The Military Discipline Plate 5

From The Military Discipline wherein is Martially Showne the Order for Drilling the Musket and Pike, published by Thomas Jenner, London 1642. This is plate five of the drill book published just before the wars broke out. I’ve no reason to suspect this is anything other than portraits of the trained bandes of London at their postures. These guys are dressed in high status clothes, braided breeches and slashed sleeves. Not the kind of clobber you would wear to take the the field.

The style of the plates is very similar to a drill book published in Europe in 1607 with engravings by Jacques de Gheyn. In fact there are a number of european and english drill books starting from de Gheyn, using exactly the same poses but every time updating the clothes.

More rear views here, number 13 is wearing a montero cap and interestingly number 16’s coat has no back seam, and is slit to the waist, something that would only really work with a well fulled broadcloth that wouldn’t fray easily along the edge. 15’s coat in contrast looks like it is hemmed.

This is number five in the series. I took the photos from the original book.

The Military Discipline Plate 4

From The Military Discipline wherein is Martially Showne the Order for Drilling the Musket and Pike, published by Thomas Jenner, London 1642. This is plate four of the drill book published just before the wars broke out. I’ve no reason to suspect this is anything other than portraits of the trained bandes of London at their postures. These guys are dressed in high status clothes, braided breeches and slashed sleeves. Not the kind of clobber you would wear to take the the field. We are still crunching through musket drill, broken down into all the separate moves that would most probably be thrown away on the battlefield. All back views this time. Notice from the legend that numbers 11 and 12 are using a ‘charge’ to introduce powder down their barrels. Victorian wisdom always suggested these bandolier containers were called apostles.  This is number four in the series. I took the photos from the original book.

 

The Military Discipline Plate 3

From The Military Discipline wherein is Martially Showne the Order for Drilling the Musket and Pike, published by Thomas Jenner, London 1642. This is plate three of the drill book published just before the wars broke out. I’ve no reason to suspect this is anything other than portraits of the trained bandes of London at their postures. These guys are dressed in high status clothes, braided breeches and slashed sleeves. Not the kind of clobber you would wear to take the the field. Some fancy garters on display here too. This is number three in the series. I took the photos from the original book.

The Military Discipline Plate 2

From The Military Discipline wherein is Martially Showne the Order for Drilling the Musket and Pike, published by Thomas Jenner, London 1642. This is plate two from the back of a drill book published just before the wars broke out. I’ve no reason to suspect this is anything other than portraits of the trained bandes of London at their postures. These guys are dressed in high status clothes, braided breeches and slashed sleeves. Check out the fancy hose on the musketeer in picture 8. Not the kind of clobber you would wear to take the the field. This is second in the series. I took the photos from the original book.

The Military Discipline Plate 1

From The Military Discipline wherein is Martially Showne the Order for Drilling the Musket and Pike, published by Thomas Jenner, London 1642. This is plate one of a drill book published just before the wars broke out. I’ve no reason to suspect this is anything other than portraits of the trained bandes of London at their postures. These guys are dressed in high status clothes, braided breeches and slashed sleeves. Not the kind of clobber you would wear to take the the field. This is first in a series. I took the photos from the book.

The Humerous Tricks and Conceits

of Prince Roberts malignant she-monkey, discovered to the world before her marriage. Also the manner of her marriage to a cavaleer and how within three dayes space, she called him cuckold to his face, London 1643

One of those anti-royalist pamphlets referring to Prince Rupert’s selection of pets. His poodle Boye was also the subject of some derision but here is his monkey, presumably about the blow smoke cheekily in the face of her cuckolded husband.

She is wearing a hood tied beneath her chin, a short petticoat effort hiding her simian modesty (this is not standard 1640s fashion as far as I can tell) and a shoulder belt for her sword. The cavalier is wearing a long buttoned coat with turn back sleeves over a short doublet and tapered breeches. His linen band is smart with a modest lace edge and his riding boots (spot the spurs) are folded in the common style to show off his boot hose.

 

Dorothy Bonham

And an unknown boy, painted by an unknown artist around 1638-41. Dorothy, or more correctly Dame Dorothy may or may not have been Lady in Waiting to Elizabeth I in her youth and was also rumoured to have played a part in foiling the Gunpowder Plot, though later investigation revealed that her part was choosing the story as the subject of a tapestry that she made after the event! Dorothy died in 1641 apparently from being pricked by an infected needle (though this may have been fabricated too to attract visitors to the Hall) shortly after this portrait was completed. A popular story has her body walled up and her ghost walking the corridors of Ightham Mote. Sadly also not true, the grand Dame was safely interred in the local churchyard, but why let the facts get in the way of a cracking story?

Anyway, this picture caught my eye because Dorothy is not dressed in the latest fashion unlike the rather sad little boy in pink stood next to her. She is wearing a black petticoat and bodice over which she seems to have a red partlet or (perhaps a sleeveless waistcoat) covering her body and a large starched ruff around her neck. She’s keeping her head warm with a black hood and possibly a lace coif underneath. The boy is in a fashionable pink suit; matching doublet (slashed sleeves to show his shirt), breeches (trimmed with ribbon) and short cloak with a laced linen falling band and cuffs with matching ribbons on his shoes and pink hose.

Dorothy was some looker, forty years earlier. Both paintings are at Ightham Mote House  in Kent.

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