Ne irascaris, Domine - The Viola da Gamba Society

had from the beginning of the late unhappy troubles, vigorously
and faithfully served his Majesty under the command of Ralph
lord Hopton, then of sir Jam. Smith in the quality of a major of
horse, and continued in arms until the surrender of Pendennis
Castle, from whence he went to his late majesty of blessed
memory, and afterwards followed his now majesty [Charles II.] in
Holland and Flanders; and in about the year 1650 he returned into
Cornwall, his native country, where he betook himself to the
study and practice of physic, &c. 15
The Polwheles then were of some social standing, their connections extending
to Oxford and its university,
he places where a
16 the English court, and the Inns of Court. We
have no evidence of any artistic leanings, although their status as minor
nobility was fertile ground for developing any such talent. Equally important
were the London and Oxford links, which could be just t
work like 'Polewheele's Ground' might become established.
But it would appear from the Frankfurt manuscript (D-F, Mus Hs 337) that the
ground itself was not by Francis Polwhele at all, but by a 'Peter Young'. His
name crops up in three previously known instances: Peter Leycester's lyra viol
book, ff.54v-55r ('Per Peter Younge'); GB-Ob, MS Mus. Sch. C.61, p.6 ('Peter
Young'), US-U q763 P699c, f.9v ('Peter Young'; Francis Withy's hand in
manuscript pages added to a copy of Playford's Cantiones Sacrae 1674). To
these
can now be added the four pieces in the Frankfurt manuscript:
(1) 4. M
M Peter Young's Ground […]
r Francis Pollwheels Division on M r Peter Young's Ground […]
r
(2) 5. M r Daniell Northcombe's Division on
(3) 7. A Division by M r Peter Young […]
r r
(4) 8. A Division by M John Withey on M Peter Young's Ground […]
However, we are no further forward from Gordon's Dodd's comment in 1981
that 'As yet we cannot identify Peter Young as a person.'
with Polewheel's ground turn
17 Is it just possible
that he was connected in some way with William Young? Even more curious is
the fact that the divisions generally associated
out not to be those by Francis Polewheel either!
A rough pencilled copy of the ground (only) is found together with an
otherwise unidentified second ground on a blank page of MS imhs 079.001 of
the Düben collection at Uppsala University: treble and bass parts for Jenkins's
two suites in VdGS Group IV. These parts are believed to have travelled to
Sweden from England with the musicians in Bulstrode Whitlocke's Embassy
of 1654. It is also printed anonymously as 'A Ground' in John Playford's An
18
Introduction to the Skill of Musick (London, 1655), p. 52.
Assuming the attributions are correct (and there is no reason to doubt them),
15 A. Wood, Fasti Oxoniensis, ed. P. Bliss, Oxford, 1820, IV, ii, 234.
16 Seven members of the family attended Exeter College during the seventeenth
century, and one was at Queen's. See J. Foster, Alumini Oxoniensis: The Members of the University
of Oxford 1500-1886, Oxford, 1891.
17 VdGS ME 140.
18 Margaret Gilmore, in her facsimile edition of Playford's The Division Violin, Oxford,
1982, lists US-NYp, Drexel MS 3554, p.61, as another source for the ground, but I have been
unable to confirm this.
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