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The Seeing America Project
Course: The Seeing America Project > Unit 7
Lesson 2: 11,000 B.C.E. - 1700 C.E.- Clovis Culture
- Mesa Verde and the preservation of Ancestral Puebloan heritage
- Mesa Verde cliff dwellings
- Chaco Canyon
- Paquimé jars
- Inventing “America” for Europe: Theodore de Bry
- Thought the Puritans were dour? Think again!
- Portraits of John and Elizabeth Freake (and their baby)
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Thought the Puritans were dour? Think again!
The video explores a special cupboard made for Governor Thomas Prence of Plymouth Colony. It highlights the cupboard's ornate design, vibrant colors, and its role as a status symbol. The cupboard held valuable items like silver and textiles, reflecting Prence's wealth and religious beliefs. Created by Steven Zucker and Beth Harris.
Video transcript
(gentle music) - [Narrator] We're in
the Wadsworth Atheneum looking at a cupboard,
and this is really special because we know exactly
who it was made for. - [Narrator] Governor Thomas
Prence of Plymouth Colony. - [Narrator] Which would
today be the southeast part of Massachusetts. - [Narrator] It's the
separatists who were journeying to America as religious pilgrims, they established a colony
in 1620 and he becomes one of the most important
people in Plymouth Colony and he makes significant decisions about religious tolerance,
how Quakers will or will not be accepted into the colony. - [Narrator] And he also
has to create policy about how the colony will
deal with Native Americans. - [Narrator] So Thomas
Prence marries four times. His last wife is Mary and in his will, he gives to her this court
cupboard in his new parlor and the cupboard cloth
as well as a cushion. - [Narrator] And if you
think about what the inside of a pilgrim's home might have been like, you might imagine something
very severe and plain and it might come as
some surprise to learn that they owned furniture
as highly ornamented and as beautiful as this cupboard. - [Narrator] And not only
was it highly ornamented, it was vibrant with
paint that included reds and black and the oak at
the time wouldn't have had this patina, it would have
been almost bright yellow. - [Narrator] Almost garish to our eyes. - [Narrator] The people
that we have come to know as the pilgrims and the Puritans
enjoyed sumptuous materials and texture and color just as we do today. - [Narrator] So let's talk
about that word cupboard. If you think about it, it's cup board. - [Narrator] A table was called a board and you sat at a board in
form, a table and a bench, so the suspended surface area
on which you place things. And court means short so
we're looking at this court cupboard will silver displayed on the top as it may have been in the
period and it's meant for you to look at these goods,
this court cupboard would have been the center of your parlor, which was the most
important room in the house and for some people, it was
one of only a very few rooms in the house. - [Narrator] So this is a
tremendously valuable piece of furniture but it was displaying objects that had even greater value. - [Narrator] In the
hierarchy of goods in a home of this period, you have your
silver, then your textiles, and most people are surprised to learn that the textiles in
the home are more valued than the furniture and
this object would have held your silver, your textiles,
your ceramics and glass, which fall to the bottom of the hierarchy. - [Narrator] I can imagine
this dominating the parlor. This is something that
drew your attention, not just in its vivid coloring
but these decorative forms, these bulbous, vase-shaped
columns on either side and half-spindles that
decorate the entire front of the cabinet. We see elements that
look very architectural. - [Narrator] Highly decorated
and highly architectural. You have a cornice and here's your frieze. - [Narrator] And in its heaviness, it has a medieval feeling. - [Narrator] So they're throwing in ideas from medieval art and architecture, they're throwing in Renaissance
and then there's also this style mannerism
that is coming from Italy and so you have this mixture
and by the time they arrive, it's like playing a game of telephone. The ideas traveling from Italy
to France to Northern Europe and then they hop from
Northern Europe to England and from England to the Americas. - [Narrator] The people who
made this were the turner and the joiner so someone
turned the decorative items that are symmetrical and
someone joined the pieces of cabinetry together. - [Narrator] Using
mortise and tenon joinery. The turner, he's working on
a lathe to create these split spindles, even the
bosses that you see here and these massive columns. - [Narrator] And so having
luxurious furniture like this, the silver to go on
top, having the textiles to go in the drawers and on the surface, these all were signifiers of that status of this very early colonist
in Plymouth Colony. - [Narrator] For a separatist who believed that he was preordained,
this would fit very well in his worldview. - [Narrator] So his great wealth signified that he had been selected by
god, predestined for heaven. (gentle music)