The Merry Gang was a group of aristocrats associated with the court of Charles II of England during the Stuart Restoration of 1660. The gang was centred on John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester , who stated their aim was to restore the idea of masculinity that had prevailed at the time of Henry II ( r. 1154–1189 ). They were also patrons of the arts, supporting the poet John Dryden and the dramatist Nathaniel Lee .
51-547: The gang advocated libertinism , drank copiously, and engaged in acts that outraged public decency, including violence towards women. Members of the gang fought with constables and watchmen and were involved in a number of killings. Charles II was indulgent towards the gang, forgiving some of their crimes. The influence of the Merry Gang declined after the 1670s, with new ideals of masculinity calling for better behaviour. The gang were known by various names; they were dubbed
102-531: A few Lollards held libertine views such as that adultery and fornication were not sin, or that "whoever died in faith would be saved irrespective of his way of life". During the 18th and 19th centuries, the term became more associated with debauchery. Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand wrote that Joseph Bonaparte "sought only life's pleasures and easy access to libertinism" while on the throne of Naples. Les Liaisons dangereuses ( Dangerous Liaisons , 1782), an epistolary novel by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos ,
153-468: A duel over the affair. Buckingham mortally wounded the Earl and afterwards took the countess into his home, sending his own wife to live with her father. Around this time Killigrew circulated a falsified paper purporting to be from the countess and testifying to his virility. Charles II pardoned Buckingham over the killing of Shrewsbury. In 1671, a Thomas Muddyman reported to Rochester that Savile had broken into
204-408: A giant candelabrum with tiered, branching arms ending in crystal globes", which showed not only the hours of the day but "many things also belonging to geography, astrology, and astronomy, by the sun's shadow made visible to the eye." The King was fascinated by astronomy; his personal association with the science was illustrated by the fact that the sundial was not only his personal pride and joy but
255-541: A maze of "fifty narrow passages, formed by sheds, blank walls, the residences of the nobility, and the workshops of the tradesmen." A house in Privy Gardens was occupied by Margaret, Dowager Duchess of Portland . She died on 17 February 1785. Upon her death the contents of the Portland Museum were sold off starting on 24 April 1786 and continued over a 37 day period. This museum is not to be confused with
306-523: A new King's Sun Dial was erected for Charles II, designed by Father Francis Hall , a Jesuit priest. It was an extremely elaborate construction that Hall detailed in a book, Explication of the Diall , that he published in 1673 to explain how it operated. It stood 3 metres (9.8 ft) high and was constructed of stone, brass and wood, with gilded ironwork and painted glass panels to accompany its 270 component dials. It resembled "a fountain of glass spheres, or
357-399: A new standard for masculinity became defined by better manners. Libertinism A libertine is a person questioning and challenging most moral principles, such as responsibility or sexual restraints, and will often declare these traits as unnecessary or undesirable or evil. A libertine is especially someone who ignores or even spurns accepted morals and forms of behaviour observed by
408-560: A privy, or private, garden that was located behind what is now the Banqueting House . An orchard, which was part of the estate, adjoined it to the south. When Henry VIII seized York Place, he bought more land to the south of the orchard to expand the estate. The old privy garden was cobbled over and later became known as the Pebble Court, while the orchard was converted into a new and much larger Privy Garden, known at first as
459-555: A row of townhouses, some of which were occupied by prime ministers seeking homes near the government buildings nearby. The last remnants of the Privy Garden were destroyed in 1938 during the construction of government offices on the site of the present Ministry of Defence Main Building . The Privy Garden originated in the 16th century as part of the estate of York Place; Cardinal Wolsey 's London residence. The estate already had
510-636: A short interruption during the Glorious Revolution ). It now occupies a spot in Trafalgar Square outside the National Gallery . A large sundial, set up on the orders of James I , stood in the middle of the garden from 1624. The dial was designed by Edmund Gunter , professor of astronomy at Gresham College . It consisted of a large stone pedestal with four dials at the four corners and "the great horizontal concave" in
