"... we walked home, my little boy carrying a link, and Will leading my wife."
I'd like to say Pepys carried the umbrella, but if he had one, I think he'd boast about it.
"In French, ‘parapluie’ means umbrella, with ‘para’ meaning protection. Whereas in English, umbrella has the latin stem ‘umbra’ meaning shadow so has a direct link to its predecessor, the parasol.
"It was only by the 16th century that the umbrella as we know it became a reality. The decisive moment when oil and wax covers replaced the status quo covers on parasols. It is from this moment that the umbrella became an item to protect against bad weather and rain. From this point on, the parasol and the umbrella have separate destinies.
"In the 17th century, the umbrella became a hit in Western countries, especially in stylish Italy, France and Britain. At first, it was only considered a feminine accessory to protect women from the rain, but English men progressively adopted it through the 18th century with Jonas Hanway leading the way for the era of umbrellas for men."
So Will Hewer is escorting Elizabeth, and Pepys is sloshing around in the muck, or picking his way around it?
Yes, England had a class sytem for most of its history -- as did every other country in Europe. If you have nobility, you have a class system.
Please accept that as a fact as we're going to have to deal with the ramifications which almost cost England a war which happens during the Diary. Pepys isn't a snob -- he hasn't cut all his buddies from the Exchequer or Merchant Taylors School. But as low man on the Navy totem pole, he wants people to acknowledge that there is a totem pole and he has the privilege of being on it.
"...walked to Whitehall, it being very cold and foul and rainy weather."
What do you expect in November, Pepys? Perhaps you needed time to think about things. Just because Charles II has said he's cutting the number of London Hackney coaches last week doesn't mean they have disappeared off the streets -- but maybe the drivers don't want their horses slipping on the filthy cobble stones, so there aren't many available? Plus it's Sunday, so maybe they have time off like the watermen?
"Secondly, what would the seating arrangement be, if they did come along? Boy-girl-boy-girl, taking up a couple of rows?"
The seating arrangement would be first comes, possibly takes all, MartinVT.
The families sit together, but the children might be relegated to the back row where their inattention would attract less notice. Relatives and friends of the Commissioners also creep in there from time to time, leaving late arriving Commissioners with crampted quarters at best. This isn't the last time we'll hear about seating negotiations and faux pas.
St. Olave's was The Navy Church, and the previous Puritan/Presbyterians must have been happy to mingle with their fellow parishoners.
But now the Book of Common Prayer is being reintroduced, and Charles II is making every effort to impose himself (and his representatives) as being in charge. "This day also did Mr. Mills begin to read all the Common Prayer, which I was glad of."
One way of establishing the status and influence of the Navy Commissioners within the parish is to put them 'on high' so the other parishoners have to look up at them in their private gallery on Sundays.
There were two rows of pews in the new gallery, so my guess is the usher at the door wanted the gallery to be full for its debut. The servants probably arrived first, and were directed up there by the usher. They knew to sit in the back seats by the wall. The Commissioners, knowing their seats were saved, arrived right before the service started, and found only the front pew available. Luckily none of the ladies had chosen to attend, so the Commissioners could comfortably take their places in the front.
Why were the ladies not there? We will ask that about Elizabeth many times during the Diary, and my guess is that when they counted heads for manditory attendance, they only counted male heads, and the ladies were given a pass so they could deal with children and lunch. Elizabeth, if she goes, is more likely to go to church in the afternoon.
Probably one of the Commissioners had a chat with the usher after the service and told him that the Navy Pew was for the Commissioners and their families only, and not to do that again. No big deal.
I never parked in the CEO's parking space either. No big deal. But if the parking lot attendant on a busy day had told me to park there ... hmmmm.
Pies covered in ornamental devices were commonplace on high-status tables in the 16th and 17th centuries, and are frequently depicted in Netherlandish, German and Italian paintings. Kitchen Interior (1644) by David Teniers the Younger features a large pie decorated with gilt strapwork, awaiting delivery to the dining room. The pastry has an Imperial double-headed eagle surmounted by the head, tail and wings of a swan bedecked in a floral headdress, and a bauble in its gilt-covered beak.
