In August 1586, Francis Drake sailed home to England after raiding the Spanish West Indies.

Entering the Inns of Court in London, he was greeted with cheers. His ships carried precious

commodities like pearls, which he would present his gifts to Elizabeth I.

Around the same inns of court, gentlemen smoked so many pipes of American tobacco that

travelers complained that the English are constantly smoking, yet the men believed it gave them

an air of civility. And in 1607, some of the 104 English men who embarked on the 3.5

thousand bar voyage to colonise Jamestown, Virginia, took with them goffering ions,

tours to crimp fabric to make ruffs. For the things to pack for such an unpredictable

journey, the goffering ion evidently counted as essential.

What connects these ruffs, pipes and pearls is the story of England's colonial pursuits.

While regular listeners will know that we recently explored the founding of Jamestown,

today we're going on a slightly different adventure.

The stories we're going to hear today examine how England's desire to colonise affected

both those they met and those at home. Politics, literature and behaviour were all shaped

by relations with colonies like Jamestown, far from being something that the English only

did to others, colonisation and the related notions of civility led to changes in English culture

to. To learn more, I am delighted to be joined by Dr. Lauren Working, author of the Making

of Imperial Polity, Sability and America in the Jacobian Metropolis.

Dr. Working spent five years as a research associate working on the project, travel, trans,

culturality and identity in England, 1550 to 1700 at the University of Oxford, and is now

a lecturer in early modern studies at the University of York. Prepare for fascinating insights into

how seemingly simple objects reveal a great deal about the reality of colonisation.

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