A Dog’s Elegy

A familiar image from a parliament pamphlet from 1644 which is worth a closer look. Following the royalist defeat at Marston Moor, Prince Rupert’s lost his dog in the ensuing chaos. The dog Boye, a poodle was widely held to be his familiar, the witchcraft implied presumably explaining his military prowess in the war. Notice the musketeer on the right hand side, a rare picture of an English soldier from this period, though oddly he seems to be firing left handed and has his bandolier of charges hanging where a right handed soldier would hang his sword. Good evidence of a coat though and some understated lace decoration down his left leg. The woman on the left, presumably meant to be a witch dressed in bodice (or possibly a waistcoat) and petticoat with an untied coif.

Thomas Edgar

Painted in 1635, Thomas wears a rather splendid figured silk doublet of a very similar fabric and style to the Isham Doublet in the Museum of London that I posted about on my other blog. The breeches are made in a matching fabric and seemingly secured to the doublet with points, though from the Isham doublet I now know that the points could have been decorative and the two joined with hidden hooks (on the breeches) and eyes. He has topped the ensemble off with a linen band, well laced and tied with band-strings that end with some very fancy linen worked tassels