange satin. Mars followed, borne in his dragon-like chair
by four torchbearers and attended by three gentlemen armed with
shields and swords. Mars himself wore armor covered with hair, and
carried a shield and bared sword. At this point, the messenger of love,
in a short garment and coat armor painted with burning hearts pierced
with darts, was probably sent by Venus to Mars with a request to aid
her in the rescue of Cupid, who was being held by the Marshall. A
"Maske of ladies" rescued Cupid (clad in canvas,hose, a silver doublet
with Wings of white feathers, carrying a bow and arrows, and blind-
folded) While Mars and his men no doubt battled with the Marshall and
his band who wore their own armor and carried shields. 154

Busy as the Revels were with costumes for the Lord of Misrule

and the Triumph of Cupid, they also had to prepare three masques which

 

153Feuillerat, 110.
154
Much of this action is conjecture. Howard's descriptions
were somewhat confused, and the accounts reveal only the costumes and
properties made. Although Mars and Venus were once husband and wife,
and Cupid the son of Venus by Vulcan, no parallel story involving these

three characters can be found.

160

were presented during the Christmas season. 155 One was a Masque

156 for which the Revels made can-

of Covetous Men "with longe noses"
. . 157

vas breeches stuffed With hair, caps, and "showes." Torchbearers

to the Covetous Men were Baboons158 who wore black and tawny face-

masks of tinsel, "furred heades, " and furred gloves on their hands and

feet which were probably long enough to cover their arms and legs.

J 159

For a Masque of Graziers the Revels made six "corner"

 

caps trimmed with two dozen aiguillettes which resembled mother of
pearl. Their torchbearers were Soldiers for whom six masqueing
swords were made.

A Masque of "women of Diana hunting" had "matrons" as

torchbearers, and their garments were of cloth of silver trimmed

with flowers of silk and gold. 160 This may have been the "Maske of

155Because the other activities took precedence in the accounts,

very little can be determined of the nature of these masques.

156Also called "maske of satires" in the accounts. There were
eight masquers and eight torchbearers.
157Thirty-two lambskins for these costumes were probably used
in the caps which were made by a skinner. The nature or use Of eight
"fette of pipes" bought at 13. each and used in this masque is not ap-
parent.

158Also called "savage men" in the accounts.

159A "maske of pollenders, " also mentioned in the accounts,
was probably identical to this one; the verb "to poll" meant to clip or
shear the hair or horns of animals (Shipley, 518), a task related to
grazing.

160 . . . .
Nothing else concerning this masque occurred in the accounts.

161
ladies." involved in the Triumph of Cupid.

Cawarden relied heavily on costumes and properties in the
storehouse to outfit the various entertainments this Christmas season;
he estimated the value of these garments at over 11.3262.161 Besides
this, the masques cost over £47; the Triumph of Cupid cost the same;
and the expenses of the Lord of Misrule were over $342.

The King had not been well for some time, and it was decided,
apparently even while the Lord of Misrule was cavorting, that enter-
tainment would be presented on Candlemas (February 2) and during
Shrovetide in an effort to raise the spirits of the young boy. The Revels
went to work on January 7, but by February the King was considerably
worse and Candlemas entertainment was postponed until Shrovetide.
Work at the Office continued but Shrovetide entertainment was likewise
canceHed, and the Office closed on February 16. Edward's health im-
proved somewhat toward the end Of February, and the Revels worked
through the entire month Of March to prepare five masques and two plays
which were presented over Easter and May Day. 165

The Masque Of Greek Worthies involved the six mythological

heroes, Hercules, Jason, Perseus, Pirithous, Archilles, and Theseus.

 

_ 161Feuillerat, 124.

165nm” 140-41.
166 .

They all may have been Argonauts, if any common character-
istic was intended. Oskar Seyffert, A Dictionary of Classical AntiL'-
ties, ed. Henry Nettleship and J. E. Sandys (2nd ed. rev.; New York:
mridian Books, 1956), p. 62.

 

166

162

MAP OF LONDON - CIRCA 1600162

Warwick Inn, Old Office of the Revels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . White
The Blackfriars, Office of the Revels, 1547-1559 . . . . . . . . Black

Stopping Places Of the Lord Of Misrule,
163
January 4’ 1552 O I C O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 0 Red

Route and Stopping Places of the

164
Lord of Misrule, January 4, 1553 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Green

 

 

 

162Stow, Survey of London, H, Back Cover.
163According to Machyn's Diary. (Feuillerat, 276).
164

According to Machyn's Diary. (Ibid., 281).

 

 

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164

These masquers appeared in long garments of white cloth of silver
stained with colors which had short sleeves paned with red satin. The
garments were trimmed with cloth leaves, and each character was iden-
tified by his name "wrytten" on his breast and back. Pouldrons, or
shoulder plates, 167 and shinguards on their buskins were made Of
paste and cement in the form of lion heads which were trimmed with
hair and given tongues of red sarcenet. Each headpiece, also in the
form Of a lion head, covered the head but exposed the masquer's face
through the lion's mouth, and was trimmed with spangles and shell-
shaped plumes. Each masquer carried a gilded shield and a falchion,
the latter with a handle shaped like the neck and head of a griffin. Her-
cules also carried a great club. Their torchbearers were Satyrs who
wore upper garments of changeable taffeta and leg coverings of "oxens
legges 8: counterfette ffeete. "168 They carried gilded halberds.

Probably the most grotesque masque presented over the ele-
ven-year period was the Masque of Deaths, ”being medyoxs half man
half death. " Six masquers appeared in doublets and hose painted(?)169

like living men in the front and like skeletons in the back. Their head-

 

167Skeat, 304.

168Feuillerat, 133-35. Such costumes suggest figures more
like Pan, whose legs and feet were those of a goat (Seyffert, 453),
than Satyrs, who were wholly men. (Ibid. , 560).
169Anthony Toto bought gum arabic, saffron, and other colors
at this time, and possibly used them for painting these cloth garment.

165

pieces, which perhaps covered the entire head, were likewise "doble
vizaged, " and they carried long spears and shields, each fitted in the
center with the head Of a dead beast. Their torchbearers were wholly
"deaths" dressed in canvas frocks painted like skeletons, and a "tab-
retter, " or drummer, dressed likewise, was engaged to lead the ma-
cabre procession. 170

Certainly the most unusual, and probably quite comical, en-
tertainment was the Masque of Bagpipes. Six large, ihollow bagpipes
were fashioned of barrel hoops, wickers, osiers, and rods, and covered
with canvas. False pipes were fixed on the bags and the pieces then
gilded and painted. Six apes were molded of paste and cement, then
each covered with a dozen grey conyskins and mounted in a sitting posi-
tion on top of each bagpipe with the false pipes in its mouth. Four min-
strels with loud pipes and two with soft pipes went inside the bagpipes,
and by moving about, causing the apes to move, undoubtedly presented
a very amusing sight. When the fun was over, the minstrels appeared
from the bagpipes in yellow kersey coats, breeches, and hose. 171

In the Masque of Cats, six masquers appeared, apparently

wearing cat-like costumes. Their tails of wicker were covered with

172
thirty dozen catskins and their headpieces trimmed with "amells of

 

l7"Feuillerat, 130-33.

171Ibid. , 130-36.

172The accounts had: "great tayles of wycker made for a maske

Of Cattes all couered over with cattes tayles. " (Ibid. , 131).

166
glas and stone holowe counterfett lyk bace stones," and wooden balls
and buttons foiled and silvered to resemble pearls.

For the Masque of Tumblers "goinge vpon theyre handes with
theyre feete vaard" eight costumes of paste and cement were made,
the coverings for the legs and feet resembling sleeves and hands, and
vice versa. Headpieces, undoubtedly with painted faces, were also of
molded work, and "the tumbler thus attired, his arms made to resem-
ble legs, and his legs like arms, a mask on his breech, by alternately
turning his face to and from the spectators, made his real position
laughably equivocal. "173

These entertainments were not "masques" in the strict sense
of the word, but pastimes designed to cheer the obviously dying King.
They were grotesque and at the same time funny, good examples of the
late medieval sense of humor.

William Baldwin's Irish Play Of the State of Ireland was to have
been presented on Candlemas174 but, like the masques, had to be post-
poned until the spring. Most of the costumes were taken from those on

hand in the storehouse and are consequently not known, but other pieces

which were newly made give a good idea of the dramatis personae. It

 

appears to have been a play Of politico-religious nature which included

a king (for Whom a crown was made of gold paper and buckram), a re-

 

173Kempe, 88. Such heavy and stiff attire seems, however,

particularly cumbersome for tumblers.

l7llFeuillerat, 288 .

167
ligious character (who wore another headpiece of gold paper), a devil
(whose apparel was hired), Lady Fame (in a cap and coat painted with
175
eyes, tongues, and ears), and at least two Irishmen (for whom were
made a headpiece and gown of Irish frieze, a grey kersey coat lined
with cotton and cut with long pleats, a dagger, a halberd, sword, and
. 176
spear). Wigs and beards were also rented.
. . 177
John Heywood, Singing-Master at St. Paul's, presented
his boys in a play, probably at Eastertime. Twelve coats of lockeram
were made for it by the Revels, the only extant detail. 178
While Northumberland schemed to maintain his dominating
influence over a successive ruler, 179 the King's health declined. On
July 6, 1553, he died, 180 and by September the Revels were busy again,

preparing for the coronation Of Mary.

After the fall of Somerset in October, 1551, court entertain-

 

175See p. 117, n. 26.

176 ,
Feuillerat, 141 -43.

177
Gas sner, 158.

178
Feuillerat, 142.

179R is interesting to note that the Revels were involved in the
marriage of Lady Jane Grey to Northumberland's son, Guildford Dud-
ley. On May 20, he wrote to Cawarden requesting the loan of enough
garments for a masque of men and a masque of women to be used at
their wedding a few days later. (Feuillerat, 306). Undoubtedly Cawar-
den complied.

180

Innes, 216. The now-annual airing was conducted between

May 31 and June 7 with six tailors and the Officers in attendance.
(Feuillerat, 144).

168
ment became lighter and more colorful. Certainly the revival of the
Lord of Misrule was largely responsible for this brighter attitude, but
the masques, too, were presented more as gay spectacles than solemn
ceremonies. Even classical themes, such as the Triumph of Cupid
and the Masque Of Greek Worthies, had elements of humor and fantasy.
Just who was responsible for this subtle change is not clear. Possibly
it was Cawarden who, once Somerset lost his influence, saw his chance
to express his own ideas. Possibly it was an imaginative member of
the Council in a position superior to Cawarden's. It may have been
the King himself, however, who told the Lord Chamberlain his wishes

which were passed on to the creative Revels.

