The Roaring Girls of Queer London

May 10, 2018 8:03 PM

Flashy hooligans like Moll Cutpurse and Long Meg sported broad-brimmed hats, wore “ruffianly short locks,” and carried swords.
posted by MovableBookLady (8 comments total)

I wrote my undergrad thesis on the play The Roaring Girl, which was based on Moll Cutpurse! Fun read.
posted by apricot at 8:42 PM on May 10, 2018 [1 favorite]

One observer stated that “it is better that a woman give herself over to a libidinous desire to do as a man, than that a man make himself effeminate.”

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:22 PM on May 10, 2018 [7 favorites]

Also, the term "rumpscuttle" needs to make a comeback.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:24 PM on May 10, 2018 [5 favorites]

Does anyone know where this image is from? A friend had it as a facebook profile but couldn't tell me any more about it. It looks Moll Cutpurse-like to me.
posted by gnuhavenpier at 1:31 AM on May 11, 2018

the rise in public awareness of the tribade, the fricatrix, the rubster

I think these three, along with Rumpscuttle, need to be Batman villains.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:49 AM on May 11, 2018 [1 favorite]

That illustration looks 19th century to me
posted by bq at 7:20 AM on May 11, 2018 [2 favorites]

Apricot: My first major publication was on The Roaring Girl :)
posted by Saxon Kane at 9:50 AM on May 11, 2018 [2 favorites]

Ackroyd hits several of my favourite beats here. One intertext:

[Mall Cutpurse] poured scorn on “a contemporary as remarkable as myself, called Aniseed-water Robin, who was clothed very near my antic mode, being an hermaphrodite, a person of both sexes, him I could by no means endure.” She hired London boys to throw dirt at him.

More on Robin here, including the full quote from Mall:

There was also a fellow contemporary of mine, as remarkable as my self, called Aniseed-water Robin: who was clothed very near my Antic Mode, being an Hermaphrodite, a person of both sexes; him I could by no means endure, being the very derision of natures impotency, whose redundancy in making him Man and Woman, had in effect made him neither, having not the strength nor reason of the Male, nor the fineness nor subtlety of the Female: being but one step removed from a Natural Changeling, a kind of mockery (as I was upbraided) of me, who was then Counded for an Artificial one. And indeed I think nature owed me a spite in sending that thing into the world to Mate and Match me, that nothing might be without a peer; and the vacuum of Society be replenished, which is done by the likeness and similitude of manners: but contrariwise it begot in me a natural abhorrence of him with so strange an Antipathy, that what by threats and my private instigating of the Boys to fall upon, and throw Dirt at him, I made him quit my Walk and Habitation, that I might have no further scandal among my Neighbours, who used to say, here comes Malls Husband.

Robin has a song of his own: Dainty fine aniseed water by William Lawes. It's plausible that the first two lines may have been based on Robin's street-cry.

"Dainty fine Aniseed water fine,
dainty content and your mony againe."
See, here comes Robin Hermaphrodite,
"Hot Waters," he cries for his delight:
He got a Child of a Maid, and yet is no man,
was got with child by a man, and is no woman.

posted by Pallas Athena at 3:03 PM on May 11, 2018 [2 favorites]