18C Women Around the World

Costumes de Differents Pays, by Jacques Grasset de Saint-Sauveur (France, 1757-1810) c 1797 Hand-Colored Engraving from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

By the end of the 18C, worldwide exploration & colonization by Europeans were fairly commonplace, enabling the late 18C & 19C public to catch a glimpse of the clothing & customs of other peoples.

Sisters & Sisterhood 18C

"Any woman who chooses to behave like a full human being should be warned that the armies of the status quo will treat her as something of a dirty joke. That's their natural and first weapon. She will need her sisterhood." Gloria Steinem  

Portrait of Countess A. S. Protasova with Her Nieces by Angelica Kauffman (1788)

It is much more complicated than sexual harassment, it is centuries of patriarchy.

"Gender is the remaining caste system that still cuts deep enough, and spreads wide enough, to be confused with the laws of nature." Gloria Steinem. Moving Beyond Words

16 - 17C Women with Modified Ruffs & Wings - The New Style, perhaps a Bit Uncomfortable

1620 unknown lady by Nathaniel Bacon (English painter, 1585–1627)

1595-1600 Mary Fitton English

1600 attr to Domenico Robusti, also known as Domenico Tintoretto, (Italian painter, 1560-1635), Madonna delle Rose

1603 Princess Royal, daughter of James I, VI and Anne, 1603

1605 Francesco Montemezzano (Italian artist, c 1540-1602) Portrait of a Woman with Children

1605 Margaret of Savoy by Federico Zuccaro (Italian Mannerist Painter, ca.1542-1609)

1611 Princess Elizabeth of France by Frans Pourbus the younger (Flemish painter, 1569–1622)

1616 Lady Diana Cecil by William Larkin (English painter, c 1580–1619)

1619 Unknown Lady

1620 A lady in Red by Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger (Flemish English painter, 1562–1635) De

tail

1620 A lady in Red by Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger (Flemish English painter, 1562–1635)

1620 Lady Bridget Croke by Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger (Flemish English painter, 1562–1635)

1623 Elizabeth of Bohemia

1623 Mary Bromley

1625 Dame Mary Wooley attr English school

1639 Sigrid Kurtzel Swedish School

1616 Robert Peake the Elder (1551–1619) Elizabeth Kenn Poulett (1593-1663)

Perhaps Elizabeth Sidney (1585-1614) Attributed to Marcus Gheeraerts (II)(1561–1636)

1619 Paul Van Somer, Lady Elizabeth Grey, Countess of Kent Elizabeth Talbot (1582-1651)

1615 William Larkin (English painter, c 1580–1619) Frances Howard Countess of Somerset (1593-1632)

18C Women Around the World

Costumes de Differents Pays, by Jacques Grasset de Saint-Sauveur (France, 1757-1810) c 1797 Hand-Colored Engraving from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

By the end of the 18C, worldwide exploration & colonization by Europeans were fairly commonplace, enabling the late 18C & 19C public to catch a glimpse of the clothing & customs of other peoples.

18C Women Around the World

Costumes de Differents Pays, by Jacques Grasset de Saint-Sauveur (France, 1757-1810) c 1797 Hand-Colored Engraving from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

By the end of the 18C, worldwide exploration & colonization by Europeans were fairly commonplace, enabling the late 18C & 19C public to catch a glimpse of the clothing & customs of other peoples.

1696 How Gentlewomen Should Behave Dutifully Towards Parents

Abraham van den Tempel (1622-1672) 1660s Family

The Accomplished Ladies Rich Closet OF Rarities

John Shirley [J. S. (John Shirley), fl. 1680-1702.]

LONDON Printed by W Wilde for n. Bodington in Duck Lane; and J. Blare on London-Bridge. 1696.

Instructions for Young Gentlewomen in Behaving themselves dutifully towards their Parent.

AS our Parents are those from whom, next God, we have our Being, and by whose tender Care and inseparable Love we are nourished and preserved from innumerable Dangers and Hazards; therefore observe,

In the first place, your Reverence, Love, and Obedience, is strictly required, not only by the Tyes of Nature, but by God's Holy Word, as sundry places in Scripture manifest; nor can their Infirmities in any wise absolve you, or dispense with your non-performance; but in such a case you ought to double your observance, that thereby, as much as in you lies, you may hide their Weakness and Defects from the Eyes of others.

