Nothing says devotion like a message of love embroidered into a bedsheet with human hair from your mate’s severed head. This kind of stuff is why history should NEVER be considered boring. Here’s the caper, as reported in the never-boring Daily Mail:
A 300-year-old bedsheet embroidered with a love message in human hair that was possibly taken from a severed head is to go on display at a London museum.
Anna Maria Radclyffe embellished the old linen in memory of her husband James, who was beheaded for treason in 1716.
The third Earl of Derwentwater and grandson of Charles II, he was 26 when he was executed for his involvement in the first Jacobite rebellion, a story which was immortalised in Sir Walter Scott’s 1817 novel Rob Roy.
The sheet OFF MY dear Lord’s Bed in the wretched Tower of London February 1716 x Ann C of Darwent=Waters+.
The London Museum believes the embroidery could be either hair from James’s severed head, or from hers, or a weaving of the two. We’re going with that last one. Both James and Anna are said to be unquiet in their graves, haunting the ruins of Dilston Hall.
James, third Earl of Derwentwater, and his devoted wife Anna.
The sad tale was made into a ballad:
And then there’s this:
Matthew says
Didn’t the Victorians keep locks of their dead ones hair? It seems that in the past these macabre memorials were more common. I don’t know if people in the past were odd or if we are too squeamish.
I do know that my boss’s grandparents kept a severed finger in pickle brine. Her uncle had accidentally cut it off and they kept it. When she related that story I asked where her grandparents were from. She replied, “Georgia.”
I replied that figured. It kind of is something that someone in the Deep South would do. I don’t mean that in a bad way.
JimC says
Oh, you KNOW where I am on suchlike. We moderns are way too sanitized.
Aaron Yetter says
Yeah well the cops had a lot of questions for me about my collection of the heads of my enemies. No charges thou when I exclaimed it was part of my German -Irish heritage. My ancestors kept the Romans from conquering all of Europe.
lane+batot says
Good on yer ancestors, mate! I personally tried to cash in all my own baby teeth with the Tooth Fairy, although I know some people keep one or two for sentimental sake. But I had a run-in with the Tooth Fairy, alas, which prevented me from getting money for the complete set. Sometimes it really does pay to NOT investigate life’s mysteries too closely……
wayne says
I have locks of fur from 3 of our deceased Labrador retrievers. I tied off each lock with fly tying thread in a different color. I’ll do the same for the 2 dogs we have now. Just a way to hold on.
JimC says
We have a piece from my wife’s horse’s tail.