Long time no blog, long time no sleep

It's been a while. Apparently it is Christmas in a little over a week's time. It is also the boy's first birthday in a little while longer than that. Somehow, somewhere (this is sounding rapidly like an excerpt from West Side Story), I have lost three months. The boy has started nursery and suffered endless days off nursery with various lurgies. Less than three months ago he couldn't sit up without falling over, now he is speed crawling (the last two days). But, I digress. I really post to share with you a link to Magna Carta, and the Henry III Fine Rolls blog. Lovely.

Remembrance Day

In Britain this was the first anniversary of the Armistice ending WW1 to pass without the attendance of eye-witnesses, the last three veterans residing in the U.K. having died in the past year. A British soldier from the war still lives, but in Perth, Australia.

In another connection between Australia and WW1, I have had in my possession for some months the 1916 diary of a friend's grandfather, which I offered to transcribe for her (although with pregnancy there has been a major hiatus on this front). So, to mark the war, lest we forget, I have flipped forward to 11 November 1916:

"There was a straff of unusual violence last night
our first Div had ten guns blown out we never heard if any of the men got knocked
it has been rather a fine day & the mud is like glue a mans feet weigh somewhere near 1 cwt
Fritz put some busters very near us last night & today"

Artefact of the week (2)

Two artefacts from Norwich Cathedral, which I visited on Thursday, for you:
(1) the Despenser reredos
(2) the Pelican lecturn
Both of these survived the Reformation by being hidden: the reredos disguised as a plumber's table, the lecturn buried in a garden. Shame that the powers that be there felt the need to put a hole in the lecturn stand in order to feed a microphone cable through it, though.

August culture vultures (1)

August appears to be a time when Cambridge is awash with festivals of various kinds. This weekend the boy went to a concert of early music performed on reconstruction medieval instruments. Myself, I went to the latest exhibition at the FitzWilliam Museum on the influence of Darwin's theories on the art of the time.
nb. the culture content is reduced by taking young children with you, as a museum visit today with a friend and said young children reminded me.

Apparently it really is sunny...

in the south. That is in the south of England, where the boy and I spent the long weekend. 'The South' in England is a somewhat elastic concept. For those who wish to be considered from 'The North' as diametrically opposed to 'The South', the said South begins anywhere below the particular latitude of their hometown. However, visiting East Sussex we were definitely in 'the South', as confirmed by local pub-goers who seemed to regard anything north of the Thames as the wild North. Eejits.

We were visiting a friend who works and lives at Herstmonceux castle, and it was a weekend of much eating out and visiting sites of historical interest, don't you know. The only downside was that we ate as if we were teenagers on a growth-spurt and moved as if we were shuffling off to live in Bexhill-on-Sea. That aside, it was a great weekend, where we:

1. Spent some time in the British Museum 'doing' the Assyrian galleries, Africa and some of Roman Britain (before we got turfed out). I found the lion hunt displays a bit relentless in the Assyrian galleries. In the African gallery I'd recommend the 'Tree of Life'.

2. Splashed out on National Trust membership for a year and put it to good use by visiting Bateman's (Rudyard Kipling's house) and Bodiam castle. The latter is so liberally provisioned with fireplaces its primary use must have been as grand manor house rather than for defence of the south coast, whatever the introductory video might say. Watch this if you ever go though, if only for the shot of a knight apparently making his fortune in the Hundred Years War by riding down a fleeing peasant.

