Among the works dedicated to early Stuart England there are many that grow beyond the problem alluded to in their title. Professor Linda Peck's lively and meticulously researched monographs and essays are always such works. Primarily known for her studies of the early Stuart court and the Jacobean aristocracy, Peck has adhered to this subject through all of her works, commencing with her study of the earl of Northampton and finishing with her editorial masterpiece on the mental world of the Jacobean court. She has always been interested in the wide-ranging problems connected with the role of the immediate royal circle within the system of central administration in the first half of the seventeenth century, with the patron–client network, the effectiveness of the court policy of the early Stuart monarchy, and the advantages and disadvantages of involvement in the court community. The royal court in her works has always been presented as an institute of power, a centre where a specified type of culture was formed, and as a space where human fates were sealed.
From the beginning Peck's studies contributed to modern historiography with new subjects and scholarly approaches. Traditional decisions were revised with a new range of original sources introduced and interpreted by the author. Each work amplified our vision of the influence of the political culture of the Stuart court in early modern English society, as Peck has always used a complex historic and cultural analysis in her investigation of the subject.
Linda Peck's latest monograph, Consuming splendor, develops not just the range of problems considered in her previous works but also the general principles of her methodological approach. At the centre of Peck's study lies the phenomenon of luxury (extended to rarities and exotics) as it was understood and consumed by representatives of early Stuart society. The subject in itself is not new for modern historiography; many works published in the last quarter of the twentieth century are dedicated to this phenomenon. A number emphasize the court-centred nature of this phenomenon; but luxury goods were not just used for the satisfaction of the monarch's immediate circle. Generally investigations have been restricted by the limits of the epoque of the Enlightenment which emphasize fundamental changes in luxury itself and also point at the expansion of consumption, in part a result of the growing interest of a prosperous gentry and expanding trade and entrepreneurial class. New stereotypes concerning luxury are directly connected with the emergence of the new English consumer society.
Consuming splendor is different from all of these works not just because of the chronological limits but also because the author wants to present the ‘rebellious’ seventeenth century as an integral part of this process. Peck succeeds in showing both a development in the consumption of luxury goods between the Middle Ages (and even the ancient world) and early Stuart England, and new trends at the time of James I and Charles I that, in some respects, even strengthened in the years of the civil wars, republic, and protectorate. While considering succession and changes in the attitude to luxury goods and their consumption Peck always, where possible, adds to her research an analysis of the influence of these processes on the construction of the social identity of different groups in early Stuart society.
A decline in criticism, on the part of clerical moralists, of ownership of luxury goods, the creation of favourable conditions during the early Stuart monarchy for the reproduction of those same goods (by inviting foreign craftsmen to England, through the borrowing of handicraft and manufacturing technologies, and through the translation of specialist, technical, literature) and the increase in supplies from the New World and the European continent all favoured the expansion of consumption in the early seventeenth century. An expansion of the market and the constant renewal of the range and assortment of luxury items available gave an impulse to the development of a specified retail trade; the number of shops offering luxury goods and rarities for those who could afford them increased. Together with the courtiers and aristocrats, new consumers included the well-to-do gentry and merchants who tried to imitate the lifestyles of the social elite. Luxury items and rarities from the capital penetrated the English provinces, and this secondary market played an important role in the formation of yet further markets on the micro level in the English countryside, facilitating the acquisition of luxury goods by the less-wealthy in society.
Interest in luxury goods and rarities intensified the cultural contacts between the English and those who lived on the continent. European artistic tastes (especially Dutch and Italian) influenced the formation of new standards of personal appearance, as well as the interior design and decoration of the English house, where rare and luxurious items from exotic countries (including India and China) became essential. Sometimes these were even exhibited in separate rooms (Wunderkammern or studiolo). Such private collections of European fine art and objets d'art were added to by tourists on the European Grand Tour, and through the acquisition of items purchased from British merchants.
Interest in European artistic culture penetrated even the most conservative areas of early Stuart society. Peck shows how the artistic tastes of Europeans changed the attitudes of ordinary people, and of clerical authorities, to the construction of gravestones for the English nobility. Gravestones became more splendid and monumental, amplifying the perspective not just of the family vaults but also of the whole parish architectural landscape.
Throughout the nine chapters of her monograph Linda Peck creates a picturesque depiction of the changes connected with the consumption of luxury in early Stuart England. She clearly demonstrates the influence of these changes on the development of the self-consciousness of different groups within the population of the British Isles, which internalized new, mostly European, values and became less closed and more cosmopolitan. The differences in procurability and consumption of such goods not only stressed the traditional demarcation of English society but also changed English identity, especially in the forms of its visual representation. Aspects of gender demarcation and definition were no less significant.
This is a rich contribution to the history of early Stuart society, which combines precision with readability. In some chapters of her study Peck offers only partial answers to her own questions and her unwillingness to propose global readings suggests that she is very aware of the provisional nature of conclusions reached at this stage in such a pioneering study. Perhaps the most powerful thing that she offers the reader is the sense that early modern English history is still under review. Linda Peck provides us with a glimpse of the wealth of material that potentially far outgrows the problem mentioned in the title of her study, reminding us that there is still much to be explored.
