Hannah Dow is an English graduate who is interested in literature of the English Civil War. She has carried out research on Inigo Jones’s designs in the Richard Southern Collection at the University of Bristol Theatre Collection to further her own understanding of the role of the court masque in 17th-century politics. She hopes that her posts will inspire others to delve into the fascinating materials held in the Southern Collection.
Not much can compare to the dazzling spectacle known as the Stuart masque. For this form of courtly entertainment was characterised by intricate set designs, extravagant costumes and intriguing characters played by courtiers, members of the royal family and sometimes, even the monarch themself (Fig. 1).
Unlike many plays and pageants of the early modern period, the masque was solely performed indoors and was, for the most part, reserved for an audience made up of the élite, although such occasions were surprisingly informal as there were often reports of audiences over-indulging in the merriment of the evening and actors drunk on wine. After taking a trip to the Theatre Collection to view the various prints of costumes and set designs by the 17th century architect and set designer Inigo Jones, I could not help but picture the scenes that befell the court as they witnessed this theatrical wonder by the flicker of candlelight.
The masque played a significant role in upholding Stuart mythology. Indeed, it is certain that these productions utilised the power of spectacle to showcase the virtues associated with the monarch and reinforce ‘kingly absolutism’ (Butler 21). In the words of Stephen Orgel, the masque was the ‘expression of the monarch’s will, the mirror of his mind’ (45, Illusion of Power). Though to view these entertainments as merely theatrical forms of royalist propaganda would be to overlook how they could stage tensions that arose in the narrative of the court in the lead up to the English Civil War. This is because the masque often ‘functioned at the intersection of rivalrous political discourses’ and could scrutinise the monarch in discreet ways (Bevington and Holbrook 9). Thus, rather than viewing spectators as passive recipients of courtly spectacle, we must consider the various meanings that could emerge beyond the intended staging and acknowledge ‘the heterogeneity of [the masque’s] receivers’ (Shohet 27). This perspective prompts a consideration of the complex ideas which could be transmitted through the aesthetics of the masque, and more importantly, the different ways in which audiences would have perceived them. I hope to illuminate these possible meanings by drawing on some of the interesting materials I came across at the Theatre Collection while searching through a box of Inigo Jones set and costume designs held as part of the Richard Southern Collection (Fig. 2).
My exploration of these holdings will consist of two blog posts. Post one will explore the role of the masque in celebrating the monarchy using Florimène as a case study; then post two will uncover how the imagery of the masque hinted at its eventual downfall. As a graduate of English Literature, it was a bit daunting to open an archive box full of images rather than texts. The experience made me think about how we often privilege the written word over visual artifacts when performing research into early modern drama. This became more apparent when I came across this stage design for Florimène (1635), a masque commissioned by Queen Henrietta Maria (Fig. 3).
I was mesmerised by what I soon found out to be called the ‘ornament’ or ‘proscenium’, also known as the arch which framed the stage. To investigate the meaning behind the intricate design, I searched Early English Books Online to see if I could locate the text for the masque. But to my surprise, no play-text has survived except for an English summary of the French production.
Fortunately, during my second trip to the Theatre Collection, I came across this text in the Southern Collection, in a simple folder that had the words ‘THE ARGUMENT OF FLORIMENE’ inscribed on the front. Inside was a transcription of the English summary which proved to be very helpful in learning about this masque (Fig. 4). Though the fact that images of the set designs were preserved while the original play-text is lost to time points to how the artistic endeavours of the set designer could be favoured over the words of the playwright, whose identity in the case of Florimène is unknown.
In typical pastoral fashion, the plot summary of Florimène describes a group of shepherds and shepherdesses who are caught up in a series of romantic entanglements and misunderstandings. The masque largely focuses on Filene who cross-dresses as a shepherdess in order to get closer to his love interest Florimène. However, Florimène has already attracted the interest of the shepherd Anfrize who suffers from the pains of love. Florimène’s desire for Filene and commitment to female constancy prompts her to make a trip to the temple of goddess Diana (Fig. 5), where she prays that she may take Filene as her suitor. Diana then acts as a kind of matchmaker to Florimène and the rest of the rural folk as she couples the pairs up so that gender disorder is resolved, and heterosexual harmony is restored. Such narratives where ‘love and chastity gained their divine rewards in the harmony of marriage and peace’ served court ideology by associating these ideals with the union between King Charles I and his French wife, Queen Henrietta Maria (Orgel 136, ‘Florimène’).
