As a Dutchman, I can only presume that a word borrowed into English for a Dutch painting technique, "dead colour" was simply taken from the Dutch verb "doodverven" or noun "doodverf". Those words do indeed mean "undercoat", "put an undercoat on a picture", and the part "dood" is indeed a (in Dutch not that common but by no means unnatural) metaphoric use, referring to the deadish, pale hue of such paints.
Going back to the very first annotation: yes, take-out food! It may sound surprising now, when we think we in the last couple of decades are the inventors of everything, but take-out food goes back, not to Pepys' time; not to the Middle Ages; but at least as far back as Rome in the first century. IIRC take-out bakeries are mentioned, with complete historical veracity, in the Cambridge Latin Course. They would be entirely matter-of-fact to Sam.
Richard - not giving you the other initials, 'cause privacy, and they're common, and I'm a programmer so I don't trust the internet. Dutchman. Used to be an Anglophile, and I would be again but for Brexit and, frankly, some attitudes I experienced even before that. I was welcome in 1999 - in 2008 not any more. You've changed, England... but I still love your Sam, and your P.G., and above all your Geoffrey.
I've known about this site for quite a while, but my reaction always was "nah, I'm not going through all those years of backlog". And then I was reminded in December - I think it was on Hacker News, but it might have been Reddit or Metafilter - that a new reading was about to start next January 1st. So I had no excuse to stay away any more, and here I am.
Posting comments from a continental point of view, with interests in history, science, and linguistics.
I must be confused. According to L&M, Pepys complained of a swollen testicle. From this, it is concluded that he had an inguinal hernia. Now... these are in roughly the same area of the body, it is true. But as a man, I would never, under any circumstances, confuse a wildly painful swollen bollock - seriously, women, you have no idea! - with a somewhat hurting extrusion on my hip. What's going on here? This conclusion makes no physiological sense at all.
Fun fact: the Thynnes mentioned by San Diego Sarah, from Longleat in Wiltshire, are now the Marquesses of Bath and feature in the BBC television series Animal Park. The second- or third-previous Marquess built a safari park on the estate to pay for the upkeep of Longleat Castle.
Meanwhile, the current Earl of Sandwich - that is, the heir of Sam's cousin Edward Montagu - runs a chain of sandwich shops with his son, called Earl of Sandwich. And yes, the sandwich was named after Earl #4. Who can blame them?
(I don't think the Thynnes are related to Hercules Grytpype-Thynne, but I'd be delighted, as well as very surprised, to learn otherwise.)
Since Squire Bence died in 1648, this is certainly not him.
However, his brother Alexander was master of Trinity House up until 1660. Since that institute deals with shipping, amongst others with the maintenance of lighthouses, Alexander Jr. would have known the Sir Wm.s Both professionally. It seems reasonable, therefore, that it was him both times the name is mentioned. He would have been 70ish, though, 10 years older than Wm. Batten at this point.
Alternatively, his son John, who would defeat Samuel in a parliamentary election a few years later, was 38 / 39 by these dates. Nearly as old as Wm. Penn, 20 years younger than Wm. Batten, 10 years older than Sam. Agewise, perhaps a slightly more likely possibility. He was a merchant trading with foreign countries, so perhaps not as close professionally but certainly not entirely unacquainted with the naval crowd either.
As for the word Tory: Wikipedia claims that Titus Oates, a couple of decades into the future, would be the first to introduce the word to England, but this page proves that wrong. Perhaps he was the first to use it to refer to Roman Catholic rebels specifically, and Samuel here is using it in its older, more general meaning of either Irish rebel against Cromwell, or Irish ruffian in general?
Ooh, I'd forgotten that now is Bonfire Night, @Sarah! Good catch, presuming you really are in California. (If you're secretly English, well...)
As for how he got it, modern smokeless power is an industrial product, but old-fashioned black powder is famously easy to make, requiring one completely common ingredient, one which is not that hard to get, and one which is doable. Charcoal is, obviously, easy. Saltpetre would have been readily available just for curing meat. You'd have to buy it, but it would have been sold in shops. Pure sulphur doesn't have any other domestic (!) uses, but surely apothecaries would have it? Alchemy and early (pseudo-) medicine used it. And then it's just a matter of taking the right proportions, and a pestle and mortar.
What puzzles me is why Wayneman would have gunpowder just randomly in his pocket, whether loose or as a packet. It's not as if he is expected to load a pistol any moment of the day.
- There may in fact have been a plot, but if so it was a minor one (it doesn't even appear on Wikipedia, only as a vague note on Yarranton's own page), it got nowhere, and neither Vane nor Lambert was involved; - However, they got them out of the way and separated (Vane to the Scillies, Lambert Guernsey) to make sure they couldn't communicate either with the plotters or with one another; - The Venetian ambassador believes they were in fact involved (but seems to have been wrong; - Samuel was wrong about only two people being involved and both of them being sent to the Scillies.
