Umbrellas and their History | Page 8

the ceremonies of the Byzantine Church; they
were borne over the Host in procession, and formed part of the
Pontifical regalia.
A mediæval gem represents a bishop, attended by a cross-bearer, and a
servant who carries behind him an Umbrella.
In the Basilican churches of Rome is suspended a large Umbrella, and
the cardinal who took his title from the church has the privilege of
having an Umbrella carried over his head on solemn processions. It is
not, altogether impossible that the cardinal's hat may be derived from
this Umbrella. The origin of this custom of hanging an Umbrella in the
Basilican churches is plain enough. The judge sitting in the basilica
would have it as part of his insignia of office. On the judgment hall
being turned into a church, the Umbrella remained, and in fact occupied
the place of the canopy over thrones and the like in our own country.
Beatiano, an Italian herald, says that "a vermilion Umbrella in a field
argent symbolises dominion."
References crop up now and then throughout the middle age records, to
Umbrellas; but the extreme paucity of such allusions goes to show that
they were not in common use. In an old romance, "The Blonde of
Oxford," a jester makes fun of a nobleman for being out in the rain
without his cloak. "Were I a rich man," says he, "I would bear my
house about with me." By this very valiant joke he meant, as he
afterwards explained, that the nobleman should wear a cloak, not that

he ought not to forget his Umbrella So it is clear, we find, that our
forefathers depended on their cloaks, not on their Umbrellas, for
protection against storms.
Careful research has enabled us to light on a solitary instance of an
ancient English Umbrella, for Wright, in his "Domestic Manners of the
English," gives a drawing from the Harleian MS., No. 603, which
represents an Anglo-Saxon gentleman walking out attended by his
servant, the servant carrying an Umbrella with a handle that slopes
backwards, so as to bring the Umbrella over the head of the person in
front. It probably, therefore, could not be shut up, but otherwise it looks
like an ordinary Umbrella, and the ribs are represented distinctly.
Whether this earliest Jonas Hanway (the reputed first importer of the
Umbrella, of whom more hereafter) was peculiarly sybaritic in his
notions, or whether, like the mammoth of Siberia, he is the one
remaining instance of a former "umbrelliferous" race, must, at least for
the present, remain undecided. The general use of the Parasol in France
and England was adopted, probably from China, about the middle of
the seventeenth century. At that period, pictorial representations of it
are frequently found, some of which exhibit the peculiar broad and
deep canopy belonging to the large Parasol of the Chinese Government
officials, borne by native attendants.
John Evelyn, in his Diary for the 22nd June, 1664, mentions a
collection of rarities shown him by one Thompson, a Catholic priest,
sent by the Jesuits of Japan and China to France. Among the curiosities
were "fans like those our ladies use, but much larger, and with long
handles, strangely carved and filled with Chinese characters," which is
evidently a description of the Parasol.
In the title-page of Evelyn's "Kalendarium Hortense," also published in
the same year, we find a black page represented, bearing a closed
Umbrella or Sunshade. It is again evident that the Parasol was more an
article of curiosity than use at this period, from the fact that it is
mentioned as such in the catalogue of the "_Museum Tradescantium_,
or Collection of Rarities, preserved at South Lambeth, by London, by
John Tradescant."

In Coryat's "Crudities," a very rare and highly interesting work,
published in 1611, about a century and a half prior to the general
introduction of the Umbrella into England, we find the following
curious passage:--
After talking of fans he goes on to say, "And many of them doe carry
other fine things of a far greater price, that will cost at the least a duckat,
which they commonly call in the Italian tongue umbrellas, that is,
things which minister shadow veto them for shelter against the
scorching heate of the sunne. These are made of leather, something
answerable to the forme of a little cannopy, & hooped in the inside with
divers little wooden hoopes that extend the umbrella in a pretty large
cornpasse. They are used especially by horsemen, who carry them in
their hands when they ride, fastening the end of the handle upon one of
their thighs, and they impart so large a shadow unto them, that it
keepeth the heate of the sunne from the upper parts of their bodies."
Reference to the same custom, of riders in Italy using