561-458: Is a trenchant description of sexual libertinism. Wayland Young argues: "... the mere analysis of libertinism ... carried out by a novelist with such a prodigious command of his medium ... was enough to condemn it and play a large part in its destruction." Agreeable to Calvin's emphasis on the need for uniformity of discipline in Geneva, Samuel Rutherford (Professor of Divinity in
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#1732797750787612-422: Is based to some extent on Boileau 's version of Juvenal 's eighth or fifteenth satire, and is also indebted to Hobbes, Montaigne , Lucretius , and Epicurus , as well as the general libertine tradition. Confusion has arisen in its interpretation as it is ambiguous as to whether the speaker is Rochester himself, or a satirised persona. It criticises the vanities and corruptions of the statesmen and politicians of
663-634: Is much evil in it, for whilst the crosses and altars of the idols remained untaken away in Jerusalem, the wrath of God continued against Israel." One man took more direct action; it was recorded in 1659 that "about this time there was a cook that lived by the Palace Gate, Westminster, that in Sermon time went into Whitehall Garden, and with him carried a smith's great hammer; he broke there those goodly statue of brass and marble, which report said they were
714-568: The Marquis de Sade . The word libertine was originally coined by John Calvin to negatively describe opponents of his policies in Geneva , Switzerland. The group, led by Ami Perrin , argued against Calvin's "insistence that church discipline should be enforced uniformly against all members of Genevan society". Perrin and his allies were elected to the town council in 1548, and "broadened their support base in Geneva by stirring up resentment among
765-459: The Palace of Whitehall was almost totally destroyed by fire in 1698. From the start of the 18th century onwards, the garden went through major changes as it fell into neglect. It was painted in 1747 by Canaletto during a period of transition, as Westminster was being transformed by the construction of new buildings and roads. By the start of the 19th century it had been redeveloped as the site for
816-665: The "great garden". At the time, Westminster was not heavily built up as it is now, and York Place – later renamed Whitehall Palace – lay within a suburban area dominated by parks and gardens. St. James's Park , across the other side of Whitehall, was a royal hunting ground. Henry's garden was very ornately decorated, as 16th-century visitors noted. The Spanish 3rd Duke of Nájera wrote of a visit in 1544 in which he saw "a very pleasant garden with great walks and avenues in all directions, containing many sculptures of men and women, children and birds and monsters, and other strange figures in low and high relief." Von Wedel recorded in 1584 that in
867-464: The 1650s but became the target of Puritan zealotry during the Interregnum, due to the perception that they were biblically prohibited "graven images". A woman named Mary Netherway wrote to Oliver Cromwell to demand that they be taken down, demanding that he "demolish those monsters which are set up as ornaments in [the] privy garden, for whilst they stand, though you see no evil in them, yet there
918-820: The Merry Gang by the contemporary poet Andrew Marvell , politician Samuel Pepys called them the "counsellors of pleasure" and the Lord Chancellor Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon called them the "men of mirth". Historian J. H. Wilson, writing in 1967, called them the "Court Wits". The leader of the gang, John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, referred to its members as "Rake-Hells". Other members included George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham , Richard Vaughan, 2nd Earl of Carbery , Charles Sackville, Lord Buckhurst , Sir George Etherege , Sir Charles Sedley, 5th Baronet , Sir Fleetwood Sheppard , Henry Guy , Henry Killigrew , Henry Savile , and William Wycherley , as well as many leading literary figures of
969-571: The Palace of Whitehall 51°30′14″N 0°07′30″W / 51.503841°N 0.124894°W / 51.503841; -0.124894 The Privy Garden of the Palace of Whitehall was a large enclosed space in Westminster , London , that was originally a pleasure garden used by the late Tudor and Stuart monarchs of England. It was created under Henry VIII and was expanded and improved under his successors, but lost its royal patronage after
1020-693: The Privy Garden became the site of a new street. In 1808 a row of houses called Whitehall Gardens was constructed on the site. Behind each house, long grassy gardens planted with rows of trees led directly down to the river, until they were cut off by the construction of the Victoria Embankment along the river bank between 1865 and 1870. Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli lived in one of the houses between 1873 and 1875, while Sir Robert Peel lived in another (and died there in 1850 after falling from his horse on Constitution Hill ). The trees outside