Note that (as also mentioned somewhere in those pages on mourning) the periods for mourning were not nearly as long yet, and not nearly as strictly held to, as in Victorian times. For instance, there would be a mass said one month after a person's burial, but by that time only the closest relatives would still be in full or even half mourning.
@David G: the vow was not so much not to go to the theatre, as not to go to the theatre *on his own*. He's taken his wife, and friends, several times, but AFAICT this is the first time he's been there alone all this month.
@Annie: it was probably to do with the reputation singing (and dancing) masters had at the time: that they would try to have a fling with every single one of their students. Sam probably thought that as long as Elizabeth had her lessons together with him, it was OK.
@Sarah: more likely that daily prayer was a personal matter, but on Sunday it was a family affair. Though to be honest, that's speculation, albeit based on a bit of experience.
Another argument for the later birth date is that her parents only married in 1643, and her brother, William Penn of Pennsylvania fame, was born in 1644. It looks likely that William was born of his parents' marital bliss, and therefore unlikely that Margaret was born out of wedlock.
@San Diego Sarah: your source must have its references mixed up, because Justus and the count are two different persons.
The count of Egmont at this point was Lodewijk Filips, who is not very interesting.
Justus van Egmont, /suo ipso dictu/ "Verus", was a painter who was in no way related to the nobleman who got his head chopped off and thereby inspired a Beethoven overture, but who was himself rather more notable than his contemporary count.
Interestingly, Pepys *could* have met either of them, but probably didn't. Both lived in Flanders, rather than around The Hague; but both of them would have travelled, as Sam did.
Comments
Third Reading
About Saturday 28 December 1661
RLB • Link
In a much more trivial mind than previous commentators, I wonder what kind of card games they played in those days.
About Friday 13 December 1661
RLB • Link
As a Dutchman, I can only presume that a word borrowed into English for a Dutch painting technique, "dead colour" was simply taken from the Dutch verb "doodverven" or noun "doodverf". Those words do indeed mean "undercoat", "put an undercoat on a picture", and the part "dood" is indeed a (in Dutch not that common but by no means unnatural) metaphoric use, referring to the deadish, pale hue of such paints.
About Thursday 5 December 1661
RLB • Link
Going back to the very first annotation: yes, take-out food! It may sound surprising now, when we think we in the last couple of decades are the inventors of everything, but take-out food goes back, not to Pepys' time; not to the Middle Ages; but at least as far back as Rome in the first century. IIRC take-out bakeries are mentioned, with complete historical veracity, in the Cambridge Latin Course. They would be entirely matter-of-fact to Sam.
About Roger L'Estrange
RLB • Link
As an irrelevant side note, I've only come across that surname once before. I wonder if Roger is an ancestor of Jasper?
About Roll Call. Say hello!
RLB • Link
Richard - not giving you the other initials, 'cause privacy, and they're common, and I'm a programmer so I don't trust the internet. Dutchman. Used to be an Anglophile, and I would be again but for Brexit and, frankly, some attitudes I experienced even before that. I was welcome in 1999 - in 2008 not any more. You've changed, England... but I still love your Sam, and your P.G., and above all your Geoffrey.
I've known about this site for quite a while, but my reaction always was "nah, I'm not going through all those years of backlog". And then I was reminded in December - I think it was on Hacker News, but it might have been Reddit or Metafilter - that a new reading was about to start next January 1st. So I had no excuse to stay away any more, and here I am.
Posting comments from a continental point of view, with interests in history, science, and linguistics.
About Wednesday 4 December 1661
RLB • Link
@john: one can tell that a body's probably drowned, and roughly how long ago, by its looks. Not legal evidence, but good enough for a diary.
(As for "out of tune", I take it not to mean in a sour mood, but a bit under the weather. As I am today.)
About Tuesday 3 December 1661
RLB • Link
I must be confused. According to L&M, Pepys complained of a swollen testicle. From this, it is concluded that he had an inguinal hernia. Now... these are in roughly the same area of the body, it is true. But as a man, I would never, under any circumstances, confuse a wildly painful swollen bollock - seriously, women, you have no idea! - with a somewhat hurting extrusion on my hip. What's going on here? This conclusion makes no physiological sense at all.
About Tuesday 3 December 1661
RLB • Link
Fun fact: the Thynnes mentioned by San Diego Sarah, from Longleat in Wiltshire, are now the Marquesses of Bath and feature in the BBC television series Animal Park. The second- or third-previous Marquess built a safari park on the estate to pay for the upkeep of Longleat Castle.
Meanwhile, the current Earl of Sandwich - that is, the heir of Sam's cousin Edward Montagu - runs a chain of sandwich shops with his son, called Earl of Sandwich. And yes, the sandwich was named after Earl #4. Who can blame them?
