Thursday, December 10, 2009
Christmas Sale - 50% off all downloads
Monday, November 23, 2009
The curious case of the King of Spain's blue coat
On 21 November 1553 Francisco de Eraso wrote to Prince Philip, future king of Spain, mentioning that a portrait by Titian had been sent secretly to Mary, queen of England, so that she could see his likeness before deciding whether to marry him. Eraso's letter is very specific about the picture that has been sent, describing 'the one with the blue coat with white wolf-skin, which is very good and like you'.There appear to be two portraits by Titian of Philip II, all dating from around the right time in the 1550s to be the painting referred to in several
letters written in November 1553. The picture sent was said to be 'already old', although it was painted only 'three years ago', and belonged to queen Mary of Hungary. The portrait had suffered already by the passing of time and transportation, but was considered good enough to get a sense of Philip's appearance 'if s
he will put it in a proper light and look at it from a distance, as all Titian's paintings have to be looked at'. Perhaps unusually, the queen dowager made it very clear that the portrait was only on loan to Mary of England, and was to be returned after the marriage 'since it is only a dead thing, when she has the living model in her presence'.Clearly the description does not tally with the portraits (shown left and right) in existence at this time. The solution, identified by Charles Hope in an article entitled 'Titian, Philip II and Mary Tudor', is found in a reading of the original manuscript of Eraso's letter, where the portrait is described as 'vestido con un sayo afforando con lobos blancos' ('dressed in a furred sayo with white wolfskin'.) There is, in fact, no mention that the coat was blue. A sayo is a distinctive Spanish coat described by a modern dictionary as 'a large wide coat without buttons, any loose coat or dress'. The picture, above right, therefore fits the description well, although Charles Hope suggests that the surviving painting is a studio copy of another version of the same picture that was sent to Mary. In short, Titian probably painted multiple versions of the same image, and one - now lost - version of the 'furred' portrait was sent to England.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
How Scottish Flu makes you swell like a bagpipe
"My eyes swelled beyond my temples, and my mouth beyond my nose, and my ears met at the top of my head; my cheeks - but no power of language can describe them [...] Thus, swollen like a bagpipe, I lay groaning and screaming for many days."Thus spoke Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, a noted Scottish antiquarian, in 1816, when writing to the earl of Leven and explaining his slowness in responding to a letter because of influenza. Much as Sharpe had clearly suffered from his infection, his letter seemed primarily intended to demonstrate his self-deprecating and somewhat crude brand of humour to the earl.
Throughout the long letter Sharpe writes amusingly about his experience, which he blames on overly hot party, and the fact that someone had stolen his coat.
"Lady Campbell of Arkinlass, who has apartments in Holyroodhouse, had the goodness to send me a card for a party ... I went, and after dancing a great deal on a carpet, and in a room hot enough to have baked all the mutton pies in the Cannongate, when I came to make my departure, I found that somebody had made free with my great coat .... I had to walk a good part of the way home in a shower of rain, the consequence of which was such a concatenation of aches in the way of rheumatism as I never before sustained in my life."
The end result was, claims Sharpe, that although "I will make no use of vulgar similitude respecting haggisses or those parts of little children which the wholeseome birch is sometimes wont to visit", his head now resembled that of the Greek goddess Fame (or Pheme), who according to legend had multiple tongues, eyes, ears and feathers.
Despite his lighthearted letter, Sharpe was in fact one of the most learned men of his generation, an editor of volumes for the Bannatyne Club, as well as an artist and connoisseur with a collection that surpassed Walter Scott's in terms of quality: including such famous pieces as Holbein's portrait long thought to be of Margaret Tudor, and eleven of the surviving Lewis Chessmen.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Account of a Paris Tournament
(Click on the image to see full size).
On 28 September 1514, a joust was held in Paris to honour the coming Princess Mary, sister of Henry VIII, who was about to marry Louis XII of France.
The tournament saw a huge archway erected with 5 large pillars, from which were hung coloured shields. By touching the shields, competitors qualified for different types of competition, including running the course with a lance (presumably on horseback), "coups d'espée sans nombre" (endless blows of the sword), fighting on foot with a two-handed sword, and throwing the lance while holding a target (in other words, while others were thowing lances at the competitor). The shields were protected by defendants whose job it was to keep the competitors away at all costs. Meanwhile, all the competitors' own shields, numbering over 150, were hung from the inside of the archway as decoration.
There was considerable danger involved in medieval jousts of this sort, and deaths sometime occurred. The duke of Albany, brother of James III of Scotland, was killed in 1485 during a similar tournament in Paris, when a splinter of wood entered his eye.
(Source, Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, 2nd Edition, vol. 1.2 p. 1392)
Sunday, September 6, 2009
The disgraceful case of the Vicar of Dronfield, 1633
Click on the image to see a larger version
Thursday, August 27, 2009
TannerRitchie Newsletter: August 2009
The new academic year is just around the corner, which means it's now officially 'nag your librarian for MEMSO' season! In the meantime, why not try out our Short-Term Personal Subscriptions to MEMSO to get you over the hump? Convenient, affordable and a cheaper way to buy eBooks.
If you haven't taken a look at TannerRitchie Publishing's products for a while, now is a great time to see what we can offer for your teaching and research needs, whether for insitutional purchases, or low-cost individual subscriptions.