1071-555: The Privy Garden behind walls and buildings on all sides. A high wall to the west separated it from The Street, the main thoroughfare at the south end of Whitehall that bisected the palace in a north-south direction. To the north, a range of buildings occupied by high-ranking courtiers separated it from the Pebble Court that lay behind the Banqueting House, while to the east the Stone Gallery and state apartments, used by
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#17327977507871122-761: The Quintessence of Debauchery , 1684). Other famous titles are Histoire de Dom Bougre, Portier des Chartreux (1741) and Thérèse Philosophe (1748). Precursors to the libertine writers were Théophile de Viau (1590–1626) and Charles de Saint-Evremond (1610–1703), who were inspired by Epicurus and the publication of Petronius . Robert Darnton is a cultural historian who has covered this genre extensively. A three-part essay in The Book Collector by David Foxen explores libertine literature in England, 1660-1745. Critics have been divided as to
1173-671: The Restoration. A terrace also separated the Privy Garden from the Bowling Green, but this was removed in 1673–4 and part of the Bowling Green was added to the garden. The Privy Garden was originally created as a private royal pleasure garden and continued to serve a similar purpose during the Interregnum (1649–1660) , when the English Council of State put considerable effort and money into repairing and improving
1224-544: The University of St. Andrews, and Christian minister in 17th-century Scotland) offered a rigorous treatment of "Libertinism" in his polemical work "A Free Disputation Against Pretended Liberty of Conscience" (1649). A Satyr Against Reason and Mankind is a poem by John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester which addresses the question of the proper use of reason , and is generally assumed to be a Hobbesian critique of rationalism . The narrator subordinates reason to sense. It
1275-400: The arts. The poet John Dryden benefitted from their patronage and the dramatist Nathaniel Lee was an associate. The latter drank often with gang members and spent five years in a mental asylum because of the effects of his alcohol consumption. The activities of the Merry Gang often featured in anti-Stuart propaganda. The influence of the gang and other rakes at court declined after the 1670s as
1326-634: The balcony of a pub in Covent Garden , where the former mimed lewd acts, blasphemed , and drank a toast to the king with wine in which he had washed his genitalia. An enraged mob unsuccessfully attempted to break into the pub to apprehend the men. Sedley was afterwards fined £500 but, remaining on good terms with Charles II, apparently escaped having to pay it. In 1666, Buckingham became a lover of Anna Talbot, Countess of Shrewsbury (she had earlier been involved with Killigrew). Two years later, Buckingham fought Francis Talbot, 11th Earl of Shrewsbury in
1377-539: The bedroom of "Lady Northumberland" (presumably Elizabeth Percy, Countess of Northumberland whose husband Josceline Percy, 11th Earl of Northumberland had died in 1670) with the intention of raping her. In 1675, members of the gang, including Buckhurst, Savile, Rochester, and Sheppard, destroyed a valuable pyramidical glass sundial in the Privy Garden of the Palace of Whitehall . Rochester was heard to exclaim "what does thou stand here to fuck time!" before destroying
1428-523: The centre, with east, west, north and south dials at the sides. It was subsequently vandalised, allegedly by an intoxicated courtier, and fell into ruin in Charles II's reign. Andrew Marvell lamented that This place for a dial was too insecure Since a guard and a garden could not it defend; For so near to the Court they will never endure Any witness to show how their time they misspend. In 1669
1479-784: The court of Charles II. The libertine novel was a primarily 18th-century literary genre of which the roots lay in the European but mainly French libertine tradition. The genre effectively ended with the French Revolution . Themes of libertine novels were anti-clericalism , anti-establishment and eroticism . Authors include Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon ( Les Égarements du cœur et de l'esprit , 1736; Le Sopha, conte moral , 1742), Denis Diderot ( Les bijoux indiscrets , 1748), Marquis de Sade ( L'Histoire de Juliette , 1797–1801), Choderlos de Laclos ( Les Liaisons dangereuses , 1782), and John Wilmot ( Sodom, or
1530-592: The current Portland Museum, Dorset , this one was in Bulstrode Park and featured the art collection of the Duke and Duchess. The auction was conducted by Mr Skinner and Co, of Aldersgate Street. Lot number 4155 was the Portland Vase . The area was ripe for redevelopment by the landholding elite, who wished to have suitably grand townhouses to occupy while attending Parliament and the court. The vestiges of
