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Salon: Issue 316
17 March 2014

Next issue: 31 March 2014


The Society of Antiquaries of London Online Newsletter (Salon) is a fortnightly digest of news from the heritage sector. It focuses on the activities of the Society and the contribution that the Society's Fellows make to public life. Like the intellectual salons of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Europe, it aims to amuse and to stimulate debate as well as to inform. A copy of Salon’s editorial policy can be found on the Society’s website. News and feedback for publication in Salon should be addressed to the Editor, Christopher Catling.
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Inside this issue

Forthcoming meetings

Tea is served from 4.15pm, and meetings start at 5pm

20 March 2014: ‘When prehistoric farming begins: new insights from Kingsmead Quarry’, by Alistair Barclay, FSA, and Gareth Chaffey
Investigations at Kingsmead Quarry (Berkshire) have produced new insights into social change and habitation from the fourth to the second millennia BC. Over a period of 2,000 years this landscape was transformed from one of small timber houses — the dwellings of pioneer farmers associated with small-scale agriculture — to one where farming was organised on a grand scale.

The (so far) unique discovery of four early Neolithic houses on a single site provides new information on architecture, households, sequence and connections with other parts of Britain. There is also evidence to suggest overlap with mortuary monuments — houses of the living and the dead. Lasting for perhaps no more than 200 years, these houses, and perhaps this way of life, fade from the known archaeological record. A focus on dwelling is replaced by attention to monument building, occasionally on a grand scale, along with enigmatic pit digging and burial.

During this long period of time the traces of habitation and farming become less tangible. However, the less detectable evidence for investment in the land and its tenure may only be apparent by the sudden large-scale reorganisation of the landscape into a system of farmsteads and farms during the middle centuries of the second millennium, a process that may well have preserved past methods and attitudes to land use, marking and ownership.

27 March 2014: ‘Baroque and later ivories in the Victoria and Albert Museum: how people and objects shaped the collection’, by Marjorie Trusted, FSA
Dozens, if not hundreds, of people have shaped the great collection of baroque and later ivories at the V&A, but two individuals stand out. The first is Dr Walter Leo Hildburgh (1876—1955), a slightly eccentric American, who settled in London in 1912, and generously donated or bequeathed more than seventy baroque ivories to the V&A. The second is Margaret Longhurst (1882—1958), a few years Dr Hildburgh’s junior, who curated the ivories at the V&A from about 1926 onwards and who in 1938 became the first woman keeper at a UK national museum. Her catalogue of the ivories, published in two volumes in 1927 and 1929, provided the bedrock for the speaker’s own, published in 2013. In this lecture Marjorie Trusted will also examine the V&A’s baroque and later ivories more broadly, from the first acquisitions in 1853 into those of the twenty-first century, and look at how taste and understanding developed and broadened over that stretch of 160 years.

30 April 2014: Anniversary Meeting
Details to come in a future issue of Salon.
 

Regional event: South West Fellows, 18 March 2014


The first lecture to be organised by the newly formed Fellows’ Group in the south west of England will take place in Exeter on Tuesday, 18 March 2014, when Fellow Kevin Leahy will give a paper called ‘What, Where, When and Why: getting to grips with the Staffordshire Hoard’. The lecture will take place at the University of Exeter, Laver Building, Lecture Theatre LT6, 6th floor, at 6pm. All Fellows are welcome. A campus map, with walking directions from St David’s station, is available on the University of Exeter website and parking on the campus after normal working hours is free.
 

Ballot results: 6 March 2014


We welcome the following new Fellows of the Society, elected in the ballot held on 6 March 2014:
  • Steven Ashby, Lecturer in Medieval Archaeology at the University of York Steve Ashby specialises in portable material culture. He co-directs the Torpel Archaeological Project, a study of the west Cambridgeshire landscape, and is editor for the Finds Research Group. He is currently preparing publications on Craft Networks in Viking Towns (with Søren Sindbaek) and Crafts, Consumption and the Individual in Northern Europe AD 1000—1600 (with Gitte Hansen and Irene Baug).
  • Dominic Fontana, Senior Lecturer in Geography at the University of Portsmouth Specialising in Historical Geography and Geographical Information Systems, Dominic Fontana has made innovative use of geographical data to model the events surrounding the loss of the Mary Rose. He has helped with the development of the new Mary Rose Museum and has significant involvement in the Langstone Harbour Archaeological Project, where he is currently working on a Bronze Age site.
  • Virginia Dellino-Musgrave, maritime archaeologist Virginia has been a council member of the IfA and Chair of the IfA Marine Archaeology Group. Her publications include Marine Archaeology: a handbook (CBA, 2012) and contributions to A Maritime Archaeological Research Agenda for England (CBA, 2013).
  • Anne Lehoerff, Professor of European Protohistory, University of Lille 3 Anne Lehoerff set up the Laboratoire d’Étude des Alliages Cuivreux Anciens, specialising in the archaeometallurgy of ancient copper alloys. Her studies include the analysis of weapons and armour from the European Bronze Age and research into the metal hoards of this period. She is currently co-director of the international BOAT 1550 BC project, involving partners from France, Belgium and the UK in a study of Bronze Age navigation.
  • Graham Voce, Executive Secretary of the International Institute for Conservation (IIC) Graham Voce has been responsible for the management of the IIC since 2004, a role that includes editing the IIC’s Bulletin and organising international conferences in Munich, London, Istanbul, Vienna and Hong Kong as well as liaison with conservation bodies around the world, such as the Institute for Conservation (UK) and the American Institute of Conservation.
  • Judith Mary Leigh, Wales Officer, Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings Judith has worked for many years as a Historic Environment Field Adviser (English Heritage) and Wales Officer (for SPAB). She has contributed to the management of thousands of archaeological sites and traditional buildings in England and Wales and is the author of numerous conservation reports and articles in the SPAB Journal. She is also a member of the Cathedrals Fabric Commission for England and of Diocesan Advisory Committees for the care of church buildings.
  • Christopher DeCorse, Professor of Archaeology, Syracuse University, NY, USA Christopher DeCorse’s primary area of research is African archaeology, particularly in West Africa during the Atlantic slave trade era. He has conducted fieldwork in Sierra Leone, Ghana, the Gambia, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, Senegal, Benin and Togo, and his publications include An Archaeology of Elmina (2001), West Africa during the Atlantic Slave Trade (2001; as editor) and Small Worlds (2008; as co-editor).
  • Verity Jane Platt, Associate Professor of Classics and History of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY Verity Platt is an authority on the art and religion of the Roman world with a particular interest in epiphanies on which she has published widely, including Facing the Gods: Epiphany and Representation in Graeco-Roman Art (Cambridge 2011).
  • Timothy John Hunter, Director, Gurr Johns (Art Advisers) Tim Hunter worked in the Department of Western Art at the Ashmolean (particularly on medieval objects and silver) and was a Senior Director and Head of Nineteenth-century European Art at Christie’s before taking up his present post. He is currently preparing a catalogue of the important picture collection at Magdalen College, Oxford.
  • Madeleine Gray, Reader in History, University of South Wales Madeleine Gray’s publications include Images of Piety: the iconography of traditional religion in late medieval Wales (2000) and The Protestant Reformation: belief, practice and tradition (2003). She is currently co-ordinating the Cistercian Way Project (the all-Wales heritage footpath), and is creating an online analytical database of medieval tomb carvings in Wales.
 

