Publication of the week: Professor Jane Ridley

Ridley, J., “‘The sport of kings’: Shooting and the court of Edward VII”, The Court Historian 18.2 (December 2013), 189-205

For Victorians, the ‘sport of kings’ was fox hunting. But fox hunting boasted of being ‘open to all’ and for this reason — as well as mounting radical opposition in the last third of the nineteenth century — it was not suited to be a court sport. The Royal Buckhounds, which hunted the carted stag, were an anachronism. This article shows that the new court sport developed by Edward VII as Prince of Wales on his Sandringham estate was battue shooting of reared pheasants: driving birds into a wood or covert, through which the beaters walked in line, pushing out the birds to fly over the guns standing in position outside. Professor Ridley suggests that historical narratives of the rise of opposition to hunting have obscured the significance of this sport for the court. She argues that pheasant shooting performed many of the functions required for a court sport. It was predictable, highly organised, spectacular and competitive. Above all, it was training for war.

The Court Historian is the peer-reviewed journal of the Society for Court Studies, exploring all dimensions of court life, from politics, palaces and war to dress, dining and gardens.

Jane Ridley is Professor of History at Buckingham, and author of a major new biography of King Edward VII: Bertie: A Life of Edward VII (Chatto & Windus, 2012).