page_title: Bankes's Horse
section_title: London
hierarchical_section_title: Bankes's Horse / London
caption_attribution_description: Image of English Elizabethan clown Richard Tarlton in rustic apparel with pipe and tabor
context_page_description: Marocco, widely known as Bankes's Horse, was the name of a late 16th- and early 17th-century English performing horse. He is sometimes referred to as the "Dancing Horse", the "Thinking Horse", or the "Politic Horse".
context_section_description: Bankes sold his possessions and used the money to purchase silver horseshoes for Marocco, then moved to London to work at inn-yard theatres. According to Thomas Nashe, Bankes had Marocco's tail bobbed: "Wiser was our Brother Bankes of these latter daies, who made his iugling horse a Cut, for feare if at anie time hee should foyst [defecate], the stinke sticking in his thicke bushie taile might be noysome to his Auditors." Bankes lived at the Cross Keys Inn on Gracechurch Street, where their act performed. A passage from Tarlton's Jests (1611) says:
  The[re] was one Banks, in the time of Tarlton, who served the Erle of Essex, and had a horse of strange qualities, and being at the Crosse-keyes, in Gracious streete, getting mony with him, as he was mightily resorted to. Tarlton then, with his fellowes, playing at the Bel by, came into the Cross-keyes, amongst many people, to see fashions, which Banks perceiving, to make the people laugh, saies; seignior, to his horse, go fetch me the veryest foole in the company. The jade comes immediately, and with his mouth drawes Tarlton forth. Tarlton with merry words, said nothing but, "God a mercy, horse." In the end Tarlton, seeing the people laugh so, was angry inwardly, and said: Sir, had I power of your horse as you have, I would doe more than that. What ere it be, said Banks, to please him, I will charge him to do it. Then, said Tarleton: charge him bring me the veriest whore-master in the company. The horse leades his master to him. Then "God a mercy horse indeed," saies Tarlton, The people had much ado to keep peace; but Banks and Tarlton had like to have squar'd, and the horse by to give aime. But ever after it was a by word thorow London, God a mercy horse! and is so to this day.
  Exactly when Marocco and Bankes moved to London is unknown, but for Richard Tarlton (a renowned clown) to have seen the act, they must have arrived before Tarlton's death in September 1588. Bondeson has suggested that the entire episode with Tarlton was staged to garner publicity.
  Marocco could walk on two and three legs and play dead. He could pull out particular audience members—such as people wearing spectacles—on Bankes's command; he could distinguish between colors, such as green and violet (horses are only partially colorblind). In one stunt, the horse drank a large bucket of water, then urinated on Bankes's command. In another, he was told to pick out the "maids" (virgins) from the "maulkins" (harlots) in the audience. When ordered to bow to the queen, Elizabeth I, Marocco was trained to do so; when ordered to bow to Philip II (King of Spain), the horse was trained to bare its teeth, whinny, and chase Bankes offstage. This stunt was soon thereafter imitated by other animal trainers. By 1593, John Donne had written:
  But to a graue man, he doth moue no more 
  
  Than the wise politique horse would heretofore, 
  
  Or thou, O Elephant, or Ape, wilt doe, 
  
  When any names the k[ing] of Spaine to you.
  Whether by sleight-of-hand or by the horse's own talent, Marocco was known for his unusual counting abilities. Coins could be collected from the audience, and Marocco would indicate to whom each coin belonged and, with stomps of his hoof, how many coins had come from each. Contemporary poet John Bastard wrote:
  Bankes hath a horse of wondrous qualitie
  
  For he can fight, and pisse, and daunce, and lie,
  
  And finde your purse, and tell what coyne ye haue:
  
  But Bankes, who taught your horse to smel a knaue?
  By the mid-1590s Marocco and Bankes had become some of London's most popular entertainers; Bankes was now wealthy, living and performing at the Bell Savage Inn, where Marocco was kept in the stables. Eventually Bankes had an arena built on Gracechurch Street just for their act. A musician was employed who played a song called "Bankes's Game" during the act, and who entertained the audience between shows. Although the tune and lyrics have not been preserved, the song "The Praise of a Pretty Lass; or, The Young Man's Dissimulation", published sometime in the early 17th century, follows the same tune. The first ve
caption: Richard Tarlton
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