Ballot results: 13 March 2014


We welcome the following new Fellows of the Society, elected in the ballot held on 13 March 2014:
  • The Rt Hon The Hon William Arthur Waldegrave, Lord Waldegrave of North Hill, Provost, Eton College William Waldegrave is a Trustee of the Strawberry Hill Trust and a member of the governing board of the Lewis Walpole Library, which preserves much of Horace Walpole’s material for scholarly study; he has built a significant collection of Walpole manuscripts and books. He was responsible for The Wall Paintings of Eton (by Fellow Henrietta McBurney et al, 2013), which won the 2013 Berger Prize, and for the development of the Verey Gallery and the Jaffar Gallery at Eton College. In government he was responsible for historic buildings and spokesman for the arts; in the Lords he has supported legislation consonant with the Society’s aims.
  • Marcus James Risdell, Curator, Garrick Club Library and Collections Marcus Risdell is an expert on theatrical history and curator of the Garrick Club’s important collection of theatrical and its archive and library. He is Co-Chair of the Association of Performing Arts Collections and on the Committee of the Society for Theatre Research. He co-curated an exhibition on the iconography of Shakespeare in 2009 and has published significant contributions on the Georgian theatre.
  • Lawrence Raymond Poos, Professor of History, The Catholic University of America, Washington DC, USA Lawrence Poos has wide research interests, including the marriage, household formation, migration and labour and family and property law (especially local customary law) in rural England from 1300 to 1600. He is a member of the group working on the digitisation of the Archbishops’ Registers of the Diocese of York, 1225—1646.
  • David Andrew Pearson, Manager, Digital Preservation Section, National Library of Australia, Canberra David is an archaeologist and information technology specialist, undertaking research on conflict archaeology and on the application of digital systems in the preservation and accessing of archaeological and archival data. His publications have appeared in the Journal of Conflict Archaeology, Historical Archaeology, International Journal of Digital Curation, Library Hi Tec and D-Lib Magazine.
  • Stephen James Patterson, Head of Collections Information Management, Royal Collection Trust Stephen is an experienced scholar in the fields of bibliography, genealogy and insignia and a practitioner in data management. His publications include a catalogue of foreign orders in the Royal Collection (Royal Insignia, 1998); he is currently working on early Garter insignia and the history of relations between the British and Russian royal families.
  • Sarah Dromgoole, Professor of Maritime Law, University of Nottingham Sarah is an internationally recognised authority on the legal protection of the underwater cultural heritage, a subject on which she has written a substantial monograph and has edited two volumes covering policy and practice in eighteen significant jurisdictions around the world. She has served for twenty years as a member of the UK’s Joint Nautical Archaeology Policy Committee.
  • Clare Woodthorpe Browne, Curator, Textiles, Victoria and Albert Museum Clare Browne is the V&A’s specialist in dress, furnishing and ecclesiastical textiles from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries across a range of techniques including weaving, printing, embroidery, lace and tapestry. Recent publications include Raphael: cartoons and tapestries for the Sistine Chapel (co-edited with Fellow Mark Evans, 2010), Textiles at Court in The Golden Age of the English Court from Henry VIII to Charles I (2012) and Tudors, Stuarts and Early Romanovs: life at court 1509—1685 (2013).
  • Paul Spencer-Longhurst, Senior Research Fellow, Paul Mellon Centre for British Art Paul has published widely on French Neo-classical and Romantic art, British painting of the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and the history of collecting and patronage. He has also curated major exhibitions in Britain and the US on Gainsborough, Constable, Turner, Rossetti, ‘Birmingham Private Collections from Van Dyck to Cornelia Parker’ and ‘Swedish Landscapes from the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm’. He is currently revising the catalogue of Richard Wilson’s works for publication during the artist’s tercentenary.
  • Margaret Lucille Kekewich, retired academic Margaret Kekewich is a scholar of the fifteenth century. Her interests in literary and artistic (especially artefactual) materials are well exemplified in her book on King René of Anjou (2008) and in her important article on William Caxton (Modern Language Review, 1971). She also ranges more widely, as witness her recent book, Retreat and Retribution in Afghanistan, 1842 (2011).
  • Graham Roderick Jones, landscape historian Graham Jones has worked in the UK and in universities in Germany, Spain and the USA. His Saints in the Landscape (2007) was the first comprehensive review of church and other dedications in Britain. He edited Saints in Europe (2003) and has digitised much relevant material for publication as electronic resources.
 
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Kelmscott Manor’s first ever artist-in-residence


Slot window in Multi Faith Space, Goscote Hospice, Walsall 2011. Photograph: Sasha Ward

Stained-glass artist Sasha Ward has been appointed as the first ever artist-in-residence at Kelmscott Manor. Sasha is based in Marlborough, Wiltshire, and her innovative glass techniques have led to more than seventy major projects and commissions for public and private buildings, including Churchill Hospital, Oxford (2014), Dorset County Hospital (2013), Liverpool Premier Inn (2012) and the Millbank House Library for the House of Lords (2012).

Sasha says: ‘my work is made primarily for buildings. I aim to introduce colour, pattern, interesting light effects or specific subject matter to a place. I work mostly in glass and have always used techniques that are compatible with modern building methods. Most of my work has been commissioned for public buildings and it ranges from small stained glass chapel windows to colour schemes for hospital departments.’ Sasha also replicates her designs on textiles, glass plates, tiles and bowls. Examples of her work can be seen in the Winchester University Art Collection, on the Art in Partnership website and on the Axis website.

At Kelmscott she will make works inspired by the Manor and its collection; she will also run workshops and drop-ins and give informal talks during her residency. Kelmscott Manor Property Manager, Sarah Parker, said that ‘we received more than 150 applications for the opportunity to be artist-in-residence at the Manor, all of them from artists of standing. Six were shortlisted and it was an agonising decision, but Sasha shone through.’
 
