umi-umd-3911

371 Pages·2006·1.05 MB·English

ABSTRACT

Title of Dissertation: THE GOLDEN CHAIN: ROYAL SLAVERY,
SOVEREIGNTY AND SERVITUDE IN EARLY
MODERN ENGLISH LITERATURE, 1550-1688

A.R. Bossert III, Doctor of Philosophy 2006

Dissertation directed by: Professor Theodore B. Leinwand, Department of English

Enchained kings, enthroned slaves, and enthralled subjects—these are the emblems of
royal slavery abounding in early modern English literature. They express concerns over
national identity and monarch-subject relationships, and they arise in debates regarding
absolutism, constitutionalism, and imperialism between the years 1550 and 1688. Thus,
my dissertation performs close readings of rhetorical tropes relating to two early modern
debates: monarchy’s function and servitude’s nature. This research synthesizes work by
David Norbrook, Rebecca Bushnell, and Constance Jordan regarding the influence of
domestic politics on English literature with studies by Kim Hall, Ania Loomba, and Nabil
Matar on English imperialism.
The introduction explores early modern depictions of Moses, whose self-denial
advances nation-building. Three types of royal slavery emerge: 1) a slave who becomes a
prince, 2) a slave who becomes a prince’s property, or 3) a prince who becomes a slave.
Moses experiences all three types, and serves as a model for other royal slaves and
English leaders.
Chapter One examines enslavement to monarchs. Political rebels and love slaves in
Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra, accounts of Hercules, and the Fairie Queene
describe slavery to excuse disloyalty. However, these examples also blame subjects for
enslaving themselves.
Chapter Two shows how images of enslaved kings appeal to pathos. Sympathetic
royal slaves appear in Guevara’s Diall of Princes, Owen Feltham’s Resolves, and
Marlowe’s Tamburlaine. Shakespeare’s plays problematize sympathetic royal slave
rhetoric, while The Rape of Lucrece’s royal slave images question the poem’s
republicanism. Hutchinson’s Order and Disorder uses royal slave figures as anti-
monarchical invectives.
Chapter Three discusses slaves who become rulers who learn that true restoration is
impossible. In Milton’s Paradise Lost, the devils’ utopia masks their vulnerability;
Scudery’s Briseis in Several witty discourses depicts an enslaved princess’s false
restoration. However, Scudery’s Cariclia and Cartwright’s protagonist in The Royal Slave
suggest that patience yields rewards surpassing one’s original state.
My conclusion argues that the slave revolt in Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko fails because,
like the English themselves, the slaves have a fractured national identity. Without
commonwealth, the slaves surrender to private interests. Thus, Behn comments directly
on colonial practice and metaphorically on English politics.
The Golden Chain:
Royal Slavery, Sovereignty and Servitude in Early Modern English Literature, 1550-1688

by

A.R. Bossert III

Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the
University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the degree of
Ph.D.
2006

Advisory Committee

Professor Theodore Leinwand, Chair
Professor Ralph Bauer
Professor Vincent Carretta
Professor Donna Hamilton
Professor Heather Nathans (Dean’s Representative)
Copyright by
A.R. Bossert III
2006
i

Because he that is mightie hath done great things to me: and holy is his name.
And in his mercie from generatio[n] vnto generatio[n]s, to them that feare him.
He hath shevved might in his arme: he hath dispersed the proude in the conceit of
their hart.
He hath deposed the mightie fro[m] their seate, & hath exalted the hu[m]ble.
The hungrie he hath filled vvith good things: and the rich he hath sent avvay
emptie.
He hath receiued Israel his childe, being mindeful of his mercie,
As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham and his seede for euer.