3. Visited Lewes, scene of the Montfortian victory over Henry III in 1264, which was unfortunately mostly shut. The castle was having its walkway renovated, and the priory remains, although some attempt had clearly been made in the past to open them up and turn a penny from them (there were faded information boards and instructions that you could obtain leaflets from the ticket office), were shut away behind a fence topped with barbed wire. This seemed a shame, but apparently money is on its way to open the site up. All in all we appear to have visited Lewes too soon. In compensation we went to 'Anne of Cleeves' House'. A triumph of marketing over content because although given to Anne of Cleeves by Henry VIII she never went there. So, unless you want to see a local history of Lewes museum, you may not want to part with your gold. One display did catch my eye though: a series of firebacks made from local pig-iron. My question to you is, who would want a fireback of Protestant martyrs being burned at the stake? But this is a town with a fierce Bonfire night tradition (indeed, bonfire societies) with flaming crosses and (until recently) burning effigies of Pope Pius IV. This, I suppose, is what happens when your town suffers Marian persecution under Queen Mary.

4. Obviously looked around Herstmonceux castle and its grounds, including an embryonic archaeological dig, examining a purported moated manor house.

5. Shuffled along the sea-front at Eastbourne and its pier. Having never been on the 'traditional' English sea-side holiday I'd rather anticipated that all such resorts had tat shops selling 'Kiss Me Quick' hats and the other assorted junk a-plenty, but apparently Eastbourne is a little more classy than that.

6. Made it to the heart of '1066 Country' with a trip to Battle. English Heritage haven't done too bad a job here - your entrance fee buys you admittance to the battlefield and the remains of the abbey. It's not necessary to watch the video as you will hear the text again on your audio-guide. I found it a little hard to envisage the battle as you go around with your audio-guide as, of course, the terrain has changed and you don't get a full appreciation of the incline of the hill as the abbey buildings cut this off. (Tradition says that William had the altar of the 11th century church placed on the spot where Harold was killed, and this is some way up the abbey complex).

Queens, queens and more queens

No, not a discussion of any particular gender topic. This is medieval history. Traditionally written by men, it doesn't do gender really, even if there is now literature out there on queering the Vikings. Instead, today we discussed real queens from AElfthryth to Anne of Bohemia. I myself, whilst far from a copy of the Queen of Heaven, am an intercessory centre. 'Can I have an extension?' The student approaches the friendly face. The friendly face refers to the inner grumpy core. The inner grumpy core mutters and splutters and the friendly face smiles munificence. Nothing queenly for you artefact wise, but queens must have had treasure so you could look at this website instead.

Things to do when you're bored (1)

Read Domesday Book. Well, perhaps less 'read', more 'skim'. I was disappointed to learn today that nowhere really really close to my particular part of the urban jungle that is the greater West Midlands connurbation was included. On the other hand the village I currently reside in in Cambridge is.

Um, what's to celebrate?

You can right now go out into the blogsphere and find yourself some photos of the light show that was on this evening to celebrate the start of the 800th year of the University of Cambridge. You will find plenty. Because, apparently, it is more important to take photos of things to stick on your blog etc. than to actually experience them in the present moment. I must have been one of the few people who wasn't sticking a camera/mobile phone in front of someone else's face to obscure their view. It was also a shame that you couldn't properly hear the bells being rung from nearby bell towers. (And, yes, I know I'm having a moan, possibly even exaggerating slightly. And the irony isn't lost on me either).

But if you want to see something else worth seeing, without impediment, check out the new exhibition at the FitzWilliam Museum. I particularly liked the twentieth-century manuscript illumination and the Rossetti Annunciation.

Artefacts of the week

Any Anglo-Saxon coins. Real ones though, not the (actually not so cheap) replicas I bought from the FitzWilliam Museum yesterday to show my class. Go, for example, here.

Another week, another century

Gosh, that went quickly. Mainly due to panics about the 10th century I fear. Forget Aethelred being "Unready" though; I'll reserve that epithet for others. There were no pretty pictures this week, so instead I refer you to this website where you can see lots of lovely Anglo-Saxon sculpture.

This trip to London would have seen some much needed Channel swimming too, but my swimming buddy forgot their costume.

Artefact of the week

As I'm teaching this year, I thought I'd share some of the interesting sources and artefacts I come across in the course of my preparation. This week was Alfredian Wessex, the artefact of choice The Alfred Jewel.