1581-580: The demise of the Privy Gallery, the Privy Garden was extended north to include the Pebble Court behind the Banqueting House. The garden remained in Crown ownership but it became neglected and filthy with the departure of the monarchy from Whitehall. In 1733 the Duke of Richmond and other residents of the surviving properties adjoining the garden petitioned that they be allowed to lease the "void ground" of
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1632-535: The front entrance to Whitehall Gardens were the last survivors of the original Privy Garden, and stood until as recently as the late 1930s. Among the houses in Whitehall Gardens were Montagu House and Pembroke House , a Palladian riverside villa with elaborate interiors. The houses were demolished along with the rest of Whitehall Gardens in 1938, in what the architectural historian John Harris described as "a monstrous act of vandalism", to make way for
1683-453: The gang asserted the right to behave as they pleased and their antics were intended to draw the attention and amusement of the king. Rochester claimed his aim was to halt "the strange decay of manly parts since the days of dear Harry the Second ( r. 1154–1189 )". The gang engaged in acts that were loud, outraged public decency and often included violence against women. When Rochester
1734-433: The garden were "thirty-four high columns, covered with various fine paintings; also different animals carved in wood, with their horns gilt, are set on the top of the columns, together with flags bearing the queen's arms. In the middle of the garden is a nice fountain with a remarkable sun-dial, showing the time in thirty different ways. Between the spaces that are planted in the garden there are fine walks grown with grass, and
1785-409: The garden. Parliament Street was driven through the western side of the garden in 1750 to connect Whitehall to the Palace of Westminster . At the start of the 19th century the garden's "decayed wall, long fringed by pamphlets, ballads, and ragged advertisements" was removed and replaced by an iron railing and newly planted trees. Its north side remained "most confused and unpleasant", terminating in
1836-630: The garden. The Crown agreed, and in 1734 most of the garden was leased to the Dukes of Richmond and Montagu , the Earl of Loudon and Sir Conyers Darcy . When Canaletto painted a view of the garden looking north from the Duke of Richmond's dining room in Richmond House in 1747, it was a last view of a prospect that was soon to disappear with the demolition of the old palace's Holbein Gate adjoining
1887-475: The garden. They appear to have reserved it exclusively for their own use, with their own individual keys for access. By Samuel Pepys ' time, after the Stuart Restoration , it had become "a through-passage, and common." The wall that enclosed the garden was often used by ballad-sellers to display their wares to passers-by, and courtiers used it to air their laundry. Pepys recorded his titillation at
1938-938: The imagination of the essayist William Hazlitt, a man who lodged near Covent Garden during the 1820s, where he became unpleasantly intimate with the social consequences of unconventional sexual obsession that he revealed in his Liber Amoris of 1823, in which he candidly confessed to his infatuation with his landlord's young daughter." During the Baroque era in France, there existed a freethinking circle of philosophers and intellectuals who were collectively known as libertinage érudit and which included Gabriel Naudé , Élie Diodati and François de La Mothe Le Vayer . The critic Vivian de Sola Pinto linked John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester 's libertinism to Hobbesian materialism . Some notable libertines include: Privy Garden of
1989-550: The king's closest courtiers, blocked it off from the River Thames . The royal apartments were off the Stone Gallery and had a view of the Privy Garden, with a screen in place to prevent passers-by from seeing the naked king in his 7 by 7 feet (2.1 by 2.1 m) bathtub. A row of trees on the south side screened it from the Bowling Green, which had been an orchard in Henry VIII's time but was converted for leisure use after
2040-437: The king's fury. The fate of the ruined dial is unknown; it was last recorded standing at Buckingham House (later Buckingham Palace ) in 1710. After the destruction by fire of the Palace of Whitehall in 1698, the surroundings of the Privy Garden changed dramatically. Most of the palace buildings had been burned down in the 1698 fire; others were torn down as the last vestiges of the old Tudor and Stuart Palace were removed. With
2091-538: The larger society. The values and practices of libertines are known collectively as libertinism or libertinage and are described as an extreme form of hedonism or liberalism . Libertines put value on physical pleasures, meaning those experienced through the senses. As a philosophy, libertinism gained new-found adherents in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, particularly in France and Great Britain . Notable among these were John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester , and