CHAPTER XIH

THE YEARS OF MARY: SEPTEMBER, 1553 TO NOVEMBER, 1558

Late in September, 1553, the Office of the Revels opened with
eight tailors and the Officers in attendance to prepare two dozen cos-
tumes for a play that was to be presented during Mary's coronation on
October first. Almost 150 yards of satins and damasks had been sent
to the Revels from the Great Wardrobe on Mary's directive, and gar-

ments were to be made for Genus Humanum, five Virgins, Reason,

 

Verity, Plenty, Self Love, Care, Scarcity, Deceit, Sickness, Febble-
ness, Deformity, The Epilogue, The End, The Good Angel, and the
Bad Angel. 1 Just before the coronation the play was postponed until
Christmas, when it was presented by the Gentlemen of the Chapel,
apparently the only entertainment of the season.2 Shrovetide passed
Without the Revels being called to work.

Mary was wed to Philip of Spain in July, 1554, 3 and in Novem-

 

lFeuillerat, 289. The order of the characters, presented here

as it was on the warrant, strongly suggests a play on mankind's life.
ZIbid., 152-53.
3Innes, 225.

169

170

her there began a full season Of court masques. On Hallowmas (Novem-
ber 1) a Masque of Mariners was presented with eight masquers in jer-
kins Of purple cloth of gold horizontally striped with green cloth Of sil-
ver. Their breeches were "party sorted," that is, made with one leg
of blue cloth of gold and the other of green cloth Of silver. Headpieces
of red satin were striped with gold and white cloth of silver, and trimmed
with Cologne gold tassels and white feathers. Their torchbearers, also
Mariners, appeared in hoods of blue cloth of gold edged with red silk
lace, and other garments of red and white sarcenet.4

On November 28, at Whitehall, Cardinal Pole proposed that the
country should be returned to Obedience to the Pope, and on St. Andrew's
Day (November 30) England was Officially reconciled to the Church Of
Rome after twenty-five years of broken relations. 5 That night a Masque
of Hercules "or men of war comynge from the sea" was presented at
Whitehall. Actually prepared to celebrate the end of Michaelmas Term
on November 28, 6 the costumes were partially nrnde up of pieces that
had been used in the Masque of Greek Worthies nearly two years before.
Six masquers appeared in breast- and back-plate armor molded of paste
and cement in the form of lion heads. Pouldrons, also with lion heads,

covered their shoulders, and on their heads they wore morion helmets

 

4Feuillerat, 180.

51bid., 292.

6Ibid. , 163.

171
of paste and cement, each surmounted with a griffin head and the
figure of Cerberus, the three-headed dog of Hades. 7 They carried
shields of oak, great "double" halberds, 8 and wooden falchions, all of
which were gilded with gold and silver. Their torchbearers appeared
as Mariners in blue and white sarcenet slops with girdles and neck-
pieces of yellow and green sarcenet.

In mid-December, Queen Mary sent a warrant to Cawarden
advising him to prepare to furnish Nicholas Udall with "soche apperell
for his Auctors as he shall thinke necessarye, "10 and although the
Christmas paybook alluded to the charges of "plaies set owte by vdall
with alteracion of garmentes for his Actours from time to tyme, " no

specific garments were mentioned.

 

7

Seyffert, 125.

8These were probably partizans. See Pl. VI, Fig. 5, p.
9Feuillerat, 164 and 169.

10Ibid. , 159. She spoke of Udall as "our welbelovid Nicholas
vdall [who] haith at sondry seasons convenient hertofore shewid and
myndeth herafter to shewe his diligence in settinge forthe Of dialogwes
and Entreludes before V3 for our Regall disport and recreacion. " (Ibid.).

1Possibly Udall was responsible for the revival Of the tradi-
tional Boy Bishop, who appeared sometime during Mary's reign; in 1554
at the earliest. A Hugh Rhodes wrote the poem, "The Song of the Chyld-
byssh0p [which was] songe before the queenes maiestie in her privie
chamber at her manour of saynt James in the Feelde on saynt Nicholas
day [December 61 and Innocents day Wecember 28] this yeare nowe pre-
sent, by the chylde bysshope of Paules Churche with his company. "
(Ibid. , 292).

172

At Christmastide two masques were given: the Masque of
Patrons of Galleys "like venetian Senatours, "12 and the Masque of
Venuses "or amorous ladies. " The eight masquers of the first were
attired in long, straight gowns of plain raised cloth of gold and cloth
of silver which buttoned in front through loops of red tinsel, and had
long, hanging sleeves trimmed with red velvet. They wore caps of
gold cloth Of tissue and red velvet, and buskins of red baldachin; their
girdles and neckpieces were of red sarcenet. They carried daggers of
wood and molded work, the handles of which were gilt. Six Galley
Slaves, torchbearers to the Patrons, wore loose coats of blue cloth Of
gold with straight, wide, hanging sleeves Of black and White cloth of
gold. Their headpieces were of blue and red satin tufted with yellow
sarcenet, lined with buckram, and trimmed with yellow and black feath-
ers. Buskins were of several colors, and the Slaves were shackled and
chained together with fetters of gold-painted wicker. 13

The Masque of Venuses was one of rather pastoral nature

which involved six Venuses, six Nymphs as torchbearers, l4 and six

 

2Patron de Gallee was used in a general sense in reference to
any superior person, but specifically, and perhaps here, it meant the
captain of a long, low, single-decked vessel propelled by both oars and
sails. (Halliwell-Phillipps, 608).

13Feuillerat, 166-69 and 181-83.

 

14In the paybook they were called simply torchbearers to the

Venuses, but in the Inventory of 1555, six costumes for "Mymphes" fol-
lowed directly the costumes for the Venuses. (Ibid. , 186). In the Inven-
tory the Nymphs' headpieces were of wicker trimmed with silk flowers,
while in the paybook the torchbearers' headpieces were made by a basket-

 

173
Cupids. The masquers wore bodices and skirts Of red cloth of gold
trimmed with wide borders of crimson satin which were embroidered
with cloth of gold. Crimson satin sleeves were paned with white sar-
cenet, and the undersleeves were of white cloth of silver and purple vel-
vet. Their headpieces, made on wicker bases, were of purple and gold
sarcenet, and were trimmed with gold-covered wire, silk flowers,
needlework, pearls of silver- and gold-covered wood, and tassels of
Cologne gold and Cologne silver; crowning the headpieces were whole
lion heads molded Of paste and cement. Their girdles and neckpieces
were Of white sarcenet, and their visors were trimmed with hair, span-
gles, and netting.

The Nymphs' costumes were equally elaborate. Their bodices,
of black cloth Of gold, were paned, or pulled out, with flat white-gold
sarcenet, lined with buckram, and trimmed with ruffs which were also
of black cloth Of gold. Their foresleeves, of green cloth Of gold, were
pulled out with white sarcenet and "pointed" with yellow sarcenet. The
skirts were of yellow cloth Of gold fringed with blue silk and tufted with
white sarcenet, with a broad border of cloth of gold embroidered on
crimson satin with threads Of gold and silver. Over these garments
they wore capes and shorter skirts of white cloth of silver trimmed with

little wreaths of blue and yellow sarcenet. Their headpieces were of

wicker covered with orange-gold lawn and trimmed with flowers of silk,

 

maker, and flowers of silk were bought for their trimming. (Ibid. , 168-69).
Almost certainly the two were identical.

174
spangles, and green satin. Like those of the Venuses, their girdles
and neckpieces were of white sarcenet, and their visors were trimmed
\
with hair, spangles, and netting. They carried fruit baskets of wicker. l

The Cupids in this masque were dressed in shirts and girdles
of white sarcenet, and wore Wings made of colored feathers. They car-
ried quivers, each holding three arrows, and gilt. bows, the strings of
which were made Of twisted silk lace. These were fitted with "arrowes
fastened in them and goinge thwrowe the bowes with a clapp. " This de-
vice consisted Of an arrow with a shoulder cut midway on the shaft, held
to the bowstring, and passing through a hole in the center of the bow.
When pulled back and released, the arrow was stopped by the shoulder
and produced a snapping noise.

During Shrovetide, 1555, two more masques of great splendor
and cost were presented. The Masque of Turkish Magistrates included
eight masquers in long, straight gowns of red cloth of gold with roses
and scallop shells "stripped downe, " and trimmed with wide bOrders of
red dornix embroidered with cloth of gold and silver thread, and edged
with black silk lace. These were lined with red buckram, and long
sleeves, also of red buckram, were "buttoned" with pinked purple velvet

striped with silver thread. Cloth of gold undersleeves were figured with

red, white, and green velvet. The Magistrates wore headpieces made of

 

15Ibid., 166-69 and 185-86.
Douce, H, 470. This device, primarily used for keeping time
in the morris dance, may have been used the same way in this masque.

(Ibid. ) .

175

ash hoops covered with white sarcenet which were topped and wreathed
with red-gold sarcenet and trimmed with tassels of Cologne gold. Their
I-l eck cloths were of red sarcenet, and their girdles, Of the same mater-
ial, had "depe 8: large hanginges. " Their buskins were of blue cloth
Of gold "Churche woorke. " The masquers carried wooden falchions, the
handles and scabbards of which were molded of paste and cement. The
scabbards were covered with green velvet and studded with copper orna-
ments. 17

Turkish Archers served the Magistrates as torchbearers, and
wore crimson satin gowns rayed with gold thread which buttoned over
loops of cloth of silver. The gowns were lined with red buckram and
had collars Of orange cloth of silver which were turned down. Long,
red satin sleeves were paned, and trimmed with cloth of gold embroid-
ered onto orange satin. The undersleeves were Of red damask paned
with white baldachin. Like the masquers, their headpieces were of
white sarcenet over ash hoops, but were decorated with pointed wooden
tops covered with blue-gold sarcenet, and were trimmed with small
tassels of Cologne gold. Their buskins were of crimson satin, and they
carried wooden falchions with handles carved with men's heads and

scabbards trimmed with imitation gold. They also carried bows and

quivers Of arrows trimmed With foil and imitation gold and silver.

 

17Feuillerat, 173-75 and 181.

18Ibid., 174 and 182.

176

The Masque of Goddess-Huntresses was also presented during
Shrovetide. Eight masquers wore bodices Of red tinsel and purple
cloth of silver cut in scaHops with ruffed collars lined with yellow buck-
ram and cotton. Under short skirts Of red cloth of silver were longer
skirts of black and tawny tinsel trimmed with wide borders of red cloth
of gold embroidered on red satin with silver thread. Their sleeves
were also of black and tawny tinsel. Their headpieces Of red-gold sar-
cenet were trimmed with spangles, imitation pearls, tufts, and wreaths
of red, white, and black-gold sarcenet, and were crowned with gilded
lion heads with tongues of lawn. They wore White sarcenet girdles and
neckpieces, and visors trimmed with spangles, pearls, hair, and col-
ored silk knots. They carried silver bows with strings of twisted silk
lace, and gilded triangular quivers, each holding five blue and gold
arrows).