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New addition to the Kelmscott Manor team


Katy Hacket has joined the team at Kelmscott Manor as Membership and Groups Co-ordinator (a new post) where she will be responsible for administering the Friends scheme, the Patrons scheme and group bookings. Katy comes to the manor with an excellent pedigree, having previously worked as part of the English Heritage Visitor Operations team, as a Royal Collection Warden Supervisor, as Duty Manager with the Holburne Museum in Bath and as a shop manager for Sue Ryder.
 
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Cotswold Archaeology hits its quarter century


Fellow Neil Holbrook has been Chief Executive since 1991 and is one of nine Fellows on the staff (there are a further three Fellows on the Board of Trustees, including Chairman Tim Darvill and Vice Chairman, Christopher Catling).

Fellow Neil Holbrook writes to say that: ‘Cotswold Archaeology celebrates the twenty-fifth anniversary of its formation in 1989 today (17 March 2014). The Cotswold Archaeological Trust (CAT), as it was originally known, grew out of the Cirencester Excavation Committee (CEC), which had been working in the town since 1959 (and whose members included many of the most prominent archaeologists and FSAs of the day). The plan was that the CEC would see through its existing commitments to produce reports on its excavations while the new entity, a registered charity, would take responsibility for all further fieldwork.

‘The creation of CAT was directly linked to the changing state of British archaeology, and in particular the principle that developers should pay for archaeological work (formally enshrined in Planning Policy the following year with the introduction of PPG 16). From very humble, and financially straitened, beginnings Cotswold Archaeology has since grown to become one of the UK’s top four archaeological contracting organisations, employing more than 100 professional archaeologists at offices in Cirencester, Andover and Milton Keynes.

Fellow Timothy Darvill was a founder trustee of Cotswold Archaeology and has been its Chairman for twenty-two years, a remarkable achievement.

‘To mark its birthday Cotswold Archaeology has today formally launched a free online library of its reports. All of its out-of-print monographs are available for download from the Cotswold Archaeology website, alongside typescript reports on archaeological fieldwork projects (so-called ‘grey literature’). The latter can be accessed via a powerful tool that can undertake map-based and keyword searches. Over 1,000 reports have already been uploaded and this number will rise to over 2,500 in the coming months. Making the results of its work widely and freely available is an important part of Cotswold’s charitable activities; staff and trustees hope that many Fellows will make use of the facility.’
 

2015 New Year Honours List: heritage nominations invited


Do you know somebody who has given outstanding service to the heritage community? The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is asking for the nominations of potential candidates from within the UK heritage and conservation sectors for honours in 2015; they are especially keen to see more women recognised and more ethnic community candidates.

Remember that awards are not just for voluntary work: what matters is whether the person concerned has made a difference or whether their achievements are such that they stand out from the crowd. Further details can be found on the DCMS website.
 

Vikings: a case of little and large


The Vikings exhibition has opened at the British Museum to a mixed reception. Had this exhibition been mounted in the Round Reading Room, it might have been praised, much as previous BM special exhibitions have in recent years, although it would have lacked its central exhibit — the truly enormous Viking long boat known prosaically as Roskilde 6. As it is, most of the critics had as much to say about the British Museum’s new exhibition space as the exhibition itself, and many expressed the view that it was uninspiring, and that the displays were oddly old-fashioned for such a modern space.

Salon’s editor cannot but agree. No pictures can do justice to the scale of Roskilde 6 — sleek and streamlined, it is nevertheless a huge vessel, and when you enter the hall in which it is displayed, you cannot help but be impressed — by the steel skeleton, at least, if not by the surviving timbers, which are actually quite difficult to see. The same is true of the most of the other exhibits, which are considerably smaller so that it is necessary to get close to the display case in order to see them at all let alone study the detail. Twice at the relatively uncrowded press launch, Salon’s editor was invited  to ‘get out of the way’, having overstayed his notional allotted time looking at the intricate detail of a brooch or pendant; sometimes there was not even a none-too-polite exchange of words: people took their cue from Viking manners and barged in with sharpened elbows.

This is not a problem unique to the BM: the current British Library exhibition, Georgians Revealed, suffers too from the fact that one person studying an object effectively blocks everyone else from seeing it; the same was true of the recent Paul Klee exhibition at Tate Modern: Klee’s works are far smaller than you might imagine from reproductions. The sheer number of people visiting major exhibitions militates against any attempt to follow works in the order in which they are displayed: the best tactic is to dart about like a dragon fly from exhibit to exhibit whenever a space opens up.

This might explain why the British Museum (and various opera and theatre companies around the world) are enjoying such a success with their live cinema broadcasts. In the case of Vikings, we are promised expert commentary from Bettany Hughes and from Fellows Neil MacGregor and Michael Wood when Vikings is shown in cinemas on 24 April 2014. According to the press release, the cameras will allow viewers to get ‘very very close’.

Those who choose to visit the exhibition in person will need to be patient and accept that, while one or two objects are huge, most are very small — but that is far from being the exhibition’s only paradox. Just as intriguing is the evidence that Vikings (from Old Norse víkingr, pirate or raider) rejected society’s norms and values, and were prepared to commit vile atrocities without conscience or qualm, and yet they did so in order to acquire society’s ultimate power symbols, in the form of beautifully crafted beechwood, walrus ivory, inlaid stone, wrought and cast silver and gold objects. And all these stunning objects hint at the exhibition’s missing back story: we are shown superb examples of Viking technology and craftsmanship, but are not told how a ship as sleek and as effective as Roskilde 6 was designed and made, nor how the intricate grave markers were crafted, nor how the wonderful brooches were designed and cast.

Nearby the Round Reading Room currently hosts the Columbian Gold exhibition (which closes on 23 March 2014). This has excellent displays showing how the gold objects on display were cast. We could have done with the same at Vikings. We got the message that Vikings were marauders; we got the message that they were prodigious explorers across seas and oceans and up and down continental rivers. What we didn’t get was any clear message about the backbone of Viking life — the farming, shipbuilding, craftsmanship and technology.

Left: this beechwood platter from the exhibition hints at the untold back story of Viking life: the story of the farmers, boat builders, cloth and sail makers, metal workers and sculptors in wood and stone who formed the backbone of Viking society, without whom the pirates and raiders would have had no boats, no weapons, no fancy clothes or high-status jewellery.

Grayson Perry’s brilliant exhibition, The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman, also hosted by the Round Reading Room two years ago, served as a tribute to all the anonymous and gifted craftsmen and women who design and make the status symbols without which rulers and authority figures would look rather ordinary. Vikings could have done with a touch of Grayson Perry, and perhaps greater use of video and IT technology to make the exhibits more easy to see.
 

