Okay, I will admit up front the history of Richard II’s reign is NOT my area of expertise, and so I do NOT mean this piece as a “history” lesson. Rather it is meant to be an interesting historical “tidbit.” You decide whether Richard II had a “hand” (get it???) in the invention of the “handkerchief.”
Richard II and Anne of Bohemia
That being said, Tim Shaw’s Daily Medieval tells us, “Richard II (1367-1400) had all of the elegance and none of the political savvy or military skill required of a king of England in the 14th century. He was given to–and ridiculed for–extravagances and fastidiousness that shocked many of his contemporaries. In an attempt to curb his excesses, he was put under the regency of a council called the Lords Appellant. Richard decided to negotiate a peace with France and devote his energies and finances to overthrowing the Lords Appellant. The Merciless Parliament of 1388 was called to curb him. During the process, Parliament convicted most of Richard’s advisors of treason. The charges against them include lists of extravagances such as richly decorated garments and household furnishings.
“At a time when such excesses were worthy of condemnation, something like the following line–a description of an order from the king’s tailor, Walter Rauf–would surely make heads turn and eyes roll:
parvis peciis factis ad liberandum domino regi ad portandum in manu suo pro naso suo tergendo et mundando
“small pieces made for giving to the lord king to carry in his hand for wiping and cleaning his nose”
“Why does this stand out? Prior to this, the sleeve was the primary receptacle for the things for which we now use handkerchiefs or tissues. Stella Mary Newton, in her Fashion in the Age of the Black Prince, does not find any evidence of handkerchief use in the courts of Europe. This seems to counter the theory that Richard picked up this “foppish” practice from France.* We know the Romans used a piece of cloth called a sudarium for wiping sweat, but that is not likely where Richard got the idea, since there is no evidence that the sudarium survived as a custom in Europe. So maybe Richard did invent the pocket handkerchief.”
*Richard was raised in France, where his father, Edward the Black Prince, held much land thanks to Edward III’s successes in the Hundred Years War. In fact, it’s pretty certain that Richard never bothered to learn English.
Meanwhile, BBC History tells us, “Richard is the first king that we know for sure what he looked like, in part because of his own conscious attempts to raise the personal place of the monarch, through the active use of imagery and artistic representation, the most notable example being the Wilton Diptych, a portable altarpiece and Richard’s own portrait, which now hangs in Westminster Abbey. Richard constructed the first royal bathhouse, may well have invented the pocket handkerchief and used a spoon for the first time. In his patronage of architecture and personal piety, his reign has a powerful legacy in some of the key parts of Westminster Great Hall, York Minster and Canterbury Cathedral. Richard built the magnificent hammer beam roof for the hall, which can be seen to this day. The medieval parliament and king’s court often sat under its carved angels and it was from here that the kingdom was ruled.”
In Mr. Giotto’s Online Textbook, under “The Kings of England: Richard II and Three Henrys,” we are told, “Richard, unlike his grandfather and father, did not care for carrying on the war with the French. On the contrary, he enjoyed French cooking, creating the first royal cookbook. Richard was into manners, he created the first handkerchief, as he was appalled by the habit of wiping one’s mouth or nose on his or her sleeve at the dinner table.”
Rampley & Co. of London gives us a bit more information regarding the History of the Pocket Square. “Some people believe that the pocket square in one form or another can trace its origins back to ancient Egypt, where small linen cloths were dyed with a red powder that indicated they were used for decorative purposes and as an example of wealth. However, this is quite a leap of faith and small pieces of coloured cloth don’t necessarily translate directly into what you would consider a modern day pocket square.
“There are also those that trace it back to the Ancient Greeks who carried a cloth with scented perfume in order to ensure they always had a pleasant smell nearby or the Romans who used pieces of cloth to start the Gladiatorial Games, with the event starting when the Emperor dropped his handkerchief.
“Some claim the first use of a handkerchief being worn as an accessory was in 800’s where members of the Catholic Church would attach a white handkerchief to their left arm as a representation of their devotion to God and their church or that King Richard II of England was the first person to wear a handkerchief as a fashion accessory while on the throne between 1377 to 1399. Although it’s clear people have been using squares of material for various uses for a long time, we’re not convinced that this is a justifiable comparison to what is now deemed a pocket square.”
Finally, Wikipedia tells us, “Before people used the word handkerchief, the word kerchief alone was common. This term came from two French words: couvrir, which means “to cover,” and chef, which means “head.” In the times of ancient Greece and Rome, handkerchiefs were often used the way they are today. But in the Middle Ages, kerchiefs were usually used to cover the head. Then in the 16th century, people in Europe began to carry kerchiefs in their pockets to wipe their forehead or their nose. To distinguish this kind of kerchief from the one used to cover the head, the word “hand” was added to “kerchief”. King Richard II of England, who reigned from 1377 to 1399, is widely believed to have invented the cloth handkerchief, as surviving documents written by his courtiers describe his use of square pieces of cloth to wipe his nose. Certainly they were in existence by Shakespeare’s time, and a handkerchief is an important plot device in his play Othello.”
Princess Helena (Helena Augusta Victoria; Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein by marriage; 25 May 1846 – 9 June 1923) was the third daughter and fifth child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Like the queen’s other children, Helena was educated by private tutors chosen by her father and his close friend and adviser, Baron Stockmar. At her birth, Albert reported to his brother, Ernest II, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, that Helena “came into this world quite blue, but she is quite well now”. He added that the Queen “suffered longer and more than the other times and she will have to remain very quiet to recover.”