Their torchbearers were costumed as Turkish Women in bod-
ices of cloth of silver stained with drops Of gold and tufted with yellow
sarcenet. Their sleeves and skirts, of blue cloth of gold, were trimmed
with wide borders Of cloth of gold embroidered 'on crimson satin. Their
headpieces were high, conical c0pintank32‘o of felt covered with silver

lawn and trimmed with spangles and tufts of black-gold sarcenet; the

fronts were "turned vp" with blue satin, fringed with Cologne silver, and

 

lglbid” 173-75 and 185.

zoSee Chap. XIV, p. 200.

177
tufted with yellow sarcenet. Small tassels of Cologne silver and long
pieces of colored lawn were "flamynge" from the tops. Their Visors
were trimmed like those of the masquers and their girdles and neck-
pieces were also of white sarcenet, They carried gilded wooden darts.21

Such ornate and frothy spectacles were obviously those of a
feminine court. Except for minor details the costumes seem to‘have
changed only in material and color, and the masques only in name. They
were neither instructional nor humorous like those of Edward's time,
but purely visual delights for genteel and gracious courtiers.

On March 9, 1555, Cawarden received a letter from the ‘Lord
Chamberlain, Sir John Gage, directing him to prepare his paybooks for
audit and the costumes for an inventory to be taken by Gage himself,

Sir Robert Rochester (Comptroller of the Household), 22 Sir Francis
Englefield (Master of the Court of Wards and Liveries), 23 and others of
the Privy Council. 24 Cawarden, together with the other Officers and
seven tailors, immediately began an airing which lasted ten days. On
the eleventh of March the books were audited, and on the twenty-sixth

the inventory was completed. The recorded inventory included Masques

of Men, Masques of Women, Coverings of Bards and Baces, and Hang-

 

21Feuillerat, 185-86.

22
Ibid. , 293.

23Stephen and Lee, VI, 790-92.

24Feuillerat, l 78 .

178
ings which had been taken from the temporary banqueting houses of
Henry VIII. The masqueing garments, with one exception, 25 were the
complete costumes for each of the masques presented during the prev-
ious five months, as well as six complete costuInes for Irish Kerns,
"Albonyes" Warriers, Turkish Commoners, Palmers, and Falconers.
Garments of crimson cloth of gold fringed with green silk
had been made for the Irish Kerns, 27 as well as yellow sarcenet shirts
fringed with white and green caddis fringe, headpieces of yellow cloth
of gold fringed and tufted with Cologne gold, buskins of carnation canvas,
28

and wooden swords and darts painted gold.

The "Albonyes" Warriers29 had worn straight gowns of cloth of

 

25Costumes for the Masque of Hercules were not included, but

those for the Masque of Greek Worthies were. (Ibid. , 181).

26

Ibid., 180-89.
27The Irish Kern was "a kinde of footeman, sleightly armed
with a sworde, a targett of woode, or a bow and sheafe of arrows with
barbed heads, or els 3 dartes, which they cast with wonderfull facillity
and nearness. ” (Shakespeare, Macbeth, 90).

Feuillerat believed these costumes may have been used dur-

ing Christmas, 1550, or Shrovetide, 1551, for players rather than
masquers. (Ibid., 295). See pp. 125-127, above.

28Ibid., 183.

29Feuillerat suggested (315), incorrectly I believe, that the
"Albonyes" Warriers were men of Jacques D'Albon de Saint-Andre,
Marechal de France, who visited King Edward in July, 1551. They were
more likely soldiers or chieftans of Scotland, anciently called Albany or
Albainn. (Walter Miller, ed. Standard American Encyclopedia [Chicagm
Consolidated Book Publishers, 1941] , Vol. I. n. 1).). Still other possi-
bilities include soldiers of Albania, or of Albion, an ancient name for
Britain. (Ibid.).

 

 

179

gold and blue velvet raised with roses of gold. Their straight, hanging
sleeves of the same material covered undersleeves of cloth of silver and
purple velvet; capes which matched these undersleeves were lined with
blue cloth of silver. Their headpieces of red-gold sarcenet were trim-
med with green paper oak leaves and small tassels of Cologne gold.
Blue satin buskins, and broad, silver-handled daggers of wood completed
their costumes.

The Turkish Commoners, torchbearers to a Masque of Vene-
tians, 31 had been outfitted with plain gowns of crimson cloth of gold
upon which the word "LOYAL" was sewn in blue velvet. Hanging sleeves,
also of crimson cloth of gold, were edged with black lace and ”buttered”
(buttoned?) with brocaded black tinsel, which was also us ed for the under-
sleeves and for "turning down” the capes. Headpieces of yellow tinsel
were decorated with round rolls of red, white, and yellow sarcenet in
front, and red sarcenet knots at the tops. 32

For six Palmers, the Revels had made jerkins of changeable
taffeta with sleeves and skirts trimmed with gold and green silk oak

leaves ”wyndinge lyke a wrethe” and embroidered on red silk. Long,

straight slops of cloth of gold, and felt headpieces covered and lined

 

30Feuillerat, 182.

31They were neither torchbearers to the Patrons of Galleys
(like venetian Senatours"), who were Galley Slaves, nor to the Turkish
Magistrates, whose torchbearers were Turkish Archers. Cf. costume
descriptions, pp. 172, and 175, above.

3zlbid. , 184.

180

with red sarcenet, edged with green and white sarcenet wreaths, and
banded with yellow sarcenet had also been made. Palmers' staves ac-
companied the costumes. 33

The Falconers had worn blue coats of cloth of tissue with turned-
down collars, and skirts trimmed with wide crimson satin borders on
which cloth of gold was embroidered in a checkered pattern with silver
thread. The hanging sleeves were of crimson satin and the undersleeves
were of red tinsel and yellow cloth of gold. Felt headpieces had also
been made which were covered with changeable sarcenet and trimmed
with fringe and Cologne silver. White bustian falconers' bags, and silk
and gold lures completed their ensembles. 34

Despite the airing which had been conducted in March, the
usual spring airing was held again in late June, 1555. 35 In attendance
for the ten days were the Officers and seven tailors, at the new rate of
12d. per day which had been instituted in February.

King Philip left England in August, 1555, not to return until

. 36 . .
more than eighteen months had passed. Court entertainment continued

to be favored by Mary, however, and during Christmas, 1555, the

 

33Ibid.

 

34Ibid. , 183-84. That all of these nnsqueing costumes were
complete and in the style of others made during the previous five months
suggests that they had been made for masques which were never presented.

351bid. , 195-96.

361nnes, 238.

181

Officers, seven tailors, four propertymakers, three painters, a tur-
ner, and a buskinmaker worked for almost a month preparing costumes
and properties for masques and plays at a total cost of over forty-five
pounds. 37 But, for some reason, details of the entertainments were no
longer recorded in the accounts. 38 Names of the workmen were entered,
as were dates of the work periods and the costs, but (with a few excep-
tions) nothing else. 39

The Revels continued to work through January and February,
1556, preparing entertainment for Candlemas and Shrovetide, 40 and in ,
June the annual airing was conducted. The following Christmas, masques
and plays were presented including, apparently, a comedy by William
Baldwin. 41 The Office remained open again through January and half of
February, 1557, although no entertainment seems to have been presen-

42
ted.

 

37Feuillerat, 199-200 .

38This may have been the fault of the scribe who, around 1560,
made copies of the accounts; lacking the originals, Feuillerat used these
c0pies. See p. 5, above.

39

For periods of activity and comparative costs of entertainments
from Christmas, 1555, to Shrovetide, 1558, see Table I (p. 44), and
Table II (p. 71), respectively.

Ibid. , 203-11. The Office was active for seventy-six consecu-
tive days; from December 11, 1555 through February 24, 1556.

41See App. V1, p. 236-

42The total expenses approximately balanced the wages of the
Officers and tailors hired during this period. (Feuillerat, 221-24).

182

On March 18, 1557, King Philip returned to England for what
was to be his last visit. 43 The Revels began work on April 9 preparing
a ”Greate Maske of Allmaynes pylgryms and Irysshmen" which was given
at Whitehall on St. Mark's Day (April 25). 44 Cawarden, having used all
of the uncut material left to the Revels by Henry VIII, and apparently now
on a strict budget, advised the Vice Chamberlain, Sir Henry Jerning-
ham, 45 that he could not prepare a new masque to equal those which King
Philip had probably seen on the continent. J erningham took the matter
to the Queen, and more than 160 yards of sarcenets and velvets were
promptly delivered to the Blackfriars for his use from the Great Ward-
robe in Westminster. 46 Even with this dole the Revels had to repair
used hose and visors, and because of lack of time were forced to rent
six masqueing costumes. 47

In June the airing was conducted. Masques and plays were pre-
sented during Christmas, 1557, but again there seems to have been no

entertainment at Candlemas and Shrovetide, although tailors and prop-

ertymakers were hired and the Officers were in attendance every day

 

431bid. , 303.

 

44Ibid. , 225.

4El'bid. , 30 4.

46Ibid., 245 and 302. The cost of this "great" rmsque was only
a little more than forty-two pounds.

47Ibid. , 227. These garments were altered for Pilgrims, an in-
dication that the Palmers' costumes in the Inventory of 1555 had been used.

183
_ 48 . . .
from December 11 until March 4, 1558. The final airing of Mary's
. . 49 . . 50

reign was held in early June. In mid-November she died, and was
followed in August, 1559, by Thomas Cawarden. 51

The masques of her reign restored to the court the pomp and
splendor which had been known under Henry VIII, and which was to be
seen in future years under Elizabeth the First. Despite an increasing
national debt and a country-wide pall of despair, court entertainment
went on, probably as much for diversion from troubles as for a sem-
blance of prosperity. The Office of the Revels was maintained by at
least two large gifts of cloth from the Great Wardrobe, the refurbishing
and reuse of old garments, and probably by forced adherence to a smal-
ler budget. But a new age was at hand, an age which saw a new ruler, a

I

new Master of the Revels, and the emergence of the court masque as a

principal element of sixteenth century drama.

 

481bid., 235-40.
491bid., 241-42.
50Innes, 243.

51Chambers, Tudor Revels, 18.

 

CHAPTER XIV
THE WORK OF THE REVELS

With the exception of a few special items, most of the costumes
made by the Revels throughout this period were very similar to the fash-
ionable dress of the times. Some degree of historical accuracy was a-
chieved in costumes and properties made for masques with classical
themes, but even these garments seem to have generally followed six-
teenth-century patterns. By studying contemporary fashions, the mid-
century court masque can be better imagined.