Campaign news




Did you ever think you would see the day that heritage campaigners would describe the planned demolition of a Sainsbury’s supermarket as ‘an outrageous act of vandalism’? Designed by Chetwoods, the Greenwich branch of Sainsbury's was opened by Jamie Oliver just fifteen years ago, in 1999, but is now doomed to be demolished to make way for a branch of Ikea.

The reason why more than 1,500 people have signed an online petition calling for the decision to be reversed is that the building is not only architecturally distinctive (it was nominated for, but did not win, the RIBA’s Sterling Prize in 2000), it is also a pioneering example of environmental sustainability, powered by solar panels and wind turbines and designed to store heat and cut energy bills. The Twentieth Century Society calls it ‘Britain’s most innovative retail store’. Sainsbury’s are moving on to a larger store in Charlton; Ikea says the existing store is not big enough; Greenwich Council says the replacement building will ‘support the continued growth of Greenwich Peninsula’.



Alumni at Worcester College, Oxford, were shocked to receive a letter from the Provost, Jonathan Bate, a fortnight ago, informing them that the college had sold a painting by Jacob van Ruisdael (1629—82) for £10m in order to pay the bill for new student accommodation. This particular painting (Edge of the Forest with a Grainfield, painted c 1656), was bequeathed to the college by the Revd Treadway Nash in 1811; would that he had left it to our Society, of which he was a Fellow, instead of his alma mater.

The very large painting (41 by 57½ inches) will go to the Kimbell Art Museum, Texas, where it joins Ruisdael’s Rough Sea at a Jetty, painted at about the same time as the forest landscape. Ruisdael experts have characterised the Worcester painting as ‘a world-class masterpiece’, which begs the question whether the college got the best price for it (it was sold privately rather than at auction). Critics are also asking why an export licence was granted for its sale, and why the work was not referred to the export review committee. Worcester alumni are asking why they were not consulted in advance: many would have made a donation to the college to help pay the building bill if they knew the painting faced being sold. The Sunday Times reported that the painting had been offered to the Ashmolean, but that the museum was unable to raise the money to buy it, and to the National Gallery, which declined on the grounds that it already owned twenty-two paintings by Ruisdael.



Another petition that several Fellows have signed asks the Church Commissioners to reconsider the decision to rehouse the bishops of Bath and Wells in a rectory at Croscombe, Somerset, vacating the moated palace in Wells in which the bishops have lived for 800 years — albeit in a modest flat in recent years, not in the main part of the palace, which, with its 14 acres of gardens, is a popular visitor attraction and is much used for events such as wedding receptions and conferences. The Croscombe rectory is intended as a temporary residence until a new permanent home can be found for the bishop ‘within walking distance of the historic palace’.

Among those who oppose this decision are the Bishop of Taunton, the Rt Revd Peter Maurice, and seven diocesan staff. They have questioned why, if the office of the Bishop of Bath and Wells is to remain at the palace and the bishop’s chapel is to continue in use, he is being forced to live elsewhere and commute. The Church Commissioners have responded by saying that privacy is at the heart of their decision and the question of whether ‘it is sustainable for a diocesan bishop and his family to live in the midst of an increasingly busy tourist attraction’.

Underlying the disagreement is the fact that a number of bishops have been rehoused in recent years and their historic homes sold by the Church Commissioners: it is feared that, faced with the burden of maintaining and operating the palace at Wells, a decision will eventually be taken to dispose of this palace as well.

Fellow Tim Malim writes with an update on the ‘Hands Off Old Oswestry Hillfort’ petition that Salon publicised last summer, objecting to Shropshire Council’s proposals to build houses in three locations close to the hillfort. Tim says that ‘English Heritage has now written firmly objecting to two of the three schemes at Oldport Farm, north of Oswestry, which pose a threat to the setting. They have also advised that it cannot be assumed they would not object to the third site, OSW004, which, although slightly further away than the first two (OSW002 and OSW003), is much the largest with 117 houses planned. Rescue has also written with their objections, pointing out that (in their opinion) the Heritage Impact Assessment that the promoter for the Oldport sites had submitted was flawed and not compliant with National Planning Policy framework (NPPF).

‘The Hands Off Old Oswestry Hillfort campaign group organised a seminar on 22 February at which experts explained the significance of the hillfort and its setting to a packed-out meeting which encouraged Oswestry Town Council to vote against all three proposals and to advise Shropshire Council all three should be dropped until further detailed studies have been undertaken. Shropshire Council responded on 28 February by dropping the two smaller schemes at Oldport Farm, but the members voted to continue with the larger 117-house scheme at OSW004. They gave little chance for the public to talk at the meeting, and the Cabinet lead for Planning said that all he was interested in was including the site so that the Council could get CIL [Community Infrastructure Levy] money from the government. Clearly issues such as heritage, and compliance with other policy areas rather than his housing priority, are not being given their required weight within the plan-setting process.

HOOH has a template letter on its website for people who oppose the scheme to download, sign and e-mail to the Cabinet member responsible for this housing allocation. Press releases and further information can also be found on the HOOH site, and the Rescue website has a record of their correspondence on the matter.’

Tim concludes: ‘I hope all this helps to inform Fellows and to encourage them to continue to exert as much pressure as possible on Shropshire Council to implement national and local policies on the historic environment which includes safe-guarding scheduled monuments and their settings.’
 

Henry VII’s marriage bed




One of those recently sold palaces, Auckland Castle, formerly home to the bishops of Durham, is now a museum thanks to the generosity of the investment manager and philanthropist Jonathan Ruffer. Last year the museum displayed what is being claimed as the Paradise State Bed of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, restored by furniture specialist Ian Coulson, who bought it for £2,200 after it was sold at auction as 'Victorian', having been amongst the furnishings at Chester’s former Redland Hotel that were sold when the hotel was converted into flats.

Coulson recognised that it was considerably older and worked with Jonathan Foyle, Chief Executive of World Monuments Fund Britain, to research the history and provenance of the bed. BBC Four broadcast a programme about the bed in August 2013, but it has only just hit the headlines, with reports last week in the Sunday Times and the Daily Mail, following a lecture that Jonathan gave to the Friends of Crowland Abbey on 7 March 2014 in which he hailed the bed as ‘the most important piece of furniture’ in England. Our Fellow Diarmaid MacCulloch has also endorsed the find as ‘an exceptionally important discovery’. Further information can be found in an article that Jonathan Foyle wrote for the Financial Times on 8 February 2013.

The Sunday Times reports the fact that the bed shows signs of having been burnt during the siege of Lathom House when, in June 1643, Parliamentary troops tried to take the house during the absence of the Earl of Derby; they hadn’t reckoned on the force of character of his wife, Lady Charlotte, who, with considerable determination, held off the aggressors until they finally abandoned the siege in May 1644. Fellow Linda Hall points out that the siege was the theme of the 2004 Steeleye Span album, ‘They Called Her Babylon’.
 

