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Decorations: Richard

Chains and collars were evidently favourite decorations in the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries, in our own country. At the marriage of Richard II. with Isabel of France, there was, among other rich presents to the bride, a collar or chain of gold, enriched with jewels worth three thousand pounds of our money. Several kings appear to have had collars of their "livery," as they were termed, which they bestowed as marks of favour or friendship on persons of various ranks and both sexes. Richard II., in addition to his favourite device, a white hart, had a livery collar of broom-pods. Henry of Bolingbroke, on ascending the throne as Henry IV., retained his well-known livery collar of S.S., derived from his father, John of Gaunt. Edward IV. had a collar composed of two of his badges, the sun in its splendour, and the white rose; while a third, the white lion of March, was added as a pendant. Richard III. retained the Yorkist collar, substituting for the lion pendant a boar. Of the portraits of Henry VII., the greater number represent him wearing a broad and rich collar of gold, of irregular outline, thickly studded with jewels. Henry VIII. is represented by Holbein, in the portrait at Lee Priory, wearing a rich jewel appended by a long chain. At the reception of Anne of Cleves, at Paris, we are told that the Earl of South-ampton wore a chain baldrick-wise, at which hung a whistle of gold, set with rich stones of great value, the insignia of his office as Lord Admiral of England. Philip of Spain, on his marriage with Queen Mary, wore a collar of beaten gold, full of diamonds of inestimable value, at which hung the jewel of the Golden Fleece.

The Earl of Leicester presented Queen Elizabeth, in the twenty-third year of her reign, with "a chain of gold, made like a pair of beads, containing 8 long pieces, garnished with small diamonds, and fourscore and one smaller pieces, fully garnished with like diamonds, and hanging thereat a round clock, fully garnished with diamonds, and an appendage of diamonds hanging thereat." This was the third or fourth jewel with a watch presented to the Queen by Leicester.

James I. of Scotland, in the "King's Quhair," describes his first sight of Lady Jane Beaufort, who afterwards was his Queen:-- "Of her array the form if I shall write, Towards her golden hair and rich attire, In fretwise couchit with pearlis white And great balas leaming as the fire, With mony ane emeraut and fair sapphire... "About her necke, white as the fire amail, A goodly chain of small orfevory, Whereby there hung a ruby, without fail, Like to ane heart shapen verily, That as a spark of low, so wantonly Seemed burning upon her white throat, Now if there was good party, God it wot."

Gold chains were frequently bequeathed in wills, and many are described as enriched with precious stones. The portraits of our nobility and distinguished personages, for several ages, to the death of James I., gave fine samples of goldsmiths' and jewellers' work.