Luke 1.49-55, Douai Bible (1600)
ii
Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Theodore B. Leinwand, who shouldered the Atlantean burden of
directing this seemingly all-encompassing dissertation. His honest and direct guidance on
argumentation and prose was galvanizing and crucial to the endeavor. Furthermore, I
offer my gratitude for his willingness to accept the mantle of director under highly
unusual circumstances. I would also like to thank Ralph Bauer for enduring early draft
chapters and for his assistance in focusing my analysis, Vincent Carretta and Donna B.
Hamilton for their time and questions, and Heather Nathans for her thoroughly engaged
responses and questions that went beyond the requirements of a Dean’s representative. I
extend thanks to William H. Sherman for his help at the beginning of the dissertation
process. I also am grateful for the University of Maryland’s Dean’s Dissertation
Fellowship, which enabled me to complete the dissertation before the age of retirement,
and to the Graduate English directors Bob Levine and Theresa Coletti for their warm and
unwavering support.

Appreciation also goes to Meg Pearson, as well as Brandi Adams, Erin Sadlack, and
Stephanie Fitz, for serving as an audience from even the most primordial stages of the
dissertation’s evolution. And I would be remiss not to acknowledge Manju Suri of the
Graduate English Office. Not a single Ph.D. candidate can hope to pass through the
labyrinthine bureaucracy of graduate school without her patience and diligence. I also
recall the late Tom Engram, whose indispensable service to the Freshman Writing Office
made the burdens of graduate teaching lighter for us all.

Of course, my appreciation extends beyond the hallowed halls of academia. Anything I
have achieved would have been impossible without the inestimable aid from my parents,
whose generosity far surpassed any filial obligation. I thank my grandmothers, who
frequently sent word and care from the homefront. And I express heartfelt appreciation to
Melissa, Michael, and Emma Prushan for their encouragement these years.

The surrogate family I formed at University of Maryland’s Catholic Student Center
provided whatever I found missing in my distance from home. I am forever obliged to Fr.
Bill Byrne, for his friendship and spiritual guidance (as well as his bravery in teaching me
to drive). I also recognize Fr. Gareth Jones, whose refined wit and intellectual strength
has served as model in these years. I thank my friends Brian, Mary Claire, Matt, and Alex
for their camaraderie (and especially for their understanding as I spoke in wild academic
tongues for ceaseless hours). And I thank Dr. Alfred C. Boyd of the University of
Maryland Chemistry Department for making sure that I remembered that art was meant
to entertain and instruct rather than merely function as an intellectual plunder.

And, finally, I thank Kate, my faithful companion, my stalwart comrade-at-arms, and my
dearest friend. You’ve quenched fires, diverted deluges, and calmed tempests.

Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I
Thank you: and sure, dear friends, my thanks are
Too dear a halfpenny.
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Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION: MOSES, THE ARCHETYPAL ROYAL SLAVE
(cid:1) The Golden Chain and the Royal Slave
(cid:1) Moses as the King’s Slave: Identifying Nations, Identifying Slaves
(cid:1) Moses as Enslaved Royalty: Divided Selves and Self-Denial
(cid:1) Moses as Enthroned Slave: A Brief Survey of Moses and Aaron Books
(cid:1) Moses as Political Metaphor: Charles I, Cromwell, and Charles II as Mosaic
Leaders
(cid:1) Royal Slavery in Early Modern English Literature
CHAPTER ONE: THE KING’S SLAVES: REBELS AND LOVERS
(cid:1) Chapter Introduction and Overview
(cid:1) The Myth of the Freeborn Englishman
(cid:1) Caesar’s Rebels: Self-enslavement to the Straw Man Tyrant
(cid:1) Antony and Cleopatra: Love Politics and Political Love: Fear and Loving in
Egypt
(cid:1) Hercules and Omphale: Slaves Dressed as Queens, Queens Dressed as Slaves
(cid:1) Love Slavery without Love Is Tyranny
(cid:1) Spenser: Who is more Tyrannical: The Over-stepping Judge or the Legalistic
Queen?
(cid:1) The Straw Woman: Perpetuating Royal Slavery by Misrepresenting the Queen
iv
CHAPTER TWO: ENSLAVED KINGS
(cid:1) Guevara, Feltham, and Distressed Kings
(cid:1) Marlowe and the Sympathetic Tyrants
(cid:1) Shakespeare and the Pathos of Royal Slavery
(cid:1) To Pity and to Shame: Royal Slavery in The Rape of Lucrece
(cid:1) From Pity to Shame: Political Application in Seventeenth-Century Handbooks
(cid:1) Lucy Hutchinson and the Curse of Kingship
CHAPTER THREE: ENTHRONED SLAVES
(cid:1) Milton: Devil’s Can’t Be All Bad; Salvaging the Utopian Discourse of Hell
(cid:1) Scudery’s Ruling Slaves
o Briseis: Love’s Mastery
o Cariclia: Enslavement Makes Better Rulers
(cid:1) Cartwright: Royal Slavery and Tragi-comedy
(cid:1) The Return of the Golden Chain
CONCLUSION: OROONOKO, the Royal Slave
(cid:1) Oroonoko: The Failure to Form a Nation
(cid:1) Identifying with the Divided Self
(cid:1) The Royal Slave Paradigm
o Slaves to a King
o Enslaved Princes
o Slaves that become King
(cid:1) Coda
1
INTRODUCTION: MOSES, THE ARCHETYPAL ROYAL SLAVE