New discoveries confirm site of Anglo-Saxon royal village


Another discovery with important royal connections has been announced by the National Trust, which says that archaeologists in Suffolk have found conclusive evidence of the long-lost Anglo-Saxon royal settlement at Rendlesham, associated with the Sutton Hoo burials. To celebrate the seventy-fifth anniversary of Basil Brown’s discovery of the Anglo-Saxon burial site, the Sutton Hoo visitor centre will mount a small exhibition of the finds from the site, which first came to light when landowner Sir Michael Bunbury alerted Suffolk County Council to signs of illegal looting in 2008. Suffolk County Council’s Archaeological Officer, our Fellow Jude Plouviez, subsequently led a five-year project to survey the site, combining metal-detecting, aerial photography, chemical analysis and geophysics. Among the finds from metal-detecting and fieldwalking are fragments of gold jewellery, coins, weights and metal offcuts from a smith’s workshop.

Our Fellow Christopher Scull says that ‘the survey has identified a site of national and indeed international importance for the understanding of the Anglo-Saxon elite and their European connections. The quality of some of the metalwork leaves no doubt that it was made for and used by the highest ranks of society. These exceptional discoveries are truly significant in throwing new light on early East Anglia and the origins of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.’

Rendlesham (Rendlæsham ) is named by the Venerable Bede in his eighth-century work, An Ecclesiastical History of the English People, as ‘the royal township’ in which King Swithhelm of Essex was baptised, but the precise location of any such royal settlement was not known until now. Having surveyed an area covering up to 160ha, the Suffolk County Council team believe they have identified the 50ha core of a large, rich and important settlement Anglo-Saxon site that is contemporary with the burial mounds at Sutton Hoo.

The National Trust exhibition at Sutton Hoo will run through to 31 October and includes around seventy objects form the Rendlesham survey; these are ultimately destined for a new, purpose-built permanent exhibition space in Ipswich Museum. The survey was funded and sponsored by Suffolk County Council, the Sutton Hoo Society and English Heritage, with a substantial input of volunteer time. Our own Society helped to fund a small excavation in 2013, and Fellows Chris Scull and Jude Plouviez will be giving a lecture on the project to our Society in October 2014.
 
 

Suffolk and Essex church thefts


Fellow Mark Harrison, National Policing and Crime Adviser with English Heritage, reports that there have been a number of thefts from churches in the Essex and Suffolk recently, and asks Fellows in East Anglia with responsibility for church security to be extra vigilant. The thefts include a 4ft wooden angel from St Bartholomew’s Church in Wickham Bishops, a statue of the Virgin from St Mary and St Margaret, Stow Maries, an engraved wooden crucifix and bible stand from All Saints, Purleigh, a brass ceremonial cross from St Mary’s, Bures, and a ciborium and two pyxes from St Peter’s, Goldhanger, the former engraved in memory of Hilda Price and Francis Page.
 
 

Castle Studies Trust gives out grants worth £15,000




The Castle Studies Trust, founded in July 2012 with the aim of increasing knowledge of castles in the UK and abroad, has awarded its first grants for research projects on castles. Four projects share between them a total of £15,000. The four projects are: 3D modelling to reconstruct Holt Castle, Denbighshire (shown above; to be carried out by Fellows Rick Turner and Chris Jones Jenkins); an architectural and topographical survey of the standing remains of Ballintober Castle, County Roscommon (Niall Brady); a topological survey of the gardens and landscape of Wressle Castle, east Yorkshire (Ed Dennison); and a geophysical survey of Tibbers Castle, Dumfriesshire (Piers Dixon).

Trust Chairman Jeremy Cunnington says that ‘work on these projects will be carried out in the next few months, with the results being known by early 2015. The Trust will be overseeing this work and preparing for the next round of grant giving, applications for which open in September 2014.

'At the same time we are raising funds for the next round of grants. The Castle Studies Trust is entirely funded by donations and thus any support you can give would be greatly appreciated and help the Trust continue to advance our understanding of castles. The high calibre of the projects that the Trust supports (and the number of good projects that we had to turn down) shows there is much work still to do in the area of castle studies, and this is even more difficult with the continued financial restraints on traditional funding bodies.’

For further information, and to make a donation, visit the Trust’s website.
 
 

Can you identify this castle?




Perhaps one of the members of the Castle Studies Trust can help Fellow Stephen Freeth who asks whether any Salon reader can provide information about the artist or the location of the building shown in the above drawing. The drawing measures 213mm wide by 150mm high, and is in ink with grey wash. The paper has no watermark. Stephen guesses that it is late eighteenth century and that the ruined castle that it shows is located somewhere on the continent.
 
 

English Heritage consultation on the National Heritage Protection Plan (NHPP)


English Heritage says that ‘the historic environment is facing unprecedented challenges and opportunities and it is vital that we co-ordinate our collective efforts so that they can have the greatest impact. The National Heritage Protection Plan (NHPP) has been developed as a framework for the work of the heritage sector, and English Heritage is co-ordinating a public consultation (on behalf of the sector) on what the priorities for the next plan should be. It’s a key opportunity for you to have your say, not just on the overarching priorities for the historic environment, but on the way that it involves you and other individuals and organisations who care about the heritage.

‘Even if you have not been involved with or do not have a detailed knowledge of the current plan, please tell us what matters to you and what you see as the opportunities and threats for England’s heritage. There are two ways you can take part: by participating in one of thirteen half-day workshops taking place across the country (see here for details), and/or by taking part in a brief online survey which is open until 2 May 2014.’
 
 

The nation’s sculptural heritage to be captured online


The Bull, by Laurence Broderick, was created as the sculptural centrepiece of Birmingham's new Bullring, which opened on 4 September 2003.

The Public Catalogue Foundation (PCF), which recently completed its project to create a digital database of all oil paintings in public ownership, has signed a partnership agreement with the Public Monuments and Sculpture Association (PMSA) to do the same for public sculpture across the UK. The two charities will work together to create a comprehensive, searchable, digital database of sculpture in the UK from the eleventh century onwards that will be freely available to the public online and that will result in ‘a substantial improvement in public awareness of what is arguably the finest public collection of sculpture in the world’.

The PMSA has been recording and publishing county by county inventories of outdoor post-medieval British public sculpture and monuments since 1997, resulting in an online database of more than 10,000 entries. In this new partnership, the PMSA will build on this experience by being responsible for recording outdoor sculpture in the public realm, while the PCF will have responsibility for indoor sculpture in public museums and public collections.

Subject to funding being secured, the digitisation process is expected to take about four years to complete. A pilot project has already been undertaken, financed by a grant from the Henry Moore Foundation, and a steering panel of sculpture experts chaired by David Ekserdjian has given substantial support to the partnership.
 