(I don't think the Thynnes are related to Hercules Grytpype-Thynne, but I'd be delighted, as well as very surprised, to learn otherwise.)
About Mr Bence
RLB • Link
Since Squire Bence died in 1648, this is certainly not him.
However, his brother Alexander was master of Trinity House up until 1660. Since that institute deals with shipping, amongst others with the maintenance of lighthouses, Alexander Jr. would have known the Sir Wm.s Both professionally. It seems reasonable, therefore, that it was him both times the name is mentioned. He would have been 70ish, though, 10 years older than Wm. Batten at this point.
Alternatively, his son John, who would defeat Samuel in a parliamentary election a few years later, was 38 / 39 by these dates. Nearly as old as Wm. Penn, 20 years younger than Wm. Batten, 10 years older than Sam. Agewise, perhaps a slightly more likely possibility. He was a merchant trading with foreign countries, so perhaps not as close professionally but certainly not entirely unacquainted with the naval crowd either.
About Monday 25 November 1661
RLB • Link
I'm pretty sure Archer was Mrs. Mary's maiden name. After all, her pretty sister Betty has the same surname.
About Monday 25 November 1661
RLB • Link
As for the word Tory: Wikipedia claims that Titus Oates, a couple of decades into the future, would be the first to introduce the word to England, but this page proves that wrong. Perhaps he was the first to use it to refer to Roman Catholic rebels specifically, and Samuel here is using it in its older, more general meaning of either Irish rebel against Cromwell, or Irish ruffian in general?
About Saturday 2 November 1661
RLB • Link
Ooh, I'd forgotten that now is Bonfire Night, @Sarah! Good catch, presuming you really are in California. (If you're secretly English, well...)
As for how he got it, modern smokeless power is an industrial product, but old-fashioned black powder is famously easy to make, requiring one completely common ingredient, one which is not that hard to get, and one which is doable.
Charcoal is, obviously, easy. Saltpetre would have been readily available just for curing meat. You'd have to buy it, but it would have been sold in shops. Pure sulphur doesn't have any other domestic (!) uses, but surely apothecaries would have it? Alchemy and early (pseudo-) medicine used it.
And then it's just a matter of taking the right proportions, and a pestle and mortar.
About Saturday 2 November 1661
RLB • Link
What puzzles me is why Wayneman would have gunpowder just randomly in his pocket, whether loose or as a packet. It's not as if he is expected to load a pistol any moment of the day.
About Wednesday 30 October 1661
RLB • Link
So, if I get it correctly:
- There may in fact have been a plot, but if so it was a minor one (it doesn't even appear on Wikipedia, only as a vague note on Yarranton's own page), it got nowhere, and neither Vane nor Lambert was involved;
- However, they got them out of the way and separated (Vane to the Scillies, Lambert Guernsey) to make sure they couldn't communicate either with the plotters or with one another;
- The Venetian ambassador believes they were in fact involved (but seems to have been wrong;
- Samuel was wrong about only two people being involved and both of them being sent to the Scillies.
About Sunday 27 October 1661
RLB • Link
Note that (as also mentioned somewhere in those pages on mourning) the periods for mourning were not nearly as long yet, and not nearly as strictly held to, as in Victorian times. For instance, there would be a mass said one month after a person's burial, but by that time only the closest relatives would still be in full or even half mourning.
About Monday 21 October 1661
RLB • Link
@David G: the vow was not so much not to go to the theatre, as not to go to the theatre *on his own*. He's taken his wife, and friends, several times, but AFAICT this is the first time he's been there alone all this month.
About Tuesday 1 October 1661
RLB • Link
@Annie: it was probably to do with the reputation singing (and dancing) masters had at the time: that they would try to have a fling with every single one of their students. Sam probably thought that as long as Elizabeth had her lessons together with him, it was OK.
About Sunday 29 September 1661
RLB • Link
@Sarah: more likely that daily prayer was a personal matter, but on Sunday it was a family affair. Though to be honest, that's speculation, albeit based on a bit of experience.
About Margaret Lowther (b. Penn)
RLB • Link
Another argument for the later birth date is that her parents only married in 1643, and her brother, William Penn of Pennsylvania fame, was born in 1644. It looks likely that William was born of his parents' marital bliss, and therefore unlikely that Margaret was born out of wedlock.
About Thursday 26 September 1661
RLB • Link
@San Diego Sarah: your source must have its references mixed up, because Justus and the count are two different persons.
The count of Egmont at this point was Lodewijk Filips, who is not very interesting.
Justus van Egmont, /suo ipso dictu/ "Verus", was a painter who was in no way related to the nobleman who got his head chopped off and thereby inspired a Beethoven overture, but who was himself rather more notable than his contemporary count.
Interestingly, Pepys *could* have met either of them, but probably didn't. Both lived in Flanders, rather than around The Hague; but both of them would have travelled, as Sam did.