“The first Pageant was ‘The Shippe called the Royall Exchange,’ in which takes place a short poetical dialogue between the master, mate and boy, who congratulate themselves on the fortunate termination of their voyage at this auspicious time, the master ending the dialogue by a punning allusion to the Mayor’s name, when he declared his intention
‘To make this up a cheerful Holi-day.’
Neptune and Amphitrite appear upon a lion and camel; and Corineus and Gogmagog, two huge giants, ‘for the more grace and beauty of the show,’ were fettered by chains of gold to ‘Britains Mount,’ the principal pageant; which they appeared to draw, and upon which children were seated, representing Britannia; ‘Brute’s divided kingdoms,’ Leogria, Cambria, and Albania; ‘Brute’ himself, his sons Locrine, Camber, and Albanact; Troya Nova, or London; and the Rivers Thames, Severn, and Humber, who each declaim in short speeches, the purport of which is that as England, Wales, and Scotland were first sundered by Brutus to supply his three sons with a kingdom each, they are now again happily united in ‘our second Brute,’ King James the first.” (Fairholt, Lord Mayor’s Pageants.)
The giants disappeared from the Lord Mayor’s Pageants soon after this. In 1633, Clod, a country-man, in Shirley’s Contention for Honour and Riches, says:—
“When the word is given, you march to Guildhall, with every man his spoon in his pocket, where you look upon the giants, and feed like Saracens, till you have no stomach to Paul’s in the afternoon.” (Ibid.)
In the Lord Mayor’s Pageant for 1673 the giants came out again. This pageant was designed by Thomas Jordan. It appears to have been their first appearance after the Fire.
“I must not omit to tell you, that marching in the van of these five pageants, are two exceeding rarities to be taken notice of; that is, there are two extreme great giants, each of them at least fifteen foot high, that do sit and are drawn by horses in two several chariots, moving, talking, and taking tobacco as they ride along, to the great admiration and delight of all the spectators; at the conclusion of the show they are to be set up in Guildhall, where they may be daily seen all the year, and I hope never to be demolished by such dismal violence as happened to their predecessors; which are raised at the peculiar and proper cost of the city.” (Ibid.)
It would seem that in many of the pageants it was not thought necessary to set down the fact that the giants formed part, for in Henley’s Orations (1730–1755) there is one on the Lord Mayor’s Show which contains the following passage: “On that day, the two giants have the priviledge, if they think it proper, to walk out and keep holiday; one on each side of the great horse would aggrandize the solemnity, shew consisting often in bulk.” (Ibid.)
In Stow’s description of the setting of the watch on Midsummer’s Eve, he says: “The Mayor had, beside his giants, three pageants, whereas the Sheriffs had only two, besides their giants.” In Marston’s Dutch Courtezan, acted 1605, an allusion is made to the giants: “yet all will scarce make me so high as one of the gyant’s stilts that stalks before my Lord Mayor’s Pageants.”
George Wither (1661) calls the giants “Big-boned Colbrant and great Brandsmore.”