You must observe at all times to obey the Will of your Parents (if it be in your power, and not contrary to God's Command) without repining, or entring into dispute, performing what you do with cheerfulness, shewing by your willing mind your ready Obedience, and by your quick dispatch, demonstrating the Pleasure you rake in the performance, shunning all occasions of giving them any disquiet, pacifying their Anger, if it at any time arise, with submission either in Words or by Behaviour, tempering your Anions with a moderate sweetness of Disposition and Silence, for too much Ostentation or Loquacity is displeafing: When your Parents greve be you sad; when they rejoice, be you pleasant, as sympathizing with them in Heaviness and Joy; yet |be not over inquisitive into the cause; but if you are desirous to know it, wait their leisure to reveal it, or learn it from some other Hand.

Forget not to pray for your Parents as often as you put your Vows to Heaven, beseeching the Almighty to shower his Blessings upon them; which is one great advance by which a Child endeavours to make his Parents restitution for their Care and Tenderness; for nothing without calling God to your assistance can in that nature be effectual; the diffarence being otherwise so vast between what has been done for you, and what you can do to deserve it.

Let not the hopes of Riches, no, nor the seveity of your Parents, imprint in your mind a desire of their Death, let the Almighty be offended, and shorten your Days.

Shun those that speak ill of your Parents and would make them seem contemptible in your Eyes: Nor let their Poverty, should you be advanced by any means to Riches or Honour, render your Duty and Obedience less, for they cannot be but the same in all condition: If they be poor, you ought to relieve them; if they are weak of Understanding, you. must assist them with your Counsel: If they be injured or oppresed, endeavour to succour and redress them; for no Years can exempt you from observing your Duty to your Parents; nor ought you to dispose of your self in Marriage, nor otherwise, without their allowance and content, your Person being indispensibly theirs in a lawful way to dispose of. And so it was under the Law of Moses in relation to a Virgin's Vow; the which, though the had made, yet if her Father approved it not, it was void, But if her Father disallow her in the day that be heareth, not any of her Vows, nor her Bonds- wherewith she hath bound her Soul shall stand; and the Lord shall forgive her, because her Father disallowed her. By this we see the great Power that Parents had over their Children, even to a degree of cancelling, and rendring of none effect the obligation of a Vow, which Power was given by God himself.

Certain it is, that no poverty, fault, or unkindness of Parents, can dispense with that Duty and Obedience, which, by the Law of God and Nature, Children owe their Parents, for the tender care, labour, and cost, bestowed on them: Nay, though Parents should prove unnatural, and expose them, even in their Infancy, to a desperate Fortune of Hazard and Danger; yet still those Children are bound to perform their Duty, and look for their Reward from him who is the Author of all Blessings.

18C Women Around the World

Costumes de Differents Pays, by Jacques Grasset de Saint-Sauveur (France, 1757-1810) c 1797 Hand-Colored Engraving from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

By the end of the 18C, worldwide exploration & colonization by Europeans were fairly commonplace, enabling the late 18C & 19C public to catch a glimpse of the clothing & customs of other peoples.

15th Century Quickie Coffee Divorce

 

18C Women Around the World

Costumes de Differents Pays, by Jacques Grasset de Saint-Sauveur (France, 1757-1810) c 1797 Hand-Colored Engraving from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

By the end of the 18C, worldwide exploration & colonization by Europeans were fairly commonplace, enabling the late 18C & 19C public to catch a glimpse of the clothing & customs of other peoples.

1657 "Making the Body Active & Lusty" History of Tea in England & Her Colonies

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Dirk Stoop (England, c 1610-1685) Catherine of Braganza c 1610  Portugese Catherine of Braganza, wife of England's Charles II, took the tea habit to the court of Great Britain around 1660.

The first recorded drinking of tea is in China, where the earliest records of tea consumption date back to the 10th century BC. It was a common drink during Qin Dynasty (around 200 BC) & became widely popular during Tang Dynasty, when it was spread to nearby Korea & Japan. 

Pieter Gerrits van Roestraten (1630-1700) Detail of an early Tea Service - A Yixing Teapot and a Chinese Porcelain Tete-a-Tete on a Partly Draped Ledge

Tea, then called cha, was imported to Europe during the Portuguese expansion of the 16th century. Portugese Catherine of Braganza, wife of England's Charles II, took the tea habit to the court of Great Britain around 1660.

London coffee houses were responsible for introducing tea to women & men in everyday England. One of the 1st coffee house merchants to offer tea was Thomas Garway, who owned an establishment in Exchange Alley in London. He sold both prepared & dry tea to the public as early as 1657. Three years later he issued a broadsheet advertising tea at £6 and £10 per pound touting its virtues at "making the body active and lusty" & "preserving perfect health until extreme old age."