In a collaborative painting of 1618, The Sense of Taste by Peter Paul Rubens and Jan Brueghel, 4 similar pies are dressed with taxidermy specimens of a peacock, a pheasant and a partridge. The birds are all dotted with gold leaf – some even wear jewellery – while the pastry cases are covered in gilded patterns. [FOLLOW THE LINK BELOW TO SEE THE PICTURES]
The most notable collection of designs for these astonishing creations is Conrad Hagger’s Neues Saltzburgisches Koch-Buch (1719). Hagger was cook to the Archbishop of Saltzburg and his book includes more than 300 detailed engravings, many of tureen-like pastries.
A number are similar to the bird pies painted by Teniers and Brueghel, although Hagger crafts his swans and peacocks entirely from pastry and provides diagrams to show how they can be constructed. Capricious pies depicting lions, griffins or the pelican in her piety are illustrated alongside hare pasteten (pies) with gadrooned pastry sides and acanthus-adorned lids.
Despite the triumph of the tureen, pastry cooks continued to make decorative tureen-like pies. In an engraving from 1740 of a feast in Vienna in homage to Empress Maria Theresa, an ornamental pie – its top removed and a ladle protruding from its contents – sits next to fashionable pots d’ouile.
Pies continued to appear on the same table as their grand silver relatives – a taste of the eclectic attitude that so lavishly furnished the 18th century.
Simehow I doubt Elizabeth was putting a swan with feathers on top of her pies -- with or without the jewels!
Autumnal pies -- one of Pepys favorite subject. But it didn't necessarily look like the pie we're used to:
In the court of pre-Revolutionary France, hunting was October’s most important recreational activity. Complex dishes of game and poultry, the origins of which were in the culture of the chase, were served at autumnal feasts.
An English recipe for the pot d’ouile, or olio, from 1723 reads like an account of a mass extinction. It contains a rump of beef, mutton, pork, venison, bacon, geese, turkeys, capons, pheasants, wigeons, partridges, and Snipes (half a dozen), Quails (two dozen) and Larks (four dozen).
Of equal complexity was the terrine or tureiner, which derived its name from the terracotta pot in which it was baked.
These dishes served as emblems of the bounty of the aristocratic host’s parks.
By the late 17th century, French silversmiths were developing special vessels for serving these entrées, although by then the number of ingredients had been trimmed to suit refined Gallic sensibilities. Some of the earliest are from the workshop of court goldsmith Thomas Germain (1673–1748). These pots d’ouile and terrines are among the most magnificent silver vessels ever made.
A pair of tureens made in the late 1720s (now at the Getty) features lifelike wild boar head-shaped handles cast in silver. A set from 1745–50 is crowned with covers graced with trompe l’oeil cauliflowers, crayfish and crabs. The aim: to titillate guests’ appetites with realistic depictions of the ingredients of the stew they were about to consume.
One of the mysteries of culinary history is the sudden appearance of these spectacular tureens in the early 18th century. There is little material evidence before then for receptacles specifically designed for serving soups and stews. It is assumed the tureen’s ancestors were humble terracotta bowls, although none have survived. By contrast, the earliest tureens are among the most elaborate expressions of the silversmith’s art. Later examples crafted from porcelain were based on the shapes of these silver predecessors.
These impressive items did not crystallise out of thin air. Extravagantly ornamented and gilded food containers with lids had graced tables for centuries before the silver tureen emerged: receptacles made, rather incongruously, of pastry. Pies such as these were not cut into slices. Instead, the pastry lid was carefully cut off and the contents spooned out. They were, in effect, edible tureens – the bird on top identifying the nature of the contents, rather like the crayfish, crab and cauliflower on Germain’s silver tureens. An engraving in a recipe book of c. 1720 by the London pastry cook Edward Kidder depicts a wild boar pie with more than a passing similarity to Germain’s later olio pot. As items that sit outside of familiar categories of design, art historians have long overlooked such edible vessels.
