Hello Wharf Rat Guild
The Wharf Rats Guild, historical fantasy for adults and young adults, is available now. It contains some of the fruits of my research. I hope you enjoy it.
Below are some of the most interesting and useful links to online sources I’ve used in my writing. I have piles of books and articles and these are just a sample. A great deal of useful information on theatre and the players companies can be found online. JSTOR has been an incredible resource. If you have a favorite resource, let me know.
Fun Visuals
- My Pinterest board of Restoration personages and dress
- Pepys’ Cries of London Broadsheets depicting the street sellers of London.
- Retrace Pepys’ Steps during the Great Fire Rather fun.
- 17th Century London Animated video of a dizzying walk through London created by university students.
- Magic Grandad Visits Pepys Just in time to watch the fire. The old clips are great.
Primary Sources
- The Canting Academy or, The devil’s Cabinet (University of Michigan’s Early English Texts). Lovely language.
- A New Dictionary of the Canting Crew in its several tribes of gypsies, beggers [sic], thieves, cheats &c., with an addition of some proverbs, phrases, figurative speeches &c. : useful for all sorts of people (especially foreigners) to secure their money and preserve their lives ; besides very diverting and entertaining being wholly new. (University of Michigan’s Early English Texts.) The focus is on thieves’ cant, not slang as such. Print citation below.
- Samuel Pepys’ Diary
- Inns and Taverns of Old London
- The Thames Watermen in the Century of Revolution by Christopher Riordin
- Pounds, shillings, and pence at the Mint
- Brief List of 16th and 17th C slang
- Maps of England
- Life in Elizabethan England A little outside the era, but instructive.
- T.B. Macaulay’s view of the Restoration and after
The Transition from Indentured Servitude to Slavery
The first book takes place in London, and the economics of indentured servitude (getting rid of England’s “surplus population” aka poor people by sending them to Barbados or Virginia) could result in the kidnapping of children as well as adults. Slavery in the Colonies isn’t directly addressed, but there were people of African descent living in London from Medieval times. The character of 8 year-old Mags is based on that fact.
- History detectives brief article
- History of Anthony Johnson’s attempt to end his contract (AAIH)
- Brief summary of the Casor Case : “The first Africans brought to Virginia were treated as indentured servants. After working their contracts [to pay] for passage to Virginia, each was granted 50 acres of land and released to live free. During Mr. Casor’s lifetime, slavery became entrenched and indentured servitude a less economical source of labor.
- In 1640, 15 years before Mr. Casor’s civil suit, the Virginia Governor’s Council considered the case of John Punch, a Black indentured servant accused of attempting to escape with two other indentured servants who were white. Mr. Punch was sentenced to life servitude as punishment, while the two white indentured servants were only sentenced to four extra years of labor.”
- Jim Crow Museum’s Timeline of Slavery
- 1619: Africans originally treated the same as any other indentured servant; the transition to being permanent chattel seems to have taken a couple of decades to be enshrined in law (1641 – Massachusetts recognizes slavery in law).
Offline Resources, aka Books
- B.E. Gent. A new Dictionary of the Canting Crew (see above) First pub. 1699, 2010 edition titled The first English Dictionary of Slang, Oxford, Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. The original title is so much better.
- Parkes, Joan. Travel in England in the Seventeenth Century. Greenwood Press, 1925.
- Tomalin, Claire. Samuel Pepys The Unequalled Self, 2002.
- Ukers, William. All About Coffee 1922. Courtesy Google Books