Introduction to <title level="m">A Remembrance of the Worthy Show and Shooting by the Duke of Shoreditch

See the text of A Remembrance of the Worthy Show and Shooting by the Duke of Shoreditch.

In the fields to the north of the city in the Agas map, we can see pictured a number of figures carrying longbows. Archery was a popular form of recreation in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and in suburban areas like Finsbury Fields, Spitalfields, Hoxton, and Mile End Green there were shooting ranges with permanent butts set up for weekend practice and competitions. Legislation dating from the reign of Edward III required all adult English men to own a bow and four arrows, and regular practice was mandated, if not always enforced. Shooting competitions took place in parishes throughout the year, most notably the ones held annually in conjunction with the wrestling matches at Bartholemew Fair.

In the late 1570s and early 1580s, we see the appearance of what have been called bowshooting fraternities, festive organizations about which little is now known. These groups marched through the streets in great numbers, holding archery competitions in the suburban shooting ranges. Marchers carried bows, guns, shields, musical instruments, whifflers and ensigns. They wore ceremonial outfits adorned with scarves, gold chains, hats and feathers. The parade included various figures in costume, such as friars and Irishmen, and at certain points there would appear elaborate pageanting equipment of the kind seen in Lord Mayor’s pageants,See MoEML’s old-spelling anthology of mayoral shows. such as a sailing ship and a wicker giant.

The two main groups for which evidence exists, the Duke of Shoreditch’s Men, and Prince Arthur’s Knights, seem to be associated with the great Livery Companies, the Goldsmiths and the Merchant Taylors respectively. Members of these bowshooting fraternities assumed fictional identities, such as the the Duke of Shoreditch, the Earl of Pancridge, the Baron Stirrup, and the Marquesses of Clarkenwell, Islington, Hogsden and Shackelwell. Although there has been some speculation about the real persons behind these identities, there is little to go on except in the case of Marquess Barlo, who is twice identified in the text as Covell. This is almost certainly Thomas Covell, who had a shop in Goldsmiths’ Row on the corner of Friday Street. Real persons are occasionally identified as either participating or watching in the festivities, such as Sir Owen Hopton, Sir Rowland Hayward, and Sir Thomas Knyvett. The Earl of Leicester and the Earl of Arundel are praised in the margins of the text for providing food and prizes for the marchers.

A Remembrance of the Worthy Show and Shooting by the Duke of Shoreditch is the only full record we have of one of these marches, although there are scattered references to the fraternities in a number of other texts, including ballad titles, pamphlets and a book dedicated to the coats of arms of Prince Arthur’s Men. Most notably, the fraternities are fleetingly memorialized in Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part II, when Justice Shallow reminisces about his youth in London: I remember at Mile-End Green, when I lay at Clement’s Inn, I was then Sir Dagonet in Arthur’s show (Shakespeare 3.2.251-252).