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Richard Brathwaite or Braithwaite (c.1587/8-1673), writer, was born at Burneside Hall, Kendal. He went to Oriel College Oxford, and then to Pembroke College Cambridge, before going on to Gray’s Inn.
His father died in 1610, and he seems to have returned to Westmorland to look after his estates, but kept up a stream of publications on various topics, mostly of lighthearted epigrams, pastorals, and satires.
He then wrote two popular conduct books, The English Gentleman (1630), followed by The English Gentlewoman (1631, dedicated to Lady Anne Clifford), which were frequently reprinted.
His overall output was copious and varied, and may even have included plays, as well as political works and satires.
In 1638 he published what was to become his most popular work, Barnabae itinerarium, or, Barnabee’s Journal. Originally written in rhymed Latin verse as a mock eclogue (in which a shepherd welcomes
another who has been travelling and asks about his journeys), it was then made accessible to a wider audience by being translated into English ‘couch’d in a reeling ryme’, that was apparently to be sung ‘to
the old Tune of BARNABE’, a popular ballad which has not unfortunately been identified. The ‘shepherd’ who tells of his journeys is transformed into the archetypal English pub-crawler.
Exactly what he does for a living is not clear, but in the last book, he marries, gives up the drink, and transforms himself into a horse-dealer going from market to market in Westmorland and West Yorkshire.
Like Will Kempe’s Nine Days’ Wonder (1600) and John Taylor’s Pennyless Pilgrimage (1618), it is the narrative of a journey in which the writer lurches from inn to inn,
giving a complimentary or scabrous description of each. Since, unlike Taylor, he does not depend on sponsorship, he can be much ruder about the quality of the entertainment and the personal hygiene
of the obliging landladies who offer him additional services. He does not give many inn names, but the route is precisely mapped out.
He actually describes two journeys, one of which is a return. The first starts at Banbury, for reasons which are unclear, and makes a circuit round Oxford before proceeding via Daventry,
Leicester, Nottingham, Mansfield, Doncaster, Wakefield, Bradford, Keighley, Giggleswick (no mention of Skipton), Clapham, Ingleton, [Kirby] Lonsdale, Cow Brow (by Crooklands), up the old North Road via Natland to Kirkland and Kendal,
and then on to Staveley, which is just after Brathwaite's home at Burneside Hall. This sounds very much like the journey home from university at Oxford. He then returns South via Lancaster (‘John a Gants old Towne-a’),
Ashton Hall where he had relatives (the Butlers of Rawcliffe),
Garstang, Preston where he spent a week with the Bannisters, and on south via Wigan, Newton-le-Willows, and Warrington, then Lichfield and Coventry back to Daventry and then towards London — presumably the route he took
when he went to Gray’s Inn.
The second journey, starting in London, takes in Cambridge, where he was also at university, and ‘where the Muses / Haunt the vine bush, as their use is’,
Grounds, greenes, groves are wet and homely,
But the Schollers wondrous comely.
He then proceeds via Huntingdon and up the Great North Road to Stamford, Grantham (where he admires the church spire), Newark on Trent (which was flooded), Pontefract (for the liquorice), York (where he sees the piper who recovered from a hanging),
and on up to Richmond, where he turns westward through Wensleydale via Middleham, Askrigg (‘here poor people live by knitting’ — like the ‘turrible knitters of Dent’), Bainbridge, Hardraw, and through Garsdale to Sedbergh,
and Killington, where
Taking leave of Mountains many,
To my native country came I.
After this, the Fourth Book bids a farewell to his drunken wanderings, and instead provides a guided tour of the horse-markets of the Northern counties:
I am now become a Drover,
Countrey-liver, Countrey-lover
which also takes him through West Cumbria, stopping off at Ravenglass, Dalton ‘most delightfull’, ‘oaten Owston [?Ulverston] frutifull’, and Hawkshead, before going on to Lancaster, Garstang,
Burton in Lonsdale, and Hornby.
He still relishes a drink, and enjoys looking at pretty women,
But I'm chaste, as doth become me,
For the Countreys eyes are on me
as indeed they would be, as he was a JP and Deputy Lieutenant of the county.
He married for the first time in 1617, and when his wife Frances died in 1633, again in 1636. He lived through the Civil War, where he may have fought as a Royalist, and at the Restoration retired to his estates
near Catterick, where he continued to write. He died in 1673 aged 85.
