Thomas Blood and a Plot to Pilfer the Crown Jewels

As a Roundhead, Thomas Blood was inevitably keen to demonstrate his displeasure following the restoration of the British monarchy in 1660, and, it was with a desire to express this discontentment that, in 1671, he plotted to pilfer the Crown Jewels from The Tower of London.

The Jewels could be viewed at the tower and it was under this pretence that Blood, dressed as a parson and accompanied by a woman pretending to be his wife, first observed them. Here, Blood’s “wife” feigned a stomach complaint and begged the Master of the Jewel House, Talbot Edwards, to fetch some spirits. Edwards’ wife invited them upstairs to their apartment to recover. Returning later with a gift of thanks, Blood became gradually ingratiated into the family and eventually an offer was made for a fictitious nephew of Blood’s to marry the Edwardses’ daughter.

On May 9^th, Blood convinced Edwards to show him, his ‘nephew’, and two companions, the Jewels. Concealing rapier blades and pistols Blood and two fellow conspirators followed Edwards into the Jewel House, where the Jewels were kept behind a metal grille, whilst the other conspirator stood watch outside. As they entered the room a cloak was thrown over Edwards before he was struck, knocked to the floor, bound, gagged and stabbed, in an attempt to subdue him.

After removing the metal grille, Blood used a mallet to flatten out St. Edward’s Crown so he could hide it beneath his coat. The Sceptre with the Cross was cut in two to fit in their bag, while the Sovereign’s Orb was stuffed down one man’s trousers. Possibly, the disturbance caused by Edwards’ struggle raised the alarm, however, popular reports describe the fortuitous return of Edwards’ son, Wythe, who happened upon the theft and confronted the look-out, who alerted his fellow conspirators to their having been discovered. Ungagged, Edwards was able to sound the alarm with his cries of “Treason! Murder! The crown is stolen!”

As Blood and his gang fled it is said they joined the calls for alarm to confuse the guards. They dropped the sceptre and fired on the warders who eventually succeeded in capturing them. Having fallen from his cloak, the crown was found while Blood refused to give up. The orb was recovered, although several stones were missing and others were loose.

Blood refused to answer to anyone but the king so was taken to the palace, bound in chains, and questioned by King Charles and other members of the royal family. He was not only pardoned, but also given land. The reasons for the pardon are unknown though historians have speculated that the king may have feared a revengeful uprising by Blood’s followers, or that the king had a fondness for audacious scoundrels and was amused by Blood’s revelation that he had previously intended to kill the king as he bathed in the Thames but had changed his mind having found himself in “awe of majesty”. Following his pardon Blood became a familiar figure in London and made frequent appearances at Court, where he was employed to advocate in the claims of suitors to the Crown.

(Source: Wikipedia)

The Man in the Iron Mask

The Man in the Iron Mask is a name given to a prisoner arrested as Eustache Dauger in 1669. He was held in the custody of the same jailer for 34 years. His identity has been thoroughly discussed because no one ever saw his face, which was hidden by a mask of either black velvet cloth or iron. What facts are known about this prisoner are based mainly on correspondence between his jailer and his superiors in Paris.

The first surviving records of the masked prisoner are from July 1669, when Louis XIV’s minister sent a letter to the governor of the prison of Pignerol informing him that a prisoner named Eustache Dauger was due to arrive in the next month or so. Historians have noted that the name Eustache Dauger was written in a different handwriting than the rest of the text, suggesting that while a clerk wrote the letter under dictation, a third party, very likely the minister himself, added the name afterwards.

The governor was instructed to prepare a cell with multiple doors, one closing upon the other, to prevent anyone from the outside listening in. The governor himself was to see Dauger only once a day in order to provide food and whatever else he needed. Dauger was also to be told that if he spoke of anything other than his immediate needs he would be killed. According to many versions of this legend, the prisoner wore the mask at all times. 

The prison at Pignerol was used for men who were considered an embarrassment to the state and usually held only a handful of prisoners at a time, some of which were important and wealthy and granted servants. One prisoner, Nicolas Fouquet’s valet was often ill and so permission was given for Dauger to serve Fouquet on the condition that he never met with anyone else. The fact that Dauger served as a valet is an important one for whilst Fouquet was never expected to be released, other prisoners were, and might have spread word of Dauger’s existence. 

In time the governor was offered positions at other prisons and each time he moved Dauger went with him until he died in 1703 and was buried under the name of Marchioly. Though she may merely have been repeating rumours In 1711, King Louis’s sister-in-law stated in a letter that the prisoner had “two musketeers at his side to kill him if he removed his mask”. 

In 1771, Voltaire claimed that the prisoner was the older, illegitimate brother of Louis XIV but other theories include that he was a Marshal of France; Richard Cromwell; or François, Duke of Beaufort; an illegitimate son of Charles II, amongst others.

Urine Wheel

Back in the day, the medical analysis of urine relied on, well, a doctor’s five senses and superstition. But sometimes physicians needed a little extra help in divining the ramifications of some dubious tinkle.

