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Introduction
When the great manuscript forgers and pedigree mongers of bygone
years found their imaginations failing, and a "very ancient and worshipful family" that had been "settled in the county time out of mind, and formed many high alliances" sought still greater fame, then its origins were claimed to
have been lost in the "Mists of Antiquity"..... the title of this online anthology.
As the research undertaken for the publication of Moncreiffe's Family Records disinterred the old tales academics enjoy so much, and as the
imaginative excesses immortalised in so many family histories
rekindled the laughter, the first ideas for a collection of howlers
emerged, to be published both as an illustrated book and, after
redesign and substantial editing to meet the requirements of computer
screens, online. Subsequently, however, it was recognised that
zealous concentration on the hilarious would be unfair to those
honest historians whose work has given so much to the understanding
of our past, whose names could be tarnished by an unbalanced review
and yet are no longer here to defend their work. Accordingly,
the selection has been widened to include examples of profound
scholarship leavened by great wit, and paradigms of the grace
and elegance of the writers enjoyed in earlier years.
There are some truly memorable lines. The vision conjured of Walter,
the High Steward, in the Abbey church at Paisley, "in the silence
of the centuries" singing "his Te Deum for the yet ungathered greatness of his race" can leave few family
historians unmoved, whether they have Stewart blood or not; the
unconscious yet delightful pun of the scribe who, writing of the
defection of a champion who believed his opponent a cannibal,
wrote of the fear that he would be devoured "at the last Course";
and, from our own time, the immortal "J.S. of Nerdley" who penned:
"I am an ordinary English baronet . . . . . . . " in purple ink with the golden quill of Peter Simple of The Daily Telegraph.
There are some intriguing ironies: the most famous of the untruthful
justifications for the right to wear a hat in the presence of
the sovereign is that of de Courcy, whose motto is Veritas omnia vincit, and the arrogance implicit in the claim has been on at least
one occasion put down neatly by a sharp comment, as in "our peers
need not fear him assuming his privilege of being covered, for,
till the King gives him a pension, he cannot buy the offensive
Hat."
And then there are the neat evocations of bygone days: Buthlaw's
depiction of the peerage being "pruned by decapitation"; and Barron's sarcastic reference to "the well-known amiability that was characteristic of Henry VIII" leading the King to ride hatless through the Hertfordshire countryside,
accompanied by a shoeless Queen.
The illustrations are for the greater part heraldic, chosen as
memorials to the ubiquitous rôle the chromatic glories of armory
played in the lives of our ancestors, and to symbolise, through
the coincident emergence of heraldic traditions at the dawn of
authentically documented mediaeval history, the first zephyrs
dispersing the mists of antiquity.
Unusually for an anthology, a small portfolio of advertisements
has been included. The "Peerage" publishers of the past (Burke's,
Lodge, Debrett's, Dod, Collins, Stockdale's, Ridgway's, Sharpe's,
Whitaker's) found that their operations could survive only with
the support of advertisers, and from this emerged the concept
of the "peerage people" ~ those traditionally supplied with goods
and services by a small exclusive group similar in standing to
those who held the Royal Warrants (as many in the group did).
A few of their traditional advertisements have been chosen to
illustrate the flavour of those days in the first half of this
century when discriminating taste was understood to be the prerogative
of one social class. Many of those suppliers are still held to
be the best in their field, and some have become a byword for
excellence. One advertisement is allocated to each chapter, and
viewers are invited to compare the impact of their primitive design
and typography with that of the sophisticated techniques, supported
by high technology, employed today. More information about the
old products and their modern successors may be obtained by clicking
the highlighted captions.
There is a postscript to this introduction:
The tradition of blatant mendacity in the exploitation of family
historians has been continued into the last decade of the 20th
century by "bucket shop" heraldry and sham genealogists. The scams
reported regularly on Internet discussion groups and bulletin
boards may represent perhaps only a small proportion of this lucrative
and dishonest trade, but, no matter how large it is, it can be
fought by exposure. Comments on a few of the more outrageous offences
will be included in the magazine and may appear also on future
pages of Mists of Antiquity.
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From 1896:-
 Mappin & Webb's Consistency
The concept of Peerage as we understand it today is probably owed
more to Charlemagne than to any other single person. His peers
could be distinguished as men of great power enjoying a special
relationship with the Emperor in the government of his dominions
from around the end of the 8th Century. The Peerage in England
and Scotland evolved in different ways, but had developed into
what is recognisably similar to the British Peerage today by the
15th Century.
The "Peerages" (which is to say the "peerage directories") of
Burke's and Debrett's shared this reputation of having been around
a long time. Their age as institutions lent them an authority,
reinforced by their apparent continuity, that other commentators
envied. Advertisers recognised the value of "Peerage Endorsement"
as quickly as they identified the readership of the directories
with the customers they wished to reach.
Mappin & Webb's wares were designed for the rich and discriminating,
for those who travelled comfortably (for which more investment
was required then), and for those who entertained graciously (in
town or in the country). During the hundred years since this 1896
advertisement appeared, their wider market, swollen by the new
wealth and aspirations nurtured in this century, has been supported
by a service of traditional quality.
 Chapter I ~ Ancestor Hunting
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