
1600s England Through the Eyes of One of the First Modern Travel Writers (2017) - Thevet
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/see-1600s-england-through-eyes-one-first-travel-writers-180963536/
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yesenadam
It's about Celia Fiennes' _Through England on a Side Saddle In the Time of
William and Mary_

"She travelled around England on horseback between 1684 and about 1703, "to
regain my health by variety and change of aire and exercise". At this time the
idea of travel for its own sake was still novel, and Fiennes was exceptional
as an enthusiastic woman traveller."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celia_Fiennes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celia_Fiennes)

Download her book as pdf, epub etc:
[https://archive.org/details/throughenglando00fiengoog](https://archive.org/details/throughenglando00fiengoog)

That 1888 edition is the first complete one.

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barrkel
If the name Fiennes brings to mind actor Ralph Fiennes and his cousin explorer
Ranulph Fiennes, it's no coincidence: they are related.

Wikipedia has several overview pages:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fiennes_family](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Fiennes_family)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twisleton-Wykeham-
Fiennes_fami...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twisleton-Wykeham-
Fiennes_family)

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robin_reala
Drop back a few decades and Pepys’ Diary is another fine slice of life of
urban England. I’m finishing a public domain production of the 1893 edition[1]
for Standard Ebooks[2] at the moment but in the meantime they’re all online
and cross referenced at
[https://www.pepysdiary.com/](https://www.pepysdiary.com/) ; it’s fun to dive
in and read an entry or two.

[1] [https://github.com/robinwhittleton/samuel-pepys_the-diary-
of...](https://github.com/robinwhittleton/samuel-pepys_the-diary-of-samuel-
pepys)

[2] [https://standardebooks.org/](https://standardebooks.org/)

~~~
jdietrich
Peyps also created one of the great treasures of English folk history, a
collection of over 1,800 broadside ballads. Broadsides are the closest thing
we have to a 17th century newspaper - cheaply printed, sold in the street and
fundamentally ephemeral. Browsing his collection gives a remarkable insight
into the zeitgeist.

[https://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/page/pepys](https://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/page/pepys)

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pgcoghlan
If you want an account of these times written in modern English, "The Time
Traveller's Guide to Restoration Britain" is a lively and entertaining read:
[https://www.amazon.co.uk/Time-Travellers-Guide-
Restoration-B...](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Time-Travellers-Guide-Restoration-
Britain-ebook/dp/B01I0RU15S/ref=sr_1_1)

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classichasclass
I note with interest how her travelogue was rediscovered. How will this work a
couple hundred years from now when people of our generation put stuff online
instead of pen to paper? Will there hopefully be a local copy on their
computer, assuming the SSD or HD hasn't died and later generations can read
it? Or will it simply perish when the hosting bill isn't paid, or the account
is inactive?

A lot of memoirs from this writer's era certainly didn't survive either, but
it seems like there was a greater chance back then even considering the cost
of pen, ink and paper.

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pjmlp
I think about that every time I am visiting an archaeological site with stone
inscriptions.

Looking 5000 years in the future, no one will be able to read our documents,
like we do with those written 5000 years ago.

~~~
thfuran
Reading 25 year old documents is hard enough. I mean, none of my current
computers even has an optical drive, let alone a 3.5" floppy. To say nothing
of the actually-floppy floppies.

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ggm
If you've read Neal Stephenson's "system of the world" this book is a voice
straight out of that timeline. And for more contemporary references "the
favourite"

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johnr2
Interesting article, but I'm slightly puzzled by the [sic] comments following
many of the quotes. The use of English looks correct for the time.

~~~
00ajcr
Surely the [sic] annotations are to indicate that the quotations are unchanged
from the original source text, which contains somewhat archaic language and
misspellings of words when compared to modern English.

~~~
johnr2
You're right. I'm so used to seeing it used in a snarky way that I was
overlooking the original meaning of "sic erat scriptum" (thus was it written).

