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Famous Impostors
''Famous Impostors'' is the last of four non-fiction books completed by Bram Stoker, the author of '' Dracula''. It features numerous historical impostors and hoaxes. The first edition was published by the Sturgis & Walton Company of New York in November 1910. The British edition was published by Sidgwick & Jackson of London, also dated 1910, but printed in the United States. Newspaper and magazine coverage implies that it was published in January 1911.. Contents Dashed (—) annotations are by Wikipedia. * Pretenders ** Perkin Warbeck ** The Hidden King — Sebastian of Portugal ** Stephan Mali — Šćepan Mali ** The False Dauphins ** Princess Olive *Practitioners of Magic ** Paracelsus ** Cagliostro ** Mesmer *The Wandering Jew *John Law *Witchcraft and Clairvoyance ** Witches ** Doctor Dee ** La Voisin ** Sir Edward Kelley ** Mother Damnable - a brewer and owner of todays The World's End, Camden. Suspected witch after her death. ** Matthew Hopkins *Arthur Orton (T ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sidgwick & Jackson
Sidgwick & Jackson is an imprint of book publishing company Pan Macmillan. Formerly it was an independent publisher; as such it was founded in Britain in 1908. Its notable early authors include poet Rupert Brooke and novelist E.M. Forster. In more recent times it helped launch the careers of Lynda La Plante, Shirley Conran and Judith Krantz. The Managing Director from 1968 to 1995 was William Armstrong; the company and Armstrong were said to have encouraged individuality and entrepreneurship among staff. Armstrong was also the father of the singer Dido. Subject interests *Commercial and popular non-fiction. *High-profile biography. *History of popular culture. *Sidgwick Military list: supported in association with the Imperial War Museum and National Army Museum The National Army Museum is the British Army's central museum. It is located in the Chelsea district of central London, adjacent to the Royal Hospital Chelsea, the home of the "Chelsea Pensioners". The museum is a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Dee
John Dee (13 July 1527 – 1608 or 1609) was an English mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, teacher, occultist, and alchemist. He was the court astronomer for, and advisor to, Elizabeth I, and spent much of his time on alchemy, divination, and Hermetic philosophy. As an antiquarian, he had one of the largest libraries in England at the time. As a political advisor, he advocated the foundation of English colonies in the New World to form a "British Empire", a term he is credited with coining. Dee eventually left Elizabeth's service and went on a quest for additional knowledge in the deeper realms of the occult and supernatural. He aligned himself with several individuals who may have been charlatans, travelled through Europe and was accused of spying for the English crown. Upon his return to England, he found his home and library vandalised. He eventually returned to the Queen's service, but was turned away when she was succeeded by James I. He died in poverty in London ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Moon Hoax
The "Great Moon Hoax", also known as the "Great Moon Hoax of 1835", was a series of six articles published in ''The Sun (New York), The Sun'', a New York newspaper, beginning on August 25, 1835, about the supposed discovery of life and even civilization on the Moon. The discoveries were falsely attributed to Sir John Herschel, one of the best-known astronomers of that time. The story was advertised on August 21, 1835, as an upcoming feature allegedly reprinted from ''Edinburgh Courant, The Edinburgh Courant''. The first in a series of six was published four days later on August 25. Article The headline read: The articles described animals on the Moon, including bison, goats, unicorns, bipedal tail-less beavers and bat-like winged humanoids ("''Vespertilio-homo''") who built temples. There were trees, oceans and beaches. These discoveries were supposedly made with "an immense telescope of an entirely new principle". "Vespertilio-homo" can be translated from Latin as man-ba ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dean Swift
Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whigs, then for the Tories), poet, and Anglican cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, hence his common sobriquet, "Dean Swift". Swift is remembered for works such as ''A Tale of a Tub'' (1704), ''An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity'' (1712), ''Gulliver's Travels'' (1726), and ''A Modest Proposal'' (1729). He is regarded by the ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' as the foremost prose satirist in the English language, and is less well known for his poetry. He originally published all of his works under pseudonyms—such as Lemuel Gulliver, Isaac Bickerstaff, M. B. Drapier—or anonymously. He was a master of two styles of satire, the Horatian and Juvenalian styles. His deadpan, ironic writing style, particularly in ''A Modest Proposal'', has led to such satire being subsequently termed "Swiftian". Biography Early life ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Mayne Young
Charles Mayne Young (10 January 1777 – 1856) was an English actor. He was born to a respected London surgeon (doctor). His first stage appearance was in Liverpool on 20 September 1798, where he played a Young Norval in Home's blank verse tragedy ''Douglas''. Young's first London appearance was in 1807, as Hamlet with his friend Charles Mathews playing Polonius. "With the decline of John Philip Kemble, and until the coming of Kean and Macready, he was the leading English tragedian". He retired in 1832 in a farewell performance playing Hamlet with, as a special honour to him, Mathews as Polonius and Macready as the Ghost. Early life Charles Mayne Young was born on 10 January 1777 in Fenchurch Street. He was educated at Eton and Merchant Taylors'. Worked in a merchants' house, Longman & Co. Career Following his first performance in Liverpool on 20 September 1798, one review stated, 'A young man (whose name we understand is Green oung appeared for the first time in public ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Berners Street Hoax
The Berners Street hoax was perpetrated by Theodore Hook in Westminster, London, England, in 1809. Hook had made a bet with his friend Samuel Beazley that he could transform any house in London into the most talked-about address in a week, which he achieved by sending out thousands of letters in the name of Mrs Tottenham, who lived at 54 Berners Street, requesting deliveries, visitors, and assistance. History On Monday, 27 November, at five o'clock in the morning, a sweep arrived to sweep the chimneys of Mrs Tottenham's house. The maid who answered the door informed him that no sweep had been requested, and that his services were not required. A few moments later, another sweep presented himself, then another, and another; twelve in all. After the last of the sweeps had been sent away, a fleet of carts carrying large deliveries of coal began to arrive, followed by a series of cakemakers delivering large wedding cakes, then doctors, lawyers, vicars and priests summoned to minis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mary East