The doublet was the basic upper garment of both men and women
at this time. It was a close-fitting vest with points at the waist for attach-
ing hose or skirts, and points around the armholes to which matching
sleeves were tied although sleeves were sometimes sewn directly to the
doublet. Wings at the armholes hid the points. During the years of Hen-
ry VIII, doublets were straight-bodied and long—skirted, and were fastened
up the front, to the top of the collar with buttons or hooks and eyes. From
the forties the doublet was slashed or pinked, braided or embroidered,

and lace-trimmed. Hose which often accompanied the doublet was usually

184

 

185

made of the same material, 1 and it was in this form that they were
usually found in the accounts. Many were included in the inventory of
April, 1547, of cloth of gold; later they were made of damask and canvas. 2

The jerkin, also, was a common article of dress among the mid-
dle class and would be called a short coat or jacket today. Usually it
had a collar and attached sleeves and was worn over the doublet or with-
out it. Buff jerkins, worn by military men, were very plain, and those
worn by nobility were, of course, very rich. 3 Like doublets, jerkins
could be embroidered, trimmed with lace, pinked, or paned. 4 Several
very elaborate jerkins were in the inventory of May, 1547, but most of
those made thereafter were plainer, being for tumblers, for the Lord of
Misrule's yeomen, for mariners (made with hoods), and for harque-
busiers (painted (like armor).

Shirts were more undergarments than outer. Linthicum des-
cribed them as ”with high necks and long sleeves, made of linen and

silk . . . and about a yard long. ”6 They were mentioned just twice in

 

1 Linthicum, 197-99.

2
In Pl. 111, p. 186, the center figure wears a doublet with a pat-

tern of slits, the upper left figure wears a short doublet with wings at the
armholes, the upper right figure is wearing a long doublet with pleats
and puffed sleeves.
3
Strutt, 353.
4 . .
L1nth1cu1n, 202.

The lower right figure in P1. III is wearing a sleeveless je‘rkin
with a wide collar.

Linthicum, 21 3.

PLATE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

_.:

 

MALE DRESS OF THE SIXTEFNTH CENTURY

187
the accounts; one of cambric was in the inventory of May, 1547, and
six were made of sarcenet for Cupids in a masque.

Sleeves, as has been mentioned, were very often separate
parts of dress, and many were found in the early inventories as parts
to kirtles, gowns, frocks, jerkins, and cassocks. There were sever-
al styles and fashions including: wide, long, "hangyng 8: Cutt, " "paned
vpon with clothe of golde, " trunked to the coat, guarded horizontally,
hanging by, ”with workes Cutt 8: drawen with Sarcenet, " "sewed Rounde
with labelles, " and "great wyde sleves opyn. " An example of a common
fashion at the time is found in those made for short garments: "longe
Small Sleves hanging 8: wyde greate under Sleves or Ruffes. " These
double sleeves were often worn; one under or fore sleeve from the
shoulder to the wrist, and an outer sleeve from the shoulder to the el-
bow, generally hanging down. 7 Also in the inventory were seven pairs
of sleeves “wyng fasshion of Blewe Satten lyned with whyte Sarcenet
powderyd. " These were probably large bell-shaped sleeves in which
the lining was visible.

In the sixteenth century, the term, skirt, was used in reference
to the lower part of any garment; although clothing which fastened at, and
hung from the waist was called the skirt, it was part of an ensemble, not
a separate piece of clothing. The term was used several times in the

accounts to signify a garment's extremities, but two,instances occurred

 

7Ibid. , 171 .

188
of women's garments with skirts of material different from that of
the garment proper. With "Italyon" gowns were skirts or "the nether
Basse . . . of purple vellet vpon Syluer. " Other garments for women
were made with "thupper Skyrtes of Crymsyn clothe of golde with
workes. "

Smocks, also for women, were simple shirt-like garments,
usually worn next to the skin as underwear. 8 Among the poorer classes,
however, the smock was equivalent to an "everyday" dress. It'is sig-
nificant that on the three occasions when smocks were made by the Rev-
els they were for Irishwomen, were yellow, and of sarcenet and buck-
ram; obviously they were degrading garments, thought of as typical of
the lowest class pe0ple. A smock required six yards of material.

The sixteenth-century kirtle worn by women was a proper
outside dress although a gown or cloak was usually worn over it. It
consisted of a bodice with a front and back part (tied or laced together
at the shoulders and ribs), an accompanying skirt, and detachable
sleeves. 9 Although the Revels apparently made no kirtles, several
were included in the April, 1547, inventory as "Maskyng Garmentes
for women"; most appeared again in the inventory of 1555. They were
very elaborate, as the description of one will show:

One kyrtell conteyning fore parte 8: backe parte of blewe

 

81bid., 189-91.

9Ibid., 185-86.

189
velvett stryped with golde freenge with silke and lyned with
,sarcenett with one payere of f01i%sleves of crymesen Satten
rewed and Raysed w1th gowlde.

Gowns, coats, capes, and robes were all basically the same:
elaborately trimmed, indoor-outdoor garments, usually with attached
sleeves, open in front, and equivalent to (and just as varied as) the
modern top-coat. These were the most‘ frequent products of the Rev-
els tailors, along with matching headpieces, and it is almost certain
that the masquers supplied their own undergarments, shirts, and pet-
ticoats to accompany these coats when it was possible.

Linthicum described the gown as a long garment, open in
front, somewhat resembling the modern top-coat. It was worn- over
most other garments, but often under the cloak. Sixteenth-century
gowns, which required six to twelve yards of material in addition to
linings, were very expensive; not only were they made of costly cloths,
but were guarded, embroidered, trimmed with lace, jagged, and pinked.
The chief fashions were the Dutch, a round gown without a train; the
Flanders, which had a fitted bodice and stiff collar; the Italian, usually
trainless, which had double bodices, of which the outer was slashed;
and the much-admired French, which had full skirts, wings at the arm-

holes with hanging sleeves, and was much welted or pinked. 11 In the

Revels accounts were gowns for young boys, priests, Irishmen, the Lord

 

lOFeuillerat, 187.

”Linthicum, 182-83.

190
of Misrule and his Councilors, and Italian gowns for women. Sleeves
were made long, wide, ruffed, cut.. and drawn, and with undersleeves.
Many costly fabrics were used, and a cape almost always accompanied
a gown. They were not, however, a common garment of the Revels.
Strutt best described the coats of the day, those in the ward-

robe of Henry VIII:

Long coats, deIni-coats, short coats, riding coats, coats

with bases or skirts, stalking coats, tenice coats, and coats

of leather. These were sometimes lined, faced with fur,

and other ways ornamented, in a vast variety of fashions.

Sometimes also they had straight sleeves; sometimes large

loose sleeves, generally of a different consistency fnom

the bodies; and sometimes they had no sleeves at all.
Such could describe the coats made by the Revels. They were long,
short, large, and great. They were made for soldiers, and in 1551
and 1552 for the Lord of Misrule's Messenger, Herald, Trumpeter,
Interpreter, Jugglers, Fools, Marshals, and Hunters. Coats were made
of dornix, damask, canvas, velvet, satin, taffeta, baldachin, cloth of
gold, sarcenet, kersey, and lockeram. Frequently they were lined,
either with cheap buckram or cotton which would not be seen, or sarcen-
et or lawn, probably visible. Undersleeves were often made with the
coat, of the same material in a different color. The outer sleeves, when
recorded, were described as trunked to the coat, ruffed, wide, open, long,

or great. Occasionally the coat itself was described: with great compass

quarters, with great ruffs, with great and long pleats, ruffed in the waist,

 

IZStrutt, 354.

191
paned, and "sewed Rounde with labelles aboutes the skyrts of Red
Tylsent hanging on of Buttons 8: tasselles. " Almost always they were
trimmed in some manner; guarded, embroidered, figured, tufted,
fringed, or painted. Very often matching caps or hats were made of
the same material; hoods were always made with coats for fools. The
amount of material required varied between four and nine yards.

Occasionally the Revels made cassocks: loose, wide-sleeved
coats of knee or thigh length. 13 These were elaborately trimmed and
used by both men and women, particularly by attendants to the Lord of
Misrule in 1552. Frocks were similar. Originally clerical garments,
they were made of silk for William Somers, the Fool, and of canvas
for torchbearers.

Costumes simply called ”garments" were entered many times
in the accounts and their similarity to coats places them in this category.
Here follows one particularly complete description of twelve garments
in the inventory of April, 1547, rewritten in modern English with punctu-
ation for clarity.

Twelve long garments of plain cloth of silver with great wide
sleeves; the backs and breasts scaled over with black velvet;
the collars, outer and under skirts, and undersleeves of cloth
of gold paned vertically with crimson satin; the under skirts
and undersleeves lined with white sarcenet; the middle skirts
and labels over the shoulders of plain cloth of silver and

black velvet guarded vertically with small guards of cloth of
gold; the outer skirts guarded with cloth of silver set between

 

13Linthicum, 195-96.

14Strutt, 373 .

192
the cloth of gold and the crimson satin; eight pairs of the
sleeves lined with black-gold sarcenet, and four pairs lin-
ed with changeable sarcenet; all edges fringed with Cologne
gold and Cologne silver fringe. '

Capes, mantles, and cloaks were synonymous terms for
sleeveless shawls worn over the shoulders and tied at the neck. They
were different in length, however; mantles covered only the shoulders,
capes came to the waist, and cloaks fell to any length below the waist.
Although the Revels occasionally made these garments, most were
found in the inventories of 1547, where they were called "large Coopes
or mantelles" or ”clokes and skalpers, " They were of cloth of silver,
satin, sarcenet, taffeta, baldachin, tissue, and buckram (used in lin-
ings). They were described as sharp, great, loose, lined, compass
(round), paned, furred, powdered, fringed, and guarded; they served
as companion pieces to many garments including gowns, cassocks,
frocks, jerkins, smocks, and even cloaks.

The term, robe, was generally reserved for the gown or coat
worn by nobility or royalty as official insignia. 16 Eight, made with pow-
dered linings in 1547, were probably for the Masque of Young Moors, in
which King Edward took part. Several with wide sleeves were made for
the Lord of Misrule's Councilors in 1552, and three, for the Lord him-

self, were particularly rich. The first required nine yards of white bald-

achin and was trimmed with fourteen yards of embroidered cloth of gold.

 

15Feuillerat, 10.

16Linthicum, 213.

193
The second was of red baldachin trimmed with fur and a large embroid-
ered guard of purple and silver thread. The third was of "wrought puple
furred vellet'I with. a powdered ermine lining, and a coat, hat, and man-
tle were part of the ensemble.

Much confusion often exists in the nomenclature of sixteenth-
century hose. Hose, or hosen (the terms were synonymous), consis-
ted of two parts: upper stocks (also called trunk hose, trunks, or
breeches), which covered the body from the waist to above the knee,
and lower stocks (also called long hose, stocks, stockings, or nether
stocks), which covered the foot and leg to above the knee. 1?

