Saturday 23rd December. Walk at 2.30pm, Virtual Tour at 7.30pm
We look at London Austen’s London and at how Jane Austen spent Christmas and at Georgian Christmas traditions and amusements.
Here is a short podcast about the walk and Regency Christmas traditions.
“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a Jane Austen devotee in possession of the good fortune of a couple of free hours must be in want of this virtual walk.”
This is a special walk, which looks at the traditions of Christmas during the Regency period and how Jane Austen might have celebrated it. It will give some background to Jane Austen’s life and her knowledge of London. We used her novels and her letters to find out what she might have done at Christmas, but also at how Christmas was kept in this period, and the range of ‘Curiosities, Amusements, Exhibitions, Public Establishments, and Remarkable Objects in and near London available to enjoy.
This is a London Walks Guided Walk by Kevin Flude, Museum Curator and Lecturer.
Review: ‘Thanks, again, Kevin. These talks are magnificent!’
This is the Podcast which is a taster for the Roman Walk on Saturday 16th December 2023 starting at Monument Tube Station. This is a London Walks Walk by Kevin Flude. To book click here.
Below, I give links to the Late November and early December Posts I have revised and republished. But, first, I would like to tell you about a great lecture I heard at the British Museum, this evening. It was given by Dr Emma Southon on her book about women in the Roman Empire. Her viewpoint was that a study of women in the Roman Empire gives a radically different insight into the Roman world than the traditional. One full of humanity rather than normal evidence which is, generally, about wars, and Empires and bravery and horrific cruelty and ambition and honour. She started with the story of Turia, whose extraordinary epitaph on her tombstone miraculous survived and gave her husband’s view of his extraordinary wife, and his utter sorrow at his loss on her death. Below, is a review of the book and a link to a podcast with the Author.
So, here are the December posts. December 1st and 2nd give an overview of December and the meaning of Winter. December 3rd is about Advent and the fact that you were not allowed to marry during Advent. December 4 gives a Shakespearean view of a cold winter’s day, and a composition by Vaughan Williams.
And late November posts, November 28th tells some interesting tales, both ancient and modern, about Eels, Pies, Rock ‘n’ Roll and my horror of Jellied Eels. November 29th, tells you how to make a ‘dish of snow’ and introduces Ice Houses. November 30th is about Scotland and St Andrews. Like them if you like them! And share them if you want to share them.
Almost ‘one in three women have been subjected to physical and/or sexual violence at least once in their life.’ says the UN on its page Ending Violence Against Women Day.
In writing my Almanac of the Past, I have been struck by how violent are most of the stories of the Saints of the early Catholic Church. At the bottom of this post, you will find an essay touching upon this thorny subject. And click here for research on violence against women. Their results are not good news countries that speak English. South Africa is the worst, the USA 7th, Australia 11th, UK 12th, and New Zealand 15th. They admit the figures are difficult to interpret as what is being counted is reported crimes. It is likely that the worst countries are those where women do not feel free to report sexual violence.
Today is St Catherine of Alexandria’s Day, which makes an appropriate Saint for the UN Day. So I have updated this very interesting story and republished it today. Have a read.
I was interested in this site because it was one of the many palaces owned by Henry VIII, and it began as a moated manor house before a transition into a small red brick courtyarded Palace, as seen above. Henry had, if my memory serves me well, approximately 57 Palaces and Manor Houses. 16 in the London area and 11 along the River Thames
But what I really liked when I visited the website was the charm of this lovely video by the Enfield Archaeology Society. Now those who know the wonderful TV Sitcom called the ‘Detectorists’ starring Toby Jones, Mackenzie Crook, Diana Rigg and others, will recognise the styling of the amateur archaeologists – all looking like rumpled would be Indiana Jones’s! Very English.
Electric Mountain Dinorwig Power Station, Llyn Peris (photo: K Flude)
I have revised the post on All Souls’ Day. If you follow the link you will read about ‘Souling’, Purgatory, and English, Mexican and Polish Customs for 2nd November.
But this post is prompted by an interesting article in the Guardian about the Dinorwig Power Station in North Wales. It’s a place I visit regularly. The photograph is from a Medieval Welsh Castle, Dobaldarn Castle, near the National Slate Museum in the new Unesco World Heritage Site of the Slate Landscape of North West Wales. The photo above gives an idea of the majesty of the destructive power of quarrying for slate.
Dobaldarn Castle, North Wales (photo by K Flude)
The Power Station is remarkable. It is a huge cavern in the mountain. When the National Grid has a lot of cheap energy, water is pumped to the top, and when electricity is in short supply, the water runs turbines to provide extra power. It is, in effect, a giant battery, and what makes it even more worthy of a part in a James Bond film is that it has the capability of initiating a Black Start to the Grid. If some cosmic catastrophe turns off the entire grid, Dinorwig can restart the Grid.
The article in the Guardian has some great pictures of it and the text is very interesting. You might want to start reading a third of the way down the article which has a long preamble.
I published the following post about Hardy’s Tree on 28th December 2022. Here, follows the original post and an update which suggests the tree and the gravestones were not erected by Thomas Hardy.
This is the day that Herod ordered the slaughter of the Innocents, or Childermas, and I am glad to see that my Grandson is now older than Herod’s prescription.