AN EXAMPLE OF ROYAL SLAVERY
In a 1590 slave narrative, Edward Webbe describes his Mandevillean travels
throughout the Mediterranean region, from plausible encounters with his Turkish captors,
to his more fantastic encounters with unicorns. After finally escaping his chains and
arriving in Italy, Webbe is beset by yet another travaile:
The report in Rume [sic], Naples, and all ouer Italy, in my trauel which was at
such time as the Spaniards came to inuade England, after I ha[d] beene released of
my imprisonment, as I passed through the streets, the people of that partes asked
mee howe I durst acknowledge myselfe to be an Englishman, and thereupon to
daunt mee, did say, that England was taken by the Spaniards, and that the Queene
of England (whome God long preserve) was taken prisoner, and was comming
towardes Rome to doe pennance... (D1r-D1v)1
The Italians harass Webbe with the cruellest of ironies. After having finally regained his
own freedom from slavery, they want him to believe Queen Elizabeth has become the
spoils of war herself. Indeed, her alleged condition is quite slavish, as Webbe goes on to
explain how her Spanish conquerors force her to march waist deep through a network of
trenches running all the way to Rome and dug especially for her (D1v). If there is any
question what will happen to her (and her subjects) once she meets the pope, the story is
preceded by a large illustration of a diminutive English subject sycophantically on his
knees before a towering bishop (E4v). Although English pride and disdain for captivity

1 See The Rare and most wonderfull things which Edw. Webbe an Englishman borne, hath seene and
passed in his troublesome trauailes, in the Cities of Ierusalem, Damasko, Bethlehem and Galely: and in the
landes of Iewrie, Egypt, Grecia, Russia, and Prester Iohn...London: 1590.
2
moves Webbe to deny the accounts, his Italians know precisely where to hit an English
subject. They assault his love of freedom and his identification with his monarch. In other
words, Webbe describes Italians directly assaulting his English national identity through
an image of a captured Queen, a figure of royal slavery. For readers in 1590, the joke is
perhaps on the Italians. The Spanish Armada has been crushed, but for those who
remember the fear of invasion, the image of Elizabeth led as a prisoner is perhaps
sobering. To transfer his own debased servitude unto his Queen is too much for Webbe to
bear or imagine (and this from a man who endured Turkish galley-slavery and believes in
unicorns). Royal slavery can thus be a pathetic appeal; it can unify and define English
national identity; and it can speak directly to hopes and fears regarding restoration.
However, to Webbes’ Italians (who no doubt share common traits with Catholic holdouts
in England), royal slavery can also express a subversive agenda against government and
rouse disdain for those who abuse or usurp power. To an English reader with Webbes’
sensibilities, Elizabeth led to Rome is tragic; to those readers who were still hoping for a
restoration of the Catholic Church, it perhaps appears like justice. Thus, Webbe’s account
sets forth many of the themes to be explored in the following. It exemplifies royal
slavery’s multivalent meanings and its relevance to English national identity.