During the reigns of Edward and Mary two varieties of upper
stocks were popular; breeches, which were panedand puffed out like
pumpkins to a mid-thigh length, and slops, a slightly longer kind which
were wide, bagging, and only sometimes paned.18

Long hose and nether stocks were made of several materials

by the Revels including satin, taffeta, baldachin, linen, canvas, kersey,

and once, black goatskins. Hose may have been worn without other foot-

 

17Ibid., 204.

l8Ibid. , 209. A third variety, the form-fitting "devil's breech-
es, " were comparable to modern tights, and were worn with a thigh-
length doublet. (Ibid., 204). '

In Pl. 111, p. .186, the upper left figure is wearing paned
breeches and long hose, the lower right figure is wearing unpaned
breeches, the‘lower left figure is wearing unpaned slops, and the cen-
ter and upper right figures are both wearing devil's breeches oi: long
hose.

194
wear by the masquers, for there was an instance of "newe solinge"
eight pairs of hose.

Slops were much more often worn by masquers than were
breeches; over one hundred and sixty individual pairs appeared in the
accounts as against only thirty-eight pairs of breeches. Slops were
short, or large, and were made of sarcenet, satin, silk, taffeta, cloth
of gold, cloth of silver, and kersey. Occasionally they were paned,
guarded, or otherwise trimmed, and cost between 6d. and 3s.4d. a
pair to make.

Although fewer breeches were made, they were better described,
ans some what better made. They were of the same materials as slops
but were frequently lined and almost always paned and elaborately trim-
med. Eight pairs made for the Masque of Covetous Men were of canvas
stuffed with hair and quilted.

Buskins were the primary footwear of the masquers. Almost
two hundred pairs of these soft, calf-length boots19 were made or used
by the Revels during this period. Frequently they were soled with thin
leather, and the uppers were made of satin, damask, dornix, baldachin,
velvet, and lockeram, a pair requiring one and a half yards of material.
Buskinmakers generally charged 12d. a pair for their making and in-
cluded the cost of the soles in the price. Occasionally they were trimmed

with sheepskin or fur, and at one time with lions' heads which had been

 

19Linthicum, 247.

195
molded and covered with fur.

Other footwear was used at various times. For the activities
of the Lord of Misrule in 1552, the Revels bought eight pairs of pat-
tens, elevated overshoes of wood designed to keep the wearer above the
wet and dirt)r streets. 20 Almost certainly these were used by the Lord
of Misrule's Councilors, for at about the same time, one pair of “pant-
acles" (that is, pantofles) were bought, probably for the Lord himself.
These, too, were for outdoor wear, but were fancier and costlier; they
resembled modern mules, and were worn over other footwear. This
particular pair, which cost 33. 4d., were of Bruges satin and probably

J
were worn over the Lord's rich baldachin and velvet buskins when he
visited London.

Two pairs of slippers were recorded in the accounts. They
were of crimson satin and were worn by women in Italian gowns.‘ Shoes
were purchased a few times, at from 15d. to 25. the pair; in one instance
they were of gold baldachin, and in another, of tissue.

The most common neckwear used in the costumes was the part-
let, an elaborate covering for the upper chest and neck sometimes worn
with matching sleeves by both men and women. 21 Several were in the

inventories of 1547, made, trimmed, and lined with sarcenet, satin,

velvet, lawn, and silk, and ornamented with embroidery, stolework,

 

2011m” 257-58.

 

21Ibid. , 162-63.

196
Venice gold and silver, knots of pearls, and rich guards. Some had
collars and others, sleeves. Neckerchers (neckerchiefs?) were appar-
ently very similar; two in the same inventories were of white silk lace
with collars of Venice gold and pearls, and trimmed with clasps of
gold and little. garnets. For four masques in the 1554-55 season, art-
icles of dress called simply neck coverings and neck pieces were made,
each of them of sarcenet. Collars of different material or color were
made for many costumes, and were high, quilted, turned down, and
guarded. Ruffs, just coming into use as neckwear during Edward's
reign, 22 were apparently never used in this manner by the Revels, al-
though they sometimes appeared on sleeves of coats and gowns.

Gloves were a necessary part of every masqueing habit just as
they were for street dress. Well over two hundred and fifty pairs were
bought by the Revels and worn by the masquers, torchbearers, musicians,
and the "mynisters that attyre and make them redye. " Several times
they were specially-made for specific purposes; those of black goatskin
for Moors have already been mentioned. Most of the time they were pur-
chased from rnilliners, however. Ten and a half dozen pairs of plain
gloves, probably white, were bought at different times at from 3d. to 6d.
a pair. A total of eight and a half dozen pairs of "Spanish" gloves cost
between 6d. and 8d. a pair on three occasions, and eighteen pairs of

”melane" (that is, Milan) gloves, bought once, cost a shilling a pair.

 

zzIbid., 158.

197
No gloves were listed in the inventories nor were any ever repaired;
probably they were kept by the masquers as souvenirs--gloves were
one part of the costume which could be worn on the street.

The girdle was a fitted belt fastened in front, used by women
to confine their garments at the waist, and by men to support the sword
hanger. 23 As part of the masqueing costume they were probably just
decorative sashes. Those made by the Revels were almost always of
sarcenet, although some in the early inventories were of velvet, lawn,
and cloth of gold over rope. Less than half a yard of material was re-
quired for their making.

With several of the doublets listed in the April, 1547, inven-
tory were placards. Originally the placard was a plate of armor cover-
ing the abdomen, 24 but by this time it had become merely an ornamen-
tal covering for the area of the stomach and was worn by both sexes.

According to Machyn's account of the Lord of Misrule's ride
through London in 1552, his yeomen wore "balderykes a bowt ther nekes
whytt 8: blue sarsenetes 8: chynes of gold. "25 These baldrics, or
shoulder sashes, were not entered in the Revels accounts, and though
the colors of one of the liveries were white and blue, the material was

kersey, not sarcenet. During the same season, the Lord's hunting cos-

 

23mm, 265.

Z4Planche, 202.

25Feuillerat, 281.‘

198
tume included a horn hung from his shoulder with a green silk baldric.

The headdress was the most important part of a masquer‘s
ensemble. To the Revels, it was a challenge to their ingenuity, and to
the spectators, it was a clue to the nature of the masque, or the masquer.

Although headdress was described only in the most general
terms throughout the accounts, several types appeared which may be
classified as caps, hats, hoods, helmets, crowns, hair nets, and head-
pieces; the last embracing those fantastic creations which could not have
been worn seriously in real life.

Caps were as they are today, close-fitting head-coverings of soft
material, with or without a small base or inside band, and lined only
when the lining would show. Satin was by far the most common material
for caps, but velvet, damask, tinsel, tissue, taffeta, dornix, and silk
were also used. Sarcenet was often used for tufting, wreathing, and
garnishing. Caps were lined just twice, with sarcenet and with taffeta.
Double ”turff" caps were made once; the turfe was the turned-up edge
of a cap.26 Buttoned caps were made for the Lord of Misrule's Gentle-
men Ushers in 1552, and were probably ”round, with a slight brim
turned up and fastened by buttons, [a style] fashionable during the twen-
ties to fifties. "27 For the Lord himself a cap of maintenance or office

was made of red feathers, charnlet thrum, and a plume. The cap of

 

stkeat, 423.

27Linthicum, 222 .

199
maintenance had a soft cone and rolled brim or band powdered with
the insignia of office; it was very similar to the modern "Santa Claus"

28 . . . . .
cap. Six ”corner'I caps, trimmed w1th aignllettes, were made for

 

the Masque of Grasiers in 1553. A white satin night cap was bought in
1548 to use as a pattern, and in the April, 1547, inventory were satin
"vnder Cappes or nyght Cappes" which were used as bases for hats.

Over fifty hats were made by the Revels during the eleven years,
far fewer than the nmnber of caps; undoubtedly they took longer to make
and were more expensive. However, many of the ”felts" that were fre-
quently bought actually may have been hats, for the word meant both hat
and the base of a hat. 29 Almost 350 of these felts were purchased, most
at 8d. each; long felts were 6d. to 9d. each, and broad felts were 10d.
each. Two of the headblocks bought in 1552 were "for the feltmakers to
mowlde hattes vpon"; probably most felts were bought as flat sheets and
shaped in the workrooms. Taffeta was the favorite material of hats for
street wear, 30 but only nine of those made by the Revels were of taffeta;
the rest were of cloth of gold, baldachin, satin, damask, tinsel,and sar-
cenet.

Several "coopyd" hats were included in the first inventory of

1547. Probably "copped" was intended, a term meaning sharp or high

 

8Franz Sales Meyer, Handbook of Ornament (New York: Dover
Publications, Inc., 1957), pp. 514-15.

29Halliwell-Phillipps, 352.

 

3O Linthicum, 2 31 .

200
from which the name for another hat derived, the "copintank" or "co-
patain."31 According to the lexicographer, Halliwell-Phillipps, "a
hat with a high crown [was] called a copped crown hat. "32 Eight of these
cppped hats were of yellow tinsel with silver lawn rolls at the turfe;
eight were long, of quilted cloth of gold with long indented flaps on all
sides lined with sarcenet and fringed with Cologne silver; eight were of
crimson satin, their turfes fringed with Cologne silver and hung with
labels of silver lawn; eight were long and fringed with Venice gold; and
two were long and of cloth of silver tufted with purple-gold sarcenet.
Copintanks, which were high, conical, or ”sugarloaf" hats, 33
were used a few times. Six, undescribed, were bought in 1550 at 8d.
each, and were probably only undecorated felt cones. Eight which had
been used by "turky woomen” were described in the 1555 inventory as of
felt, covered with silver lawn, spangled and tufted with black-gold sar-
cenet, the fronts turned up with blue satin, fringed with Cologne silver
and tufted with yellow sarcenet, with long lawns ”flamynge" and hanging
from the tops which were also trimmed with small tassels of Cologne

silver.

Five "huffkyn" hats were used on one occasion. A huffkin was

 

3
1Ibid. , 228.

32Halliwell-Phillipps, 269.

3 3 Linthicum, 22 8.

H 11;. ‘

 

 

201
a sort of muffin, 34 and most likely the hats were muffin-shaped. They
were of crane color and russet damask with bands of red-gold sarcenet,
and were part of costumes for Germans.

Thrummed hats were used once, and were simply felt hats
with a pile or nap. 35 Other hats were made with the tops falling to one
side, with turfes of wire covered with cloth of gold, and were trimmed
with stripes of cloth, buttons, leaves, and wreaths. 36

For the Fools and Dizards of the Lord of Misrule in 1551 and
1552, hoods were made as part of their coats. 37 Over one hundred
”cappes 8: hodes" were‘also made in 1551 for the Lord's yeomen, and
seven hoods for friars, and eight "huddes or hedpeces . . . (aftyr tholde
ffasshion 8: ffringid abowtes" were included in the April inventory of
1547. For the Masque of Mariners in 1554, the Revels made jerkins
with attached hoods.

Helmets were made on two occasions, both times in the style

of the morion, a narrow-brimmed, conical helmet of the mid-sixteenth-

38
century foot soldier. Those made for thirty of the Lord of Misrule's

 

34Wright, 585.