"Lay long in bed this morning though an office day, because of our going to bed late last night."
That means the Navy Board sat today to discuss business. However, it only takes 2 for a quorum, so Pepys didn't have to be there. This is the first time I recall him giving himself the morning off from such an event -- who knows what mischief the remaining Commissioners will get up to without his maintaining law and order amongst the files.
No doubt the trusty Hewer is on the lookout for the winks, significant throat clearings and any surprising grunts of agreement.
$100,000 p.a.??? -- oooops, sorry! you probably guessed this is an example of brain habit taking over the fingers -- the annotation should read 100,000/.s.
"So home, where I found my wife up, she shewed me her head which was very well dressed to-day, she having been to see her father and mother."
Yes, Elizabeth did stay up to show off her new hairdo -- but I bet she talked about Balty's horse with her parents today as well. And that's probably why Balty avoids the Pepys for a while. He desperately wants to be a gentleman and they just spoiled his illusion of grandeur.
Today, 13 June 1661 Sandwich left to for Tangier, and bring back Queen Catherine.
He wrote: "I took a barge at Privy Stairs at Whitehall and boarded the Mary yacht at Deptford about 12 o'clock and so sailed for the Downs, where I arrived on board the Royal James on Friday in the evening."
Lots of points to think about in that post, Stephane.
On one question, "Do a MP for towns that are nowhere near Deptford, the Treasurer of the Navy and, for that matter, Sam himself, have to be personally on dockside to pay off a bunch of sailors from a single frigate?"
Later on we will see that no, they don't have to be there. Ships at Portsmouth have their own Commissioner, for instance. But the Navy Board are not trotting off to Liverpool or Falmouth or Hull where there are ships but no commissioners.
I think the Navy Board personnel are taking especial care of Deptford because MPs like the meticulous Col. John Birch and the pamphleteer William Prynne just turn up "to help" -- i.e. checking to see the money is really going to the sailors, to experience the process, and to better understand the Navy paperwork, etc. If something goes wrong the questions, accusations and fall-out will come fast. Saying the process of distributing thousands of pounds had been delegated to underlings won't be sufficient.
"... the King had promised him 4,000/. per annum forever, and had already given him a bill under his hand (which he showed me) for 4,000/. that Mr. Fox is to pay him."
Clearly Sandwich is thrilled about this. I wonder if he knows Monck was promised $100,000 p.a.?
L&M: Sir Sidney Montagu, Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich's father, was a royalist in the Civil Wars. It was King James who had 'raised' him. making him a Master of Requests and a Knight of the Bath in 1616.
Rabat - Morocco is home to 9 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, one of them being the entire capital city of Rabat. With its unique blend of modernity and antiquity, Rabat is a must-visit for history-loving tourists.
Overlooking the Oued Bouregreg, the red sandstone walls of Chellah are a formidable sight. Just past Bab Zaer, the ruins are easily accessible to those visiting Rabat. Upon entering, you’ll be immersed in a beautiful and well-preserved realm of ancient Moroccan history.
There is evidence that the site, which was a natural port on the banks of the Bouregreg, was first occupied by the Phoenicians as early as the third century BC. The Phoenician settlement was known as Shalat. The site was later controlled by Carthage, modern-day Tunisia.
Chellah was officially built by the Romans around 40 AD and was known at the time as Sala Colonia, or Sala. This major port city included key Roman architectural elements such as a forum, a triumphal arch, a temple, aqueducts, and a principal roadway.
Sala was also home to one of the Romans’ two main naval outposts on the Atlantic coast; the other was in the modern-day city of Larache. The Sala port was primarily used by commercial Roman ships heading southwest towards Casablanca.
During the reign of the Romans, Sala Colonia was a center of Christianity in Roman Africa.
Although the city fell to local Imazighen tribes around 250 AD, the Romans maintained commercial and political contact with Sala until the seventh century AD.
