Free Public Domain Historical Clipart

This is no insult to Sir Philip Sidney, but only to the rather exorbitant demands of the form he had chosen. His own sonnets vindicate him as a poet, and some of them, even Hazlitt owned, who did not like him, 'are sweet even to a sense of faintness, luscious as the woodbine, and graceful and luxurious like it.' 207 visits

Nijmegen, Gelderland (dated 1544) 80 visits

Groningen (1509) 78 visits

In this city Pinto met, apparently for the first time, with Master Francis Xavier, general superior or provincial of the order of the Jesuits in India, in all parts of which occupied by the Portuguese he had already attained a high reputation for self-devotion, sanctity, and miraculous power; and who was then at Malacca, on his return to Goa, from a mission on which he had lately been to the Moluccas 364 visits

Portrait of St. Francis Xavier, One of the Earliest Missionaries to Japan

(From the original painting at Hampton Court.) 403 visits

The Embarkation of Henry VIII. from Dover, 1520

Coaches in the Reign of Elizabeth I (From 'Archcæologia.') 584 visits

Image 8120 477 visits

Sir Francis Drake, in his Forty-third Year

The first theatre was built in 1570. Thirty years after there were seven. The Queen had companies of children to play before her. They were the boys of the choirs of St. Paul's, Westminster, Whitehall, and Windsor. The actors called themselves the servants of some great lord. Lord Leicester, Lord Warwick, Lord Pembroke, Lord Howard, the Earl of Essex, and others all had their company of actors—not all at the same time. The principal Houses were those at Southwark, and especially at Bank Side, where there were three, including the famous Globe 594 visits

The first Spanish ships to meet their fate were the stragglers from the main body of the Armada. Above is shown one such vessel being engaged by an English captain. The great Spanish galleon is quite at the mercy of the smaller but handier vessel, which has got the wind of her enemy, and is pouring a destructive fire into her prow. 272 visits

In this fruitless attempt to invade our shores ten thousand Spaniards gave up their lives. England lost but one ship and about a hundred men. 253 visits

Lord Howard Attacking a Ship of the Spanish Armada

Philip of Spain, arriving in the Straits of Dover on his journey to England to espouse Mary, flaunts the flag of Spain without paying the customary salute. Lord Howard of Effingham, the English admiral, soon brings him to his senses by firing a round shot across his bows. 180 visits

Teaching the Spaniard 'The Honour of the Flag'

Looking at the lofty hulls, the immense mainsails, and the nearness of the ports to the water-line, we can easily understand how a want of care wrecked the Mary Rose. The ship in the background on the right is apparently trying to reduce sail, and has had to lower her main-yard. Her mainsail is almost in the water, to the apparent danger of the ship. 152 visits

Observe the sharp ram, the tower-like forecastle, and the curiously perched cabin aft. Also the tail-like ornaments at the stern, possibly reminiscent of the sterns of the old "Dragon-ships" and "Long Serpents". The big and somewhat triangular openings are probably gun-ports, but no guns are visible. 143 visits

Why the crowd resorted thus to tipple the horrible compound does not appear: one would rather drink the usual glucose and dilute sulphuric acid of modern times. The pictorial sign of the old house still proudly declares— “When Skelton wore the laurel crown My ale put all the alewives down.” To do that, you would think, it must needs have been both good and cheap. Certainly, if the portrait-sign of Elynor be anything like her, customers did not resort to the “Running Horse” to bask in her smiles, for she is represented as a very plain, not to say ugly, old lady with a predatory nose plentifully studded with warts. 189 visits

Dr. Martin Luther 536 visits

Queen Elizabeth travelled in a coach, either the one built by Walter Rippon or that brought by Boonen (who, by the way, was appointed her coachman), on some of her royal progresses through the kingdom. When she visited Warwick in 1572, at the request of the High Bailiff she “caused every part and side of the coach to be opened that all her subjects present might behold her, which most gladly they desired.” The vehicle which could thus be opened on “every part and side” is depicted incidentally in a work executed by Hoefnagel in 1582, which Markland believed to be probably the first engraved representation of an English coach. As will be seen from the reproduction here given, the body carried a roof or canopy on pillars, and the intervening spaces could be closed by means of curtains. 565 visits

Showing near-side “Boot.” Coaches with "Boots" From Coach and Sedan, we obtain a quaint but fairly graphic description of the coach of this period:— “The coach was a thick, burly, square-set fellow in a doublet of black leather, brasse button’d down the breast, back, sleeves and wings, with monstrous wide boots, fringed at the top with a net fringe, and a round breech (after the old fashion) gilded, and on his back an atchievement of sundry coats [of arms], in their proper colours.” The “boots” were projections at the sides of the body between the front and back wheels, as shown in the drawing of the coach occupied by Queen Elizabeth’s ladies; and there is much evidence to support the opinion that these boots were not covered. 305 visits

