ABSTRACT
In 1632 Sir Thomas Shirley commissioned what was, perhaps, the largest documentary text celebrating lineage in early modern England. It was a pedigree roll the size of a large advertising billboard (11 ft 9 in by 29 ft 2 in), consisting of a series of parchment strips sewn together. On it was recorded the genealogy of the Shirley family of Staunton Harold in Leicestershire, from their Anglo-Saxon ancestor, Sewale of Ettington, to the current head of the family, Sir Thomas’s elder brother, Sir Henry Shirley, Bart. At the top of the roll were pictures of knights, barons and earls bearing the escutcheons of noble families into which the Shirleys had married. At its foot was the Shirley coat of arms, with its 50 quarterings and family crest of a Saracen’s head. The body of the text contained the family tree and coloured drawings of the various sources which Sir Thomas had used for tracing his genealogy: deeds and documents, armorial glass from church windows, and funeral monuments and brasses1 (Figure 15.1).