Sala was a town of Christianized Imazighen ruled by a Byzantine governor until 683 AD, when the Muslim Arabs arrived. Uqba ibn Nafi was the first Muslim ruler to conquer the city.
In 1031 AD, the Almoravids resettled Sala, erected new buildings in the town, and rebuilt the Great Mosque of Sala. They were overthrown by Amazigh Almohads by 1147 AD and the site became a royal burial ground.
Sala was abandoned in 1154 AD after its inhabitants moved across the Oued Bouregreg to Sale.
The Almohad dynasty used the site as a sacred cemetery, or necropolis, until the Marinid dynasty took power in the early 13th century AD.
In the 14th century AD, the Marinids named the necropolis “Chellah.” This dynasty built the defensive walls and towers that guard Chellah today, along with the mosque, the Quranic school, and the royal tombs.
Like his grandfather, Charles II built a palace in Newmarket.
Construction began in 1668; the architect was William Samwell, although there is a tradition Sir Christopher Wren was involved in the work, if we are to believe an anecdote dating from the 18th century: This relates that when the new building was completed Charles found the ceilings too low – he was over 6 ft. tall – and complained to Sir Christopher who, a much shorter man, brazenly claimed they were quite high enough. Whereupon, ‘the King squatted down to his height and creeping about in this whimsical posture cried “Aye, Sir Christopher, I think they are high enough!"'
Charles II’s residence occupied a slightly different site from that of the Jacobean palace. An 18th century plan shows the second Caroline palace was centered around a large courtyard with a projecting wing to the southwest.
To judge by contemporary accounts the Newmarket Palace was not an impressive structure: according to Cosmo II, Grand Duke of Tuscany, who visited Newmarket in 1669, ‘the King’s house, compared with other seats of the English nobility, does not deserve the name of a royal residence’, while in 1670 John Evelyn was equally disparaging, saying it was ‘mean enough, and hardly capable for a hunting house, let alone a royal palace!’
[ONE YEAR IS HARDLY ENOUGH TIME TO BUILD A PALACE, SO EITHER THEY WERE STAYING IN THE FIRST PART, OR ANOTHER BUILDING ALTOGETHER. - SDS]
Such adverse comments should not be allowed to detract from the major role which Charles II’s palace played in the life of not just Newmarket but England as a whole in the second half of the 17th century.
During Charles II’s frequent visits here, the mansion became the focus of Court festivities, as John Evelyn discovered in October 1671 when he found it alive with ‘dancing, feasting, revelling’, although, he added with more than a whiff of puritanical disapproval, ‘more resembling a luxuriously abandoned rout than a Christian Court’.
“I had good discourse, particularly of the people at the Cape of Good Hope, …”
As this is the only mention of what we know of as South Africa, I’ll post this info here. If you’re interested in the Dutch settlement of that country, there's a book named “Creating the Cape Colony: The Political Economy of Settler Colonization” by Erik Green.
I haven't read it, but if you find a confirmation of the procreation tradition which has alarmed everyone (including Pepys), please share!!! I have my doubts ...
Comments
Third Reading
About Sunday 11 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
The history of umbrellas at
https://www.beau-nuage.fr/en/?fc=…
About Sunday 11 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
"... we walked home, my little boy carrying a link, and Will leading my wife."
I'd like to say Pepys carried the umbrella, but if he had one, I think he'd boast about it.
"In French, ‘parapluie’ means umbrella, with ‘para’ meaning protection. Whereas in English, umbrella has the latin stem ‘umbra’ meaning shadow so has a direct link to its predecessor, the parasol.
"It was only by the 16th century that the umbrella as we know it became a reality. The decisive moment when oil and wax covers replaced the status quo covers on parasols. It is from this moment that the umbrella became an item to protect against bad weather and rain. From this point on, the parasol and the umbrella have separate destinies.
