18th Century History

Ezzelin and Meduna - John Henry Fuseli1779

Sun, 20 May 2012 12:30:09 -0400

Ezzelin and Meduna - John Henry Fuseli
1779

“Lady Augusta” - kirby(via)

Fri, 04 May 2012 14:08:54 -0400

“Lady Augusta” - kirby
(via)

The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens - Museum Visit

Wed, 02 May 2012 20:22:35 -0400

Situated along the St. Johns River in Jacksonville, FL; the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens is a true gem to this Northeast Florida city. I have visited many times in the past, but have never been able to take photos inside the museum. I am grateful that their photography policy has changed, so I can share some of their 18th century pieces with you.

The room containing their 18th century collection has been updated since my last visit, and the layout is much more suited to show off their large collection of Early Meissen Porcelain, “one of only three collections of this type and quality in the world”. The cases have been updated and placards now include interactive QR codes. My guests and I had a wonderful time looking at all of the quirks and paintings on the pieces. It is truly a marvelous collection.

Although the museum is of modest size, you can still easily spend half a day taking in the art. They always have a few rotating exhibitions (one of which was the reason for my visit this time), so things are kept fresh at the Cummer.

Not to be outdone by the inside, the Cummer Gardens (Italian and English) draw garden enthusiasts and camera happy families alike. The smell of the gardens in the spring and early summer is completely delicious, and there are wonderful views of the St. Johns River.

I highly recommend a trip to this museum if you find yourself in Florida. The 18th century room will please your senses, and the rest of the museum has much to admire as well. The staff and volunteers have always been friendly and accommodating, and the Cummer does much to inspire culture in the city of Jacksonville.

To view more photos from The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens, visit our Facebook Page.

Fashionable Contrasts or The Duchess’s little...

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 19:49:26 -0400

Fashionable Contrasts or The Duchess’s little shoe yielding to the magnitude of the Duke’s foot - James Gillray

Petticoat - c. 1720: England ©The Kyoto Costume Institute, photo...

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 15:20:19 -0400

Petticoat - c. 1720: England

©The Kyoto Costume Institute, photo by Toru Kogure

"It is ungentlemanly to use a napkin for wiping the face or scraping the teeth, and a most vulgar..."

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 11:19:13 -0400

“It is ungentlemanly to use a napkin for wiping the face or scraping the teeth, and a most vulgar error to wipe one’s nose with it.”

- 1729 French Treatise

vivelareine: A portrait of Madame Elisabeth in a chemise dress...

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 18:37:55 -0400

vivelareine:

A portrait of Madame Elisabeth in a chemise dress by Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun. Circa the 1780s.

Second Course - Elizabeth Raffald Dearest followers, Please...

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 21:02:24 -0400

Second Course - Elizabeth Raffald

Dearest followers,

Please accept my most sincere apologies for being absent as of late. I have been researching and writing for two senior seminars, and my free time has been limited. My research topics are of course related to the 18th century, and I look forward to sharing them with you after completion. Soon I shall have nothing but free time to devote to all the things you love about the 18th century (and I have a few ideas up my sleeve).

Your most obedient and humble servant,

Heather

"I am no Saint, no Spartan, no Reformer."

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 19:45:29 -0400

“I am no Saint, no Spartan, no Reformer.”

- Sir Robert Walpole

What was the last 18th century related book you read?

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 09:56:54 -0400

Stuff Museum People Say

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 19:27:48 -0400

Stuff Museum People Say

treasure for your pleasure: Equity Auditions for MARIE ANTOINETTE at the American Repertory Theatre

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:59:48 -0400

treasure for your pleasure: Equity Auditions for MARIE ANTOINETTE at the American Repertory Theatre:

vivelareine:

The following is based on information from BroadwayWorld.com:

The American Repertory Theatre (in coordination with the Yale Repertory Theatre) is holding auditions for equity actors interested in performing in Marie Antoinette by David Adjmi, due to premiere in the fall of 2012. The auditions…

The GIN LANE Gazette by Adrian Teal.