A hundred and fifty years later than Piers Plowman we get another picture of an English ale-house, by no less celebrated a poet. This famous house, the “Running Horse,” still stands at Leatherhead, in Surrey, beside the long, many-arched bridge that there crosses the river Mole at one of its most picturesque reaches. It was kept in the time of Henry the Seventh by that very objectionable landlady, Elynor Rummyng, whose peculiarities are the subject of a laureate’s verse. Elynor Rummyng, and John Skelton, the poet-laureate who hymned her person, her beer, and her customers, both flourished in the beginning of the sixteenth century. Skelton, whose genius was wholly satiric, no doubt, in his Tunning (that is to say, the brewing) of Elynor Rummyng, emphasised all her bad points, for it is hardly credible that even the rustics of the Middle Ages would have rushed so enthusiastically for her ale if it had been brewed in the way he describes. 220 visits

Joannes Stradanus, born at Bruges 1536, died at Florence 1605, a Flemish historical painter who delighted in portraying all kinds of sport, such as shooting, hunting, fishing and coursing, which he did with wonderful skill and in most realistic fashion. This picture is reduced from ' Venationes Ferarum,' a work consisting of 105 large plates of sporting scenes, dated 1578. The hunters carry stonebows, and the rabbits are being driven from their burrows by smoke and fire. Purse nets and stop nets may also be seen in use. 392 visits

Image 6706 282 visits

Image 6560 261 visits

Image 5997 321 visits

Image 5996 331 visits

Image 5995 312 visits

There are many great contentions between miners concerning the forked twig, for some say that it is of the greatest use in discovering veins, and others deny it. Some of those who manipulate and use the twig, first cut a fork from a hazel bush with a knife, for this bush they consider more efficacious than any other for revealing the veins, especially if the hazel bush grows above a vein. Others use a different kind of twig for each metal, when they are seeking to discover the veins, for they employ hazel twigs for veins of silver; ash twigs for copper; pitch pine for lead and especially tin, and rods made of iron and steel for gold. All alike grasp the forks of the twig with their hands, clenching their fists, it being necessary that the clenched fingers should be held toward the sky in order that the twig should be raised at that end where the two branches meet. Then they wander hither and thither at random through mountainous regions. It is said that the moment they place their feet on a vein the twig immediately turns and twists, and so by its action discloses the vein; when they move their feet again and go away from that spot the twig becomes once more immobile. 329 visits

Elizabethan or Marie Stuart Period - 1558 - 1600 1097 visits

Elizabethan or Henry III - 1570 1093 visits

Court Dress 1550 - Tudor or Francis I 982 visits

Court Dress 1540 - Tudor or Francis I 1069 visits

Citizens Dress of 1545 1021 visits

Court Dress - Early 15th Century 1034 visits

Here we find exhibited a school for practice; and the manner in which the archers shot at the butts, or dead marks, a pastime frequently alluded to by the authors of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. In the reign of Henry VII. the cross-bow was forbidden by law to be used; and, soon after his son ascended the throne, it was found necessary to renew the prohibition; yet, notwithstanding the interference of the legislature, in less than twenty years afterwards, the usage of cross-bows and hand-guns was so prevalent, that a new statute was judged necessary, which forbad the use of both, and inflicted a penalty of ten pounds for keeping a cross-bow in the house. 616 visits

Cross-Bow Shooting at the Butts.—XVI. Century

Image 4831 736 visits

During the winter of 1537-1538, the naval yards of Constantinople were busy with the preparations for a new fleet which should take the offensive against the Venetians and the Christians generally. In the spring Barbarossa got out into the Archipelago and, raiding at will, swept up another batch of prisoners to serve as galley slaves for the new ships. Meanwhile, the Mediterranean states nerved themselves for a final effort. Venice contributed 81 galleys, the Pope sent 36, and Spain, 30. Later the Emperor sent 50 transports with 10,000 soldiers, and 49 galleys, together with a number of large sailing ships. 478 visits

The woodcut represents a very beautiful vielle; French, of about 1550, with monograms of Henry II. This is at South Kensington. The contrivance of placing a string or two at the side of the finger-board is evidently very old, and was also gradually adopted on other instruments of the violin class of a somewhat later period than that of the vielle; for instance, on the lira di braccio of the Italians. It was likewise adopted on the lute, to obtain a fuller power in the bass; and hence arose the theorbo, the archlute, and other varieties of the old lute. 1206 visits

Map showing the first settlements made on the Eastern coast of North America 930 visits

Section of Frobisher's map of the world, 1576. Copied from Hakluyt. It shows what the English explorer thought America was. 670 visits

De Soto's Expedition 1539-1542 The outlines and names of states are given for convenience in tracing De Soto's course. 738 visits

