Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Lord Mayors' Pageants, Vol. 1: Being Collections Towards a History of These Annual Celebrations, With Specimens of the Descriptive Pamphlets Published by the City Poets; History of Lord Mayors' Pageants
IT has frequently been a matter of surprise with me, that in these days when the manners and customs of our ancestors receive so large a share of consideration, the subject to which this volume is devoted, and which connects itself so immediately with the Metropolis of the Empire, has never been fully treated on. Brief and meagre notices, are all that the public are possessed of, such as the few pages devoted by Hone to the subject, in his volume on Ancient Mysteries, where he declares that a work of the kind would be desirable, but adds an undertaking requiring so much labour in the execution, is scarcely to be expected. Here, then, is the secret the annual descriptive pamphlets, published by the city-poets, detailing the pageantry so exhibited, are of such rarity and value, that they are seldom seen, and the series are widely scattered, few and far between, in public or private collections.
It will be found, by a perusal of this volume, 6tha in former times, these pageants and their allusions, connected themselves in no small degree with the history of the country, and its political movements; and shadowing forth as they do, the opinions of the metropolis, they are worthy of more attention than may be at first imagined, by persons who only know them through the expiring relics now yearly exhibited. The city companies were a most important body in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and these pageants are very characteristic of their ancient state; and are valuable for the insight they give us of the tastes and manners of the metropolis during the periods when they were displayed; and it is with this view that this work was undertaken, and not for their intrinsic value as literary works, although some of the earlier pageants may on this score merit attention.
As I have set myself the task of compiling this book, I have endeavoured to do it worthily; and I have visited every accessible library, to get together extracts from all the pageant-pamphlets that were published, but their great rarity, and the impossibility of getting at all, has foiled my attempts at thorough completeness. All that I have done, I have taken great pains to render accurate in authority, not even taking quotations on trust; and in the course of my research in allquarters, I have been enabled to bring together much information on city antiquities and history, which I believe will not be found elsewhere. As the leisure work of an artist, done con amore, it does not pretend to compete with the labour of a professed litterateur, and though, to use the words of Robert Southwell, many carpes are expected when curious eyes come fishing, my hope is, that, it may be courteous skill will reckon this, though coarse in respect of other exquisite labours, not unfit to entertain well-tempered humours both with pleasure and profit.
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