"In the 17th century, the umbrella became a hit in Western countries, especially in stylish Italy, France and Britain. At first, it was only considered a feminine accessory to protect women from the rain, but English men progressively adopted it through the 18th century with Jonas Hanway leading the way for the era of umbrellas for men."
So Will Hewer is escorting Elizabeth, and Pepys is sloshing around in the muck, or picking his way around it?
About Sunday 11 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
Yes, England had a class sytem for most of its history -- as did every other country in Europe. If you have nobility, you have a class system.
Please accept that as a fact as we're going to have to deal with the ramifications which almost cost England a war which happens during the Diary.
Pepys isn't a snob -- he hasn't cut all his buddies from the Exchequer or Merchant Taylors School. But as low man on the Navy totem pole, he wants people to acknowledge that there is a totem pole and he has the privilege of being on it.
About Sunday 11 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
"...walked to Whitehall, it being very cold and foul and rainy weather."
What do you expect in November, Pepys?
Perhaps you needed time to think about things.
Just because Charles II has said he's cutting the number of London Hackney coaches last week doesn't mean they have disappeared off the streets -- but maybe the drivers don't want their horses slipping on the filthy cobble stones, so there aren't many available?
Plus it's Sunday, so maybe they have time off like the watermen?
For info on Hackney carriages, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…
About Sunday 11 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Secondly, what would the seating arrangement be, if they did come along? Boy-girl-boy-girl, taking up a couple of rows?"
The seating arrangement would be first comes, possibly takes all, MartinVT.
The families sit together, but the children might be relegated to the back row where their inattention would attract less notice. Relatives and friends of the Commissioners also creep in there from time to time, leaving late arriving Commissioners with crampted quarters at best.
This isn't the last time we'll hear about seating negotiations and faux pas.
About Sunday 11 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
Money talks, and so does the new Administration.
St. Olave's was The Navy Church, and the previous Puritan/Presbyterians must have been happy to mingle with their fellow parishoners.
But now the Book of Common Prayer is being reintroduced, and Charles II is making every effort to impose himself (and his representatives) as being in charge. "This day also did Mr. Mills begin to read all the Common Prayer, which I was glad of."
One way of establishing the status and influence of the Navy Commissioners within the parish is to put them 'on high' so the other parishoners have to look up at them in their private gallery on Sundays.
There were two rows of pews in the new gallery, so my guess is the usher at the door wanted the gallery to be full for its debut. The servants probably arrived first, and were directed up there by the usher. They knew to sit in the back seats by the wall.
The Commissioners, knowing their seats were saved, arrived right before the service started, and found only the front pew available.
Luckily none of the ladies had chosen to attend, so the Commissioners could comfortably take their places in the front.
Why were the ladies not there? We will ask that about Elizabeth many times during the Diary, and my guess is that when they counted heads for manditory attendance, they only counted male heads, and the ladies were given a pass so they could deal with children and lunch. Elizabeth, if she goes, is more likely to go to church in the afternoon.
Probably one of the Commissioners had a chat with the usher after the service and told him that the Navy Pew was for the Commissioners and their families only, and not to do that again. No big deal.
I never parked in the CEO's parking space either. No big deal. But if the parking lot attendant on a busy day had told me to park there ... hmmmm.
About Saturday 10 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
"This night going home, Will and I bought a goose."
Was it alive or dead?
Jane won't like you if it is alive.
About Tuesday 13 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
PART 2
Pies covered in ornamental devices were commonplace on high-status tables in the 16th and 17th centuries, and are frequently depicted in Netherlandish, German and Italian paintings.
Kitchen Interior (1644) by David Teniers the Younger features a large pie decorated with gilt strapwork, awaiting delivery to the dining room. The pastry has an Imperial double-headed eagle surmounted by the head, tail and wings of a swan bedecked in a floral headdress, and a bauble in its gilt-covered beak.
In a collaborative painting of 1618, The Sense of Taste by Peter Paul Rubens and Jan Brueghel, 4 similar pies are dressed with taxidermy specimens of a peacock, a pheasant and a partridge. The birds are all dotted with gold leaf – some even wear jewellery – while the pastry cases are covered in gilded patterns.
