Category Archives: Everyday life

Douce’s Baked Apple Pudding

Posted on October 5, 2012 by mercedes-c

I have just finished cataloguing Douce’s folders of woodcuts, which contain quite a few illustrations from late eighteenth-century and early nineteenth-century German almanacs. The autumn months are often represented by apple-picking: In one of his commonplace books, Douce wrote down … Continue reading →

Posted in Almanacs, Everyday life, Prints, Seasons, Uncategorized, Woodcuts, Zodiac | Comments Off

Douce’s Annunciation

Posted on September 11, 2012 by mercedes-c

When told of Douce’s acquisition of a View of Clifton Ferry with a Holiday Party and Bristol Fair by Rolinda Sharples (1793-1838), his friend George Cumberland wrote that they had been ‘sold at an auction to Mr Douce who knows nothing … Continue reading →

Posted in Antiquaries, Collections and Collectors, Colour, Everyday life, History of printmaking, Paintings, Prints, Religion, Woodcuts | Comments Off

Rural sports

Posted on July 27, 2012 by mercedes-c

On the same day the Olympic Games are officially starting in London, and in the spirit of Douce’s wonderfully mad notebooks of Coincidences (Bodleian), the first image that came to my attention when opening the folder of prints to catalogue … Continue reading →

Posted in Colour, Drawings, Everyday life, Festivals, Games, Prints, Satirical prints, Sports | Tagged Olympics | Comments Off

Satirical highlights

Posted on July 13, 2012 by mercedes-c

Douce’s satirical prints are being catalogued at the moment. With only one more folder to go, I have chosen the highlights below -they loosely relate to some topics of current interest: bad weather, economic recession, and major public celebrations involving … Continue reading →

Posted in Drawings, Everyday life, Prints, Satirical prints | Comments Off

French Prints and Fans

Posted on May 30, 2012 by mercedes-c

My colleague Cath Casley has noticed a pretty fan in the Ashmolean’s collection which seems to relate to some of the prints in which Douce was interested -I am copying her message below: Found this fan within the collection of … Continue reading →

Posted in Broadsides, Everyday life, Festivals, Napoleon, Prints, Relics, Religion | Comments Off

The ringball alley

Posted on April 4, 2012 by mercedes-c

After cataloguing Douce’s prints of ‘Cricket, Racquets &c., Bat and Ball’, I have just started working on his images of ‘Billiards, Bowling, [Quoits], Skittles &c’. The first few mounts contained the usual Doucean mix of engravings from various Dutch books … Continue reading →

Posted in Everyday life, Games, Prints, Sports | Comments Off

Palm Sunday

Posted on April 3, 2012 by mercedes-c

Douce was very interested in religious ceremonies and devotional practices and hence he gathered a remarkable number of prints on this subject. However, the only depictions of Easter parades that I have found among his prints are images of Palm Sunday … Continue reading →

Posted in Everyday life, Festivals, Prints, Religion | Comments Off

Student life

Posted on March 26, 2012 by mercedes-c

Sports and various outdoor activities seem like an appropriate subject for a post, now that we have 123 days to go before the London Olympics start, Hilary term has just ended, and the first days of Spring have brought sun … Continue reading →

Posted in Everyday life, Games, History of printmaking, Prints, Satirical prints, Sports | Comments Off

The Science of Sleep

Posted on February 27, 2012 by mercedes-c

Last weekend, I saw this article on sleep habits on the BBC news website: The myth of the eight-hour sleep If you scroll down, you will see two prints used by Prof Ekirch as visual evidence of his findings on … Continue reading →

Posted in Everyday life, Prints | Comments Off

Courtships and Love Affairs

Posted on February 14, 2012 by mercedes-c

After going through Douce’s folder labelled ‘Courtships & Love Affairs’, I think it is fair to say that he was not much of a romantic. His selection of images of romance includes this depiction of a gloomy ‘man in love’ … Continue reading →

Posted in Everyday life, Fools, Games, Prints | Comments Off