Early Modern History

The Drakes of Esher Place

I have written two true stories of the Drakes of Esher Place 1593-1647 – Francis Drake, Esquire and Mrs Joan Drake – during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. These are companion pieces, and together they provide a rare insight into an imperfect marriage during the early modern period, from the perspective of both husband and wife. Whilst they can be read in either order, I wrote Mrs Drake’s story first, and investigated what might have caused her husband’s anger and frustration afterwards.

Both stories have a short version of 3-4 pages, which is suitable for publication in local history magazines. However, for those interested in a more in-depth read based on detailed analysis of (and quotes from) the primary sources – a book published in 1647, and court documents from 1605 – plus extensive research of the main people involved, with footnotes of relevant associated facts, a list of sources, and an index, I have made these available both as a ‘flipbook’ and pdf.

The Museum of Melancholy: The Divine Case of Mrs Drake 1615-47

In the early 1600s, Mrs Joan Drake is married to Francis Drake (godson of the great explorer) and lives in Esher Place in Surrey, previously owned by Cardinal Wolsey. They should be leading a charmed life, but she suffers from a deep melancholy that manifests itself in both physical symptoms and a spiritual anxiety. Seeking a cure, Dr John Hart, a Doctor of Divinity, arranges for a series of Puritan preachers to take on her ‘case’ and as the years pass finds himself inexorably drawn into Mrs Drake’s confidence.

Based on the long-forgotten book Hart published in 1647, some twenty years after her death, this is a true account of Mrs Drake’s final years in which, despite the occasional quarrel, she involves him in a secret plan to help her escape — whilst pregnant with her last, ill-fated child — and makes a heartbreaking confession to him on her deathbed. Written as a spiritual guide but concealing a memoir, Hart’s wonderful phrasing and bygone vocabulary form a testament of his devotion, tantalisingly debatable if it was reciprocated or unrequited, but which ultimately proved deadly.

Although the events took place four hundred years ago, the issues are surprisingly contemporary: an intelligent and strong-willed woman struggling with her bodily and mental wellbeing, resolutely combatting the social norms and religious dogma with persistent subversions, and still fervently hoping for a happy ending.

To download short version as pdf click here

To read full version as Flipbook click here

To download full version as pdf click here

Drake vs Drake: A Case of Mistaken Identity 1593-1615

In 1593, thirteen-year-old Francis Drake of Esher Place in Surrey is invited to visit his godfather, the celebrated explorer Sir Francis Drake, at his home at Buckland Abbey. He leaves three months later convinced that he will be named his heir and will inherit the estates of the ageing and childless national hero. However, Sir Francis dies off the coast of Panama on his next voyage and makes a hasty codicil to his will, in which he leaves his godson only one small manor for which he has to pay a substantial fee.

This deathbed act leads to years of legal wrangling in which Francis Drake, now in his early twenties, fights for what he believes are his rightful dues against Thomas Drake, Sir Francis’s younger brother and executor, and Jonas Bodenham, a shady character brought up as the son Sir Francis never had to handle his business affairs. There are no holds barred; the only way to win is to drag his godfather’s name through the mud by accusing him of defrauding Queen Elizabeth I twenty years previously. This is the true story of events, based on transcripts of the original documents from the Court of Exchequer in 1605, that revolves around eyewitness accounts of the burning and looting of Spanish colonial settlements in the Caribbean, and the ‘embezzlement and purloining’ of gold coins from a damaged ship of the Spanish Armada whose captain is held to ransom. It is also the story of the young Francis Drake of Esher’s search for identity and what it means to be a man — amidst the piratical machismo of the West Country sailors, and the licentious posturing of the Jacobean court —and his gradual acceptance of his Puritan heritage.

To download short version as pdf click here

For a preview of the full version please contact the author.

Why Early Modern History?

Chris

Sometimes, caught up in research about a person who lived four or five hundred years ago, I find myself wondering why I, or anyone, should be interested in them now? There is also the broader question — what is the relevance of early modern history today, when there are so many contemporary issues to be addressed?

