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I only just got back from work, so I am going to feature a quick post which I have always wanted to write. A color which I think is extremely beautiful is hunter green–a dark yet vivid green. This is a classical color which has been mentioned frequently in English since the end of the 19th century. Hunter Green, as you might imagine, was named for the green garb which 19th century hunters wore in the field (a much richer and bluer green than the olive drab which soldiers and sportsmen wear today. I was hoping there was more to say about the history of the color (Because I think it is quite splendid) but, alas, that was all I could find. Here is a picture of a nineteenth century hunter!
The Brazilian Goldsmith Carlos Martin manufactured the Imperial Crown of Brazil in 1841 for the coronation of Emperor Dom Pedro II. The crown is also known as the Diamantine Crown—because it is covered with 630 diamonds—ooh, so sparkly! I guess, the crown also has 77 large pearls too, but nobody really talks about them. The imperial crown of Pedro II replaced the unremarkable crown of the extremely remarkable Dom Pedro I, a revolutionary and reformer who was responsible for many of the things which went right for Brazil. We’ll have more to say about him later this week.
With 8 magnificent golden arches meeting beneath an orb and cross, the crown of Brazil echoes the crown of Portugal…and rightly so, since the great South American nation began as the most magnificent Portuguese colony (although Goa, Macau, Agola, and Mozambique were quite nice too). Here is a picture of Emperor Pedro II looking exceedingly magnificent (and perhaps a bit silly too) as he opens the annual Parliamentary session in 1872.
So lovely was the crown of Brazil that is was the central motif of the Brazilian flag until the monarchy was abolished in 1889. Unlike other crowns which were sold or stolen after independence, the Brazilian crown has remained in posession of the Brazilian republic and can currently be seen at the Imperial Palace in the City of Petrópolis.
Ferrebeekeeper has a longstanding obsession with Gothic concepts and forms. We have explored the long strange historical roots of the Goths (which stretched back to the time of the Roman Empire and the northern corners of Europe), and looked at Gothic aesthetics ranging from clocks, to beds, to gates, to houses, to alphabets, to cathedrals. Today’s Gothic-themed post straddles the divide between literature and architecture. We already saw such a two discipline dynamic at work with the beginning of the Gothic revival, an aesthetic movement which grew up out of a popular novel The Castle of Otranto.
The term “Steamboat Gothic” is sort of a reverse case. In 1952, Frances Parkinson Keyes published “Steamboat Gothic” a long-winded romantic novel about the lives and loves of a riverboat gambler and his progeny as they pursue their fortunes over generations beside the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. After the novel came out the great 19th century wedding cake mansions of columns and porches which stood along these rivers came to be known as “steamboat gothic.” This beautiful filigree style was thought to resemble the many tiered decks of great southern steamboats from the belle epoque of river travel.
Many different Victorian design trends come together in “steamboat gothic”–the Italianate, Gothic revival, and Carpenter’s Gothic mix together with style trends like Greek revival and “nautical.” The mixture simultaneously evokes the beauties of classical antiquity, the ante-bellum south, and 19th century middle America.
Look at these beautiful porches and porticoes. I wish I were on the veranda of one of these beauties sipping lemonade and looking out over the river (although really I would probably be being bitten by mosquitoes as I desperately painted yet another layer of snow white paint on a big empty house).
Isabel II was queen regnant of Spain from 1833 until 1868, when she was forced out by a somewhat muddled coalition of Spanish liberals and republicans. Her reactionary reign was a long series of palace intrigues, military conspiracies, and church meddling.
During the 19th century, there was a fashion for European sovereigns to commission small easily wearable coronet-style crowns (a fashion which was greatly promoted by Queen Victoria, the foremost monarch of the day). Queen Isabel commissioned this beautiful little yellow crown of diamonds, gold, and topazes. When she was forced out by the “Glorious” (but ineffective) revolution she took the crown into exile with her in Paris, however she willed it to the Atocha Chapel. If my sources are to be believed (and they are internet sources…so maybe they shouldn’t be) the little coronet is still used to adorn the church’s votive statue on high feast days.
From the 1830s through the late 1850s, the capital of winemaking in the United States was Ohio. Nicholas Longworth of Cincinnati successfully planted great vineyards of Catawba grapes along the Ohio River. He had moderate success making sweet white wines but his greatest success came after he accidentally produced a sweet sparkling wine which oenophiles of the day likened to French champagne. The sparkling wines of Ohio became briefly internationally famous and bon vivants of the East Coast, Victorian England, and continental Europe paid top dollar for what was regarded as a premium International luxury beverage. Odes to the grape were written by famous poets and the Ohio valley briefly resembled Ardennes.
Oh jeeze….
The Catawba grapes which were at the center of this Bacchic empire were a dark brownish pink/purple grape from the East Coast. They were said to be a hybrid of native American grapes and imported European vines, although where the distinctive grapes and the distinctive name actually came from is seemingly lost in history (which is to say it was probably all a marketing stunt by Longworth). The grapes themselves were sweet red grapes with a tendency to have a foxy flavor (which sounds like more marketing language for unpleasant muskiness). The vines grew vigorously but were subject to attack from powdery mildew. In the 1860s powdery mildew joined forces with economic devastation and dislocation of the American Civil War to crush the nascent Ohio wine industry to such a thorough extent that it sounds like I am writing about alternate universe history.
