That the ancient town of Banbury, lying on the northern verge of the
county of Oxford, should have been famed, from time immemorial, for its
rich cakes, should not excite our special wonder, seeing that the
district has some of the richest pasture land in the kingdom; a single
cow being here known to produce 200 pounds of butter in a year! Butter,
we need scarcely add, is the prime ingredient of the Banbury cake,
giving it the richness and lightness of the finest puff-paste; and, to
the paper in which the cakes are wrapped, the appearance of their having
been packed up by bakers with well-buttered fingers.
The cause of this cake-fame must, however, be sought in a higher walk of
history than in the annals of pastry-making. It appears that the Banbury
folks went on rejoicing in the fatness of their cakes until the reign of
Elizabeth; from which time to that of Charles II., the people of the
town were so noted for their peculiar religious fervour, as to draw upon
themselves most unsparingly the satire of contemporary playwrights,
wits, and humorists. By some unlucky turn of time, cakes, which were
much valued by the classical ancients, and were given away as presents,
in the Middle Ages, instead of bread, became looked upon as a
superstitious relic by the Puritans, who thereupon abolished the
practice. They formed so predominant a party at Banbury, in the reign of
Elizabeth, that they pulled down Banbury Cross, so celebrated in our
nursery rhymes. In the face of this historical fact, however, the
reputed "zeal" of the Banburians has been attributed to an accidental
circumstance, in modern phrase, "an error of the press." In Gough's
edition of Camden's _Britannia_, in the MS. supplement, is this note:
"Put out the word _zeale_ in Banbury, where some think it a disgrace,
when a _zeale_ with knowledge is the greater grace among good
Christians; for it was first foysted in by some compositor or press-man,
neither is it in my Latin copie, which I desire the reader to hold as
authentic." It was, indeed, printed, as a proverb, "Banbury zeal,
cheese, and cakes," instead of "Banbury veal, cheese, and cakes."
Gibson, in his edition of Camden, however, gives another version,
relating: "There is a credible story--that while Philemon Holland was
carrying on his English edition of the _Britannia_, Mr. Camden came
accidentally to the press, when this sheet was working off; and looking
on, he found, that to his own observation of Banbury being famous for
cheese, the translator had added cakes and ale. But Mr. Camden thinking
it too light an expression, changed the word _ale_ into _zeal_; and so
it passed, to the great indignation of the Puritans, who abounded in
this town." Barnaby Googe, in his _Strappado for the Divell_, refers to
Banbury as
"Famous for twanging ale, zeal, cakes, and cheese."
Better remembered are the lines in his _Journey through England_:
"To Banbury came I, O profane one!
Where I saw a puritane one
Hanging of his cat on Monday
For killing of a mouse on Sunday."
Early in the seventeenth century, the Puritans were very strong in
Banbury. In Ben Jonson's _Bartholomew Fair_, Zeal-of-the-Land Busy, the
Puritanical Rabbi, is called a _Banbury man_, and described as one who
was a baker--"but he does dream now, and sees visions; he has given over
his trade out of a scruple that he took, that it spiced conscience,
_those cakes he made_ were served to bridales, May-poles, morrises, and
such profane feasts and meetings:" in other words, he had been a baker,
but left off that trade to set up for a prophet; and one of the
characters in _Bartholomew Fair_ says: "I have known divers of these
Banburians when I was at Oxford." And Sir William D'Avenant, in his play
of _The Wits_, illustrates this Puritanical character, in
"A weaver of Banbury, that hopes
To entice heaven by singing, to make him lord of twenty looms."
Old Thomas Fuller personifies the zeal in the Rev. William Whately, who
was Vicar of Banbury in the reign of James I., and was called "The
Roaring Boy." Fuller adds: "Only let them (the Banbury folks) adde
knowledge to their zeal, and then the more zeal the better their
condition." The Vicar was a zealous and popular preacher, according to
his monument:
"It's William Whately that here lies,
Who swam to's tomb in's people's eyes."
In the _Tatler_, No. 220, in describing his "Ecclesiastical
Thermometer," to indicate the changes and revolutions in the Church, the
Essayist writes, "That facetious divine, Dr. Fuller, speaking of the
town of Banbury, near a hundred years ago, tells us, 'it was a place
famous for cakes and zeal,' which I find by my glass is true to this
day, as to the latter part of this description, though I must confess it
is not in the same reputation for cakes that it was in the time of that
learned author."
The Banburians, however, maintained their character for zeal in a grand
demonstration made by them in favour of Dr. Sacheverell, whose trial had
just terminated in his acquittal; and in the same year, this High Church
champion made a triumphal passage through Banbury, on his journey to
take possession of the living of Salatin, in Shropshire, which was
ridiculed in a pamphlet, with a woodcut illustrative of the procession;
and there appeared another pamphlet on the same lively subject.
Thus far the association of cakes with zeal in the case of Banbury. It
is worthy of remark that cakes had formerly not unfrequently a religious
significance, from their being more used at religious seasons than at
other times. The triangular cakes made at Congleton, in Cheshire, have a
raisin in each corner, thought to be emblematic of the Trinity; the
cakes at Shrewsbury may have had something to do with its old religious
shows. Coventry, on New Year's day, has its God-cakes. Then we have the
Twelfth-cake with its bean; the Good Friday bun with its cross; the
Pancake, with its shroving or confessing; and the Passover cake of the
Jews. The minced pie was treated by the Puritans as a superstitious
observance; and, after the Restoration, it almost served as a test for
religious opinions. According to the old rule, the case or crust of a
minced pie should be oblong, in imitation of the cradle or manger
wherein the Saviour was laid; the ingredients of the mince being said to
refer to the offerings of the Wise Men.
Returning to the Banbury cake: in a _Treatise of Melancholy_, by T.
Bright, 1586, we find the following:--"Sodden wheat is a grosse and
melancholicke nourishment, and bread especially of the fine flour
unleavened. Of this sort are bag puddings made with flour; fritters,
pancakes, _such as we call Banberrie Cakes_; and those great ones
confected with butter, eggs, &c., used at weddings; and however it be
prepared, rye, and bread made thereof, carrieth with it plentie of
melancholie."
At Banbury, the cakes are served to the authorities upon state
occasions. Thus, in the Corporation accounts of this town, we find a
charge of "Cakes for the Judges at the Oxford Assizes, 2_l_. 3_s_.
6_d_." The present form of the cake resembles that of the early bun
before it was made circular. The zeal has died away, but not so the
cakes; for in Beesley's _History of Banbury_, 1841, we find that Mr.
Samuel Beesley sold, in 1840, no fewer than 139,500 twopenny cakes; and
in 1841, the sale increased by at least a fourth. In August, 1841, 5,000
cakes were sold weekly; large quantities being shipped to America,
India, and even Australia.
The cakes are now more widely sold than formerly, when the roadside inns
were the chief depôts. We remember the old galleried Three Cranes inn at
Edgware, noted for its fresh supplies of Banbury cakes; as were also the
Green Man and Still, and other taverns of Oxford Road, now Oxford
Street.
Banbury Cheese, which Shakspeare mentions, is no longer made, but it was
formerly so well known as to be referred to as a comparison. Bishop
Williams, in 1664, describes the clipped and pared lands and glebes of
the Church "as thin as Banbury cheese." Bardolf, in the _Merry Wives of
Windsor_, compares Slender to Banbury cheese, which seems to have been
remarkably thin, and all rind, as noticed by Heywood, in his Collection
of Epigrams:--
"I never saw Banbury cheese thick enough,
But I have often seen Essex cheese quick enough."