Map of 1515, showing what some geographers then supposed North America to be. This is one of the earliest maps on which the name America occurs. It will be notices that at that time it was confined to South America. 736 visits

The most extensive and extreme use of the corset occurred in the 16th century, during the reign of Catherine de Medici of France and Queen Elizabeth of England. With Catherine de Medici a thirteen-inch waist measurement was considered the standard of fashion, while a thick waist was an abomination. No lady could consider her figure of proper shape unless she could span her waist with her two hands. To produce this result a strong rigid corset was worn night and day until the waist was laced down to the required size. Then over this corset was placed the steel apparatus shown in the illustration on next page. This corset-cover reached from the hip to the throat, and produced a rigid figure over which the dress would fit with perfect smoothness. 833 visits

Ignatius de Loyola, 1491-1556 A.D. Inigo Lopez de Recalde, or Loyola, as he is commonly known, was born at Guipuzcoa, in Spain, in 1491. He was educated as a page in the court [pg 262]of Ferdinand the Catholic. He afterwards became a soldier and led a very wild life until his twenty-ninth year. During the siege of Pamplona, in 1521, he was severely wounded, and while convalescing he was given lives of Christ and of the saints to read. His perusal of these stories of spiritual combat inspired a determination to imitate the glorious achievements of the saints. 1039 visits

The picture is an exceedingly interesting representation of a grand imperial banquet, from one of the plates of Hans Burgmair, in the volume dedicated to the exploits of the Emperor Maximilian, contemporary with our Henry VIII. It represents the entrance of a masque, one of those strange entertainments, of which our ancestors, in the time of Henry and Elizabeth, were so fond. The band of minstrels who have been performing during the banquet, are seen in the left corner of the picture. 2637 visits

The coronation procession of Charles V. of France, will help us to exhibit some of the orders of the clergy with their proper costume and symbols. First goes the aquabajalus, in alb, sprinkling holy water; then a cross-bearer in cassock and surplice; then two priests, in cassock, surplice, and cope; then follows a canon in his cap (biretta), with his furred amys over his arm. 1999 visits

Time-chart A.D. 800-A.D. 1500 3326 visits

Very few religious-spirited men had the daring to break away or the effrontery to confess that they had broken away from all authoritative teaching, and that they were now relying entirely upon their own minds and consciences. That required a very high intellectual courage. The general drift of the common man in this period in Europe was to set up his new acquisition, the Bible, as a counter authority to the church. This was particularly the case with the great leader of German Protestantism, Martin Luther (1483-1546). 1074 visits

Ignatius began his career as a very tough and gallant young Spaniard. He was clever and dexterous and inspired by a passion for pluck, hardihood, and rather showy glory. His love affairs were free and picturesque. In 1521 the French took the town of Pampeluna in Spain from the Emperor Charles V, and Ignatius was one of the defenders. His legs were smashed by a cannon-ball, and he was taken prisoner. One leg was badly set and had to be broken again, and these painful and complex operations nearly cost him his life. 1420 visits

Europe in the Time of Charles V 1107 visits

Holy Roman Emperor Charles V Most of the figures that stand out in history, do so through some exceptional personal quality, good or bad, that makes them more significant than their fellows. But there was born at Ghent in Belgium in 1500 a man of commonplace abilities and melancholy temperament, the son of a mentally defective mother who had been married for reasons of state, who was, through no fault of his own, to become the focus of the accumulating stresses of Europe. The historian must give him a quite unmerited and accidental prominence side by side with such marked individualities as Alexander and Charlemagne and Frederick II. This was the Emperor Charles V. For a time he had an air of being the greatest monarch in Europe since Charlemagne. Both he and his illusory greatness were the results of the matrimonial statecraft{v2-200} of his grandfather, the Emperor Maximilian I (born 1459, died 1519). 584 visits

Caroche, covered with leather, studded with gold-headed nails, percherons; period, end of sixteenth century. 1057 visits

Scarification without cupping in Egypt in the 16th century. To obtain sufficient blood, 20 to 40 gashes were made in the legs and the patient was made to stand in a basin of warm water. (From Prosper Alpinus, Medicina Aegyptorum, Leyden, 1719. 794 visits

A man employing leeches to reduce his weight, 16th century. (From P. Boaistuau, Histoire Podigieuses, Paris, 1567. ) 830 visits

Chitarrone A therbo. Wood, inlaid with ebony, ivory, and coloured woods. Two sets of wooden tuning-pegs, the lower containing twelve, and the higher eight. The instrument had wire strings. 1106 visits

Queen Elizabeth 445 visits

Interior of a Kitchen of the Sixteenth Century. Fac-simile from a Woodcut in the "Calendarium Romanum" of Jean Staéffler, folio, Tubingen, 1518. 913 visits