 

Launch of ‘Home Front Legacy 1914—18’


A recently re-discovered First World War practice battlefield at Browndown Training Camp in Hampshire was used as the venue last week for the launch of ‘Home Front Legacy 1914—18’, a new campaign run by English Heritage and the Council for British Archaeology (CBA) that will see heritage experts working with civilian and military volunteers from all three services to identify and record for posterity all kinds of physical remains of the First World War Home Front that are currently unknown or neglected.

Rob Harper, Conservation Officer at Gosport Council, found the overgrown and forgotten trench systems after studying a 1950s aerial photograph. ‘They are on Ministry of Defence land but open to the public’, he said; ‘local people picnic here and are aware of the lumps and bumps but their origin has been a mystery until now. Gosport was a departure point for thousands of soldiers setting off to the trenches of Europe, many of whom may well have practised here.’

Speaking from the practice battlefield on 6 March 2014, Dan Snow, CBA President, called for volunteers to join the project to ‘scour the nation’s towns, villages, countryside and beaches to track down local First World War places that are just not in the records, upload observations on what they find to a specially designed app and add to an online map that will reveal the impact of the war on our landscape.’

Fellow Wayne Cocroft, English Heritage’s First World War expert, said: ‘English Heritage is exploring old documents and aerial photographs, many of which haven’t seen the light of day since being put away after the war. We’re identifying former drill halls, requisitioned factories and farm buildings, pill boxes, secret listening stations, acoustic mirrors, prisoner-of-war camps and gun emplacements — places that deserve to have the part they played in history made known.’

The CBA’s Home Front Legacy website has information on how to get involved and provides access to an online recording toolkit, guidance and resources, including an app for recording sites in the field and a map and photo gallery of newly recorded sites. The English Heritage website contains information about all kinds of buildings and sites associated with the First World War and describes other English Heritage projects taking place over the centenary period.
 
 

Lives remembered: Nicholas Peter Brooks, FSA (14 January 1941 to 2 February 2014)


Nicholas Peter Brooks: historian, archaeologist and authority on the Anglo-Saxons. Photograph: Chris Robinson

The following obituary is based on that written by Jinty Nelson and published in the Guardian on 6 March 2014.

Born in Virginia Water, Surrey, Nicholas was educated at Winchester College and graduated in history from Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1961. His interest in Kent’s historic landscape was fired by visits to the family’s holiday cottage, south of Canterbury. Anglo-Saxon Canterbury was to become central to his life’s work. His Oxford DPhil on the Canterbury charters, supervised by Professor Dorothy Whitelock at Cambridge, was finished in 1969 and published as The Early History of the Church of Canterbury (1984). The charters record donations of property to the church, nearly all by lay benefactors, giving details of where estates lay and how valuable they were, when they were received, on what terms leases were granted, and disputes arising later.

What makes Canterbury’s charters special is their large number, the fact that they mostly survive as originals, and that through them can be traced the workings of lay piety, and the build-up of Canterbury’s lands through the Anglo-Saxon period, which explains its importance as a great institutional landowner with huge political clout. The full edition of the 185 charters, completed through thirty years’ further editorial labour, shared between Nicholas and his colleague Susan Kelly, with unstinting support from the British Academy, was published in the two bulky volumes of Charters of Christ Church Canterbury in 2013.

In 1978, Nicholas became general editor of the series ‘Studies in the Early History of Britain’ (later, ‘Studies in Early Medieval Britain’); thirty volumes of studies were published under his guidance, and four under his personal editorship or co-editorship: Latin and the Vernacular Languages in Early Medieval Britain (1982), St Oswald of Worcester (1996), St Wulfstan and his World (2005) and Early Medieval Studies in Memory of Patrick Wormald (2009). These publications were important in establishing Anglo-Saxon England in the context of the whole of the British Isles and continental Europe.

In 1964, while still working on his DPhil, Nicholas was appointed to his first academic post, at the University of St Andrews. In 1985, he was appointed to the chair of medieval history at Birmingham. There, history prospered under his wise and supportive headship, as did the faculty of arts during his stint as dean. He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 1989. After his retirement in 2004, a group including several of his former students, now academics themselves, produced a festschrift, Myth, Rulership, Church and Charters (2008), testimony to Nicholas’s personal warmth and kindness as well as to his academic distinction.
 

Feedback


Fellow David Cranstone asks whether Salon really meant to say ‘canon ball ... fragments’ (in the Clogh Coulter Castle report)? If so, he thinks the preservation conditions must have been exceptional, and so must the reverend canon’s discomfort! David adds that this is a frequent, and always enjoyable, mistake; the best example that he has so far encountered is in a guide to a church in York, ‘which informed me that the church tower had been badly damaged in the Civil War when a canon was mounted on the roof and exploded!’.

Fellow Julian Munby wonders whether Paul Bahn is correct in saying that Jacques Spon, the seventeenth-century doctor and antiquary based in Lyons, coined the term ‘archaeology’. Julian writes: ‘the oldest book on my shelf with the word in the title is Archaeologiae Atticae libri septem: Seaven books of the Attic Antiquities, by Francis Rous (Oxford 1649), first printed in three books in 1637. It would be a nice point to determine whether his “antiquities” were so different from those of Jacques Spon in 1685.’
 

Call for papers: Colnaghi and their Associates 1880—1940


Proposals (maximum 300 words) for papers (25 minutes maximum) should be sent to Jeremy Howard by Monday 14 April 2014 on any aspect of the art market or history of collecting between c 1880 and c 1940 that relates to the history of Colnaghi, to their principal rivals and associates, or to the wider context of the art market, art dealing, art scholarship and art buying during this period as reflected in the Colnaghi archives. The conference, jointly organised by Waddesdon Manor, Colnaghi and the University of Buckingham, will be held at Waddesdon Manor on Friday 26 September 2014.

Between 1880 and 1940, Colnaghi played a key role in the international art market, selling important masterpieces to some of the greatest American collectors, as well making important sales to European private and public collections. Thanks to the survival of a remarkable number of letter books, account books and other business records, the Colnaghi archive offers unique opportunities to study the workings of the art market during the ‘Gilded Age’ and in the period up to the Second World War, which effectively brought an end to one of the most glamorous eras in the history of the art market.

The archive has recently moved to Waddesdon Manor, and will be housed in the new Waddesdon Archive at Windmill Hill on the Waddesdon estate, which houses the papers associated with the members of the Rothschild family connected to the Manor. The purpose of this conference is to bring together international scholars researching the history of the art market, particularly in those areas reflected in the archives, celebrate the move of the archive to Windmill Hill and promote and encourage future research.