The entire reason I bring up this boom and bust story is because it is memorialized in a very beautiful color, Catawba, a pretty organic shade of brownish pinkish purple. Now whenever you see the delightful color (which is used less than it should be), you can think of how Ohio might have become a land of rolling rivers, chateaus, monasteries, lavender fields, and fine living….
(Call me crazy, but this kind of looks like Ohio with a beautiful medieval town in it…)
A visit to a museum of fine art with a collection of works older than a century quickly convinces the viewer that flowers have a symbolic language which has long been of paramount importance to human concerns. However, as one walks through rooms of Dutch still life bouquets, pre-Raphaelite garden scenes, and post-modern steel blossoms, one also longs for a symbolic guide. Flowers have long held a cryptographic significance but the idiom varies from culture to culture—even from person to person. The Victorians, who were positively crazy for flowers (but famously bashful in person) tried to standardize the language of flowers in order to make things more clear. They utilized classical poetry and art for certain long-held associations and invented a huge number themselves: the result was the famous “language of flowers”.
Ideally a courting couple would exchange bouquets which included romantic-messages (the concept was possibly invented by horticulturists and the florists’ guild). Daily “talking bouquets” let couples know how each partner was feeling. Awkward suitors pinned their hopes on extravagant floral gifts. As the popular culture of the nineteenth century picked up on the concept, it became part of the literature, theater, and art of the time. Publishing houses sold floriographies—dictionaries of flowers—which can still be read or found online: You can look at a more comprehensive online “floriography” here, but I have isolated some choice examples below:
Heart’s Ease: thought
Hyacinth (yellow): jealousy
Larkspur (pink): fickleness
Nasturtium: Conquest and victory in battle
“To crush your enemies, to drive them before you and hear the lamentations of their women…”
Mock Orange: Deceit
Orchid (Cattleya): Mature Charm
Peony: Shame; gay life; happy marriage
“Um…”
The experience is somewhat queasy-making. It is hard not to wince at all the inappropriate or offensive things I have said to various young ladies I have esteemed (or, indeed, to my friends–since I like to bring flowers as dinner gifts or thank you presents).
The language of flowers was most en vogue in Western Europe and the United States from 1810 to 1880. However just as it evolved from a long antecedent of flower symbolism it has also cast long shadows—and flowers have played substantial roles as signifiers in movies, television, and popular music up to this day. None-the-less the high formalism and stilted exactitude of the language of flowers has faded into the twilight (thankfully, since goodness knows what the Victorians would have thought of dyed orchids and anthuriums.
Censored by Parental Advisement Board
It has been a long time since Ferrebeekeeper added a new post to the gothic category. In order to remedy that deficit (and perhaps to focus somewhat on the strange & troubling nature of time itself) here is a gallery of gothic clocks. Something about the ornate yet solemn gothic style seems particularly suited to instruments which measure the passing of time. Until recently, clocks were precious and expensive items and it was very appropriate to dress them up in stylish little reliquary-style cases. Additionally, like churches or crypts (which were frequently constructed in the same style), clocks betoken a world which transcends human understanding or control. Nineteenth century clockmakers particularly relished the gothic aesthetic so most of the clocks below are gothic-revival era objects from England, France, or Germany. However clock makers from before the 19th century also looked to medieval sacred conventions when crafting their timepieces (as can be seen in the ancient sconce clock from 16th century Germany). Perhaps even more strangely, modern clock-makers also frequently refer back to the gothic tradition. At the bottom of my gallery I have included some startling resin clocks made by contemporary manufacturers. The modern timepieces might have jumped from “gothic” to “goth” but they still resemble little shrines to the omnipresent and ineluctable force of time.
Gothic Clock (Germany, 16th century AD)
Antique French Gilt Brass Boudoir Clock (Jarrot Freres)
Oak Case Gothic Revival Bracket Clock, Barraud & Lunds, Cornhill, London, c. 1838-1842
Vienna Regulator. Gothic style, probably from around 1865
Japy Freres Brass Mantel Clock (Gothic Griffons Nouveau)
Libert Gothic Cathedral Clock (French, 19th Century)
Antique Waterbury Steeple Gothic Clock (19th century)
Mahogany Gothic Double Fusee Bracket Clock by Webster Cornhill (English, 1890)
Neo-Gothic Style Partial Gilt Clock (French, 19th Century)
Oak Fussee Gothic Bracket Clock (Tiffany & Co.)
Antique Bronze Gothic Mantle Clock (Austrian, late 19th Century)
Walter Durfree 9-tube clock with Hersbhepe works and Gothic mahogany carved case.
Bielefeld Clock (the pattern is available at http://www.finescrollsaw.com)
Contemporary Resin Gothic Dragon Clock (from Dragon Artwork)
Grim Reaper Gothic Wall Clock (Contemporary, resin)
On Borrowed Time Gothic Clock (Contemporary, resin)
Contemporary Gothic Resin Clock
Contemporary Wall Clock
ferrebeekeeper 