Hardy’s Tree in St Pancras Church, Camden, London has fallen down. Hardy was an architect and worked in London for a while, where one of his jobs was to supervise the clearance of the graveyard. Several poems of Hardy refer to the removal of graves from their original positions and in this case, the gravestones were set around an Ash tree that inspires many, including my Central St Martin’s students who used it in a project recently. So, I was shocked to read a Guardian article (since deleted) which noted the sad demise of the Tree.
Extracts from one of several Hardy Poems about moving graves and gravestones follow, but I need to update the post about the connection to Hardy. The Guardian has now got an article which suggests the connection with Hardy is a more recent one than previously thought (Guardian article).
I (and I think the Guardian) were alerted to this by the work of Lester Hillman, who wrote a Churchyard Guide and a recent pamphlet about the Tree, which is reported in ‘Context ISSN 1462-7574’. This is the Journal of the City of London Archaeological Society. Evidence proves that the Ash Tree dates to the 1930s, and that the mound of gravestones is from burials relocated from St Giles in the Fields, and therefore unlikely to have been in St Pancras at the time Hardy was responsible for clearing it.
So it is not ‘the’ Hardy Tree, but then nor was the tree at Sycamore Gap anything to do with Robin Hood. What it was, was a beautiful piece of nature, in a poignant setting. May she rest in peace.
The Levelled Churchyard Thomas Hardy
O Passenger, pray list and catch Our sighs and piteous groans, Half stifled in this jumbled patch Of wrenched memorial stones!
We late-lamented, resting here, Are mixed to human jam, And each to each exclaimed in fear, I know not which I am.
Where we are huddled none can trace, And if our names remain, They pave some path or porch or place Where we have never lain!
Edinburgh from Arthur’s Seat. Castle to the left, St Giles the ’rounded’ spire in the middle, and Salisbury Crags to the right
This is a poem which is ‘printed’ on the side of the Scottish Parliament.
by Hugh MacDiarmid
But Edinburgh is a mad god’s dream Fitful and dark, Unseizable in Leith And wildered by the Forth, But irresistibly at last Cleaving to sombre heights Of passionate imagining Till stonily, From soaring battlements, Earth eyes Eternity
Cotswold Cottage relocated to Dearborn, Michigan, Jan 1931. The Dog is called Rover.
Following my post where I introduced the story of Henry Ford and his visits to Broadway; my subscriber from Paris sent me details that led me to a really comprehensive description of Ford’s activities in the Cotswolds. He loved it so much, as the post from the Henry Ford Museum reveals, that he sent to the US not only a complete Cottage, but also the Barn, Stables and dry stone walling. He then went to stay in the Lygon Arms in Broadway; visited nearby Snowshill, where a dilapidated Blacksmith Shop dating to the 1600s with all its tools was purchased and sent to the Museum in Michigan.
Snowshill Blacksmith shop dating to the 1600s taken to the Henry Ford Museum, Dearborn, Michigan
Here is the post – it has lots of interesting photos.
Screen Shot of the Virtual Tour of the Sir John Soane Museum
The Sir John Soane Museum is my second favourite London Museum. It’s the place I choose to take people who don’t know London. What I like about it is the atmosphere. It’s not a place I go because of the collection, it’s a place I go because I’m just awestruck when I enter the doors.
Architect Soane, made a Museum of his house, filling it with architectural and sculptural pieces but also some stupendous Art, particularly paintings by William Hogarth. But that isn’t my motivation to keep going back. It’s the Picture Room (and the domed ceilings). Soane had a great collection of paintings, but not enough walls. What he did was to design the Paintings Room. When you visit you go in, admire the paintings on the wall, and the attendant comes in, opens a shutter, and behind the great paintings are another wall of great paintings. And then he opens another set of shutters, and there, is another feast for your eyes.
Now, they have made high quality digital images of the rooms, and put them together using photogrammetry into a digital model which you can explore.
So, feast your eyes on it here: (choose Picture Room from the three options).
It’s not quite as user-friendly as it might be. Firstly, when the tour delivers you to the Picture Room, you have to take over control to go in and explore the 360 degree image of the room. Unfortunately, the pictures are not clickable, so you cannot get information about them from here. Also, the ‘hot spots’ which allow you to open the shutters, only reveal themselves, on my computer, if you approach them at a certain angle.
But don’t let this put you off, I’m sure you will find your way around. So go into the Room, look around, move the cursus, and you will see little signs pop up which open and close the shutters. Really, do try it! There are a couple of other rooms to explore too.
Oh, and the Dome Ceilings? Soane was a specialist in buildings that didn’t want windows in normal places. He was the architect of the Bank of England where windows in the walls were a security risk, and also of London’s first purpose built art gallery – the Dulwich Picture Gallery. Windows reduced the space for paintings, so he designed special low domed ceilings, and the Soane Museum is full of his experimentation in the form.
Scara Brae Three D Model
Another delight is the 3D model of Scara Brae which allows you to explore the Neolithic village, and walk around it. There are labels on this one, so you do get information too.
360 Degree Panorama Virtual Tours. My part in their development.
I was an early adopter of this form of virtual reality, setting up virtual tours of the Old Operating Theatre Museum in the 1990’s. I have a draft post of this which I have been awaiting time to finish, which I hope to finish soon….
Thanks to the Museum’s Journal article on Photogrametry of May/June 2022 for the two examples above.
