Quicksilver Reading CompanionDaniel Waterhouse is trapped in London with his father, Drake, during the height of the Great Plague while Isaac Newton retreats to the countryside.
“found Drake seated before a virginal” — A virginal is a smaller, rectangular keyboard instrument of the harpsichord family, popular in the 16th and 17th centuries for domestic music-making.
“helping Newton buy prisms” — Newton’s Optics began with his use of glass prisms to demonstrate that white light is composed of a spectrum of colors, a foundational discovery that challenged the prevailing belief that color was a mixture of light and darkness.
“libels inveighed against Ship Money, a new tax imposed by Charles I” — Ship Money was a non-parliamentary tax revived by Charles I to fund the navy without calling Parliament; it became a major point of contention and a leading cause of the Civil War.
“pilloried, branded, and mutilated” — The Court of Star Chamber Punishments often sentenced religious dissidents to have their ears cropped or faces branded with letters like “SL” for Seditious Libeller.
“James I had outlawed the export of unfinished English cloth” — James I attempted the Cockayne Project in 1614, a failed economic plan to boost the English dyeing industry by banning the export of raw cloth, which instead caused a massive trade depression.
“the town of Leyden was crowded with English pilgrims” — Leiden served as a refuge for English Separatists (Pilgrims) for over a decade before many of them departed for America on the Mayflower.
“presented Drake and his new wife, Hortense, with this set of Delft pottery” — Delftware is famous Dutch tin-glazed earthenware, often decorated in blue and white to emulate expensive Chinese porcelain.
“St. Lawrence Jewry” — A prominent guild church in the City of London where John Wilkins served as vicar; it was later destroyed in the Great Fire and rebuilt by Christopher Wren.
“The generative spirit lives on—transmuting dead flesh into something else—just as maggots are generated out of meat” — Spontaneous Generation was the pre-modern scientific theory that living organisms could arise from non-living matter, a concept natural philosophers were only beginning to disprove.
“Monsieur de Montmor’s salon in Paris” — The Montmor Academy was a private scientific society (1654–1664) that served as a precursor to the French Academy of Sciences.
“Mr. Daniel Coxe said that mercury had been found running like water” — Daniel Coxe was a real physician and member of the Royal Society who reported on various natural phenomena and later became a major colonial land claimant in North America.
“the power of King Louis” — Louis XIV, the “Sun King” of France, represented the ultimate threat to English Protestants due to his absolute monarchy and aggressive Catholicism.
“orgies at Whitehall” — Whitehall Palace was the main residence of English monarchs in London, notorious during the Restoration for the perceived debauchery of Charles II’s court.
“Goldsmith’s Note. People started doing this about the time you left for Cambridge.” — Goldsmith’s Notes were receipts issued for gold deposits; they began to circulate as a form of paper currency, marking the birth of modern banking.
“tiny student octavo volumes of the usual Continental savants” — An octavo is a book size created by folding a sheet of paper three times to form eight leaves, resulting in portable, affordable editions popular among scholars.
“Robert Hooke” — Robert Hooke was a brilliant polymath and curator of experiments for the Royal Society, famous for his law of elasticity and his pioneering microscopy.
“Robert Hooke and Sir Robert Moray had been up in its belfry conducting experiments” — Sir Robert Moray was a Scottish statesman and a key founder of the Royal Society, serving as its first president.
“experiments with two-hundred-foot-long pendulums” — Pendulum Experiments were conducted in high buildings like St. Paul’s to study gravity and the rotation of the Earth, though the results were often inconsistent.
“newfangled Classical porch slapped onto it some three or four decades ago” — Before it burned in 1666, Old St. Paul’s Cathedral featured a famous classical portico designed by architect Inigo Jones.
“Dr. Nathaniel Hodges, one of the only physicians who hadn’t fled” — Nathaniel Hodges was a real physician who remained in London during the Plague to treat victims and later wrote Loimologia, a vital historical account of the epidemic.
“King Henry VIII had kicked out the Papists” — The English Reformation was the 16th-century break of the Church of England from the authority of the Pope, initiated by Henry VIII’s desire for an annulment.
“some clever Dutchmen had built water-wheels there” — The London Bridge Waterworks used waterwheels under the bridge’s arches to pump Thames water into the city’s first pressurized lead pipes.
“Sir Thomas (“Bad money drives out good”) Gresham” — Thomas Gresham was a Tudor financier who founded the Royal Exchange; he is the namesake of Gresham’s Law, which states that undervalued currency will be hoarded while overvalued currency circulates.
“something called Sympathetic Powder that supposedly healed wounds” — The Powder of Sympathy was a form of sympathetic magic where a remedy was applied to the weapon that caused a wound rather than the wound itself.
“nux vomica” — Nux Vomica are the seeds of the Strychnine tree, commonly found in 17th-century “cabinets of curiosities” and used as both a medicine and a poison.
“Sir WILLIAM CURTIUS a hairy ball found in the belly of a cow.” — Sir William Curtius was a diplomat who served as the English Resident in Germany and was a fellow of the Royal Society.
“The Earl of Balcarres’s heart” — Alexander Lindsay, 1st Earl of Balcarres was a Scottish nobleman whose heart was examined by the Royal Society to investigate a medical anomaly.
“Hungarian vitriol” — Vitriol is a historical term for sulfate minerals used in alchemy and medicine; “Hungarian” vitriol specifically referred to copper sulfate.
“his air-compressing engine” — The Boylean Air Pump was a landmark instrument developed by Hooke and Boyle to create a vacuum, proving that air was necessary for combustion and life.
“addressed simply “GRUBENDOL London.”” — Grubendol was the coded pseudonym used by Henry Oldenburg, the Secretary of the Royal Society, to manage his massive international correspondence and avoid postal interference.
“all were goldsmiths” — Goldsmith-Bankers in the 17th century evolved into the first modern bankers by accepting gold deposits and issuing receipts that functioned as early paper money.
“carry lock-boxes back and forth to the Mint” — The Royal Mint was the institution responsible for producing Britain’s coinage, located within the secure walls of the Tower of London.
“367-11/32 troy oz. depos. by my Lord Rochester” — John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester was a notorious Restoration poet and rake known for his wit and hedonistic lifestyle at court.
“spilled into the Thames at the Provincial Governor’s Palace” — This refers to Roman London; the Governor’s Palace was a massive complex located near modern Cannon Street station.
“the hairpin was fashioned in the shape of a caduceus” — The Caduceus is the staff of Hermes/Mercury, featuring two snakes winding around a winged staff; it serves as a symbol of commerce and alchemy.
Original annotations by: sinder, stephenson, thompson, rats, lotzmana