There is a
portrait of him in Abbot Hall, Kendal, by a very inept artist, name thankfully unknown, who toured the NorthWest in the 1630s.
Richard Brathwaite’s Barnabae itinerarium, or, Barnabee’s Journal: Selections1
The subheadings are editorial, and not in the original. This transcription only gives the English version.
Wakefield to Kendal
[sig. D7r]
Turning thence, none could me hinder
To salute the Wakefield Pinder; The folk hero George-a-Green, the Pinner of Wakefield
Who indeed’s the worlds glory,
With his Cumrades never sory,
This the cause was, lest you misse it,
Georgies Club I meant to visit.
[sig. D8r]
Streight at Wakefeeld was I seene a,
Where I sought for George a Greene a,
But I could find no such creature,
On a signe I saw his feature:
Where the strength of ale so stirr'd me,
I grew stouter farre than Geordie.
[sig. E1r]
Thence to Bradford, my tongue blisters
At the Family of Sisters, Latin: In Familiam Amoris
They love, are lov’d to no Eye-show,
They increase and multiply too,
Furnish’d with their spritely weapons
Their flesh feeles Clarks are no Capons.
[sig. E2r]
Thence to Kighley, where are mountaines
Steepy-threatning, lively fountaines,
Rising Hils, and barraine valleis,
Yet Bon-Socio’s and good fellowes,
Joviall-jocund-jolly Bowlers,
As they were the world Controulers.
[sig. E3r]
Thence to Giggleswick most sterill,
Hemm'd with rocks and shelves of perill;
Neare to th’ way as Traveller goeth,
A fresh Spring both Ebbes and Floweth,
Neither know the Learnd’st that travell
What procures it, Salt or Gravell.
[sig. E4r]
Thence to Clapham, drawing nyer
He that was the common Cryer,
To a breakefast of one Herring
Did invite me first appearing.
Herring he, I drinke bestowed,
Pledges of the love we owed.
[sig. [E5]r]
Thence to Ingleton, where I dwelled
Till I brake a Blacksmiths palled,
Which done, women rush’d in on me,
Stones like haile showr’d down upon me,
Whence amated, fearing harming,
Leave I tooke, but gave no warning.
[sig. [E6]r]
Thence to Lonesdale, where I viewed Kirby Lonsdale
An Hall which like a Taverne shewed;
Neate Gates, white Walls, nought was sparing,
Pots brim-full, no thought of caring:
They eat, drink, laugh, are still mirth-making,
Nought they see that’s worth care taking.
[sig. [E7]r]
Thence to Cowbrow, truth I’le tell ye,
Mine hostesse had a supple bellie,
Bodie plumpe, and count’nance cheerfull,
Reeling pace (a welcome fearfull)
Like a drunken Hag she stumbled,
Till she on her buttocks tumbled.
[sig. [E8]r]
Thence to Natland, being come thither,
He who Yorks Contempts did gather
Gave me harbour, light as fether
We both drunke and eat together,
Till halfe-typsy, as it chanced,
We about the Maypole danced.
[sig. F1r]
Thence to Kirkland, thence to Kendall,
I did that which men call Spendall,
Night and day with Sociats many
Drunk I ale both thick and clammy.
“Shroud thy head, Boy, stretch thy hand too,
“Hand h’as done, head cannot stand to.
[sig. F2r]
Leaving these, to Staveley came I,
Where now all night drinking am I,
Alwayes frolick, free from yellows,
With a Consort of good fellows,
Where I’le stay and end my journay,
Till Brave Barnabe returne-a.
FINIS
Via Lancaster to Preston and onwards
[sig. G4r]
First place where I first was knowne-a,
Was brave Iohn a Gants old Towne-a,
A Seat antiently renowned,
But with store of Beggars drowned:
For a Jaylor ripe and mellow,
The world h’as not such a fellow
[sig. [G5]r]
Thence to Ashton, good as may be
Was the wine, brave Knight, bright Ladie,
All I saw was comely specious,
Seemly gratious, neatly precious;
My Muse with Bacchus so long traded,
When I walk’t, my legs denaid it.