James How, born Mary East (approx. 1716 – 8 June 1780), was an English tavern owner best known for Female husband, living as a married man (despite being born female) from 1732 until 1766, when legal action against an extortionist forced a permanent return to female presentation. How's story was the subject of contemporary newspaper articles, a section in Bram Stoker's ''Famous Imposters'', a song in R.M. Anderson's ''Songs From The Howling Sea'', and a painting in Ria Brodell's ''Butch Heroes'' series. Their gender identity and Human sexuality, sexuality remain ambiguous, with early sources presenting How as a cross-dressing but fundamentally Heteronormativity, heteronormative Cisgender, cis-woman and later sources interpreting them as a Transgender, trans man, Gender variance, gender-nonconforming, and/or sexually non-normative. Early and Married Life Little is known about How's life before the age of sixteen, when they took on a male identity and the name "James How" in o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Maupin
Julie d'Aubigny (; 1673–1707), better known as Mademoiselle Maupin or La Maupin, was a French opera singer. Little is known for certain about her life; her tumultuous career and flamboyant lifestyle were the subject of gossip, rumour, and colourful stories in her own time, and inspired numerous fictional and semi-fictional portrayals afterwards. Her life loosely inspired the titular character of Théophile Gautier's 1835 novel, ''Mademoiselle de Maupin,'' in which she employs multiple disguises to seduce a young man and his mistress. Due to her relationships with men and women, some modern-day sources refer to d'Aubigny as bisexual and/or queer. Early life Julie d'Aubigny was born in 1673 pp. 350-352 archive.org/ref> to Gaston d'Aubigny, a secretary to Louis de Lorraine-Guise, comte d'Armagnac, the Master of the Horse for King Louis XIV. Her father, who trained the court pages, took care of her education teaching her academic subjects of the type given to boys but also tr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hannah Snell
Hannah Snell (23 April 1723 – 8 February 1792) was a British woman who disguised herself as a man and became a soldier. Hannah Snell was mentioned in James Woodforde's diary entry of 21 May 1778 selling buttons, garters, and laces. Biography Hannah Snell was born in Worcester, England on 23 April 1723. She was the youngest daughter of her family, with five sisters and three brothers. Locals claim that she played a soldier even as a child. In 1740, after the death of her parents, she moved to London to live with her sister. She married James Summes, a Dutch seaman, on 18 January 1744. Towards the end of Snell's pregnancy with their daughter, her husband abandoned her, leaving her in debt. Her daughter, Susannah, died a year later. Snell borrowed a man's suit from her brother-in-law James Gray, assumed his name, and began to search for Summes. She later learned that her husband had been executed for murder. According to her account, following the death of her daughter, on 23 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
History Of Cross-dressing
This article details the history of cross-dressing, the act of wearing the clothes of the sex or gender one does not identify with. Background Patriarchy is a social system in which men hold the primary power over women and their families in regards to the tradition, law, division of labor, and education women can take part in. Women used cross-dressing to pass as men in order to live adventurous lives outside of the home, which were unlikely to occur while living as women. Women who engaged in cross-dressing in earlier centuries were lower-class women who would gain access to economic independence as well as freedom to travel, without much risk of losing what they had. The practice of women dressing as men was generally viewed more positively as compared to men dressing as women. Altenburger states that female-to-male cross-dressing entailed a movement forward in terms of social status, power, and freedom whereas men who cross-dressed were ridiculed or otherwise viewed negativ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arthur Orton
Arthur Orton (20 March 1834 – 1 April 1898) was an English man who has generally been identified by legal historians and commentators as the "Tichborne Claimant", who in two celebrated court cases both fascinated and shocked Victorian society in the 1860s and 1870s. The son of a London butcher, Orton went to sea as a boy, spent a year in Chile, and worked as a butcher and stockman for squatters in Australia in the middle-to-late 1850s. In 1866 Thomas Castro, a butcher from Wagga Wagga in Australia, claimed to be Roger Tichborne, the heir to the Tichborne estates and baronetcy who had been declared lost at sea in 1854. During the protracted court proceedings that followed Castro's claim, evidence was produced that Castro might in fact be Arthur Orton, attempting to secure the Tichborne fortunes by imposture. The verdict of the jury in ''Regina versus Castro'' (1873–74) was that Castro was not Roger Tichborne, and that he was Arthur Orton. He was sentenced to fourteen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Matthew Hopkins
Matthew Hopkins ( 1620 – 12 August 1647) was an English witch-hunter whose career flourished during the English Civil War. He claimed to hold the office of Witchfinder General, although that title was never bestowed by Parliament, and was mainly active in East Anglia. The son of a Puritan minister, Hopkins' career as a witch-finder began in March 1644 and lasted until his retirement in 1647. He and his associates were responsible for more people being hanged for witchcraft than in the previous 100 years, and were solely responsible for the increase in witch trials during those years. He is believed to have been responsible for the executions of over 100 alleged witches between the years 1644 and 1646. Hopkins and his colleague John Stearne sent more accused people to the gallows than all the other witch-hunters in England of the previous 160 years. Early life Little is known of Matthew Hopkins before 1644, and there are no surviving contemporary documents con ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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