In this issue
- MEMSO: Short Term Personal Subscriptions: our best deal ever for individuals.
- MEMSO: Instutional Subscriptions.
- Historical database and web application design and consultancy.
- Follow us on Facebook/Twitter: get you daily dose of obscure historical trivia.
- Complete list of new ebooks since March 2009.
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2. MEMSO: Institutional subscriptions and NetLibrary
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3. Historical database & web application development and consultancy
As well as our own publications, TannerRitchie Publishing has worked on developing, programming and shaping a range of other historical database resources since 2000. We have extensive experience of the requirements of digital academic publishing, and best-practice standards for good web application development. We offer a full range of database and web application development, and consultancy to historians and researchers interested in creating new historical resources. Contact us at office@tannerritchie.com to find out more.
4. Follow us on Facebook/Twitter: : get you daily dose of obscure historical trivia
Historians are leading the way with the use of Facebook and Twitter to create innovative ways to interact with each other. TannerRitchie Publishing provides interesting daily extracts from MEMSO, which aim to illustrate some little-known event that tend to range between the surprising and the bizarre. Since the spring we've seen saltpetre diggers running amok, James VI's invention of the air conditioner, Elizabeth I's emoticons, and early-modern waterboarding.
5. Complete list of new ebooks since March 2009.
As always, we constantly adding important new series and a range of new titles to our existing series. But if there are series you would like to see that we don't have yet, please drop us a line and let us know at office@tannerritchie.com
| Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland (Treasurer's Accounts), volume 9 (1546-1551), 672pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland (Treasurer's Accounts), volume 10 (1551-1559), 660pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Acts of the Privy Council of England, volume 23 (1592-1592), 484pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Acts of the Privy Council of England, volume 24 (1592-1593), 581pp | $20 | Buy online | |
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| Acts of the Privy Council of England, volume 27 (1597-1597), 456pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of Letter-Books Preserved Among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London at the Guildhall, volume 3 (1291-1309), 324pp | $15 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of Letter-Books Preserved Among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London at the Guildhall, volume 6 (1337-1352), 326pp | $15 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of Letter-Books Preserved Among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London at the Guildhall, volume 7 (1352-1374), 428pp | $15 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of Letter-Books Preserved Among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London at the Guildhall, volume 8 (1375-1399), 593pp | $15 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of Letter-Books Preserved Among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London at the Guildhall, volume 9 (1400-1422), 402pp | $15 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of Letter-Books Preserved Among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London at the Guildhall, volume 10 (1422-1461), 519pp | $15 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of Letter-Books Preserved Among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London at the Guildhall, volume 11 (1467-1497), 417pp | $15 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of State Papers Relating to Ireland, volume (1600-1601), 642pp | $20 | Buy online | |
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| Calendar of State Papers, Venice and Northern Italy, volume 27 (1643-1647), 438pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of State Papers, Venice and Northern Italy, volume 29 (1653-1654), 445pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of State Papers, Venice and Northern Italy, volume 30 (1655-1656), 468pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of the Charter Rolls, volume 2 (1257-1300), 754pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of the Charter Rolls, volume 3 (1300-1326), 777pp | $20 | Buy online | |
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| Calendar of the Charter Rolls, volume 5 (1341-1417), 724pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of the Charter Rolls, volume 6 (1427-1516), 462pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of the Close Rolls, volume (1330-1333), 785pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of the Close Rolls, volume 1333 (1333-1337), 908pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of the Close Rolls, volume 1337 (1337-1339), 795pp | $20 | Buy online | |
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| Calendar of the Close Rolls, volume 1341 (1341-1343), 842pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Calendar of the Stuart Papers Preserved at Windsor Castle (HMC), volume 6 (1718-1718), 934pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Cartularium Comitatus de Levenax , volume 1 (1200-1398), 154pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Collection of the Decisions of the Lords of Council and Session, volume 1 (1661-1686), 315pp | $30 | Buy online | |
| Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, volume 1 (1264-1359), 908pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, volume 2 (1359-1379), 826pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, volume 3 (1379-1406), 888pp | $40 | Buy online | |
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| Manuscripts of the Duke of Hamilton (HMC), volume 1 (1315-1717), 269pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Manuscripts of the Duke of Hamilton (HMC), volume 2 (1563-1794), 271pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 5 (1676-1678), 845pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 6 (1676-1678), 848pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 7 (1681-1682), 1001pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 8 (1683-1684), 913pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 9 (1684-1684), 1018pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 10 (1684-1685), 810pp | $30 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 11 (1685-1686), 831pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 12 (1686-1686), 707pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 13 (1686-1689), 813pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Register of the Privy Council (Scotland) - Series 3, volume 14 (1689-1689), 944pp | $40 | Buy online | |
| Registrum Monasterii de Passelet , volume 1 (1163-1529), 546pp | $30 | Buy online | |
| Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati, edited by Thomas Duffus Hardy, volume 1.1 (1119-1216), 347pp | $20 | Buy online | |
| Statutes and Ordinances and Acts of Parliament of Ireland (Early Statutes of Ireland), volume 1 (1204-1421), 673pp | $30 | Buy online | |
| Statutes and Ordinances and Acts of Parliament of Ireland (Early Statutes of Ireland), volume 2 (1427-1460), 867pp | $30 | Buy online |
Friday, August 14, 2009
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