10 Facts About Nine Worthies

Nine Worthies are nine historical, scriptural, and legendary personages who personify the ideals of chivalry established in the Middle Ages, whose lives were deemed a valuable study for aspirants to chivalric status.

In French they are called Les Neuf Preux or "Nine Worthies Valiants", giving a more specific idea of the moral virtues they exemplified: those of soldierly courage and generalship.

Nine Worthies include three pagans, three Jews (Joshua, David and Judas Maccabeus) and three Christians (King Arthur, Charlemagne and Godfrey of Bouillon).

Nine Worthies were a popular subject for masques in Renaissance Europe.

The list of Nine Worthies actually named in the play include two not on the original list, Hercules and Pompey the Great.

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Nine Worthies had not devolved to folk culture even in the seventeenth century, for a frieze of the Nine Worthies, contemporary with Shakespeare's comedy, was painted at the outset of the seventeenth century at North Mymms Place, Hertfordshire, an up-to-date house built by the Coningsby family, 1599.

In later years, nine of the "Most Illustrious Ladies of All Ages and Nations" were chosen from scripture, history and legend to be placed alongside their male counterparts, though the choices for the Lady Worthies were not usually standardized and often varied by region, author and artist.

Nine Worthies of London is a book by Richard Johnson, written in 1592, which borrows the theme from the Nine Worthies.

Nine Worthies were Sir William Walworth, Sir Henry Pritchard, Sir Thomas White, Sir William Sevenoke, Sir John Hawkwood, Sir John Bonham, Christopher Croker, Sir Henry Maleverer of Cornhill, and Sir Hugh Calverley.

Term "Nine Worthies" was later used to refer to nine of the privy councillors of William III: Devonshire, Dorset, Monmouth, Edward Russell, Carmarthen, Pembroke, Nottingham, Marlborough, and Lowther.