I have come up with two key reasons. Firstly, as long as there is a great narrative, with captivating events and characters, then the fact that it is historical, and true, makes it all the more interesting. I find the early modern period (c1500-1700) an ideal source for stories because it is far enough away that people thought and behaved very differently, and are therefore more perplexing, but not so distant for them to be unrecognisable to us; and there are many primary sources available — thanks to the invention of printing and the shift from Latin to the vernacular — to provide a broad basis for research (even if, inevitably, this restricts the scope to the literate). In addition, although every generation imagines it faces the greatest challenges, there can be few doubts that those who lived in Europe during the evolution from the Medieval to the beginnings of the ‘modern’ era faced unprecedented, and traumatic, change that turned their world upside down: the re-emergence of classical, pre-Christian, humanistic thought in the Renaissance, with its cultural and artistic outpourings, that led to the beginnings of scientific enquiry and questioning of previously irrefutable ‘facts’; the Reformation that challenged a fundamental, absolutist belief system going back centuries and unleashed violence and horror between Protestants and Catholics; the establishment of commercial trades and the middle-classes, that gave rise to social, political and legal upheavals and battles over sovereignty; the emergence of nation states and military advancements; and the broadening of horizons and first stirrings of globalisation as a result of the voyages of discovery.

Imagining what it must have been like to live through such a period of immense change as an individual or family leads naturally to a second reason for preferring early modern, and especially local, history…Empathy. I am drawn to stories of local people because it creates a stronger link to know that they lived where I live, and (at least for natural topography) saw what I see. For the same reason I look for letters, diaries and eyewitness accounts because that’s where the intriguing details of their real lives exist, rather than the historian’s broad sweep or the repetitive lists of births, marriages and deaths. Of course, it helps when those I am researching came into contact with famous faces or were caught up in some historical event, because that broadens the appeal of a story, which is ultimately the aim of writing it down.

The Renaissance Search Engine

Back to Renaissance Europe

Leonardo da Vinci’s Ideal City Plan

Leonardo da Vinci and his assistants along with the train of mules carrying his personal belongings, furniture and paintings, one of which is the Mona Lisa which he is still working on, arrive in the Château de Clos-Lucé in the summer of 1516. It has been a long and arduous journey of a thousand miles which has included hurriedly crossing the Alps before the winter set in.

This is the first time in his long life – he is sixty four but with his long grey hair and beard looks much older – that he has left his native Italy. His previous patrons have provided him with work in the various city states of Italy, initially in Florence, then Milan and most recently in Rome where he was lodged in the Belvedere Villa, a recent addition to the Vatican with sweeping views across the city. Here he was employed by Pope Leo X, but found himself struggling to compete with the fame of the younger Michelangelo, riding a wave of admiration following the completion of the Sistine Chapel ceiling after four years of effort.

It was as part of the Pope’s entourage that set out in late 1515 to meet François 1 in Bologna to discuss peace terms, following his anointing as Duke of Milan, that Leonardo met his final patron. In advance of the meeting, the Pope had commissioned an invention from Leonardo that would amuse the young king of France and could be given as a gift. This turned out to be a mechanical lion, two meters high and three meters long and made of wood, that was able to move by way of a single spring and cogs that controlled its motions. It could take a few steps forward, move its tail and sit up on its hind legs. Having done this, a compartment would open up in its chest and a bouquet of lilies would be presented. Lilies were part of the Medici coat of arms, and the Pope had been Giovanni de Medici prior to being anointed as the last ‘non-priest’ to become leader of the Catholic church.

François was already an admirer of Leonardo through his knowledge and admiration for the Italian renaissance, and this must have been the ideal opportunity to offer him security in his old age, as the uncertainties due to the Italian wars continued. Despite his fame, Leonardo is illegitimate and not a rich man by birth so he relies on commissions, many of which he has not completed due to his unstoppable curiosity in everything around him. The title they agree on is “First Painter, Engineer and Architect to the King” and the job comes with a grace and favour home near to the French Court’s summer residence in Amboise, and a decent pension.

