M&D: Silk and Hemp
Steve Maas
stevemaas at hotmail.com
Fri Dec 17 13:15:36 CST 1999
Though Lord Ferrer (pp. 111-114) apparently was not actually "hang'd
... with a Rope of Silk" but with Hemp (if y'er interested see Tim Ware's
HyperArts Web Guide for my MDMD post about this subject), a Rope of Silk was
indeed the right of a peer, according to a December 1999 Smithsonian article
about British aristocrats. The Smithsonian article quotes from _Burke's
Peerage & Baronetage_ about "Robert Crichton, 8th Lord Crichton of Sanquhar;
b c 1568" who had a fencing master, John Turner, murdered and "was granted a
peer's privilege of being hanged by a silk [rope]."
The same magazine's story about clocks includes a discussion of Harrison and
his H1 through H4. The article is disappointing though: it neglects to
include a discussion of talking clocks.
Steve Maas
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