The Colnaghi archive is particularly rich in the period from the end of the nineteenth century to the late 1930s, when some of the greatest sales in the firm’s history were made, which can be cross-referenced against the archives of some of their principal rivals and associates, such as Knoedler, Agnew’s and Duveen.  The move of the archive to Windmill Hill coincides with the recent acquisition of the Knoedler archive by the Getty Foundation and of Agnew’s archive by the National Gallery. Agnew’s and Duveen Brothers were Colnaghi’s principal rivals throughout this period; Knoedler were Colnaghi’s closest partners and the conduit through which nearly all the sales to the great American collectors were channeled.

The time is ripe for a reappraisal of this period in the firm’s history, which, it is hoped, will promote scholarly collaborations between dealers’ archives and other important archives held by institutions such as Villa I Tatti, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and the Frick Collection. The conference will also aim to explore some of the links between Colnaghi and the Rothschild family and the National Gallery and examine Colnaghi’s interrelationships with other dealers, collectors, museums, auction-houses and scholars during the ‘Gilded Age’ and inter-war years.
 

Events




22 March 2014: ‘The Who, Why and When of Wansdyke’
, a debate hosted by the Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution, 16 Queen Square, Bath BA1 2HN, from 2pm to 5.30pm. Four expert speakers with differing views — our Fellows Andrew Reynolds, Peter Fowler and Helen Geake plus Jonathan Erskine — will discuss new research, fieldwork and thinking about this most enigmatic of earthworks. To book, see the Bath Box Office website.

27 March 2014: ‘Jeremy Collier, a Anglo-Catholic bishop and outlaw, buried in St Pancras Old Churchyard’, by Peter Foley, of the University of Arizona, being the first in the 2014 series of lectures designed to raise funds for the conservation of London’s St Pancras Old Church. Other speakers include Fellow Alan Powers, on 15 May, on ‘Northern Adventure: Paul Nash in St Pancras’; Professor Mark Philp of the University of Warwick on ‘William Godwin and Unconventional Women’, on 6 June; cartoonist Adrian Teal on ‘The Chevalier D’eon, a cross-dressing French spy’, on 3 July; and Dame Janet Todd, President of Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge, on ‘A most extraordinary pair, Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin’, on 16 October.

Tickets can be purchased online by visiting the church’s MyDonate page. For further information, see the parish website and the project website.

31 March 2014: ‘Singular Perfection at South Kensington: collecting “Persian carpets” for the V&A, 1873—93’, by Moya Carey, Curator for the Iranian Collections, Asian Dept, V&A. This paper in the Wallace Collection’s ‘Seminars in the History of Collecting’ series will address the V&A’s relationship with carpets from Iran under Robert Murdoch Smith, including a large donation of contemporary textiles and carpets from the Shah of Iran and the purchase of the sensational Ardabil Carpet in 1893. Admission is free and booking is not required. Information and details of future seminars can now be found on the Wallace Collection’s website.

2 April 2014: ‘The Staffordshire Hoard Project: the current state of knowledge’, by Fellow Chris Fern at the Society of Antiquaries, Burlington House. Tea is served from 4.30pm, the Chair is taken at 5pm and non-members of the British Archaeological Association are welcome to attend but are asked to make themselves known to the Hon Director (Fellow Linda Monckton) on arrival and to sign the visitors’ book.



13 April 2014: ‘The Church of St Andrew and St Cuthman at Steyning and its place in Romanesque architecture’, a lecture by our Fellow Malcolm Thurlby, in the Steyning Centre at 2.30pm, followed by tea and a visit to the church led by the speaker. Contact Fellow David Parsons for a copy of the booking form.

This talk will investigate the various eleventh- and twelfth-century programmes of construction at Steyning in order to reconstruct the original form of the church, complete with its early Romanesque sculpture, in the context of late Anglo-Saxon and Norman antecedents. The original use of the church is examined and a case will be presented for the former location of the shrine of St Cuthman in the north transept. The design of the nave is viewed in the context of aisled churches in England and Normandy. Specific attention is paid to the interesting variety of motifs on the capitals and arches of the nave arcades, the use of decorative wall bosses, and the unusual articulation of the interior wall of the clerestory. Evidence will be presented to indicate that the masons received their training under the auspices of Henry of Blois, Abbot of Glastonbury (1126—71) and Bishop of Winchester (1129—71). Comparative examples will include St Cross, Winchester, and, more locally, St Mary de Haura, New Shoreham.

8 and 9 May 2014: ‘(Un)dressing Rubens: fashion and painting in seventeenth-century Antwerp’, to be held at the Rubenianum, in Antwerp. In many a Rubens painting, dress and textiles take up a large part of the picture plane — up to 90 per cent in certain portraits. Yet the history of dress has long been relegated to the margins of art history. Traditionally, dress was seen as a useful instrument for dating paintings or identifying artists, but the history of dress was considered a mere auxiliary discipline. The objective of this colloquium is to redress this scholarly imbalance. Through an inclusive approach it will investigate dress and fashion in the work of Rubens and his contemporaries and successors from the Southern Netherlands, often active at foreign courts. In addition to paintings, extant garments, archaeological finds, archival records, contemporary texts on dress and fashion prints will be considered as subjects of study to generate a comprehensive view of historical dress, its representation and its perception in the Southern Netherlands. Fellow Karen Hearn is among a distinguished list of speakers. For further information, see the Rubenianum’s website.

7 June 2014: ‘Rumblings in God’s Acre’, Senate House, University of London, 10am to 4.30pm: the Mausolea & Monuments Trust and the Church Monuments Society have joined forces for this conference that will examine developments in churchyard monuments and memorials from the medieval period to the modern day. The speakers include our Fellows Brian and Moira Gittos, Fr Jerome Bertram, Roger Bowdler and Julian Litten. Further information can be found on the website of the Mausolea & Monuments Trust. Looking ahead, the Trust will host a talk by our Fellow Gavin Stamp on 'Edwin Lutyens and First World War memorials' on Remembrance Day, 11 November 2014.

1 and 2 July 2014: History of Collecting Workshop at the Institute of Historical Research and Wallace Collection; speakers include a number of Fellows working at the Wallace Collection, National Gallery, British Museum, Royal Collection Trust and National Portrait Gallery. For further information see the workshop’s website.
 

Old Saint Peter’s, Rome


Arguably the most important church in western Christendom, St Peter’s Basilica as we know it is a mere upstart, whose 400th anniversary will be celebrated in twelve years’ time. This book, edited by Fellows Rosamond McKitterick and Joanna Story plus Carol Richardson and John Osborne, is concerned with the much older late antique church whose fragmentary and scattered physical remains have survived in sufficient detail to enable reasonable deductions to be made about its plan, appearance and development. The book is equally concerned with exploring the symbolic importance of St Peter’s and how successive popes succeeded in establishing Rome as the centre of the Christian world, turning a cemetery on the edge of the city into a site to which pilgrims flocked and on which successive popes and monarchs lavished their wealth and creative energy.