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 09:05:00 -0400

(I am very excited for this project that Adrian Teal is working on, and I’m hoping we can all rally behind him in support of this book. There are some wonderful benefits for supporting. Please consider helping this book come alive and showing appreciation for those keeping the 18th century alive. I asked him to explain the project, so I hope you enjoy! - Heather)

The Whig politician, Charles James Fox, is the 18^th century in human form, to my way of thinking. Lauded for his ‘talent for friendship’, he was a fat, unshaven, scruffy womaniser, who was descended directly from the party animal King Charles II, and lived life on his own terms. He was a ‘man of sensibility’, who cried openly in Parliament when friends felt compelled to speak against him, and who married a courtesan in secret, devoting his declining years to tending their garden, and making her happy.

Fox was also an heroic drinker and compulsive gambler, infamous for all-night sessions. On one notorious occasion in 1772, he played Hazard non-stop from Tuesday through to Wednesday night, during which time he won, lost, and recovered £12,000, and finally lost £11,000. He paused briefly on Thursday to debate in the House of Commons, then returned to his club, drank until Friday morning, walked to Almack’s to gamble until 4pm, winning £6,000, then rode to Newmarket and blew £10,000 on the gee-gees. The Georgians – I think we can agree - make today’s celebs look like teetotal milksops.

My mission is to recapture some of the spirit of this gloriously dissipated, bawdy, and star-studded epoch, and I’m writing a crowd-funded book for Unbound called The GIN LANE GAZETTE. It will be a compendium of illustrated highlights from a fictional newspaper of the 1700s: a kind of scurrilous Georgian tabloid. It will contain some of the most sensational headlines and true stories of my chosen period (1750-1800), generated by many familiar figures from history. The presses are presided over by Mr. Nathaniel Crowquill, the editor and proprietor, whose premises are located in Hogarth’s chaotic Gin Lane, and who has devoted fifty years to rooting out scandal and oddities with which to titillate his readership. The rascally Mr. Isaac Jakes supplies merciless caricatures and engravings, which disport themselves across every page. Sports reports, obituaries, fashion news, courtesans of the month, and advertisements for bizarre Georgian goods and services will also feature in this exuberant assemblage of muck and fun. I want to give readers an authentic flavour of the debauchery, bravery, villainy, inventiveness, and eccentricity which characterize the 18^th century. Virtual Georgian reality, in book form, is my aim.

Unbound has published works by Monty Python legend, Terry Jones, and a host of others, including Tibor Fischer and Kate Mosse, and I’m honoured to be joining their ranks. I have spent sixteen years producing cartoons for clients such as The Sunday Telegraph and History Today, and hope to combine my experience in journalistic caricature with my love of history in a unique and evocative way. I entreat you to read my pitch, watch my video, and pledge if you like what you see…

www.unbound.co.uk/books/22

The Combat of Mars and MinervaJoseph-Benoit Suvee1771

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 22:10:54 -0400

The Combat of Mars and Minerva
Joseph-Benoit Suvee
1771

Why STEM is not enough (and we still need the humanities)

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 09:31:46 -0400

Why STEM is not enough (and we still need the humanities)