Read more →

Mona Lisa’s Travels

Back to Renaissance Europe

Mona Lisa is Stolen 1911

Lisa Camilla Gherardini is born in the summer of 1479 into an ancient family from Tuscany that has fallen on hard times and is living in a rented house in the centre of Florence. She grows up with olive skin, fine dark hair, long eyelashes, full eyebrows and something about her manner which, at the age of 16, attracts the attention of Francesco del Giocondo. He is fourteen years older and has been married before, but his wife has died leaving him with the sole care of a young son. His offer of marriage has pleased Lisa’s parents as he is a highly successful and wealthy man, being a Consul of the Silk Guild, one of the seven Greater Guilds in Florence. Members of his wider family are silk producers with control over its supply from ownership of the mulberry trees that provide nutrition for the silkworms, to workshops which transform the raw fibres into dyed cloth, and then to the sale of the highly sought after silks to the upper echelons of Florentine society and beyond. Along with his brother, Francesco owns two shops and rents a third, and one of his best-selling lines is a silk fabric woven with gold thread – a silk cloth of gold. The marriage, and Francesco’s career, progress well and he and his second wife have an additional son and daughter – Piero and Piera – but Piera dies at the age of two. In 1503, when Francesco decides to commission a portrait of his twenty-four-year-old wife, they have another daughter Camilla1.

By this time, Leonardo da Vinci’s reputation as a painter is well established and he has completed most of his major works including the Last Supper and Salvator Mundi. His patrons have been the most powerful men from the leading families of the independent Italian states, including the Medici, the Sforza and the Borgia – he is currently in the employ of Cesare Borgia as his military architect and engineer. Therefore Francesco achieves something of a coup in securing Leonardo’s agreement, although Leonardo’s father is a neighbour and has, in his capacity as a notary, drawn up several deeds for him, and it has to be said may have had an influence. Following the sitting, Leonardo continues to work on the small portrait, that measures only 77x53cm2, as time allows since he has received another much larger commission – to paint a mural for the council hall in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, which is to measure 17×7 metres3.

Five years go by and Leonardo leaves Florence for Milan in 1508 at the request of the French Governor, and by extension the French King Louis XII, having failed to complete either the larger or smaller commission, claiming ‘technical difficulties’ with his paints. Once he has left Florence, he abandons any attempt to deliver the portrait of Lisa Del Giocondo, and therefore never receives any payment for his work. It becomes for him a type of ‘work in progress’ on which he experiments over the years with fine layers and subtle touches with the goal of achieving the ultimate ‘sfumato’4 appearance he has in mind.

Read more →

Marguerite d’Angoulême

Back to Renaissance Europe

Marguerite d’Angoulême 1492-1549

The Spiritual Advisor (1516)

In 1516, King François’s older sister, Marguerite, is 24 and in an unhappy, childless marriage, arranged by her father, to Charles, the duc d’Alençon, who owns a large part of Normandy. Marguerite is well educated and well-read (but not yet the renowned literary figure that she will become), so it is understandable that she had cried throughout her wedding service as her husband is illiterate and primarily concerned with hunting. In contrast, Marguerite has books imported to her new home at the castle in Alençon, and also invites musicians, poets and scholars to a regular salon which becomes known as ‘The New Parnassus’ after the mountain in Greek Mythology which, as the home of the Muses, was the inspiration for all poetry, music, and learning.

For a young woman of royal blood, she has an unusual sense of social justice that contrasts with the entitlement of most of her peers. She looks at, rather than through, the ordinary people of Alençon and notices how many are poor and begging, or are old and infirm. She makes it her duty to visit the convents, hospices and almhouses, and sees the unmarried pregnant women and abandoned children. She listens to the stories of violence, rape and infanticide. She recoils hearing how certain types of men, some of them priests and monks, abuse their positions of power. Then she decides that she can do something about this, at least in the lands her husband controls. She starts collecting funds from the noblewomen of her court to give to charity, but being of a reflective nature, she soon realises that real improvements require reform, so she focuses on how hygiene can be improved to stop disease spreading, and how healthier meals can be provided to reduce infant mortality. So that all this is not a ‘once and forgotten’ exercise, she establishes a group of observers to oversee the implementation and report back.

Marguerite’s marriage options were first publicised as a child when her mother Louise de Savoie, widowed early after the death of her husband, had written a letter to England offering Marguerite, aged 10, as a bride to Henry Tudor who was a year older. It was not unusual among the ruling classes to be betrothed as young children, as part of political machinations. At that time, Henry had just become heir to the throne of England after his older brother, Arthur Prince of Wales, had died of sweating sickness at his castle on the Welsh Marches after only 5 months of an unconsummated marriage to Katherine of Aragon, who survived the same illness. The offer was politely refused, and Marguerite was spared the opportunity to become Henry VIII’s first wife.

