Tea at Trianon: Feathers

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Friday, February 26, 2021

Feathers

From History Extra:

In Europe, feathers first became common as a hat decoration in the early 14th century. During the 16th century, hats adorned with ostrich feathers were in demand by those wealthy enough to purchase them in the fashion centres of Europe: Paris, Vienna, Florence and Prague. Wealthy ladies, courtiers and high-ranking military officers wore them too.

A famous panache of feathers, comprising no fewer than eight plumes, each over four feet long, was worn by the ever flamboyant King Henry VIII when he rode majestically into Boulogne, his forces having seized it from the French in September 1544. They were probably the tail feathers of a species of Indian peafowl.

This kind of panache, usually comprising naturally white or black ostrich feathers – but sometimes dyed in other colours – atop an officer’s hat was deemed to have a practical function as well, and was not simply an adornment. It made the wearer much more visually obvious to his soldiers. Before the battle of Ivry in Normandy in 1590, King Henry IV of France commanded his leaders “not to lose sight of his white panache, that it would lead them to victory and honour”. His forces won the battle, thanks to his panache or otherwise.

The ostriches whose magnificent feathers were used to make these panaches originally inhabited virtually all of north Africa, much of eastern and southern Africa, the Arabian peninsula and large parts of the Middle East. They had always been hunted for food, but once a market developed in Europe for their feathers to adorn hats, the killing was stepped up. Chased on horseback until they were exhausted, or shot, their populations were soon being depleted. In 1807, an estimated 509 kilos of ostrich feathers were imported into France alone. By 1850, they had been reduced to near extinction across the Arabian peninsula; they had all but disappeared from north Africa before the 19th century was out. (Read more.)