Old Dominion University ODU Digital Commons History Theses & Dissertations History Spring 1981 Games and Gaming of the Stuart Aristocracy Vicky Ann Sanderlin Old Dominion University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/history_etds Part of the European History Commons, and the Social History Commons Recommended Citation Sanderlin, Vicky A.. "Games and Gaming of the Stuart Aristocracy" (1981). Master of Arts (MA), thesis, History, Old Dominion University, DOI: 10.25777/dkcr-6286 https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/history_etds/25 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the History at ODU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in History Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ODU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. GAMES AND GAMING OF THE STUART ARISTOCRACY by Vicky Ann Sanderlin B.A. May 1977, Old Dominion University A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Old Dominion University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS HISTORY OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY May 1981 ppro; DO G„. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ABSTRACT GAMES AND GAMING OF THE STUART ARISTOCRACY Vicky Ann Sanderlin Old Dominion University, 1981 Director: Dr. Douglas G. Greene Games and gaming provide insight into the lives of the people of the past. This thesis analyzes the games and gaming patterns of the aristocracy of Stuart England. This examination of gaming concentrates on the place of leisure games in the world of the elite. The study focuses on games suitable for inclement weather and includes both children's and adult's games from the period. This thesis addresses three basic questions: 1) who were the gamesters, 2) when and where did they game, and 3) what games did they play and how did they play them? Answers to these questions have provided clues to several aspects of seventeenth century gaming in England. Tra­ ditional and customary gaming, regulation of gaming, pro­ fessionalism in gaming, and the expansion of gaming locales and the intensity and frequency of play are prominent patterns which are investigated in this thesis. The study also provides a catalogue of the most popular games during the Stuart era. The rules, notable players, and history of the games are delinated. Finally, the social context of Stuart England is examined as it relates to gaming. The political, economic, Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. religious, and social turmoil of the era which includes the Civil Wars, the Restoration, and the Glorious Revolu­ tion, forms the background for an investigation of the gaming of the Stuart aristocracy. The conclusion is that leisure time use is directly keyed to the rapidly changing world of Stuart England. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. To My Parents: Priscilla Ann Donna Sanderlin James Allen Sanderlin, Sr. ii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The author would like to thank Dr. Douglas Greene for his kindness in the preparation of this thesis. It was a privilege to be directed and guided by such a fine scholar and warm human being. Without his constant re­ assurance this study would not have been possible. I am also appreciative of the aid Dr. Robert MacDonald and Dr. Charles Haws provided. I am indebted to the talented Sara Coski for pro­ viding the illustrations that accompany this thesis. She and Ann Watkins provided valued friendship and advice. Atsuko Biernot, Tom Burkman and many others, loaned re­ search materials, gave editorial assistance and constant encouragement. My parents and family have been a constant source of inspiration and their support is gratefully acknowledged. Thank you Jim, Tom, Bill, Pat, and Carla. iii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES ....................................... V LIST OF P L A T E S ....................................... vi Chapter I. INTRODUCTION ............................... 1 II. GAMING IN STUART E N G L A N D .................. 10 III. STUART GAMESTERS ........................... 48 VI. GAMING L O C A L E S ............................. 81 V. ADULT GAMES IN STUART ENGLAND: BILLIARDS, BOARD GAMES, BOWLING, TENNIS AND TRADITIONAL GAMES ............. 112 VI. ADULT GAMES IN STUART ENGLAND: CARDS, DICING AND GAMBLING GAMES ......... 168 VII. CHILDREN'S GAMES AND GAMING IN STUART ENGLAND ............................. 216 VIII. CONCLUSION .................................... 240 BIBLIOGRAPHY .......................................... 250 APPENDIXES .............................................. 263 iv Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF FIGURES FIGURE PAGE I. Sedentary Games ............................... 131 v Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF PLATES PLATE PAGE I. A Gambling Scene .......................... 39 II. John Locke ................................. 77 III. The Gaming Room of an Ordinary ............ 93 IV. Robert Dover's Cotswald Games ............ 107 V. Playing B o w l s ............................... 144 VI. At the Tennis C o u r t .........................161 VII. Gaming at C a r d s ............................. 196 VIII. Children's Pastimes ...................... 234 vi Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Gaming, a significant component of life in modern Western society, has been neglected as a subject for anal­ ysis despite the attention it has received from psycholo­ gists, sociologists and educators. Gaming has been an unexamined and scarcely acknowledged tributary to his­ tory's mainstream. Recently, however, several aspects of gaming, recreation and leisure have been explored by social historians. A new breed of historian has acknow­ ledged gaming and recreating to be significant components of social experience, whose history is important in re­ constructing the life of people of the past. Such schol­ ars seek to understand gaming and recreating not in iso­ lation but in relation to the society as a whole and its patterns of social change. Knowledge of traditional or pre-industrial leisure and gaming in Stuart England has been enhanced by the work of Joseph Strutt in 1801. In his work The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England, Strutt advanced the view that a nation's games and recreations are a guage of its people's character. Strutt stated that a 1 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 2 people's true state and natural disposition were revealed when they gamed.^ Modern historians such as Christina Hole in English Sports and Pastimes (1949) and Dennis Brailsford in Sport and Society: Elizabeth to Anne (1969) have echoed Strutt's sentiments. In their works which examine the ritualistic popular sports and pastimes of all the elements of Stuart culture, they concentrate on the full range of sports played by the ordinary people of Stuart England. Much of the focus centers on rural com­ munity life and the relation of gaming and sports to the calendar with its festivals and holidays. Hole and Brailsford deal with the institutions of a predominantly conservative society and the gaming of the relatively stable agricultural masses. They do not provide an ac­ count of the gaming and recreations pursued by the aris­ tocrats and members of the upper gentry who compromised the elite in Stuart England, and who often resided in London or at the court where the gaming and social life was more diverse and volatile. ■^Joseph Strutt, The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England From the Earliest Period, Including the Rural and Domestic Recreations May Games, Mummeries, Pageants, Processions and Pompous Spectacles, edited by Charles Cox (1803: London: Methuen & Co., 1903; reprint ed., Detroit: Singing Tree Press, 1968), p. 15. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 3 Modern social historians like Lawrence Stone and Peter Laslett have attempted to sketch and define the elite of Stuart England. In Stuart society this elite owned most of the wealth, wielded most of the power and made the im­ portant political, economic and social decisions. In their influence, the Stuart aristocrats exercised power disproportionate to their numbers. Only four or five per­ cent of the people of Stuart England ranked gentry or a- 2 bove in the social hierarchy. In Stuart England's two- class society it was the elite who directed the complex changes that overtook English society in the seventeenth century and altered the old pattern of recreation and gaming. The Puritan movement, the growth of cities, the tur­ moil of the Civil Wars, the end of the Divine Right mon­ archy and the assertion of the doctrine of individualism generated ruling class instability that altered the gaming and leisure of the Stuart elite. New routes to eliteness opened as rising capitalism awarded social status on the basis of monetary considerations. Stone argues that the fierce competition for wealth and social status resulted