What 'SIC' stands for...Sic Illustrior Crescam

[etterscab]

(** mod edit - moved from Shetland News section **)

 

This was forwarded to me by a Shetlander now living and working furth of these shores.

 

I was reading about Rubens recently, & came across a piece of info I thought you might find amusing. Apparently, quite early in his career, Rubens had as a patron one Vincenzo, the Duke of Mantua. He was, by all accounts, something of a joke-figure. EG - after his first marriage failed, because it wasn't consummated, he had to shag a virgin in front of a papally authorized committee, to see whether it was him who had the problem (as his former in-laws claimed) or his estranged missus. (He had also murdered a Scottish scholar, apparently -- jealous of the esteem in which Jock was held by some powerful duke figure.) Anyway, when he was first made duke himself, Vincenzo embarked on a series of ultra-vain, grandiloquent measures, designed to give him some palace cred. These involved him assuming the most ridiculous airs & graces, poncing around in ermine & satin, designing a ridiculous tomb, replete with a sculpture of him enthroned, etc etc. And: one of his most bizarre acts, it seems, was to create his own 'army' -- in effect, a toy army, which put enormous pressure on his coffers -- which was supposed to make a powerful contribution to the overall forces of the 'holy Roman empire' against the Turks. (Their input was miminal, but Vincenzo acted as if his soldiers were saviours of Christendom. Delusions of grandeur seem to have been a speciality.)

 

So, why am I relating all this? The most amusing thing, I thought, was that this fairly laughable shower had special black uniforms created for them, emblazoned with Vincenzo's personal motto, 'Thus do I grow ever brighter'. Or, to be more accurate, emblazoned with the initials of the Latin version of the same: Sic illustrior crescam. In other words, a sort of dad's army of the late renaissance went about central Europe with SIC uniforms on. A bizarre thought.