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Kit-cat Club
A club formed in 1688 by the leading Whigs of the day, and held
in Shire Lane (now Lower Serle's Place) in the house of Christopher
Cat, a pastry-cook, who supplied the mutton pies, and after whom the
club was named Sir Godfrey Kneller painted forty two portraits of the
club members for Jacob Tonson, the secretary, whose villa was at Barn
Elms, and where latterly the club was held. In order to accommodate the
paintings to the height of the club-room, he was obliged to make them
three-quarter lengths, hence a
three-quarter portrait is still called a kit-cat. Strictly
speaking, a kit-cat canvas is twenty-eight inches by thirty-six.
“Steele, Addison, Congreve, Garth, Vanbrugh, Manwaring, Stepney,
Walpole, and Pulteney were of it; so was Lord Dorset and the present
Duke. Manwaring ... was the ruling man in all conversation ... Lord
Stanhope and the Earl of Essex were also members ... Each member gave
his [picture].” —Pope to Spence
Cowley the poet lived at Barn Elms Villas.
Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894 More on Kit-cat Club from Infoplease:
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