Cover of Explanatory Notes of a Pack of Cavalier Playing Cards, Temp. Charles II. Forming a Complete Political Satire of the Commonwealth — Background and Themes

Explanatory Notes of a Pack of Cavalier Playing Cards, Temp. Charles II. Forming a Complete Political Satire of the Commonwealth — Background and Themes

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Authors: Goldsmid, Edmund Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2014 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: Playing cards; Great Britain -- History -- Commonwealth and Protectorate, 1649-1660; Great Britain -- History -- Comic books, strips, etc. Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

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Words 12,045

Reading time 53 min

Text sections 2

This digital edition of Explanatory Notes of a Pack of Cavalier Playing Cards, Temp. Charles II. Forming a Complete Political Satire of the Commonwealth — Background and Themes is described by source-level measurements including 12,045 words, 53 min estimated reading time, and 2 detected text sections.

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Source: Project Gutenberg record #44594

Edmund Goldsmid's 1886 pamphlet decodes a satirical pack of playing cards from circa 1660, each card lampooning a Commonwealth figure. The notes explain visual and verbal puns, historical allusions, and the political context of the Cavalier perspective, drawing on sources like Clarendon and Mercurius Aulicus.

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Bradshaw was appointed president of the High Court of Justice in 1648, a year "of reproach and infamy above all years which had passed before it; a year of the highest dissimulation and hypocrisy, of the deepest villany and most bloody treasons, that any nation was ever cursed with or under: a year, in which the memory of all transactions ought to be erased from all records, lest, by the success of it, atheism, infidelity and rebellion, should be propagated in the world." (_Clarendon's History of the Rebellion_, vol. iii. p. 154, Oxford 1726, folio). He was born in 1586, died in 1659, and his body exhumed and hung in chains at the Restoration. He was a cousin of Milton, who has written a Eulogy of him in his _Second Defense of the People of England_.

_The High Court of Justice or Oliver's Slaughter-House._

"The charge and accusation, upon which they resolved to proceed against the King, being thus settled and agreed upon, they began to consider in what manner and form to proceed, that there might be some appearance of justice.... A new form they did erect never before heard of. They constituted and erected a Court that should be called the High Court of Justice. The number of the Judges named was about an hundred and fifty ... Bradshaw ... was named president ... and with great humility accepted the office, which he administered with all the pride, impudence, and superciliousness imaginable."--(_Clarendon's History of the Rebellion_, vol. iii. p. 138-139).

_Onsley. Father and Sonne._

This is evidently a misprint for Onslow. Sir Richard Onslow, Kt., "of the old stamp, a gentleman of Surrey, of good parts and considerable revenue," successfully weathered the tempests of the period. He was commander at the siege of Basing House, was driven from the House of Commons by Pride's Purge, and was afterwards at the head of a Surrey regiment at Worcester. He spoke strongly in favour of Cromwell's becoming king. Later he became a member of the Convention Parliament which restored Charles II.

_Lenthall. Father and Sonn._

William Lenthall, of Lincoln's Inn, a Counsellor at Law, and Speaker of the House of Commons. "Oliver (Cromwell) once made a spunge of him, and squeezed him out of £15,000. Who turning him and his tribe out of doors, he veered about to save himself and his great offices; and he that had been so long bell-weather in the Commons House, was thought, for his compliance and his money, to deserve to be one of the herd of Lords in the Other House," (_Mystery of the Good Old Cause._) John Lenthall, son of the speaker, was knighted by Oliver Cromwell, made a Colonel of foot, and governor of Windsor Castle.

_Parry. Father and Sonne._

Query, Sir George Parry, one of the Commissioners for Dorsetshire, who with those of Somerset and Cornwall, met Prince Rupert at Bridgewater shortly before the Battle of Naseby?--(_Clarendon's History of the Rebellion_, vol. ii. p. 393).

_Vane. Father and Sonne._

"Sir Henry Vane was of very ordinary parts by Nature, and had not cultivated them at all by art, for he was illiterate. But being of a stirring and boisterous disposition, very industrious and very bold, he still wrought himself into some employment.... His malice to the Earl of Strafford transported him to all imaginable thoughts of revenge, ... and that disposed him to sacrifice his honour and faith and his Master's interest, that he might ruin the Earl, and was buried himself in the same ruin; for which, being justly chastised by the King and being turned out of his service, he was left to his own despair.... He grew into the hatred and contempt of those who had made most use of him; and dyed in universal reproach, and not more contemn'd by any of his enemies than by his own son; who had been his principal conductor to destruction."--(_Clarendon's History of the Rebellion_, vol. ii., p. 132).