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2142-411: The literary merits of William Hazlitt 's Liber Amoris , a deeply personal account of frustrated love that is quite unlike anything else Hazlitt ever wrote. Wardle suggests that it was compelling but marred by sickly sentimentality, and also proposes that Hazlitt might even have been anticipating some of the experiments in chronology made by later novelists. One or two positive reviews appeared, such as
2193-468: The neatest made and the best workmanship in Europe, in half an hour's time [he] did above £500 worth of hurt." The statues were eventually taken down when Charles II came to the throne and were either repaired or replaced. The bronze statue of James II by Peter van Dievoet , depicting the king wearing the robes of a Roman emperor, stood just outside the garden in the Pebble Court from 1686 to 1898 (with
2244-585: The older inhabitants against the increasing number of religious refugees who were fleeing France in even greater numbers". By 1555, Calvinists were firmly in place on the Genevan town council, so the Libertines, led by Perrin, responded with an "attempted coup against the government and called for the massacre of the French. This was the last great political challenge Calvin had to face in Geneva". In England,
2295-685: The one in the Globe , 7 June 1823: "The Liber Amoris is unique in the English language; and as, possibly, the first book in its fervour, its vehemency, and its careless exposure of passion and weakness—of sentiments and sensations which the common race of mankind seek most studiously to mystify or conceal—that exhibits a portion of the most distinguishing characteristics of Rousseau, it ought to be generally praised". Dan Cruickshank in his book London's Sinful Secret summarized Hazlitt's infatuation stating: "Decades after her death Batsy (Careless) still haunted
2346-480: The period. Historian Christopher Tilmouth, in his book Passion's Triumph over Reason (2010), named James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth and John Sheffield, Earl of Mulgrave , not as members of the set but instead behaving in a similar manner to it. Buckhurst in particular enjoyed royal favour: his grandmother had been governess to Charles II and the king rewarded the family with numerous titles and land holdings. The Merry Gang were advocates of libertinism. Members of
2397-665: The piece with Sheppard. In 1676, Rochester and Etherege were involved in a brawl with the watch in Epsom that left a Captain Downs dead. At different times, Sedley and Buckhurst both paid Nell Gwyn , long-time mistress of the king, £100 a year to live with them; she also spent a period living with Rochester. Gwyn's 1679 funeral was attended by all of the gang. Despite their reputation for sexual liberalism, scandals were rare and Rochester and Savile were notable for withdrawing from court when scandal did occur. The gang were sometime patrons of
2448-495: The sight of the underwear of Charles II 's mistress, Lady Castlemaine , hanging out to dry in the Privy Garden. A century later, James Boswell wrote in his diary that he had taken a prostitute into the garden and "indulged sensuality", but he was shocked to find when he got home that she had stolen his handkerchief. For a time, each of the grass squares in the garden had a statue in its centre, standing on its own pedestal. They were probably moved there from St James's Palace in
2499-409: The spaces are planted very artistically, surrounded by plants in the shape of seats." The earliest surviving depiction of the garden, from 1670, shows a very different layout. By this time the garden had been redesigned in a grid pattern with sixteen squares of grass separated by paths. The relentless expansion of the Palace of Whitehall, which was by now a sprawling jumble of structures, had hemmed in
2550-571: Was also designed to serve as a symbol of the Stuart family. It had glass portraits mounted on it, depicting Charles, Queen Catherine , the Duke of York, the Queen Mother and Prince Rupert . A watchman was posted to guard it against the kind of vandalism that had wrecked the earlier sundial, but in June 1675 it was severely damaged when it was attacked by John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester , much to
2601-510: Was out of the country in February 1662, Buckhurst and his brother were imprisoned for the killing and robbing of a tanner in London. The two men claimed to have killed the tanner by mistake whilst chasing a thief, and were pardoned by Charles II in June. The Merry Gang often breached the peace in the streets and engaged in fights with constables. In 1663, Sedley and Buckhurst appeared naked on
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