As Marguerite now knew, marriage did not necessarily lead to happiness. Another accepted convention amongst the nobility, and one that she would fight against throughout her life in her actions and writings, was that of male infidelity. She is acutely aware that her mother had been a victim of such ‘traditions’, but also that this experience had made her a formidable woman. Louise was married at 11 to Charles d’ Angoulême who was part of the ruling Valois dynasty, although they only began living together when she was 15, by which time he had an established mistress who was to remain living with them in the household, and who bore him two daughters. He also had third illegitimate daughter with another mistress. Charles fell ill after going out riding one winter and died aged 36, leaving Louise a widow at 19, with Marguerite aged 4 and François aged 2. This state of affairs could have been disastrous for Marguerite had Louise not believed in education for women and, as she matured into her later role as mother of the king and regent, developed a keen political mind. An avid reader herself, she made sure that her children were both brought up familiar with the classics, particularly with the rediscovery of the original writings leading to new thinking in the arts and sciences coming out of Italy, and she encouraged translations into French. She made sure that François learned Spanish and Italian, which may or may not have been a blessing given his future dealings, mostly unfriendly, with those countries. Marguerite grew up with an appreciation of philosophy and poetry.

Read more →

Leonardo’s Notebooks

Back to Renaissance Europe

Leonardo da Vinci’s Notebooks (British Library)

It was not always the case that Leonardo da Vinci was recognised first and foremost as the polymath ideal of the renaissance man, as for many decades after his death his fame had more to do with his artistic genius, since his paintings and murals were there on the walls of galleries and churches for all to see, whilst his notebooks lay gathering dust in an attic.

Leonardo’s notes, sketches, observations and musings are made on loose sheets of paper of differing sizes, using ‘mirror writing’ which he writes with his left hand, from right to left. For the casual observer this makes them difficult to decipher, or even makes them think he is writing in a foreign language. In addition, his spelling is sometimes inconsistent, and he uses abbreviations. When he dies, and bequeaths them to Melzi, there are over 7,000 sheets that he has not organised into any recognisable filing system.

Melzi feels the weight of responsibility and history – his first decision is to make a catalogue of what he has inherited to ensure its preservation, but this is an almost impossible task in that he is the only person who is accustomed to Leonardo’s unique writing style and can transcribe the notes more or less accurately, so help is in short supply. He then plans to organise the pages into a chronological order, since in that way the reader could follow Leonardo’s train of thought, and the development of his ideas, and how one interest might have led to another. But it is soon obvious that this will also be impossible because there are few dates and not enough other indications of timings. He wonders – how can someone who had the most amazing intellect, who could converse knowledgeably and charismatically on almost any subject, have such an unorganised method of written communication, as if the notes were only for him and not for humanity. So he concludes that the next best option is to organise by subject matter.

Knowing that Leonardo had expressed a desire, once again unfulfilled, to compile a treatise on painting in which he would pass on his learnings to other artists and make the case for painting as a science not an art, Melzi starts by bringing together all of the pages which support this objective, transcribing, making notes as he goes and compiling a large manuscript, that will become known as the Codex Urbinas1 and ends up in the Vatican Library. This alone takes many years and he is still working on it into the 1540s. His aim that in his remaining lifetime he will achieve what Leonardo did not, that is to publish his work, will not be fulfilled, although he does gather some of the separate sheets into notebooks, and manages the relatively more achievable objective of completing a number of paintings that were left unfinished at Leonardo’s death.

Read more →

Leonardo’s Algorithm

Back to Renaissance Europe

Leonardo da Vinci, in later life

What makes a genius? Is it a natural gift bestowed by a fortunate combination of a father and mother’s DNA, in other words genetics and heredity, or is it an acquired state based on environment, education and experience? Or a combination of both? The same could be asked of any exceptional trait, such as charisma, or evil dictatorship.