After, Prince Albert’s death, Queen Victoria went into a profound depression that affected the remainder of her reign. Her children still under her care were expected to abandon their youthful pursuits and grieve for their beloved father, as did the Queen. At age sixteen, Helena was barely from the schoolroom, but Victoria’s few thoughts beyond her grief at Albert’s loss turned to finding an appropriate husband for a daughter that she had termed as the “least promising.” Victoria had written that “poor dear Lenchen, though most useful and active and clever and amiable, does not improve in looks and has great difficulty with her figure and her want of calm, quiet, graceful manners.” (Rappaport, Helen. Queen Victoria: A Biographical Companion. ABC-CLIO. Oxford. page 189.)
Three years later on another visit to Germany, Helena met another Prince Christian, this one of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg. On the maternal, Prince Christian held ties to a Danish noble family, as well as to the British royal family. His grandmother was the granddaughter of Frederick, King George II’s son. He was 15 years Helena’s senior. Unfortunately, the prince appeared older than he actually was, a fact that Victoria remarked upon on numerous occasions. Moreover, Christian was not the most intelligent of men (certainly nothing in the manner of Victoria’s “dear Albert”). He was not sophisticated or ambitious or very amiable. Nor did he possess a fortune worthy of Victoria’s daughter. Moreover, he had recently left his military post in the Prussian army. 
In my books, I often have my characters address their personal needs. For example, in A Touch of Grace, my heroine is working in the ladies’ retiring room as a seamstress at a ball, but as she is pregnant, she must sneak around to use the chamber pot that was meant for titled ladies. The heroine, Grace is married to a marquis, but she has run away from her husband and cannot let anyone know her identity. 
Born in Kirby Wiske (a village in the North Riding), Yorkshire, in 1515, Roger Ascham was the third son of John and Margaret Ascham. Ascham was the steward to Baron Scrope of Bolton. Roger Ascham was a scholar and didactic writer, famous for his prose style, his promotion of the vernacular, and his theories of education. In 1530, Ascham entered St. John’s College, Cambridge, where he studied Greek among other challenging subjects. He received his degree at the age of eighteen on 18 February 1534 and became a fellow of the college in March. At the age of twenty-one, Ascham became master of arts and began tutoring younger students. Ascham became reader in Greek around 1538 until Henry VII founded a lecture to take his place.
Ascham was educated at the house of Sir Humphrey Wingfield, a barrister, Ascham tells us, in the Toxophilus under a tutor named R. Bond. His preferred sport was archery, and Sir Humphrey “would at term times bring down from London both bows and shafts and go with them himself to see them shoot.” In 1545 Ascham published the treatise Toxophilus or the Schole or Partitions of Shooting partly in defense of archery against those who found the sport unbefitting a scholar. The work was dedicated to Henry VIII, who enjoyed the treatise so much that he granted Ascham a pension: ten pounds a year. Ascham was further honored by being assigned to tutor Prince Edward. 
Ladies in a country house were expected to practice the “correct” moral, social, and religious customs of the day. Not only were them women judged by these standards, but so were the rest of their family, especially if they acted from character. When Lydia Bennet elopes with George Wickham, she is considered a fallen woman, and by association her sisters were also considered of low morals. Such is the reason Darcy sets out to force a marriage between his old school chum and Elizabeth Bennet’s younger sisters. There would be those who criticized his marriage to Elizabeth because of her connections to trade, but the idea of marrying a woman who sister was of such low morals would not be easily overcome, even by a man of Darcy’s stature in Society. He cannot risk ruining his sister Georgiana’s Come Out by bringing a woman into her life who has relations of such low moral fiber. 
Facilities for the children were often quite sparse in comparison to the rest to the household. Girls’ toys were dolls and doll houses, perhaps a rocking horse or a small ball. Pamela Horn in Ladies of the Manor (page 32) tells us, “The clothing worn by well-to-do children for much of the Victorian and Edwardian period was cumbersome and uncomfortable. Little girls wore numerous petticoats – flannel in winter and stiffly starched cotton in summer. For outdoor excursions there were black-buttoned boots, ornate hats, and coats of pelisses, embellished with tucks, frills or pleats. There was also a large amount of ‘dressing up’ to cope with. According to Sarah Sedgwick, who was a nanny in several large households, winter clothing were retained, irrespective of the temperature, until late September. In winter, girls wore a vest, ‘a woollen binder, drawers, a bodice, a flannel petticoat and on top flannel dresses.’ Summer saw the flannel petticoat exchanged for one of lighter weight, ‘the binder was cotton instead of wool, and the frocks cotton, linen or muslin.’ The same clothes were never worn both morning and afternoon and a further complete change was required before the youngsters went downstairs for the ‘children’s hour.'”
These fabulous Thespians have brought us hours of viewing fun in Austen-inspired films. 
rtrayed Colonel Brandon in 1995’s Sense and Sensibility (21 February 1946 – 14 January 2016)
trayed Mr Weston in 2009’s Emma
28 February
“Whipping Boy”
“Not Worth a Hill of Beans”
“Cutting Off One’s Nose to Spite His Face”
Today marks the 204th Anniversary of the release of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, and in my humble opinion, the world is a better place for having read Austen’s most popular work. 
Pre-Elizabethan drama moved from miracle plays to morality plays to folk plays to interludes. Interludes were the last to develop. Initially, “interludes” were closed identified with morality plays, especially in subject matter. 
Interludes were performed at colleges or at the homes of the wealthy. They were often staged between the courses of a supper. The dialogue was very lively and contemporary (politics, new scientific discoveries, the secular elements of religion, etc.). Interludes spoke of the ruling group, changing from emphasis on Protestants to Catholics, and back again. Sometimes they went so far as to “attack” a person or a cause. They might, for example, defend a personage. In John Skelton’s Magnificence, the plot satirized Thomas Wolsey, a cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church. 
Every Woman Dreams... 