 1715 Two English Ladies & an Officer at Tea

Tea gained popularity with both women & men quickly in England's coffee houses, & by 1700, over 500 coffee houses sold it. This distressed the British tavern owners, as tea cut their sales of ale & gin, & it was bad news for the government, who depended upon a steady stream of revenue from taxes on liquor sales. By 1750, tea had become the favored drink of Britain's lower classes.

 1720 English Family at Tea by Joseph Van Akien

Charles II tried to counter the loss of tax income from spirits arising from the growth of tea, with several acts forbidding its sale in private houses. This measure was designed to counter sedition; but it was so unpopular, that it was impossible to enforce. 

1720 Man and Child Drinking Tea possibly by Richard Collins, England, d. 1732

A 1676 act taxed tea & required coffee house operators to apply for a license.  Failing to curb the popularity of tea, the British government decided to profit from tea. By the mid 18th-century, the duty on tea had reached an absurd 119%. This heavy taxation had the effect of creating a whole new industry - tea smuggling.

 1725 English Family at Tea possibly by Richard Collins, England, d. 1732

Ships from Holland & Scandinavia brought tea to the British coast, then stood offshore, while smugglers met them unloading their precious cargo in small vessels. The smugglers, often local fishermen, brought the tea inland through underground passages & hidden paths to special hiding places. One of the favorite hiding places was in the local parish church.

 1727 English Family of Three at Tea by Richard Collins, England, d. 1732 

Even smuggled tea remained expensive for the common man; however, and therefore extremely profitable. Many smugglers began to adulterate the tea with other substances, such as willow, licorice, & sloe leaves. Used tea leaves were also re-dried & added to fresh leaves.

1730 Tea Party at Lord Harrington's House, St. James's by Charles Philips 

During the 18C, tea drinking was as popular in Britain’s American colonies as it was in Britain itself. Legally, all tea imported into America had to be shipped from Britain, & all tea imported into Britain had to be shipped in by the East India Company. 

 1740 Ladies Having Tea Unknown Artist 

However, for most of the 18C, the East India Company was not allowed to export directly to America. But during the 1770s, the East India Company ran into financial problems: illegal tea smuggling into Britain was vastly reducing the amount of tea being bought from the Company. 

A British Family Served with Tea 1745 Unknown artist

This led to a downturn in its profits, as well as an increase in its stockpile of unsold tea. In an attempt to revive its flagging fortunes & avoid bankruptcy, the Company asked the British government for permission to export tea directly to America, a move that would enable it to get rid of its surplus stock of tea.

Unknown 18C British Artist, A Tea Party

 The Company actually owed the government £1 million, so the government had no desire to let the Company go bankrupt. Thus in 1773, the Tea Act was passed, granting the Company’s wish, and allowing a duty of 3d per lb to be levied on the exports to America. The colonials were growing increasingly resentful of "taxation without representation."

Jean-Etienne Liotard (Swiss artist, 1702-1789) Still Life Tea Set, 1781-83

The British government did not anticipate this being a problem for the colonials. By being exported directly to America, the cost of tea there would actually become cheaper, & 3d per lb was considerably less duty than was paid on tea destined for the British market. But it had underestimated the strength of the American resistance to being taxed at all by Britain. 

Drinking tea in the British American colonies, the John Potter Overmantle at the Newport Historical Society in Rhode Island

The issue of the taxation in America had been hotly debated for some years. Many Americans objected on principle to being taxed by a Parliament which did not represent them. Instead, they wanted to raise taxes themselves to fund their own administration. But successive British governments reserved the right to tax the colonies, & various bungled attempts to impose taxation had hardened American opposition. In the later 1760s, opposition took the form of boycotts of taxed goods. As a replacement for them, the Americans either bought smuggled goods or attempted to find substitutes for tea made from native products.

Drinking tea in the British American colonies, Gansevoort Limner, possibly Pieter Vanderlyn 1687-1778 Susanna Truax.

Finally at the end of the resulting war with America, in 1784, William Pitt the Younger introduced the Commutation Act, which dropped the tax on tea from 119% to 12.5%, effectively ending smuggling. 

18C Women Around the World

Costumes de Differents Pays, by Jacques Grasset de Saint-Sauveur (France, 1757-1810) c 1797 Hand-Colored Engraving from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

By the end of the 18C, worldwide exploration & colonization by Europeans were fairly commonplace, enabling the late 18C & 19C public to catch a glimpse of the clothing & customs of other peoples.

17C Portraits of Goddess Pomona (Women & Plants, Again...)

