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Passage Illustrated: The Great Kitchen

Addressing himself to a stout-built yeoman of the guard, who was standing within the doorway, Nicholas Clamp demanded admittance to the kitchen, and the man having detained them for a few moments, during which he regarded Mabel with a very offensive stare, ushered them into a small hall, and from thence into a narrow passage connected with it. Lighted by narrow loopholes pierced through the walls, which were of immense thickness, this passage described the outer side of the whole upper quadrangle, and communicated with many other lateral passages and winding stairs leading to the chambers allotted to the household or to the state apartments. Tracking it for some time, Nicholas Clamp at length turned off on the right, and, crossing a sort of ante-room, led the way into a large chamber with stone walls and a coved and groined roof, lighted by a great window at the lower end. This was the royal kitchen, and in it yawned no fewer than seven huge arched fireplaces, in which fires were burning, and before which various goodly joints were being roasted, while a number of cooks and scullions were congregated round them. At a large table in the centre of the kitchen were seated some half-dozen yeomen of the guard, together with the clerk of the kitchen, the chief bargeman, and the royal cutler, or bladesmith, as he was termed. [Book Four, "Cardinal Wolsey," Chapter IV, "How Mabel was received by the party in the kitchen; and of the quarrel between the jesters," p. 191]

Commentary

This is the scene of the satirical humour contest between Patch, the sour cap-and-bells fool of Cardinal Wolsey, and saucy Will Summers, Henry VIII's wise fool. Thus, George Cruikshank in The Quarrel between Will Summers and Patch in the great kitchen of the Castle in Chapter 4 animates the bare kitchen of 1842. As opposed to Cruikshank's epic scene of complex action, Delamotte offers a tranquil and uncluttered composition. However, that the ceiling is identical in both suggests that both illustrators worked from the actual architectural setting of Windsor's interiors. Whereas Delamotte likely made his sketch in the summer months of 1842, Cruikshank must have undertaken his sketching expeditions some months later. One wonders whether he had seen Delamotte's sketch before composing The Quarrel between Will Sommers and Patch in the great kitchen of the Castle in Book IV, Chapter IV.

Cruikshank's Kitchen Confrontation (March 1843)

Above: George Cruikshank's robust realisation of the quarrel between the jesters of rival masters unfold as Mabel arrives in the Great Kitchen with Nicholas Clamp, The Quarrel between Will Summers and Patch in the great kitchen of the Castle (episode 8). [Click on image to enlarge it.]

Other Views and Related Material on Windsor Castle

• Windsor Castle from the Long Walk, Victorian additions and alterations by Sir Jeffry Wyattville
• Early twentieth-century view of the castle from the river
• The Frogmore Mausoleum, adjacent to the Long Walk
• Statue of Queen Victoria at the foot of Castle Hill, Windsor

References

Ainsworth, William Harrison. Windsor Castle. An Historical Romance. Illustrated by George Cruikshank and Tony Johannot. With designs on wood by W. Alfred Delamotte. London: Routledge, 1880. Based on the Henry Colburn edition of 1844.

Patten, Robert L. Chapter 30, "The 'Hoc' Goes Down." George Cruikshank's Life, Times, and Art, vol. 2: 1835-1878. Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers U. P., 1991; London: The Lutterworth Press, 1996. Pp. 153-186.

Worth, George J. William Harrison Ainsworth. New York: Twayne, 1972.

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Last modified 15 December 2017