Saturday 27 March 1669
Up, and did a little business, Middleton and I, then; after drinking a little buttered ale, he and Huchinson and I took coach, and, exceeding merry in talk, to Dartford: Middleton finding stories of his own life at Barbadoes, and up and down at Venice, and elsewhere, that are mighty pretty, and worth hearing; and he is a strange good companion, and droll upon the road, more than ever I could have thought to have been in him. Here we dined and met Captain Allen of Rochester, who dined with us, and so went on his journey homeward, and we by and by took coach again and got home about six at night, it being all the morning as cold, snowy, windy, and rainy day, as any in the whole winter past, but pretty clear in the afternoon. I find all well, but my wife abroad with Jane, who was married yesterday, and I to the office busy, till by and by my wife comes home, and so home, and there hear how merry they were yesterday, and I glad at it, they being married, it seems, very handsomely, at Islington; and dined at the old house, and lay in our blue chamber, with much company, and wonderful merry. The Turner and Mary Batelier bridesmaids, and Talbot Pepys and W. Hewer bridesmen. Anon to supper and to bed, my head a little troubled with the muchness of the business I have upon me at present. So to bed.
15 Annotations
First Reading
Teresa Forster • Link
Bridesmaids and bridesmen
We've kept the former but I had never heard of the latter, only the best man and ushers. A bit of research and I came up with the statement that bridesmaids were traditionally friends of the bride and bridesmen friends of the groom.
Will Norton • Link
Can somebody tell me more about buttered ale?
It does not sound very tempting!
Terry Foreman • Link
Bridesman
In contemporary western culture a bridesman is a male friend of the bride, one who walks down the aisle in the bridal ceremony in the traditional place of a bridesmaid.
The term however has an ancient and obscure origin. The term is first noted by the encyclopedia Judaica from the European Diaspora of the middle of the 13th century. In this context A bridesman was not a friend of the bride but of the groom. He paid for and arranged the wedding from his own money and would be repaid someday by the groom. It was a position of the highest level of honor in male friendship.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brid…
Groomsman
A groomsman is one of the male attendants to the groom in a wedding ceremony. The term usher is more common in the UK while the term 'groomsman' is more commonly used in America. Usually, the groom selects his closest friends and relatives to serve as groomsmen, and it is considered an honor to be selected. From his groomsmen, the groom usually chooses one to serve as best man. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groo…
Mary • Link
Buttered ale.
WN, if you go to the site Encyclopaedia and look under 'Alcoholic Drinks' you will find information.
Terry Foreman • Link
"they being married, it seems, very handsomely, at Islington; and dined at the old house, and lay in our blue chamber, with much company, and wonderful merry."
Did the "much company" attend the bedded Tom and Jane "in [the] blue chamber"?
Jenny • Link
I wish Sam had been at the wedding. I'd have loved an eyewitness account of everything that happened. It sounds like such fun!
Terry, I'm sure the much company attended the bedded Tom and Jane - that was all part of the festivities back then.
Chris Squire • Link
‘muchness, n.
1. Large size or bulk; bigness. Also: size, amount, magnitude (large or small). Now rare.
. . 2. Greatness in quantity, number, or degree.
. . 1669 S. Pepys Diary 27 Mar. (1976) IX. 500 To bed, my head a little troubled with the muchness of business I have upon me at present.’ [OED]
Andrew Hamilton • Link
"he [Middleton] is a strange good companion, and droll upon the road, more than ever I could have thought to have been in him."
Sam is a good listener if his companion has something to say. I enjoy his enjoyment of such moments.
Phil Gyford • Link
Mary and Will: I've corrected the link to buttered ale, which was previously only to the 'Ale' entry.
Second Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"I took coach, and, exceeding merry in talk, to Dartford: Middleton finding stories of his own life at Barbadoes, and up and down at Venice, and elsewhere"
L&M note at his death in 1672 Middleton left land in Barbardos, Antigua and New England.
Elisabeth • Link
“Did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness!”
— the Dormouse, “Alice in Wonderland”
San Diego Sarah • Link
"they being married, it seems, very handsomely, at Islington; and dined at the old house, and lay in our blue chamber, with much company, and wonderful merry. The Turner and Mary Batelier bridesmaids, and Talbot Pepys and W. Hewer bridesmen."
That was quite a bash ... no "married in the parlor" with the other servants as witnesses for Jane and Tom. A member of parliament and a wealthy trader with the East India Company as groomsmen, held at The King's Head, Islington.
Jane Birch was a girl of no particular family or means, Tom Edwards was one of the 12 boy choristers at the Chapel Royal, assembled in September 1660 by 'Captain' Henry Cooke, the 'Master of the Children of the Chapel', so he got a free education in exchange for singing until the inevitable happened. Tom would know Will Hewer quite well after all these years of running errands and carrying the books and papers around for Pepys.
But still, this gives a whole other idea of what the servant/master "family" relationship could become.
San Diego Sarah • Link
A contemporary view of Exeter, Devon, is given by Cosmo, the future Grand Duke of Turin, who visited England in the Spring of 1669.
I've standardized the spelling of names I know, corrected scanning errors I could figure out, and increased the number of paragraphs. Sometimes I got confused making the N.S./O.S. date conversions, so I apologize if I guessed wrong:
128
On 27 March/6 April, 1669 after dinner, they departed [FROM OKEHAMPTON], and arrived in the evening at Exeter, going by the direct road till they passed Crediton, commonly called Kerbon, a village with a considerable population, all of whom are occupied in the wool manufactory.