Vertumnus & Pomona by Circle Pieter de Grebber or Pieter Fransz de Grebber (c.1600–1652/3) a Dutch Golden Age painter.

Pomona was the beautiful goddess of fruitful abundance in ancient Roman religion & myth. Pomona was said to be a wood nymph. The name Pomona comes from the Latin word pomum, "fruit," specifically orchard fruit. She was said to be  a part of the Numia, the guardian spirits who watch over people, places, or homes. While Pomona watches over & protects fruit trees & cares for their cultivation, she is not actually associated with the harvest of fruit itself, but with tending the flourishing of the fruit trees. In artistic depictions she is generally shown with a platter of fruit or a cornucopia & perhaps her pruning knife

Vertumnus & Pomona in a Garden by Adriaen van de Velde  (1636–1672)

Pomona, the alluring wood nymph, actually cared nothing for the wild woods but cared only for her well-cultivated fruit filled gardens & orchards. And Pomona had a thing about men. She fenced her garden orchards, so the rude young men couldn't trample her plants & vines. She also kept her orchards enclosed, because she wanted to keep away the men who were attracted to her good looks. Even dancing satyrs(a cross between a man & a goat) were attracted to her beauty. Despite the fact that she preferred to be alone to care & nurture her trees, this beauty was continually besieged by suitors, in particular one persistent god named Vertumnus. Vertumnus had the ability to take different human guises & made numerous attempts to woo Pomona, but she turned him away each time.

 Vertumnus & Pomona by Hyacinthe Rigaud (1659-1743)

The god Vertumus caught on to Pomona's aversion to men in her orchards & in her life generally. In Roman mythology, Vertumnus, the young, handsome god of changing seasons & patron of fruits, determined to win over Pomona.  He could change his form at will according to Ovid's Metamorphoses (xiv).  He came to her in various male disguises, which included, a reaper, an apple picker, a fisher, a solider, & more. Even with the disguises, she still never paid him the slightest bit of attention. One day Vertumnus tried a disguise as an old women. And Pomona finally allowed him to enter her garden, where he pretended to be interested in her fruit. But he finally told her he was more exquisite than her crops. After saying that, he kissed her passionately, but it wasn't enough. Vertumnus kept trying to sway her by telling her a story of a young women who rejected a boy who loved her; in despair, the boy killed hung himself, & Venus punished the girl by turning her to stone. This narrative warning of the extreme dangers of rejecting a suitor (the embedded tale of Iphis & Anaxarete) still did not seduce her. It just didn't work, of course. He then realized that it was the feminine disguise didn't work & tore it off.  It wasn't until Vertumnus appeared before her in his full manliness (apparently quite a good looking male specimen), that Pomona finally gave in to his inviting male charms. Vertumnus is a god of gardens & orchards & so it appears they were a match made in heaven. To his surprise, she fell in love with his manly wiles, & they became the ultimate loving couple working & playing in gardens & orchards together from then on.

Pomona by Hendrick Bloemaert (1602-1672)

The tale of Vertumnus & Pomona has been said to be the only purely Latin tale in Ovid's Metamorphoses. 

The subject of Vertumnus & Pomona appealed to European sculptors & painters of the 16th through the 18th centuries, providing a disguised erotic subtext in a scenario that contrasted youthful female beauty with an aged old woman. But it wasn't the old woman that ultimately won the day. In narrating the tale in the Metamorphoses, Ovid observed that the kind of kisses given by Vertumnus were never given by an old woman.  In Ovid's myth, Pomona scorned the love of the woodland gods Silvanus & Picus, but finally married the brutally handsome Vertumnus. She & Vertumnus were celebrated in  an annual Roman festival on August 13. There is a grove that is dedicated to her called the Pomonal, located not far from Ostia, the ancient port of Rome. Unlike many other Roman goddesses & gods, Pomona does not have a Greek counterpart, though she is often associated with Demeter.

Vertumnus & Pomona Caspar Netscher (1639-1684)

Vertumnus & Pomona by Aert de Gelde (1665-1727)

Vertumnus & Pomona by Abraham Bloemaert (1566 - 1651)

Vertumnus & Pomona with her Pruning Knife 1630 by Paulus Moreelse (1571-1638)

Vertumnus & Pomona  Roman god of seasons, and the goddess of fruit and gardens. 1683 David Teniers the Elder.

Vertumnus & Pomona  Juan van der Hamen (1596-1631)

Vertumnus & Pomona by Ferdinand Baltasars Pain (1616 - 1680)

Vertumnus & Pomona by Circle of  Caspar Netscher (c. 1635-1684)