[FOLLOW THE LINK BELOW TO SEE THE PICTURES]
The most notable collection of designs for these astonishing creations is Conrad Hagger’s Neues Saltzburgisches Koch-Buch (1719).
Hagger was cook to the Archbishop of Saltzburg and his book includes more than 300 detailed engravings, many of tureen-like pastries.
A number are similar to the bird pies painted by Teniers and Brueghel, although Hagger crafts his swans and peacocks entirely from pastry and provides diagrams to show how they can be constructed.
Capricious pies depicting lions, griffins or the pelican in her piety are illustrated alongside hare pasteten (pies) with gadrooned pastry sides and acanthus-adorned lids.
Despite the triumph of the tureen, pastry cooks continued to make decorative tureen-like pies.
In an engraving from 1740 of a feast in Vienna in homage to Empress Maria Theresa, an ornamental pie – its top removed and a ladle protruding from its contents – sits next to fashionable pots d’ouile.
Pies continued to appear on the same table as their grand silver relatives – a taste of the eclectic attitude that so lavishly furnished the 18th century.
Simehow I doubt Elizabeth was putting a swan with feathers on top of her pies -- with or without the jewels!
Excepted from the October 2023 issue of Apollo.
https://www.apollo-magazine.com/t…
About Tuesday 13 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
Autumnal pies -- one of Pepys favorite subject. But it didn't necessarily look like the pie we're used to:
In the court of pre-Revolutionary France, hunting was October’s most important recreational activity. Complex dishes of game and poultry, the origins of which were in the culture of the chase, were served at autumnal feasts.
An English recipe for the pot d’ouile, or olio, from 1723 reads like an account of a mass extinction. It contains a rump of beef, mutton, pork, venison, bacon, geese, turkeys, capons, pheasants, wigeons, partridges, and Snipes (half a dozen), Quails (two dozen) and Larks (four dozen).
Of equal complexity was the terrine or tureiner, which derived its name from the terracotta pot in which it was baked.
These dishes served as emblems of the bounty of the aristocratic host’s parks.
By the late 17th century, French silversmiths were developing special vessels for serving these entrées, although by then the number of ingredients had been trimmed to suit refined Gallic sensibilities. Some of the earliest are from the workshop of court goldsmith Thomas Germain (1673–1748).
These pots d’ouile and terrines are among the most magnificent silver vessels ever made.
A pair of tureens made in the late 1720s (now at the Getty) features lifelike wild boar head-shaped handles cast in silver.
A set from 1745–50 is crowned with covers graced with trompe l’oeil cauliflowers, crayfish and crabs.
The aim: to titillate guests’ appetites with realistic depictions of the ingredients of the stew they were about to consume.
One of the mysteries of culinary history is the sudden appearance of these spectacular tureens in the early 18th century. There is little material evidence before then for receptacles specifically designed for serving soups and stews. It is assumed the tureen’s ancestors were humble terracotta bowls, although none have survived.
By contrast, the earliest tureens are among the most elaborate expressions of the silversmith’s art.
Later examples crafted from porcelain were based on the shapes of these silver predecessors.
These impressive items did not crystallise out of thin air. Extravagantly ornamented and gilded food containers with lids had graced tables for centuries before the silver tureen emerged: receptacles made, rather incongruously, of pastry.
Pies such as these were not cut into slices. Instead, the pastry lid was carefully cut off and the contents spooned out. They were, in effect, edible tureens – the bird on top identifying the nature of the contents, rather like the crayfish, crab and cauliflower on Germain’s silver tureens.
An engraving in a recipe book of c. 1720 by the London pastry cook Edward Kidder depicts a wild boar pie with more than a passing similarity to Germain’s later olio pot. As items that sit outside of familiar categories of design, art historians have long overlooked such edible vessels.
About Friday 9 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Lay long in bed this morning though an office day, because of our going to bed late last night."
