I think Thomas Coryate, the extravagant traveller of the late Elizabethan ( I mean Elizabeth the 1st, of course) and the early Jacobean age, deserves some more lines than the few I dedicated to him yesterday.
He was born in a small village of Somerset in Southern England, he received a rather good education (for the time) at Winchester College (which by the way still exists nowadays and claims the longest unbroken history of any school in England), but he ended to get a rather bizarre job, for unknown reason, because he became
buffoon or jester, if you prefer, for Prince Henry, the eldest son of James I.
Maybe it allowed him to have spare time to take his long trips.
His most known travelogue has the whimsical title of “Coryat's Crudities: Hastily gobled up in Five Moneth's Travels” and it included lively and interesting descriptions
of his travel experiences. In the book we can also find the earliest English rendering of the legend of William Tell, so as a Swiss, I’m grateful to Mr. Coryate for his attention to our cultural traditions too.
Coryate didn’t import to his homeland only the fork, as I mentioned in my yesterday post, but also another item which has had a great importance for Britons: umbrella.
Even though the climate in British islands was probably not too different from what it is nowadays, nobody had felt the need to use any portable device to protect head and shoulders from heavy rain.
But umbrellas were very popular in many other countries where the climate was and is largely milder, for a simple reason, they had not been conceived as protection from rain, but from sun.
The name itself explain this principle, since umbrella comes from Latin word “ umbra” which means shade or shadow.
Anyhow Coryate took it to England from his trips as an exotic curiosity, but the use of
umbrellas became a little more popular only later, around the middle of 19th century.
Probably the first gentleman in London to use regularly and umbrella in public was Jonas Hanway, the founder of The Marine Society and Magdalen Hospital, who dared to face people’s mockeries carrying his unusual device in late 18th century.
Our Coryate died of dysentery during one of his trip to India.
umbrellas became a little more popular only later, around the middle of 19th century.
Probably the first gentleman in London to use regularly and umbrella in public was Jonas Hanway, the founder of The Marine Society and Magdalen Hospital, who dared to face people’s mockeries carrying his unusual device in late 18th century.
Our Coryate died of dysentery during one of his trip to India.
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