Sir Harry Vane, the younger, "was a man of extraordinary parts.... He was chosen to cozen a whole nation which was thought to excel in craft and cunning,* which he did with notable pregnancy and dexterity."--(_Clarendon's History of the Rebellion_, vol. ii., p. 233). "He totally ousted Sir William Russel. He was a discontent during all Oliver's and Richard's government. He is, no doubt, a man of much religion, and would have become one of the rulers in Israel, if the intended match between his son and Lambert's daughter had not been spoiled by the restitution of the Rump."--(_Mystery of the Good Old Cause._)

"_Cromwell pypeth unto Fairfax._"

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Edmund Goldsmid's Explanatory Notes of a Pack of Cavalier Playing Cards, Temp. Charles II (1886) treats a deck of fifty-two cards as a political satire in miniature. The cards, reproduced in facsimile, pair caricatured portraits with rhyming captions—such as “Cromwell, Ireton and Hudson all in y e same boate”—that Goldsmid unpacks with historical references. His method is forensic: he identifies each figure, traces the source of each jibe, and acknowledges where allusions remain opaque. The result is a guide that reads the cards as a coded Cavalier commentary on the Commonwealth.

The Card as Caricature

The captions on the cards rely on compression and visual-verbal puns. The ace of hearts shows Cromwell, Ireton, and Hudson “sailing away from the sun of loyalty towards the night of treason,” a detail Goldsmid extracts from the engraving itself. The six of clubs calls Desborough “Olivers Champion haueing a cannon in each pocket,” a boast that Goldsmid contextualizes with Clarendon’s account of Desborough opposing Cromwell’s kingship. The six of spades labels Skippon “a waggoner to S r. F. Vere one of Olivers Hectors,” and Goldsmid confirms that Skippon indeed began as a waggoner. These captions are not neutral labels; they are partisan epithets, and Goldsmid’s notes recover their sting.

Goldsmid’s Evidentiary Habits

Goldsmid rarely lets a claim stand without a source. For the seven of hearts—“Nathaniel Fines whereby hangs a tale”—he quotes Mercurius Aulicus to explain the “tale” as Fiennes’s surrender of Bristol and his escape with eighty horsemen, each “with a woman riding behind him.” For the seven of clubs, “Harrison the Carpenter cutting down ye horne of ye beast in Daniel,” he cites Daniel 7:21–26 and notes Harrison’s role in bringing the king before the High Court of Justice. When the seven of diamonds reads “Marshall curseing Mevoz,” Goldsmid turns to accounts of Edgehill, where “eminent pastors rode up and down the army.” His notes are a mosaic of seventeenth-century sources, from Clarendon to Godwin’s Civil War in Hampshire.

Limits of the Explanatory Project

Goldsmid is candid about what he cannot explain. In his introduction, he writes that “a few however remain riddles to me.” The seven of spades, “Feek the seer,” he traces to a Windsor meeting in 1648 where Feek declared a vision that monarchy would never prevail—but the card’s precise satirical thrust is left implicit. The six of diamonds, “Kelsey, a sneeking Bodice maker a gifted Brother,” yields only a probable identification via Godwin. Goldsmid does not force coherence; he presents the evidence and lets the gaps stand. This restraint gives the notes the character of a working document rather than a finished interpretation.

The Physical Object and Its Reproduction

Goldsmid’s account of the deck’s provenance is itself a miniature history of antiquarian publishing. The cards were lent by Lord Nelson to the Aungervyle Society of Edinburgh, but re-engraving them on copper proved too costly for a society of 120 members. Goldsmid, as honorary secretary of two societies, brokered a joint arrangement: the cards were reproduced in thirteen plates, with a second series of facsimiles given to members. He later purchased the plates himself. Two cards—the ace and three of hearts—were missing from Lord Nelson’s set and supplied from another source, though the figures in the three are “on a somewhat smaller scale.” Goldsmid’s attention to these material details underscores that the cards are not merely texts but artifacts.

Goldsmid’s notes are best read alongside the facsimile plates, which are not included in this digital edition. The captions and images together form a composite satire; the notes illuminate the historical referents but cannot replace the visual experience. Readers interested in the interplay of word and image in political caricature will find here a precise, if fragmentary, record of Cavalier wit.

Sometimes a small, curious object—a deck of cards carrying venomous little jokes—makes me wonder how anyone found the heart to laugh amid such upheaval. Later, turning pages elsewhere, I felt that same odd lightness: history’s weight, carried by men who simply kept going. History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 12 — Reading Notes brought that feeling back, quietly, like recognizing an old tune.