35 Linthicum, 2 32 .

36
Several styles of hats and caps appear in P1. III, p. 186,
none of which can be definitely named.
37
Hoods were commonly the headdress of Fools, as seen in
P1. IV, p. 202.

38Planche, 296. See P1. VI, Fig. 2, p. 213.

IV

PLATE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EARLY FOOL'S ATTIRE

203
harquebusiers in 1551 were of painted canvas. Eight made for the
Masque of Hercules in 1554 were more elaborate; they were of paste
and cement with the three-headed Cerberus standing over griffin's heads
in the front.

Gold paper or paste board waslalmost always used for making
crowns and miters which were required occasionally. Buckram, pro-
bably stiffened for a base, was used with gold paper once.

Cauls and coifs were both similar to modern hair nets although
they were usually lined with rich cloth.’ Neckerchers of white silk
”Cawle woorke" were in the inventory of May, 1547, but only one caul,
was bought in the eleven year period: a caul of silk garnished with silver
for the Lord of Misrule in 1551. It weighed four ounces and cost over
ten shillings. Coifs were actually small caps which fit close to the back
and sides of the head. 39 Over twenty-five were included in the early in-
ventories, most of Venice gold with "theyer perukes of here [that is,
periwigs] hanging to them. '7

Primarily, headpieces were fancy costumes for the head, but
the word was used synonymously with all other headdresses that have been
mentioned. They were fantastic or allegorical, elaborate or grotesque.
Some sat on top of the head and others entirely covered the head and neck.
All kinds of materials were used in their making, and more time was

given to them than any other single part of the costume.

 

39Linthicum, 223.

204

Bases of headpieces were made of iron and latten wire, felts
stuffed with tow and flax, pasteboard, paper, paste and cement, wicker,
and ”asshen hoopewood. ” These were then covered with lawn, satin,
sarcenet, damask, velvet, dornix, Irish frieze, or tinsel. Frequently
they were painted; twenty-four were painted'-'for Sonne beamys" for
Mary's coronation festivities, seven were painted "with Maske faces"
by Toto in 1551, and sixteen for the Masque of Deaths were painted
"doble vizaged, " one side like a living face and the other like the face of
death. Twelve ”furred heades" were made for savage men in 1552, pro-
bably for the Masque of Baboons. Molded heads were decorated with
snakes made of wire in 1551, and those for the Greek Worthies were
”mowlded lyke Lyons heddes the Mowthe devowringe the mannes hed , _
helmetwise. " Such were some of the grotesque and allegorical headpieces.

Elaborate headpieces were made at various times throughout
this period, but the richest (and best, described) appeared during the win-
ter of 1554-55. Those made for the Masque of Venuses, 40 the Masque of
Goddess-Huntresses, 41 and the Masque of Turkish Magistrates42 were
particularly handsome.

I

A headpiece found in the inventory of May, 1547, was of green

 

39Linthicum, 223.

40
See pp. 172-73, above.

41
See p. 176, above.

4
2See pp. 174-775, above.

205

satin and white-gold sarcenet "with eres, " and had probably been made
for a fool. 43 Several found in the inventory taken a month earlier were
for falcone rs, and had been made in the style of falconers' lures of red-
gold sarcenet trimmed with white sarcenet ribbon and capon feathers.

Rolls44 appeared several times as parts of headpieces, and
flocks were once bought to stuff rolls. In at least one instance, how-
ever, the word was spelled ”rails” and may have meant a veil worn
over the back of the head which was bowed out with wire at the should-
ers, a headdress also popular at this time. 45 Still other rolls were
bought with girdles and were, perhaps, akin to the French-type farth-
ingale which was ”a roll resembling an automobile tire, stiffened with
wire or stuffed with cotton"46 and worn at the hips under a kirtle.

It is doubtful that the masquers of this period used make-up
as we know it. Ceruse (white lead) was used by fashionable ladies for
painting their faces and bosoms, 47 but the ceruse and white lead bought

by the Revels was almost certainly for property painting. 48

Beards and wigs were used several times. Coifs with "perukes"

 

43See left and center figures, Pl. IV, p. 202.

44These were probably similar to those shown on the hats at
the bottom of Pl. 111, p. 186.
5
Linthicum, 166.

46Ibid. , 181 .
47 . . .
Halliwell-Phillipps , 2 38 .

48See p. 77, above.

 

 

206

or periwigs hanging to them have already been mentioned. For
Shrovetide, 1548, six "heddes of here" were bought for women mas-
quers and six were made in the Office of hair and flax; all of these were
"colored" by painters. The following year a dozen "heares and beardes”
were bought at 12d. each. In December, 1550, two women's wigs were
bought at Zs. 4d. each and seven men‘s wigs of horsehair at Zs. each.
Eight wigs of flax cost 3s. 4d. each and had to be colored or dyed by the
painters. Among the characters of the Lord of Misrule's entourage in
1552 was an Irishman and Irishwoman wearing wigs of black flax, and
for the Irish play of Easter, 1553, the Revels hired "heers beardes 8:
develles apparell. "49 Visors for the Masque of Venuses were dressed
with hair, undoubtedly periwigs, and visors with beards appeared in the
April, 1547, inventory. Part of this lot was for Germans and the beards
were of gold damask, probably not in imitation of hair but rather as face-
masks. In 1548, Moors' caps were made of wooly lambskin to simulate
tight, curly hair, and a year later, priests' caps were made with hair,
and shave crowns for friars or monks, with lambskin.

Masks, or visors, simple oblong pieces of velvet or silk with

eye-holes, were common street wear at mid-century. 50 Almost fifty

 

49"To make him both frightful and ridiculous, the Devil was most
commonly introduced on the stage wearing a vizard with an immense
beard. !' (Collier, 56-57, n. 1).

OLinthicum, 272. In the inventory of April, 1547, twenty-four
dozen new and serviceable masks for men and women were recorded.
Yet over the next five years another nineteen dozen‘ masks were bought,
a total of forty-three dozen which could have been used over the five-

207

dozen were used during this period at prices ranging from 103. to
405. the dozen. The latter price was paid for those for the Lord of
Misrule's band in 1551, and must have been particularly fine (or over-
priced) for the Revels had te put in the linings, tyings, and headbands
(of red and black sarcenet) themselves. Frequently masks were altered
to match costumes; they were trimmed, colored, lined, and gilded, and
those for the Masque of Venuses were dressed with "hear spangle
countrefet pearle 8: slived silke in knottes and colours. ” The use of
masks may have fallen out of favor with Mary, for none appear to have

1
been used during her reign with the exception of those for the Venuses
and six old visors which were lined and repaired in 1557 for the Great
Masque.

Allegory was apparently intended in the costumes of some
masques, and certainly in the costumes of some plays. Most abused
were religious characters, as they were in real life at this time. Gar-
ments for friars in the early inventory were of velvet, in white, green,
orange, and russet purled with gold lace, hardly appropriate materials
for poor preachers. Four friars who attended the Lord of Misrule in

1552 wore garments of tinsel, again a very rich and inappropriate mater-

 

year period. Fourteen dozen were bought specifically for the Lord of
Misrule's band in 1551. If each participant in every masque and play
presented during this period wore a mask, seventeen dozen would have
been used. This represents the use of over thirty-one dozen masks in
five years, with a surplus of twelve dozen still remaining in the store-
room. But in December, 1550, two men spent an entire day mending
masks. The need for so many new masks or the necessity of mending
old ones is not apparent.

208

ial. Those in a play during Edward's coronation, however, were more
correctly attired in grey kersey and beads. 51

During Christmas, 1549, a masque or play was presented
which involved nine hermits. 52 Their garments were not recorded,
but they wore hoods of russel decoreated with buttons, and carried lan-
terns, beads, staves, little bowls, and straw-filled canvas bags in-
scribed with a word or motto.

The Irish were considered to be little more than savages at
this time, 54 and although Irishwomen's garments made by the ARevels
appear to have been degrading, 55 those made for Irishmen were some-
what finer. Linen was used for their hose on one occasion, and the
Irishman with the Lord of Misrule in 1552 wore a long paned garment of
red and blue satin lined with black buckram, a headpiece of dornix, and
buskins of Bruges satin. He may have been made to look ludicrous, how-
ever, with his wig of black flax. The garments for Irish Kerns, included

in the inventory of 1555, were certainly not the rags of wild men. 56

 

51Probably they were similar to those pictured in P1. V. , p. 209.

52
See pp. 123-24, above. An anchoress, i. e. , a female anchor-
ite or hermit, is pictured at the bottom of P1. V, p. 209.
53These may have been clack-dishes, or clap-dishes, beggars'

wooden cups which they clacked on pavement or walls as an appeal.
(Shipley, 153).

4
5 Innes, 311.

5F’See p. 188, above.

See p. 178, above.

PLATE V

 

 

      
   

§
' N

‘0‘

.~\.

 

 

 

 

RELIGIOUS HABITS OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY

210

Costumes of several other national groups were made at
different times, but it cannot be asserted that they were in the national
style. Costumes were made for Moors, Egyptians, Italians, Germans,
Turks, Venetians, Amazons, Ancient Greeks, and ”Albonyes" Warriers.
In keeping with the diplomatic relations of the period, there were no
masques, costumes, or even mention of the French or the Scots.

Several horse trappings included in the inventories bore decor-
ative heraldic devices, many of which were symbols used by members
of the House of York, but their brief descriptions make assignment im.-
possible. Wall hangings were also recorded which had borders bearing
the royal motto and "letters and pellicans of goolde vppon eares of
wheate enbossed vpon the same"; these may have symbolized the Roman
Catholic Church. 57 Pr0perties in the early inventory "bering the half-
mone" had probably been for Turkish masquers; the half-moon or cres-
cent had been adopted as a symbol of the Turkish Empire about a century

5
before. 8 The'herault cuoeur ardant" in the Triumph of Cupid wore a

 

coat paintedwith burning hearts pierced with darts, still the universal
symbol of love.

Finally to be considered are the hand properties which masquers
almost always wore or carried as a token of their identity or nature.

Weapons were the most common symbol, and several kinds appeared.

 

57Feuillerat, 296.

58Bethel, 196.

211

The falchion59

was the most frequent hand weapon made or
bought by the Revels. This broad, slightly curved sword60 was almost
always made in the Office of wood with an elaborately carved or molded
hilt and pommel in the form of a man's head or the head and neck of a
griffin. They were painted, gilded, or foiled, and occasionally furnished
with scabbards, Daggers were made infrequently, and swords, particu-

61

larly Irish swords, were made several times.
Several varieties of spear-like weapons were used. Darts, the
long-shafted spears which were principal weapons of the Irish Kerns,
were made for Irishmen on several occasions and were also made for
the medioxes, goddesses, and Moors, those for the latter with broad
heads and silver feathers. An Irishman was once provided with a prage,
a particular kind of spear, 63 for the Irish play of 1553, and lances and
pikes were used in the mock triumph of 1548. 64 Javelin staffs, which
may have been similar to lances, were carried by participants in Ed-

ward‘s coronation.

