Pedro on 5 Sep 2006  •  Link

"Trade cards of the 17th century are extremely rare and our familiarity with them is largely due to the collections of Samuel Pepys and John Bagford.”

[APLEFORD, Richard.] [ EARLY ILLUSTRATED TRADE CARD ] Richard Apleford, Hosier, at the Black Spread-Eagle, at the West-end of St. Paul's in Ludgate-street, London, sells all sorts of silk, worsted and woolen hose, and all sorts of worsted and woolen stirrups and socks ... flannel wastcoats, drawers, and petticoats, of all sizes ... sashes for ministers ... burial crape, and dresses for the dead; and all other sorts of hosiers wares, both whole-sale and retaile; at very reasonable rates. [London] 1701

http://www.polybiblio.com/shapero…

Bill on 9 Sep 2016  •  Link

A miscellany on the phrase "black spread eagle" cobbled together from the interwebz.
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The coat of arms and the banner of the Holy Roman Empire of German Nation shows a black spread eagle on a golden base which was deduced from the aquila of the roman legions. These military ensigns of the Roman military consisted of a vertical pole and a cross-bar on its top, on which a spread eagle was attached.

Since reunification in 1990, the federal eagle has once again been the emblem of the whole of Germany. The official government and naval version [of the German flag] has a gold shield in the centre with a black spread-eagle.

Number 56 Lombard Street was known as The Black Spread Eagle as early as 1672. By 1702 the premises were occupied by Messrs Freame & Gould; in 1728 Mr Freame was joined in partnership by James Barclay and the firm evolved into the Barclays Bank we know today. The Spread Eagle has remained the Barclays logo ever since, albeit with some small alterations including a change of colour to blue in the 1960s.

British Fourth Rate ship of the line 'Black Spread Eagle' (1665)
http://threedecks.org/index.php?d…
http://www.royal-navy.org/hms-bla…

There are two possible sources accounting for the sign of the Black Spread Eagle. ... In the first place it occurs in the arms of the Scriveners' Company (1616), and this circumstance will no doubt account for its association with Milton the poet. For when his grandfather, a zealous Roman Catholic, disinherited his son (Milton's father) for becoming a Protestant, the latter was obliged to quit his studies at Oxford, and settle in London as a scrivener. And at the Spredd Eagle in Bread Street, a sign probably adopted by Milton pere to signify his profession, John Milton was born. Black Spread Eagle Court seems to have got its name from this sign. Nos. 58 and 59 to No. 63, Bread Street are occupied by one firm, who possess on the top floor a bust of the poet, with an inscription stating that the house stands on the site of that which saw Milton's birth.
It was probably as a scrivener's sign that the Black Spread Eagle had its origin, which served to distinguish the shop of J. Hardesty, Duck Lane, in 1652.
In 1642 Alice Norton printed at the Black Spread Eagle for Humphry Tuckey or Tucker. In 1664 Tucker himself was here, and sold "Alexacarius or Spirits of Salts," prepared by Constantine Rodocares.
Black Spread Eagle Alley, in Blackman Street, Southwark, in Kent Street, in Turnmill Street, and Black Spread Eagle Court in Finch Lane, owed their names to this sign, which is also mentioned in the Calendar of State Papers.
There were other Black Spread Eagles: one, a goldsmith's (Francis Spilsbury), in Foster Lane, Cheapside; another, "within six Doors of Somerset-House in the Strand"; in the Old Bailey; and in Turnmill Street.
---The Antiquary, v.44, 1908.