On 12/4/09 1:18 PM, "alexander" <[email protected]> wrote: > Hardly a fun fact... A work of fiction... > Alexander - back to silk (and peanuts). > > On Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:49:37 +0100 > David van Ooijen <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Giles Milton >> 'Samurai William' >> (Hodder and Stoughton, 2002) >> >> William Keeling, captain on a ship in a fleet sailing from England to >> the East in 1615, send to Sir Thomas Roe, first British Ambassador in >> India and aboard one of the other ships, a sheep, 100 Weymouth oysters >> and some silk strings for his viol. ...
Well, here's an interesting -real- episode in which silk for fiddle strings plays a part, from the 1690's, colonial Virginia. The incident is preserved in the court records of Accomack County. The silk mentioned does not seem to have been any sort of "special" silk intended to be used for musical instrument strings. It appears to be the ordinary, everyday silk (probably what today would be called 'silk twist') that would been kept around the house. Silk twist would have been commonly used in embroidery and probably other textile related uses too. "Silk twist" turns up frequently in estate inventories of the period. Just as an example of the sort of silk that could have been laying about the house - The court record from this case includes an inventory of goods supposedly taken from Rev. Teakle's house. The list includes "about 6 ounces of fine silk of severall colors in small sceines or hanks made up for [four] ounces". >From "Social life of Virginia in the seventeenth century: An inquiry into the origin of the higher planting class, together with an account of the habits, customs, and diversions of the people", by Philip Alexander Bruce (Margaret Teakle was the daughter of Rev. Thomas Teakle (1624-1695), an English clergyman who fled the civil war and had a long career in the Virginia colony.) >From pp. 182-183 - ³Someone present seems to have reproached Margaret Teakle for "undutifulness of Carriage and demeanor" towards Mr. Teakle "by making feast in his absence", but Elizabeth urged her to disregard her father, who had strict notions as to what were proper amusements she probably scorned and despised, and to take advantage of his not being in the house to enjoy herself. Mr. Teakle, who, though a clergyman, was a man of wealth, was engaged to be married to one of Elizabeth Parker's kinsfolk, "and a proud woman she was," exclaimed the fair tempter, "and wore fringes at the bindings of her petticoat!" Margaret Teakle seems to have yielded only too readily to her friend¹s urgent appeal, and at once fetched the silk with which the fiddler might string his instrument; and as a reward for his playing gave him several yards of ribbon as well as several yards of lace, all of which, no doubt, greatly touched the negro¹s sense of finery." ³When Mr. Teakle returned home a few days afterwards, and was informed of the desecration of his house by a dance on the Sabbath day, even during the hour when services at church were in progress, he was greatly scandalized, and at next meeting of the county court formally presented Elizabeth and her husband." [Accomac Co., VA Records, Vol. 1690-97, p. 161 et seq.] On google books - http://books.google.com/books?id=ivfYarZJFMgC&printsec=frontcover&dq=intitle :virginia+inauthor:bruce&lr=&as_drrb_is=q&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=&as_maxm_i s=0&as_maxy_is=&as_brr=3&client=firefox-a#v=onepage&q=&f=false To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