Halberds were long wooden spears similar to pikes but with

 

59"Fachelles, " also recorded in the accounts a few times, were
apparently the same as falchions.

605ee Pl. VI, Fig. 1, p. 213.

61See Pl. VI, Fig. 3.

62
See p. 178, n. 27, above, and P1. VI, Fig. 7.

63
Skeat, 305.

4
6 See Pl. VI, Fig. 6.

212

WEAPONS AND ARMOR OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY

(Relative sizes are approximate. Shafts of Figs. 5.
through 10. , and Barrel of Fig. 13. are not shown.)

1. Falchion. (Planche, 119).

2. Morion Helmet, 1558. (E, 296).

3. Irish Sword. (113—hi, 405).

4. Target. (113%, 295).

5. Partizan. (Meyer, 397).

6. Pike-head of Complicate Shape. (EL).
7. Dart. (Planche, 396).

8. Halberd. (Meyer, 397).

9. Halberd. (£2251).

10. Halberd. (fig).

11. Mace with Four Radial Blades. (II:>__ic_l_.).
12. Dagger in Sheath. (111%., 395).

13. Harquebus. (Planche, 298).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

214
battle-axe heads. In the militia they were carried by halberdiers,
"guards unto captains and ensigns, which be most times chosen gentle-
men of experience or cavaliers of the squadron. ”65 They were made or
bought on several occasions by the Revels; double halberds, used once,
were probably similar to partizans, which had symmetrical heads. 66

Short goading spears called gadsb7 were used at least once,
and truncheons, the broken shafts of spears or lances, 68 were ordered
for the jousts of hobbyhorses in 1552, certainly the right comic element
for such an activity.

Maces and clubs were often made by the Revels who used the
words interchangeably; either was a short cudgel for breaking armor or
a short decorated staff used as an ensign of authority.69 Those made for
the Lord of Misrule and his men in 1551 and 1552 were more likely the

latter. Two made for his first reign were ”turned 8: full of pykes" (that

70
is, spikes), and were probably similar to "morning-stars"?l or "Holy

 

65Allardyce Nicoll, The Elizabethans (Cambridge, Eng.: Uni-

versity Press, 1957), p. 134.

66See Pl. VI, Fig. 5.

 

6?

Halliwell -Phillipp s , 3 8 8 .
68

Skeat, 422.
69Bethel, 503.
70 . . .
Halliwell-Phillipps, 620.

7'1 Meyer, 396.

215
water sprinkles";72 maces with radiating spikes in the ends. The cost
of these varied from 4d. to 73. and was no doubt reflected in their or-
namentation. In 1551, seven "greate Colbrande Clubbes" were turned
and painted at ls. each, and the following year two of the same, with
spikes, cost 25. each, but the nature of these particular weapons is un-
known. A hollow club, made in 1551 "to burne squibbes in” has already
been mentioned.

On a few occasions "holms" or "holmaces" were bought,
painted, or mended, 74 along with falchions. The words suggest a com-
bination of "halberd” and "mace, " but their cost of 1d. each (and 6d. and
8d. for painting) indicates they were probably quite different.

The acceptance of firearms was only beginningat this time, 75
and two references to them appeared in the accounts. Although the
Lord of Misrule had thirty harquebusiers in his train in 1551, they appar-
ently supplied their own weapons.

The common defensive shield at mid-century was the target, a

light-weight, round buckler with two straps on the back for the arm and

 

72Meyrick, III, 4.

73See p. 137, n. 38, above.

74Feuillerat, 6, 14, 42, 49, and 55.
75Meyrick, 4.

76566 P1. v1, Fig. 13.

216

hand. 77 Real targets were often of wood78 and frequently, so were
those made by the Revels; they were described as of ”shelbord and fyne
onnes woorke, ” ”of bord onned, " and "of tree shelboard of waynscot
ioyned. ” At other times, however, targets were made of paste, paper,
and cloth. Such broad, flat areas gave ample reason for decoration,
and they were on occasion covered with red sarcenet, fringed at the edge
with Cologne silver and gold, painted, gilded, embossed, and trimmed
with the heads of dead animals. Targets were relatively expensive pro-
perties, costing between 19d. and 45. to make.

Besides the canvas mail and morion helmets already discussed,
armor was made on only two other occasions; for the Greek Worthies in

79 and for the Hercules in 1554.80

1553,
Such were the activities of the Office of the Revels during the
reigns of Edward VI and Mary I. Built on the incongruous foundations of
simple medieval stagecraft used in religious plays and the ornate costume
design of the secular court, their techniques were highly developed by the
time the Office was officially established. But ahead were another sixty

years of costume, property, and scenery making for the stage-conscious

courts of Elizabeth and James which saw the birth of the great age of

 

77Skeat, 402. See P1. v1, Fig. 4.
78See p. 178, n. 27, above.

7

9See pp. 163-64, above.

8OSee pp. 170-71, above.

217
English drama. The Office of the Revels was to become one of the

most influential forces in the art of stagecraft.

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APPENDIX I

PROCEDURE OF A DISGUISING

[The following order was copied by Collier from The Book of

 

All Manner of Orders Concerning an Earl's House, some part of which
was dated 1501.1 It provided that the ”disguising" should not come into

the hall until the "interlude, comedy, or tragedy" was ended.)

The Disguisars to come in aftir this manour following, with
iij torcheis to be borne before theim at their riding into the Hall, with
iij yomen waiters, suche as shalbe appointed by the Marshallis to do it.
Furst iij yoman waiters to beir iij torcheis to light them into
the hall, and when the saide Disguisars ar comyn into the hall, than the
saide parsonnes that berith the saide lightes to make their obeysaunce
and departe, or ellis to stand on side, and the iiij minstrallis, suche as
the Lord haith at that tyme, there to stonde in the hall before the saide
disguisars com, and assoon as they be comyn into the hall, the minstral-
lis to stand aside and play. And than the disguisars to make their obey-

saunce altogeder and daunce suche daunces as they be appointed. And

 

1Collier, I, 24-26.
223

224
when the saide disguisars hath doon their saide daunces, than halfe of
them to stand uppon the oon side and halfe uppon the outher side, if
there be no women. Provided alwaies that if there be women disguised,
then they to come in first. And if there be women disguised, then half
of the minstrallis afforesaid to fet in the outhir disguisars with the
lightes after they have browght in the women, and they have daunced and
their obeysaunce made, and stande aside. And they to do as the outhir
did before, ande than they to stande uppon the outher side. Alwaies the
men gevinge to the women the prehemynence of their standinge. Alwaies
provided that the minstrallis shall bring theym in, playing before thaym
such daunces as they shall daunce. Ande when they have doon, in like
case the Morris to come in incontinent as is apointed, yf any be ordey-
nid. Ane when the saide Morris arrive in the midist of the hall, than the
said minstrallis to play the daunces that is appointed for theim. And
when they here the said minsrallis play, than to come out oon aftir an
outhir, as they be appointed. And when they have doon to go forthe in
like case as they came into the said towre, or thing devised for theim.
Always reservid to the maister of the disguisinges to order it as he shall
think best and convenient; and when the said Moris is doone, than the
gentillmen to corn unto the women and make their obeisaunce, and every
of them to taike oon by thand, and daunce suche rounds as shall be appoint-
ed them to daunce togeder by the maister of the revills; and that doon, to
bring the women to their places agayne and make their obeysances, and

then departe to their owne places where they stood before.

APPENDIX II

A DISGUISING WITH A PAGEAN T WAGON, 1511

[The following account from Hall's Chronicle, copied by

 

Collier, 1 gives some idea of the procedure of a royal disguising as

well as an excellent description of a pageant wagonJ

Against the 12 daye or the daie of the Epiphane at nyghte,
before the banket in the hall at Rychemound, was a pageaunt devised
like a mountayne, glisteryng by nyght, as though it had bene all of
golde and set with stones; on the top of the whiche mountayne was a
tree of golde, the braunches and the bowes frysed with gold, spreding
on every side over the mountayne with roses and pomegranetts: the
which mountayn was with vices2 brought up towards the kyng, and out
of the same came a ladye appareiled in clothe of golde, and the children

of honour, called the Henchemen, which were freshly disguysed and

 

1 Collier, 66-67.

2A vice was an engine of wood "wherewith such things as are
done within out of sight, are shewed to the beholders by the turning about
of wheeles. " (Wright, 999-1000). The word also applied to anything in
a spiral or winding form (Halliwell-Phillipps, 910), which suggests the
use of a Windlass or winch inside the pageant wagon.

225

226
daunced a Morice before the kyng; and that done reentred the mountayne,
and then it was drawen backe, and then was the Wassail or banket

brought in, and so brake up Christmas.

APPENDIX III

THE INTERLUDE OF THE TRIUMPH OF LOVE AND BEAUTY

1
[This account, found by Collier, relates to the Christmas

festivities at Richmond in 1514, and describes typical triumphsJ

For to do pleser [to] the Kynges grace, and for to pas the
tyme of Chrestmas, by Sir Harry Gyllfurth, Master of the Revells,
was devysed an Interluit, in the wheche conteyned a moresk of vj per-
sons and ij ladys: wherfor by commandement of our soveraine lord
the Kyng, and at apoyntment of Sir Harry Gylforth, was preparyd, had
and wrought dyvers and sundry garments.

The Interlud was callyd the tryumpe of Love and Bewte, and yt
was wryten and presentyd by Mayster Cornyshe and oothers of the Chap-
pell of our soverayne lorde the Kyng, and the chyldern of the sayd Chap-
ell. In the same Venus and Bewte dyd tryumpe over al ther enemys, and
tamyd a salvadge man and a lyon, that was made very rare and naturall,

so as the kyng was gretly plesyd therwyth, and gracyously gaf Mayster

 

lCollier, 68-70.

227

228

Cornys she a ryche rewarde owt of his owne hand, to be dyvydyd with
the rest of his felows. Venus dyd synge a songe with Beawte, which
was lykyd of al that harde yt, every staffe endyng after this sortte:

'Bowe you downe, and doo your dutye

To Venus and the goddes Bewty:

We tryumpe hye over all,

Kyngs attend when we doo call. '
Inglyshe, and the oothers of the Kynges pleyers, after played an
Interluyt, whiche was wryten by Mayster Midwell, but yt was so long
yt was not lyked: yt was of the fyndyng of Troth, who was caryed away
by ygnoraunce 8: ypocresy. The foolys part was the best, but the kyng

departyd befor the end to hys chambre.

APPENDIX IV

ARTICLES AND ORDINANCES OF THE OFFICE OF THE REVELS

[This document, dated 1573, is an anonymous report upon

the working of the Office, drawn up in view of a possible reorganization,

and was printed by Chambers.l Only that part concerning the estab-

lishment of the Office is included hereJ

In what state
the office of
the Revelles
is reported to

haue bene in.