Grand Procession of the Doge, Venice (Sixteenth Century). 1298 visits

German Beggar Woodcut in the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster: in folio, Basle, 1552. 1398 visits

Gentleman of the French Court, of the End of the Sixteenth Century. From the "Livre de Poésies," Manuscript dedicated to Henry IV. 1470 visits

Free Judges From two Woodcuts in the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster: in folio, 1552. 1258 visits

Entry of the Roi de l'Epinette at Lille in the Sixteenth Century .--From a Manuscript of the Library of Rouen. 1590 visits

Empalement (Pal) From a Woodcut in the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster Mediæval punishments included more or less atrocious punishments, which were in use at various times and in various countries; such as the Pain of the Cross, specially employed against the Jews; the Arquebusade, which was well adapted for carrying out prompt justice on soldiers; the Chatouillement, which resulted in death after the most intense tortures; the Pal, flaying alive, and, lastly, drowning, a kind of death frequently employed in France 1651 visits

Doge of Venice in Ceremonial Costume of the Sixteenth Century. 1419 visits

Costumes of the Ladies and Damsels of the Court of Catherine de Medicis. 1010 visits

Lady of the Court of Catherine de Medicis

Costumes of the Ladies and Damsels of the Court of Catherine de Medicis.--After Cesare Vecellio. 1312 visits

Damsel of the Court of Catherine de Medicis

Costumes of the German Bourgeoisie in the Middle of the Sixteenth Century.--Drawing attributed to Holbein. 1235 visits

Costumes of the German Bourgeoisie in the Middle of the Sixteenth Century2

Costumes of the German Bourgeoisie in the Middle of the Sixteenth Century 1258 visits

A rich Bourgeoise, and of a Noble, or Person of Distinction, of the Time of Francis I.--From a Window in the Church of St. Ouen at Rouen, by Gaignières (National Library of Paris). 1251 visits

Costume of a rich Bourgeoise, and of a Noble, or Person of Distinction

Beheading.From the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster: in folio, Basle, 1552. 1348 visits

Representation of a Ballet before Henri III. and his Court, in the Gallery of the Louvre.--Fac-simile of an Engraving on Copper of the "Ballet de la Royne," by Balthazar de Beaujoyeulx (folio, Paris, Mamert Patisson, 1582.) 1784 visits

The Water Torture. Fac-simile of a Woodcut in J. Damhoudère's "Praxis Rerum Criminalium:" in 4to, Antwerp, 1556. In Paris, for a long time, the water torture was in use; this was the most easily borne, and the least dangerous. A person undergoing it was tied to a board which was supported horizontally on two trestles. By means of a horn, acting as a funnel, and whilst his nose was being pinched, so as to force him to swallow, they slowly poured four coquemars (about nine pints) of water into his mouth; this was for the ordinary torture. For the extraordinary, double that quantity was poured in. When the torture was ended, the victim was untied, "and taken to be warmed in the kitchen," says the old text. 1422 visits

Demons applying the Torture of the Wheel.--Fac-simile of a Woodcut in the "Grand Kalendrier ou Compost des Bergers:" small folio, Troyes, Nicholas le Rouge, 1529. 1262 visits

Sculptured Comb, in Ivory, of the Sixteenth Century (Sauvageot Collection) 1338 visits

Movable Iron Cage.--From a Woodcut in the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster, in folio, Basle, 1552. 1251 visits

Interior of a Kitchen.--Fac-simile from a Woodcut in the "Calendarium Romanum" of J. Staéffler, folio, Tubingen, 1518. 844 visits

Bailliage, or Tribunal of the King's Bailiff.--Fac-simile of an Engraving on Wood in the Work of Josse Damhoudere, "Praxis Rerum Civilium." (Antwerp, 1557, in 4to.). 735 visits

In the sixteenth century, Liébault enumerated nineteen sorts of grapes, and Olivier de Serres twenty-four, amongst which, notwithstanding the eccentricities of the ancient names, we believe that we can trace the greater part of those plants which are now cultivated in France. For instance, it is known that the excellent vines of Thomery, near Fontainebleau, which yield in abundance the most beautiful table grape which art and care can produce, were already in use in the reign of Henry IV. 658 visits

THe Spring-board Most of the bourgeois and the villagers played a variety of games of agility, many of which have descended to our times, and are still to be found at our schools and colleges. Wrestling, running races, the game of bars, high and wide jumping, leap-frog, blind-man's buff, games of ball of all sorts, gymnastics, and all exercises which strengthened the body or added to the suppleness of the limbs, were long in use among the youth of the nobility 1448 visits

The River Fisherman, designed and engraved, in the Sixteenth Century, by J. Amman. 824 visits

The Poulterer 814 visits

The Pond Fisherman.--Fac-simile of a Woodcut of the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster, folio, Basle, 1549. 837 visits

The Miller 794 visits

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