That means the Navy Board sat today to discuss business. However, it only takes 2 for a quorum, so Pepys didn't have to be there.
This is the first time I recall him giving himself the morning off from such an event -- who knows what mischief the remaining Commissioners will get up to without his maintaining law and order amongst the files.
No doubt the trusty Hewer is on the lookout for the winks, significant throat clearings and any surprising grunts of agreement.
About Wednesday 7 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
$100,000 p.a.??? -- oooops, sorry! you probably guessed this is an example of brain habit taking over the fingers -- the annotation should read 100,000/.s.
About Thursday 8 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
"So home, where I found my wife up, she shewed me her head which was very well dressed to-day, she having been to see her father and mother."
Yes, Elizabeth did stay up to show off her new hairdo -- but I bet she talked about Balty's horse with her parents today as well. And that's probably why Balty avoids the Pepys for a while. He desperately wants to be a gentleman and they just spoiled his illusion of grandeur.
About Thursday 13 June 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
Today, 13 June 1661 Sandwich left to for Tangier, and bring back Queen Catherine.
He wrote:
"I took a barge at Privy Stairs at Whitehall and boarded the Mary yacht at Deptford about 12 o'clock and so sailed for the Downs, where I arrived on board the Royal James on Friday in the evening."
Sandwich Journal (Anderson)
About Monday 5 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
Lots of points to think about in that post, Stephane.
On one question, "Do a MP for towns that are nowhere near Deptford, the Treasurer of the Navy and, for that matter, Sam himself, have to be personally on dockside to pay off a bunch of sailors from a single frigate?"
Later on we will see that no, they don't have to be there. Ships at Portsmouth have their own Commissioner, for instance. But the Navy Board are not trotting off to Liverpool or Falmouth or Hull where there are ships but no commissioners.
I think the Navy Board personnel are taking especial care of Deptford because MPs like the meticulous Col. John Birch and the pamphleteer William Prynne just turn up "to help" -- i.e. checking to see the money is really going to the sailors, to experience the process, and to better understand the Navy paperwork, etc.
If something goes wrong the questions, accusations and fall-out will come fast. Saying the process of distributing thousands of pounds had been delegated to underlings won't be sufficient.
About Wednesday 7 November 1660
San Diego Sarah • Link
"... the King had promised him 4,000/. per annum forever, and had already given him a bill under his hand (which he showed me) for 4,000/. that Mr. Fox is to pay him."
Clearly Sandwich is thrilled about this. I wonder if he knows Monck was promised $100,000 p.a.?
About Sir Sidney Mountagu (father of Sandwich)
San Diego Sarah • Link
L&M: Sir Sidney Montagu, Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich's father, was a royalist in the Civil Wars. It was King James who had 'raised' him. making him a Master of Requests and a Knight of the Bath in 1616.
About Wednesday 21 August 1667
San Diego Sarah • Link
Froward
ADJECTIVE 1. (Of a person) Difficult to deal with; contrary.
About Sale, Morocco
San Diego Sarah • Link
Pictures of Sala and Rabat at
Rabat - Morocco is home to 9 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, one of them being the entire capital city of Rabat. With its unique blend of modernity and antiquity, Rabat is a must-visit for history-loving tourists.
Overlooking the Oued Bouregreg, the red sandstone walls of Chellah are a formidable sight. Just past Bab Zaer, the ruins are easily accessible to those visiting Rabat. Upon entering, you’ll be immersed in a beautiful and well-preserved realm of ancient Moroccan history.
There is evidence that the site, which was a natural port on the banks of the Bouregreg, was first occupied by the Phoenicians as early as the third century BC. The Phoenician settlement was known as Shalat. The site was later controlled by Carthage, modern-day Tunisia.
Chellah was officially built by the Romans around 40 AD and was known at the time as Sala Colonia, or Sala. This major port city included key Roman architectural elements such as a forum, a triumphal arch, a temple, aqueducts, and a principal roadway.