The Office of the Revelles, as it shoulde seeme by
reporte, hath in tymes past bene in that order, That

the prince beinge disposed to pastyme would at one tyme
appoynte one persone, at sometyme an other, suche as
for creditte pleasaunte witte and habilitye in learnynge
he thought meete to be the master of the Revelles for
that tyme, to sett fourthe suche devises as might be
most agreeable to the princes expectacion. The workes
beinge fynyshed, It is thought that the princes Tayler

havinge the oversight of the Workemanshippe brought in

 

lChambers, Tudor Revels, 2-3.

 

229

The Revelles
Tentes and
Toyles made

an Office.

The first
master of
that office

by patent.

230
the Bill of charges and was payed for it, whereupon is
gathered that John Houlte yeoman of the Revelles vsed
to say Concerninge allowaunce of charges in the office
of the Revelles 'it hath bene but a Taylers Bill. '

It is alledged by some that afterwardes The
Revelles together with the Tents and Toylles was made
an office and certen of the kinges hous eholde servauntes
appoynted by patent to have care thereof, Off whiche
office there was a Seriaunt yeoman groomes etc. , some
of theym by the king speciallye appoynted as it shoulde
seeme, for that they hadde letteres patentes of the same
office, where cornmonlye others of their callinge in
office in the Courte have their offices without patent.
And some thinke that the Revelles was kept and wrought
within owne pallace.

After the deathe of Travers2 Seriaunt of the said
office, Sir Thomas Carden knight, beinge of the kinges
maiesties pryvie Chamber, being skilfull and delightinge
in matters of devise, preferred to that office, did mis-
lyke to be tearmed a Seriaunt because of his better coun-
tenaunce of roome and place beinge of the kinges maisties
privye Chamber. And so became he by patent the first

master of the Revelles.

 

No other references to this man have been found.

The first
Clerke
Comptroller

by patent.

The first

Clerke

by Patent.

231

Afterwardes Sir Thomas Carden, havinge by all
likelihoode mistrust of loose and negligent dealinges by
Inferiour officers or others in that office, and because
hymselfe coulde not be alwayes there present to oversee
the charge of the office, procured at the kinges handes
That there shoulde be also a Clerke Comptroller of the
said office, who beinge the princes sworne man and
carying that name might with some countenaunce or au-
thoritye stande hym in good steede for the better gov-
ernement and direction of the said office and for the
amendment of the loose dealinges both to his owne ease
and the princes good service, whiche Clerke Comptroller
was John Barnard who was the first Clerke Comptroller
of the said office for the Revelles and Tentes by patent.

It might seeme that in tymes past the same office
beinge kept in the kinges house The Clerk Comptrollers
of the kinges household or one of theym hadde eye vpon
the princes charges in that behalfe, whiche might enduce
a president for the establishement of a Clerke Comptroller
in the said office.

Sir Thomas Carden after that, beinge driven as it
should seeme from tyme to tyme to have his bookes of
accompte made vp by the Clerke of the kinges Woorkes as

the office might be vsed when it was kepte in the princes

232
Courte, thought it expedient by reason of the same
office To have some necessarye person, who beinge
the princes sworne servaunte and having office and
wages or fee by patent therefore might register and
enter the charges anye waye growen by reason of the
said office from tyme {to tyme, who also might be a
good witnes of the vpright service both of the masters
and other dealinges in the said office, and to make vppe
and perfitt the bookes reconynges and accomptes of the
said office with more readye vnderstandinge by reason
of attendaunce then the Clerke of the workes being a
straunger thervnto coulde doe, procured Thomas Phil-
ippes to be Clerke of the said office who was the first

Clerke by patent of the said office.

APPENDIX V
LETTER FROM THE LORD OF MISRULE, 1552
[Upon appointment as Lord of Misrule for the twelve days
of Christmas, 1552-53, George Ferrers sent the following letter to
Cawarden.l Since it includes some details not mentioned in the text,

it is printed hereJ

. this yeare I Imagin to cum oute of a place caulled vastum vacuum.

 

I. the great waste I asmoche to saie as a place voyde or emptie with-
oute the worlde where is neither fier ayre water nor earth / and that

I have bene remayning there sins the Laste yeare Ande bicause of Cer-
taine devises whiche I have towching this matter ./ I wolde yf it were
possyble have all myne apparrell blewe the first daie that I present my
self to the kinges Maiestie and even as I shewe my self that daie, so my
mynd is in like order 8: in like suetes to shew my self at my commyng
into London after the halowed daies / Againe how I shall cum into the
courte whether under a Canepie as the last yeare, or in a chare trium-

phall, or vppon some straunge beast that I reserve to you / But the

 

lFeuillerat, 89-90.

233

234
serpente with sevin heddes cauled hidra is the chief beast of myne
armes. / and the wholie bushe is the devise of my Crest / my worde

is semper ferians .I. alwaies feasting or keping holie daie / Vppon

 

Christmas daie I send a solempe ambassade to the kinges Maiestie

by an herrald trumpet an orator speaking in a straunge language an /
Interpreter or a truchman with hym, to which persons thre were re-
quiset to have convenient furnyture which I referre to you / I have pro-
vided one to plaie vppon a kettell drom with his boye and a nother drome
with a fyffe whiche must be apparelled like turkes garmentes according
to the patrons I send you herwith on St Stephens daie2 / I wolde yf it
were possyble be with the kinges Maiestie before dynner Mr Windham
being my admyrall as appointed to receive me beneth the bridge withe
the kinges Brigandyne andother vesselles apointed for the same purpose
/ his desire is to have the poope of his vessell covered with white and
blew like as I signifie to you by a nother lettre / Sir george howard being
my Master of the horsis receiveth me at my Landing at grenwiche with a
spare horse and iiij pages of honour one carieng my hedpece a nother my
Shelde / the thirde my sword and the fourth my axe / As for their furn-
iture I know nothing as yet provided either for my pages or other wise

save a hedpece that I caused to be made / My counsailours with suche

other necessarie persons yt attend vppon me that daie must also be con-

 

2St. Stephen's Day, i.e., December 26. (Benet, 977). Ibe-
lieve a period should follow ”herwith" in the preceding line, and a semi-
colon should follow "dynner" in the following line.

235
sydered / There maie be no fewer then sixe counsailours at the least /
I must also have a divine a philosopher an astronomer a poet a phisi-

Iohn Smyth

cian / a potecarie / a Mr of requestes / a sivilian / a disard / two
gentlemen vshers besides Iuglers / tomblers / fooles / friers and suche
other / The residue of the wholie daies I will spend other devises / as
one daie in feates of armes 8: then wolde I have a challeng performed
with hobbie horsis where I purpose to be in person a nother daie in
honting 8: hawking / the residue of the tyme _Shalbe spent in other devises
whiche I will declare to you by mouth to have your ayde and advice therin /
Sir I know not howe ye be provided to furnish me but suer methinkes I
Sholde have nolesse then five suetes of apparell / the first for the daie I
come in which shall also serve me in London and two other suetes for the
two halowed daies following / the fourth for newe yeares daie / and the
fifte for xijth daie Towching my suet of blew I have sent you a pece of vel-
vet which hath a kinde of powdred ermaines in it vearie fytt for my wering
yf you so thinke good / All other matters I referre tyll I shall speake
with you. George fferrers.

Item bagges for money Item for ye greatt seale another bagge.

Letter frome the Lorde mysrull. The order of a warraunt ffor the Revylls.

1

APPENDIX VI

A PLAY BY WILLIAM BALDWIN

[The following synopsis was sent to Cawarden by William
Baldwin on the day before Christmas, 1555, although the play was not
presented until the following Christmas, if it was presented at all. 1

Inasmuch as it contains several details of a court play of the mid-six-

teenth century it is included here.]

love and lyve

You shall vnderstande syr that I have made a Comodie concern-
yng the way to lyfe, mete as it is supposed to be played before the Quene,
and there be of the Innes of court that desyer to have the setting furth
therof, but because your mastership now thre yeres passed offered in a
sort to set furth sum of my rude devises, I thought it good to know your
mynde herein, before I gave answer to any other / The settyng furth wil
be chargeable because the matter is stately, comprehending a discourse
of the hole worlde / There be in it of sundry personages . lxij. and the

play is iij. houres long, it is now in learnyng and well be ready within

 

lFeuillerat, 215-17 and 301-02.

236

237

these .x. dayes / The matter is this, I bring in a yong man whome I
name ’Lamuel who hath a seruant called Lob, these two will attempt the
worlde to sake theyr fortune, the mete with Lust lucke and love, Lust
prorniseth them lecherie, Lucke lordship, Love lyf, they folow lvst and
throughllechery be lost, than through Lucke they recover, Luck bringeth
them to lordship from whiche through Larges and larracineZ they cum to
Lacke / Than through Love, the go to Light 8: therby attayne Lyfe / All
the players names beginne with . L. And be such as ensue.

Lamech an husbandman

Lamuel his sonne

Lob his servant

Lust

Lucke ladyes

Love

Layies Lechery a sumtuous hore

Laughing
her maydens
Lokyng
Lothyng
her men
naturall Lowting

Lantidum Sterves an here
Lymping Cure a colmanhedge

Lusty Libberne a lowtysh ruffian

 

2That is, larceny. (Bethel, 473).

naturall

238
Light feete his lacky
Leonard Lustyguts an Epicure
Syr lewes lewdlyfe a chaplayn
Lubberdy lazy

Lustiguts men

Liberall laucher
Lame lazar a spittleman
Laurens littleskyll a surgeon

Lither wyll his boy

Linag e

Lordship borne in a chare Landes

by these fower leadall coyne

natur all

naturall

Lawe
Liegerdemayn an olde courtier
Lammarkin a Lanceknight
Lodovico de . S. Lukerseco, an Italian horseman
Lamphadirizumph a drowerslate
Linage Linker an harolde
Lawde

Ladies
lewdnes
Lothly Luchre an huswyfe
Lucres Lockfast her mayd
Large conscience

Lying men s ervauntes

Lymefing e r

239
Lieger de pied
naturall Lyver white french men
Landgrave van Luxenburgh Lieutenant of an army

line 8: levell Justice

Light accompaned in a throne lenitie mercy
with these iiij learnyng
Labor

Larracine an extorcioner
naturall

Lavish a Stuarde

Lot

Lyvelode

vertues
Leannes
Lyking

Let a vice

Lamenting
states

longyng

naturall Littleleft a poore suter
Libertie a ladye
Last yeres an aged man
Little loktfor death
Lyfe a tabernacle

This is the proporcion wherein I pray you as shortly as you can to let me

240
know your myne, I pray God kepe you 8: youres, Amen.
At london this tuisday Christmas eve
Yours to do you pleasure
wyliam Baldwyn
To the right wurshipfull

Syr Thomas Cawerden. . dd.

III/II“

III/III .

031

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