These ideas are visualised through the imagery on the arch encompassing the stage. Jerzy Limon observes how the proscenium served a similar function to the designs on the title page of a book by framing the story that is being told within and depicting emblematic images which point to key motifs of the masque (80-81). Returning to the image of the proscenium in fig. 3, we can see that love and stability are symbolised by the shepherdess and shepherd playing ‘rural instruments’ in musical harmony as the positioning of man and woman on either side of the stage materialises the reinstation of heterosexual relations at the end of the masque. Above them are visuals of what seem to be putti, half divine and half human infants (often portrayed with wings), who appear throughout Greco-Roman art to represent love. In the English summary, the putti are depicted as celebrating the harmonious outcome of the masque:
‘over [the shepherd and shepherdess are] Garlands held up by naked Boyes, as the prize of their Victory. Above all, ranne a large Freese, and in it children in severall postures, imitating the Pastorall Rights and sacrifices. (‘The Argument of Florimène’, RS/018/0047. See fig 4.).
It is interesting to think about how the proscenium might be imitating royal hierarchy through the positioning of the rural folk at the bottom of the arch and the semi-divine beings on top. This is because the monarch was closely aligned with divinity due to their belief in a God-given right to rule. The putti surround the title of the masque and name of its female protagonist “FLORIMENE” which is placed in a ‘rich compartment’ at the top-centre of the proscenium (Fig. 4). This visual glorifies the female shepherdess Florimène whose commitment to the feminine ideal of constancy prompts her to seek divine guidance from Diana. The celebration of the shepherdesses’ virtue alongside the wisdom of divine authority can be translated into the ‘mutual rejoicing’ of the subject and monarch as Inigo Jones’s design follows the ‘court masques’ characteristic fêting of royalist order.’ (Shohet 2). Although the masque praised both the monarch and the subject alike, ultimately, the designs for Florimène were crafted to elevate the Queen. John Peacock, for example, states that the proscenium’s display of the shepherd and shepherdess figures recalls the designs that were found on the title pages of French pastoral romances of the period as he notes how like Florimène’s playwright, Jones was ‘working for the Queen in a French idiom’ (158). Florimène’s proscenium is a key example of how the aesthetics of the early masque seeped into royal iconography as Jones’s evocation of French theatre functioned to align the masque’s representation of divinely ordained virtue with the Queen.
The earlier pastoral masques that were commissioned by Henrietta Maria follow this format, with the proscenium doing much of the heavy work by reminding the audience of the peace and harmony that resulted from a higher power presiding over the land. Though this constant reminder of monarchical supremacy would soon leave a sour taste for the audience, as my next post will reflect on the making and breaking of royal image in the Stuart masque as we end on the brewing tempest that is Salmacida Spolia.
Works Cited
Bevington, David, and Peter Holbrook. ‘Introduction.’ The Politics of the Stuart Masque, Cambridge UP, 1998, pp. 1–19.
Butler, Martin. ‘Courtly Negotiations.’ The Politics of the Stuart Masque, edited by David Bevington and Peter Holbrook, Cambridge UP, 1998, pp. 20–40.
Early English Books Online. Proquest, www.proquest.com/legacyredirect/eebo?rd=Y. Accessed 9 Apr. 2025.
Limon, Jerzy. ‘The Emblematic Masque.’ The Masque of Stuart Culture, Associate University Presses, 1990, pp. 52–91.
Orgel, Stephen. ‘Florimene and the Ante-masque.’ Renaissance Drama, vol. 4, 1971, pp. 135–153.
Orgel, Stephen. The Illusion of Power: Political Theatre in the English Renaissance. University of California Press, 1975.
Peacock, John. ‘The French Element in Inigo Jones’s Masque Designs.’ The Court Masque, edited by David Lindley, Manchester UP, 1984, pp. 149–168.
Shohet, Lauren. ‘Introduction.’ Reading Masques: The English Masque and Public Culture in the Seventeenth Century, Oxford UP, 2010, pp. 1–36.
Early English Books Online. Proquest, www.proquest.com/legacyredirect/eebo?rd=Y. Accessed 9 Apr. 2025.