One of history’s most famous queens, Mary Stuart, better known as Mary Queen of Scots , reigned over Scotland between 1542 and 1567, until her infamous forced abdication in favor of her one-year-old son. A lesser known fact is her voracious appetite and palette, which veered towards the decadent. Newly released and previously unpublished documents show that throughout her lengthy time in prison, Mary was still treated like a queen, in what has been dubbed a “deluxe imprisonment.”
The different types of meats consumed by Mary, as depicted in household accounts kept for her upkeep. ( Public domain )
The Bon Appétit of Mary Queen of Scots
The British Library has acquired and released financial documents and one previously unpublished letter from the 1580s, which detail the finest foods and other luxuries that the imprisoned Mary Queen of Scots enjoyed during her confinement. The details are mouth-watering to say the least, and one of the big reasons is because a large household attended upon her every need. They provided her with two courses at both dinner and supper, each of which consisted of 16 individual dishes.
“The accounts provide a detailed record of monies received and paid out for a wide range of foodstuffs, from bread, butter and eggs to meat (beef, mutton, lamb, veal, boar, pork), poultry (capons, geese, hens, heron, partridge, blackbirds) and fish (cod, salt salmon, eels, herring, plaice, haddock, sole, oysters, pike, roach, carp and trout),” writes Andrea Clarke…