The country was uneven, but more fertile, and better inhabited than that passed over the preceding day; everywhere were seen fields surrounded with rows of trees, in (^d^!^ of the most beautiful verdure, gentlemen's seats, and small collections of houses. The materials of which these are constructed are mud, mixed up with short straw and chips of slate and tlle and are thickly thatched with straw.
Two miles from the city, after they had passed the bridge of Isca, called by the English Ex, several of the prmcf ji^T gi^ritlettteh of the city came to meet and pay their respects to his highness, who, descending from his carriage, answered with his usual courtesy.
When he reached the city, the people of which assembled in such numbers as to fill the suburbs and all the streets through which his highness passed, he alighted at the inn called the New Inn, where several gentlemen shortly arrived from the neighboring places to pay their compliments to him.
129
Soon after, the mayor, aldermen, and bailiffs, unexpectedly arrived in their magisterial habits of ceremony, with the insignia of justice and macebearers before them: they found his highness upstairs in the saloon, who, after having received them graciously, and desired the mayor to be covered, heard, and replied to, his congratulations.
He requested his highness to be allowed to give him a public entertainment at his own house, which invitation his highness refused, on the plea of his being incog., a plea he had made use of elsewhere; and, above all, on account of the haste in which he was, from his impatience to be in London and kiss the hands of his majesty the king.
After they were gone, Sir Arthur Ackland came in, a young man of 17 years of age, who, by the death of his father, is come into possession of a fortune of 2,000., per annum.
San Diego Sarah • Link
CONT. 2
Also Messrs. John and Dennis Rolle, sons of Sir John Rolle, one of the two lieutenants-general of the county under the general [MONCK WAS THE LORD LT. OF DEVON UNTIL 1670].
This gentleman is one of the richest in the country, having, an estate of 6,000/.s sterling per annum, besides a considerable property in ready money; which will enable him to give a reasonable fortune to his younger sons.
With him the day ended.
@@@
John Rolle MP https://www.historyofparliamenton… John married by lic. 28 Feb. 1648, Florence, da. and coheir of Dennis Rolle of Stevenstone, which lies to the east of Torrington. So these two young men are his sons. There is this additional Parliamentary note: John Rolle MP’s journey to Holland on 8 May 1660 may have been responsible for his nomination as knight of the Royal Oak, when his income was estimated as £1,000 p.a., (although when Prince Cosmo of Tuscany visited Exeter in 1669 he was told that his host’s estates brought in six times this figure).
In Cosmo's travelogue, “incognito” is generally shortened to "incog." and I think the meaning was "unofficial, informal", as opposed to "having one's true identity concealed" which is today's definition.
His highness, Cosmo, must be considered only as a traveler. Under his direction, the narrator of the records was Count Lorenzo Magalotti, afterwards Secretary to the Academy del Cimento, and one of the most learned and eminent characters of the court of Ferdinand II.
TRAVELS OF COSMO THE THIRD, GRAND DUKE OF TUSCANY,
THROUGH ENGLAND,
DURING THE REIGN OF KING CHARLES THE SECOND (1669) -
https://archive.org/stream/travel…
TRANSLATED FROM THE ITALIAN MANUSCRIPT TO WHICH IS PREFIXED,
A MEMOIR OF HIS LIFE.
LONDON: PRINTED FOR J. MAWMAN, LUDGATE STREET.
1821.
San Diego Sarah • Link
"After they were gone, Sir Arthur Ackland came in, a young man of 17 years of age, who, by the death of his father, is come into possession of a fortune of 2,000., per annum."
The Acland family of Devonshire is an old one.
An Arthur Acland from a junior branch has a Parliamentary biography, but he was born in 1616. https://www.historyofparliamenton…
Sir Hugh Acland sat in Parliament representing the senior branch, and he inherited 2,000/. in 1671. He was also too old in 1669. https://www.historyofparliamenton…
The Killerton estate in Broadclyst, near Exeter, Devon, is first mentioned in 1242. In the Elizabethan times the estate was sold to the Acland family, who owned the adjoining property at Columb John.
http://www.britainexpress.com/cou…
Wikipedia makes 2 suggestions [** and *** BELOW] about other known 17th century Aclands. My bet goes to ** as he is the right age and had inherited when he was one year old. The *** Arthur would have been 14 in 1669, and should have been away at Oxford University in March:
Sir John Acland, 1st Baronet (c. 1591 – 1647), English landowner, was the only son of Arthur Acland. Pricked High Sheriff of Devon in 1641, he fought as a Royalist during the English Civil Wars.
He was created a baronet for his service in 1644, but the letters patent were lost; a new grant was made in 1677/8 to the 5th Baronet confirming the 1644 creation.
He surrendered to the Parliamentarians when Thomas Fairfax captured Exeter in 1646 and composed for his estate.
Upon his death in 1647, he was succeeded by his eldest son.
Sir Francis Acland, 2nd Baronet (died 1649) was the eldest son of Sir John Acland, 1st Baronet. He succeeded in 1647, and died unmarried in 1649, was succeeded by his brother.
Sir John Acland, 3rd Baronet (died 1655) was the second son of Sir John Acland, 1st Baronet. He succeeded his brother in 1649. In 1654, he married Margaret, daughter of Denys Rolle.
They had two children:
a daughter, Margaret (died 1691), married John Arundell, 2nd Baron Arundell,
and a son, **Arthur (b. 1654), who succeeded to the baronetcy when Sir John died in 1655.
*** Sir Arthur Acland, 4th Baronet (1655–1672) was the only son of Sir John Acland, 3rd Baronet. He matriculated at Exeter College, Oxford on 27 July 1669.
Sir Arthur died as a minor in 1672, unmarried, and was succeeded by his uncle Hugh.
I think Cosmo's Arthur was ** above, if you believe Wikipedia.