The Teacher Philosopher - Marquis de Sade

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:15:26 -0400

Among all the learned matters one tries to cram into a child’s head when one is in charge of his education, the mysteries of Christianity, though doubtless one of the most sublime elements of that education, are nonetheless not among the easiest to explain clearly to a young mind. Try to convince a young man of fourteen or fifteen, for instance, that God the Father and God the Son are one and the same, that the Father is consubstantial to the Son and vice versa, etc., all that, however necessary it may be in ensuring a person’s happiness here below, is far more difficult to make a person understand than it is, say, to teach someone algebra. And when you really want to get your point across in a meaningful way, it is sometimes necessary to resort to physical examples, certain concrete methods that, however disproportionate they may seem, nonetheless make it easier for a young man of reasonable intelligence to grasp.
No one was more profoundly practiced in this method of instruction than Abbe Du Parquet, tutor to the young Count de Nerceuil, who was about fifteen years of age and possessed of one of the handsomest faces imaginable.
”Father,” the young count was wont to say virtually every day to his tutor, “the truth is, the whole notion of consubstantiality is completely beyond my powers of comprehension. For the life of me, I just can’t figure out how two people can be one. Could you be kind enough to clarify this for me, or at least bring the mystery down to my level.”
The good abbe, anxious to leave no stone unturned in making sure his student’s education was complete, and pleased by the thought that he might make it easier for his student to comprehend anything that might someday be an important factor in his life, seized upon a rather pleasurable means of overcoming the difficulties the young count was having in understanding the concept, figuring that an example taken from real life might just do the trick. Accordingly, he had a young nubile girl brought forth and after having instructed her as to what was expected of her, conjoined, as it were, the girl and his young student.
”Now,” said the abbe to his student, “do you understand more clearly the mystery of consubstantiality? Do you see how it is quite possible for two people to be but one?”
“Oh, good heavens, yes, my dear Abbe,” the randy young count responded, “I now understand everything with amazing clarity. Nor am I any longer surprised if this mystery, so people maintain, provides as much pleasure as that reserved for those in heaven above, for when two people become one ‘tis pure pleasure, I find.”
A few days later the young count asked his tutor if he wouldn’t mind giving him another lesson, for the more he thought about it the more he realized, he said, that he had not fully plumbed the depths of the mystery but that he was sure that if he tried it one more time everything would become crystal clear. The obliging abbe, who had in all likelihood been just as amused by the scene he had concocted as his student had been, called the same girl back and the second lesson got under way. But this time the abbe, especially moved by the vision offered to him by the sight of young de Nerceuil as he was consubstantiating with his companion, could not refrain from involving himself as a third party interested in the further clarification of the evangelical parable, and the beauteous backside upon which his hands were compelled to roam in the process of his explanation ended up exciting him uncontrollably.
”It is my studied opinion,” said Du Parquet, “that things are progressing at far too fast a pace. Much too much buoyancy in all the movements, as a result of which the conjunction, not being as intimate as it ought to be, does not conjure up a proper image of the mystery. Let me demonstrate… If we set about it just so, this way…” whereupon the scoundrel did unto his student precisely what the student was doing unto the young lady.
”Oh! Good God above! you’re hurting me, Abbe,” the lad exclaimed. “Nor can I see that this whole ceremony is serving any useful purpose. In what way, may I ask, does this further clarify the mystery?”
”Oh, ventrebleu!” the abbe mumbled, overcome as he was by the pleasurable lesson, “don’t you see, my dear boy, that I’m teaching the whole thing in one fell swoop. That’s the trinity I’m demonstrating in today’s lesson. Another six or seven lessons and you’ll be as learned as any doctor at the Sorbonne!”

May your Holi be filled with vibrant color! Holi being played...

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 09:53:43 -0500

May your Holi be filled with vibrant color!

Holi being played in the courtyard
Ca. 1795

The old coffee house (installed around 1774)- Boboli Gardens,...

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 23:04:44 -0500

The old coffee house (installed around 1774)- Boboli Gardens, Florence, Italy
Photo: Katelyn Vonfeldt

A very dear friend is in Florence right now and I couldn’t resist sharing this photo.
Check out her blog for amazing photographs.

Photo

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 12:37:25 -0500

Only history majors would drink copious amounts of alcohol and...

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 12:18:00 -0500

Only history majors would drink copious amounts of alcohol and then talk about the history of alcohol.

It’s times like these which make you realize - there might not be a great job market for us, our governments are cutting funding left and right, but damn it’s good to be a history major.

Three cheers to a wonderful weekend!

Luncheon Party in a Park - Nicolas Lancret