[sig. [G6]r]
Thence to Garestang, pray you harke it,
Ent’ring there a great Beast-market,
As I jogged on the street-a
’Twas my fortune for to meet-a
A young Heyfer, who before her
Tooke me up and threw me o’re her.
[sig. [G7]r]
Thence to Preston, I was led-a,
To brave Banisters to bed-a,
As two borne and bred together
We were presently sworne brether;
Seven dayes were me there assigned,
Oft I supt, but never dined.
Richmond to Kendal and home
[sig. V4r]
Thence to Richmund, heavy sentence!
There were none of my acquaintance,
All my noble Cumrads gone were,
Of them all I found not one there,
But lest care should make me sicker,
I did bury care in liquor.
[sig. [V5]r]
Penance chac’d that crime of mine hard,
Thence to Redmeere to a Swine-heard Redmire
Came I, where they nothing plast me
But a Swines-gut that was nastie,
Had I not then wash’d my liver,
In my guts ’t had stuck for ever.
[sig. [V6]r]
Thence to Carperbie very greedy,
Consorts frequent, victuals needy;
After Supper they so tost me
As seven shillings there it cost me:
Soone may one of coyne be soaked,
Yet for want of liquor choaked.
[sig. [V7]r]
Thence to Wenchly, Valley-seated, Wensleydale
For antiquity repeated;
Sheep and Sheepheard as one brother
Kindly drink to one another;
Till pot-hardy light as feather
Sheep and Shepheard sleep together.
[sig. [V8]r]
Thence to Middlam, where I viewed Middleham
Th’Castle which so stately shewed;
the staires, ’tis truth I tell ye,
To a knot of brave Boyes fell I;
All red-noses, no dye deeper,
not one but a peace-keeper.
[sig. X1r]
Thence to Ayscarth, from a mountaine
Fruitfull vallies, pleasant fountaine,
Woolly flocks, cliffs steep and snowy,
Fields, fenns, sedgy rushes saw I;
Which high Mount is call’d the Temple,
To all prospects an exemple.
[sig. X2r]
Thence to Worton, being lighted
I was solemnly invited
By a Captains wife most vewlie,
Though, I thinke, she never knew me;
I came, call’d, coll’d, toy’d, trifl’d, kissed,
“Captaine Cornu-cap’d I wished.
[sig. X3r]
Thence to Bainbrig, where the River
From his channell seemes to sever,
To Maidenly John I forthwith hasted,
And his best provision tasted;
Th’hoast I had (a thing not common)
Seemed neither man nor woman.
[sig. X3r]
Thence to Askrig, market noted,
But no handsomnesse about it,
Neither Magistrate nor Mayor
Ever were elected there:
Here poor people live by knitting,
To their Trading, breeding fitting.
[sig. X4r]
Thence to Hardraw, where’s hard hunger,
Barraine cliffs and clints of wonder;
Never here Adonis lived,
Unlesse in Coles Harbour hived:
Ins are nasty, dusty, fustie,
Both with smoake and rubbish mustie.
[sig. [X5]r]
Thence to Gastile, I was drawne in Garsdale
To an Alehouse neare adjoining
To a Chappell, I drunk Stingo
With a Butcher and Domingo
Th’Curat, who to my discerning
Was not guilty of much learning.
[sig. [X6]r]
Thence to Sedbergh, sometimes joy-all,
Gamesome, gladsome, richly royall,
But those jolly boyes are sunken,
“Now scarce once a yeare one drunken:
There I durst not well be merry,
Farre from home old Foxes werry.
[sig. [X7]r]
Thence to Killington I passed,
Where an hill is freely grassed,
There I staid not though halfe-tyred,
Higher still my thoughts aspired:
Taking leave of Mountains many,
To my native Country came I.
[sig. [X8]r]
Thence to Kendall, pure her state is,
Prudent too her Magistrate is,
In whose charter to them granted
Nothing but a Mayor wanted;
Here it likes me to bee dwelling,
Bousing, loving, stories telling.
FINIS.
1. Richard Brathwaite Barnabees journall under the names of Mirtilus & Faustulus shadowed: for the travellers solace lately published, to most apt numbers reduced,
and to the old tune of Barnabe commonly chanted. By Corymb&olig;us; in Latin Barnabæ itinerarium (London: John Haviland, 1638). Return
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