Enter the urine wheel, a diagram that doctors consulted to determine what maladies corresponded with the cloudiness, bouquet, and taste of the afflicted’s golden outpourings.

Even though uroscopy was far from an exact art, it did get some things right, such as diagnosing diabetes mellitus. It also got many things wrong, occasionally in downright Pythonian ways. As the magazine Doctors Review elaborates:

One of the rare instances in which uroscopy was dead-on came in diagnosing diabetes by a sweet taste to the urine. In 1674, English physician Thomas Willis (1621-1675) was the first in modern medical literature to observe this relationship. He may have enjoyed the sampling process a little too much, stating that the pee on his palate was “wonderfully sweet as if it were imbued with honey or sugar.” His taste test led him to add the term “mellitus” to this form of diabetes, from the Latin word for honey.

Urine was also used as a way to identify pure evil. As the witch hunts of Europe reached a fever pitch in the 16th and 17th centuries, self-proclaimed witch-hunters and appointed tribunals determined the guilt of countless “witches” based on whether or not the cork popped out of a bottle containing a combination of their urine and metal objects like pins and nails.

Defenestration of Prague

Defenestration is the act of throwing someone or something out of a window. Although defenestrations can be fatal the act of defenestration need not carry the intent or result of death. The term originates from two incidents in history, both occurring in Prague. In 1419, seven town officials were thrown from the Town Hall, precipitating the Hussite War [Source].

Then, after Roman Catholic officials in Bohemia closed Protestant chapels in 1617, violating the guarantees of religious liberty laid down in the Letter of Majesty of Emperor Rudolf II, defensors, appointed to safeguard Protestant rights, responded by calling an assembly where the imperial regents were tried and found guilty of violating the Letter of Majesty. They, along with their secretary, were then thrown from the windows of the council room of Prague Castle on May 23, 1618. Although inflicting no serious injury on the victims, that act, known as the Defenestration of Prague, was a signal for the beginning of a Bohemian revolt against Ferdinand II, marking one of the opening phases of the Thirty Years’ War. [Source]

These incidents, particularly in 1618, were referred to as the Defenestrations of Prague and gave rise to the term and the concept, though, one may read about other notable defenestrations in history here.

Grýla

In Icelandic mythology Grýla is a terrible mountain-dwelling monster and giantess who ventures down from her lair at Christmas time in search of naughty children to cook in a stew and eat, with the vain hope of remedying her insatiable appetite.

According to the legend Grýla has been married three times and her current husband, Leppalúði, lives with her and her their sons, the Yule Lads - mischievous and criminal Santa-type figures who also torment the Icelandic people by harassing sheep, stealing food, and window-peeping - in their cave in the Dimmuborgir lava fields, along with the black Yule Cat.

The legend dates back to the 13th century, though it didn’t become associated with Christmas until the 17th. In 1746 a decree was issued banning the use of Grýla and the Yule Lads to scare children.

[Written with the help of Wikipedia. Image: Grýla by Þrándur Þórarinsson]

Advent Calendar of Oddments 2012: December 19th

Father Christmas and the Coca Cola Company

Father Christmas dates back at least as far as the 17th century in Britain, and pictures of him survive from that era, portraying him as a jolly well-nourished bearded man dressed in a long, green, fur-lined robe - something like the 19th century image above.

Contrary to popular belief The Coca-Cola company did not invent Father Christmas’ red suit:

Urban myth has it that the red suit only appeared after the Coca Cola company started an advertising campaign depicting a red suited Father Christmas in the 1930s. Though images of Santa Claus were popularised through depictions of him for The Coca-Cola Company’s Christmas advertising in the 30s, Coca-Cola was not the first soft drink company to utilise the modern image of Santa Claus in its advertising—White Rock Beverages had already used a red and white Santa in 1915 and 1923 advertisements. 

Earlier still, Santa Claus had appeared dressed in red and white on several covers of Puck magazine in the first few years of the twentieth century, whilst cartoonist Thomas Nast had portrayed Santa Claus in red in an 1863 edition of Harper’s Weekly.

The Wikipedia for Santa Claus is actually a pretty interesting read if perchance you’re interested in the evolution of the character.

Advent Calendar of Oddments 2012: December 17th

Christmas is Cancelled

Oliver Cromwell, “who was part of the joint republican, military and parliamentarian effort that overthrew the Stuart monarchy as a result of the English Civil War, and was subsequently invited by his fellow leaders to assume a head of state role,” [Source] banned Christmas in the ‘anti-fun charter’ of 1651. Public notices were nailed to trees around Britain warning that:

The observation of Christmas having been deemed a sacrilege, the exchange of gifts and greetings, dressing in fine clothings, feasting and similar satanical practices, are hereby FORBIDDEN, with the offender liable to a fine of five shillings.

In 1657 he also banned mince pies because they symbolised Catholicism.

Advent Calendar of Oddments 2012: December 3rd