Sala was also home to one of the Romans’ two main naval outposts on the Atlantic coast; the other was in the modern-day city of Larache. The Sala port was primarily used by commercial Roman ships heading southwest towards Casablanca.
During the reign of the Romans, Sala Colonia was a center of Christianity in Roman Africa.
Although the city fell to local Imazighen tribes around 250 AD, the Romans maintained commercial and political contact with Sala until the seventh century AD.
Sala was a town of Christianized Imazighen ruled by a Byzantine governor until 683 AD, when the Muslim Arabs arrived. Uqba ibn Nafi was the first Muslim ruler to conquer the city.
In 1031 AD, the Almoravids resettled Sala, erected new buildings in the town, and rebuilt the Great Mosque of Sala. They were overthrown by Amazigh Almohads by 1147 AD and the site became a royal burial ground.
Sala was abandoned in 1154 AD after its inhabitants moved across the Oued Bouregreg to Sale.
The Almohad dynasty used the site as a sacred cemetery, or necropolis, until the Marinid dynasty took power in the early 13th century AD.
In the 14th century AD, the Marinids named the necropolis “Chellah.” This dynasty built the defensive walls and towers that guard Chellah today, along with the mosque, the Quranic school, and the royal tombs.
The 1755 Lisbon earthquake destroyed the structures that remained in Chellah at the time. ...
https://www.moroccoworldnews.com/…
About Newmarket, Suffolk
San Diego Sarah • Link
Like his grandfather, Charles II built a palace in Newmarket.
Construction began in 1668; the architect was William Samwell, although there is a tradition Sir Christopher Wren was involved in the work, if we are to believe an anecdote dating from the 18th century:
This relates that when the new building was completed Charles found the ceilings too low – he was over 6 ft. tall – and complained to Sir Christopher who, a much shorter man, brazenly claimed they were quite high enough. Whereupon, ‘the King squatted down to his height and creeping about in this whimsical posture cried “Aye, Sir Christopher, I think they are high enough!"'
Charles II’s residence occupied a slightly different site from that of the Jacobean palace. An 18th century plan shows the second Caroline palace was centered around a large courtyard with a projecting wing to the southwest.
To judge by contemporary accounts the Newmarket Palace was not an impressive structure: according to Cosmo II, Grand Duke of Tuscany, who visited Newmarket in 1669, ‘the King’s house, compared with other seats of the English nobility, does not deserve the name of a royal residence’, while in 1670 John Evelyn was equally disparaging, saying it was ‘mean enough, and hardly capable for a hunting house, let alone a royal palace!’
[ONE YEAR IS HARDLY ENOUGH TIME TO BUILD A PALACE, SO EITHER THEY WERE STAYING IN THE FIRST PART, OR ANOTHER BUILDING ALTOGETHER. - SDS]
Such adverse comments should not be allowed to detract from the major role which Charles II’s palace played in the life of not just Newmarket but England as a whole in the second half of the 17th century.
During Charles II’s frequent visits here, the mansion became the focus of Court festivities, as John Evelyn discovered in October 1671 when he found it alive with ‘dancing, feasting, revelling’, although, he added with more than a whiff of puritanical disapproval, ‘more resembling a luxuriously abandoned rout than a Christian Court’.
FROM
Cromwellian Britain - Newmarket
By By John Sutton
https://www.olivercromwell.org/ne…
About Tuesday 30 December 1662
San Diego Sarah • Link
“I had good discourse, particularly of the people at the Cape of Good Hope, …”
As this is the only mention of what we know of as South Africa, I’ll post this info here. If you’re interested in the Dutch settlement of that country, there's a book named “Creating the Cape Colony: The Political Economy of Settler Colonization” by Erik Green.
It’s published by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.; 2022; Copyright © Erik Green, 2022
You can download the entire book, open access, at https://library.oapen.org/handle/…
I haven't read it, but if you find a confirmation of the procreation tradition which has alarmed everyone (including Pepys), please share!!! I have my doubts ...