A cross-disciplinary team of international specialists – including genetic scientists, microbiologists, genealogists, anthropologists, and art historians – have created a venture, known as The Leonardo Project, with the aim of creating new insights into Leonardo da Vinci’s genius that will combine scientific technologies with state-of-the art research techniques. First, they plan to confirm that the remains in the chapel of Saint-Hubert are indeed genuine, using DNA sequencing. Leonardo’s family tree has already been updated – tracking a continuous male line from his grandfather across six hundred and ninety years, down twenty-one generations and five family branches, to identify fourteen living relatives – so that a match might be made. Other potential sources for Leonardo’s DNA and biometrics have been proposed including: hairs that might be found, stuck within the mixture of pigments, walnut oil and amber resin, on the surface of his paintings, or trapped in the folds of his notebooks; and fingerprints left behind as he softened the tones and layers. All this assumes of course that the current owners are in agreement to allow their priceless possessions to be investigated so intrusively.

Following endorsement (yet to be confirmed) of the identity of the bones, they suggest that using the same methods already developed to re-create faces from fossilised skulls, they could even create a computerised version of his face, although this would seem to call into question the accuracy of the many self-portraits that Leonardo painted during his lifetime.

There are at least a couple of observations here. Today we need a cross-disciplinary team of researchers, whereas Leonardo embodied many disciplines in his one person in his day. Furthermore, the project team finds itself effectively dissecting and analysing his body and its genetic content, much in the same way that Leonardo used dissection to inform the anatomical accuracy of his drawings.

From all of this this yet-to-be-gathered data, The Leonardo Project team hopes to find out more about his physical appearance, the state of his health, and his diet. But this does not sound as though it adds up to a recipe for genius? Is there a gene for genius?

Software engineers may have already found an answer – it is not a gene, but an algorithm. A start-up based in Florence, obviously, has used artificial intelligence technology to develop an App that has been trained on data points derived from Leonardo da Vinci’s paintings.

As might have been predicted, building the genius algorithm was not straightforward, since Leonardo did not draw a shape and fill it with colour, but the shapes emerge from the layers of colour themselves. So extensive research was required to develop a new approach to the standard ‘neural style transfer’ technique that copies the visual style of one image onto another. This resulted in a model with 500 million parameters linked to machine learning algorithms. All of this effort produces, within two minutes, your selfie in the style of the Mona Lisa.

We should not need to remind ourselves that such a feat is not generating a new genius – which may yet come about – but that those millions of data points represent, somewhere in the physical innards of a server, the vast scale of the genius of Leonardo himself.

Back to Renaissance Europe

A Judgement

Back to Sir Ranulphe Crewe

Sir Ranulphe Crewe 1558-1646

A Judgement of Sir Ranulphe Crewe

This is a shorter version edited from “Blue Blood Like Blue Ink” (see About section).

Discountenanced

I thought I had found a brief memoir, some reminiscences of his life, but the few pages of notes at the back of great-grandfather’s tattered photograph album turned out to be a summary of the research he had been carrying out into the history of his aristocratic ancestors, the Crewe family. It was evident that he had dictated them and that his eldest daughter had typed them up. The purpose was, it seemed to me, to discover where all the titles and money had gone, as he was a well-off businessman but did not possess a stately home and estates or even, by the time he died, the Crewe name itself. On the final page, his daughter had tried to create a family tree but had become frustrated by the difficulty of drawing lines using the typewriter, so had resorted to a blue pen to make the connections. I remember thinking that this was more appropriate, as it looked like blue blood.

The central character from whom all lines emanated was Sir Ranulphe Crewe1, the founder of the Crewe dynasty. He was the epitome of the self-made man, who rose from relatively humble beginnings in Cheshire in the mid-sixteenth century to become Lord Chief Justice of the Kings Bench, the most powerful judge in the country, under not one, but two Kings: James I and Charles I. Not forgetting his roots – in fact he was obsessed by his genealogy – he built one of the largest houses in the North of England of the time, Crewe Hall, as well as maintaining a comfortable ‘town house’ in Westminster. I did my own brief scan of his achievements. He had his own Wikipedia page and an entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, and seemed to be best remembered for a quote about lost noble family names, but I noted that he received almost unanimously favourable testimonials from his peers and historians of the period. On his character: “…he did not seek to obtain the applause of the world; he was a modest man… contented with the approbation of his own conscience.” On his legal career: “…his legal honesty and political consistency raised him high in the estimation of all public-spirited men.” As Lord Chief Justice: “…there was never a more laudable appointment… he had patience in hearing, evenness of temper and kindness of heart.” There was just one flaw. In the summer of 1616, Sir Ranulphe Crewe was one of two senior judges who hanged six innocent women as witches, a decision for which they were censured by James I, a revelation in itself as the King had confirmed, and indeed broadened the scope, of the death penalty in his Witchcraft Act of 1604.

I could have left it at that. After four hundred years of praise, why not leave this unedifying stone unturned? But then I discovered that there still existed twenty-four pages of vellum manuscripts from the trial of the Bewitchment of John Smith (a Child) 1616 in the Lincoln Archives, and that a local historian had made a transcript.2

Read more →

The Bewitching of John Smith

Back to Sir Ranulphe Crewe

The Bewitching of John Smith, a Child 1616: A True Account

In the manor house of Husbands Bosworth1, a village of around eighty cottages a few miles south of Leicester, John Smith, eldest son of the owner with his second wife2, was unwell. Ever since early childhood, and he was now nearly twelve3, he had complained of headaches and stomach pains, but recently, beginning around Shrovetide4, he had taken a turn for the worse and had begun to have fits that were now occurring several times a day. His father, Roger, at first tried to hold him down, but his child was thrashing about so wildly that he had to call for help, and even with servants holding his arms and legs, they could not calm him. Over the course of a few fretful weeks, the child’s condition worsened, until he no longer had bowel movements and was wailing in pain from his bloated stomach, and was refusing food and water.

Roger Smith was reluctantly away on business in London when Doctor Sheppard was called for. Vomit purges were administered to the boy that relieved the most pressing symptoms, but the fits continued, so further remedies were applied in an attempt to restore the equilibrium of the humours; but not one was successful. At a loss to explain the child’s suffering, Doctor Sheppard wrote to Roger that, summarising conversations at the boy’s bedside, he hoped that his son had not been possessed by demons. A second opinion from Doctor Cotta was requested who suspected ‘falling sickness’5. This diagnosis, however, corresponded with a further level of affliction, that everyone referred to as the ‘senseless fits’ in which, even when not convulsing, John Smith was struck blind, deaf and dumb, and during the fits appeared to be fighting unseen tormentors, and was shrieking and making strange noises. He now needed to be watched constantly, with onlookers armed with sheets to try and catch him if he should fall out of bed. At night, he insisted on having the candles lit at all times. The observers were horrified at the spectacle, most especially John’s mother, and Roger returned to find a household in chaos and panic.

Into this maelstrom came Randall, a woman from the village known for her powers of healing. Desperate for some alternative to the medical advice that had failed, Roger ushered her to the invalid’s bedside where John was having yet another of his interminable fits. The doctors stepped aside to let this dishevelled person pass, and watched suspiciously as Randall recited some incomprehensible incantations, and applied foul-smelling potions, but then there was general astonishment as John’s body stopped shaking, and he opened his eyes. Shortly afterwards, rumours began to circulate that witchcraft was the cause of John’s ailments and, in a settlement of less than five hundred souls, word spread quickly.

Read more →

Sir Ranulphe Crewe

I have written a biography of Sir Ranulphe Crewe of Crewe Hall, as part of a longer work which is based on some family history notes dictated by a great-grandfather, decended from Sir Ranulphe down a minor branch of the Crewe family, and typed up by his eldest daughter. My research highlighted some stories which have a broader appeal, which are listed in the links below:

The Bewitching of John Smith, A Child 1616

Whilst researching Sir Ranulphe Crewe, I discovered that he had been one of the Assize Court judges in the trial of the ‘witches’ of Husbands Bosworth in 1616, also known as “The Leicester Boy” trial. I subsequently obtained a copy of the original 24 pages of documents from Lincoln Archives, and made my own transcript based upon the partial one supplied, and wrote up a new version of the events that took place as the Prologue to the biography. One of the differences is that in the original contemporary account six named women are identified as being hanged, whereas most later reports state nine women, based on a letter from someone who I believe was hearing the news second-hand.

A Judgement of Sir Ranulphe Crewe

Impressed by his seemingly illustrious career, but alarmed by his error of judgement in the witch trial, I investigated Sir Ranulphe Crewe’s life, seeking to understand his character and motivations, and discovered that the truth was far more complex than a few biographical lines in history books would suggest.