The early bishops of Rome shrewdly filled the vacuum left by the withdrawal of the imperial court to Constantinople and they succeeded in establishing St Peter’s as a rock of stability as the city came under attack from the Goths (in 410) and then the Vandals (in 455). Pope Leo I (440—61) is seen as the key figure in this period when Saints Peter and Paul replaced Romulus and Remus as Rome’s special guardians, and Rome became a place of pilgrimage that was conveniently far more accessible than the lands that witnessed the lives and deaths of Christ and his Apostles.

The ups and downs of those early years make for a riveting narrative, and far from being a dry academic work, this volume is as entertaining as any account of the development of Christian liturgy and doctrine could be, especially when mixed in with some of the most important political dramas of the Middle Ages. These various essays also demonstrate that Roman church traditions established in the late antique period have proved to be more enduring than the brick walls and marble colonnades of the old church, though the current pope seems bent on a programme of reform that might see a change of emphasis from lavish imperial splendour to a culture more akin to that of the simple fisherman chosen to play a key role in the foundation of the Church.

Old St Peter’s, Rome, edited by Rosamond McKitterick, John Osborne, Carol M Richardson and Joanna Story; ISBN 9781107041646; Cambridge University Press, 2013
 
 

Pagan Britain


Our Fellow Ronald Hutton is another lively and entertaining writer, and one who has made a speciality out of trying to understand the ideas and beliefs of people at the margins of history and archaeology, people whose ideas are largely dismissed by scholars as ‘lunatic’ fringe’. Ronald is not so quick to judge, and he is fascinated by the uses that different people make of the same set of ‘facts’. One cannot help but sympathise with an author who argues that we cannot so lightly or contemptuously dismiss beliefs that are sincerely held by large numbers of rational people and that attract a huge following: far more people could describe a ley line than could define a henge, and despite the best efforts of English Heritage, it is a fair bet that 99 per cent of visitors to Stonehenge hold some sort of belief about the monument that is at odds with ‘scientific’ thinking. To study such beliefs provides interesting insights into the ways in which the past is conceived; and if we are now happy to accept AHRC funds to study folkloric beliefs about the past, why not study and attempt to understand contemporary ones?

That is an extended apology for a book that doesn’t really need one, and a book that will undoubtedly sell well to a readership that wants to know ‘what does it all mean and what did people actually do and believe?’. On the other hand, they will be disappointed if they are looking for the secrets of Stonehenge — Ronald does not come up with any theories of his own. Instead, he describes the physical manifestations of ancient ritual and belief — cursus and causewayed enclosures, henge, mound, stone rows and circles and many varieties of burial barrow, cairn and mound — and then sets side by side first what the academy has suggested as an explanation and then a series of more radical and imaginative thoughts from people no less fascinated by these monuments, but less constrained by academic discipline.

Without rubbing the reader’s nose in the fact, what emerges is that academics continually change their minds, and that recent studies overturn less recent ones, and that sometimes ideas that started out on the fringe have come to be central (solar, lunar and other astronomical alignments being but one example). Many Fellows will find their work quoted in the book, but perhaps the quote that best sums up the book’s message comes from Fellow Nick Higham: ‘archaeologists are capable of producing an almost infinite succession of models, each of which is more or less incapable of either proof or refutation’.

What the book does then is reflect the entire spectrum of theory, or what a post-processual archaeologist would call the ‘plurality of explanations’, rejecting the idea that there can be a definitive account of the past or that it is even possible to distinguish between rituals and practices that are religious as distinct from political or festive or social. The author wants us to see that some of the ideas that we might normally run from are not as crazy as they might seem, and that people in the past might well have been equally ‘crazy’; it is perfectly possible that they too believed in aliens and lines of energy criss-crossing the earth.

Though less to the fore, another fascinating aspect of the book is the author’s careful analysis of the historiography of fringe ideas — the books and magazines and essays in which they first appeared, the characters of the people who created these alternative explanations. Like Malvolio, most of them can say with hand on heart: 'I am not mad' ; often their ideas about pagan belief and worship are a reflection of their own strong commitment to green, anti-consumerist lifestyles, a utopianism not unlike that of William Morris, that sees in the past various ideals that we have lost and need to recover if humans are to have a future on the planet.

Pagan Britain, by Ronald Hutton; ISBN 9780300197716; Yale Books, 2013
 
 

Traditional Buildings in the Oxford Region c 1300—1840


This book by Fellows John Steane and James Ayres, dedicated to the memory of our late Fellow John Rhodes, is partly about how to study and record historic buildings and partly a history of traditional building types illustrated by some ninety detailed studies of buildings that are mainly located in the county of Oxford, but that occasionally stray into adjoining counties. Excellent images, and many splendid drawings and field notes, illuminate key points and illustrate what the authors say in their introduction to methods and procedures, that drawing is a fundamental technique, because in order to draw you have to see, ask questions and understand: you cannot fudge.

The book is the fruit of decades of such looking and analysing on the part of the authors and so is full of observations based on knowledge and experience: for example, potted histories of fireplaces, windows or staircases, or remarks on regional differences in thatching styles and materials, and how you can spot a roof that might once have been thatched, or on why the Stonesfield roofing slate industry collapsed despite there being large reserves of suitable stone left in the ground: climate change and increasing mild winters means that the stone could no longer be split (the unfortunate result is that barns and farm buildings are frequently and illegally cannibalised for historic roofing materials).

Over and again, the case studies presented here are set in their national context — we learn about cruck buildings per se as well as examples in Oxfordshire — so this is more than just a local-interest book, and the authors clearly enjoy showing us what they have found, whether it be eighteenth-century coat pegs carved in an unusual cuboctahedron shape, a medieval door knocker made from an iron spur, unusual graffiti, carpenters’ marks or apotropaic marks, scraps of ancient wall plaster or tantalising hints of murals and painted plaster, or things found under floorboards.

Traditional Buildings in the Oxford Region c 1300—1840, by John Steane and James Ayres; ISBN 9781842174791; Oxbow Books, 2013
 


 

Twentieth-century Architecture 11: Oxford and Cambridge


The latest issue of the journal of the Twentieth Century Society (edited by our Fellows Elain Harwood and Alan Powers plus Otto Saumarez-Smith) is devoted to a series of essays on the last century’s contribution to the colleges and faculties of the historic university towns of Oxford and Cambridge. Here is evidence aplenty that ‘historic town’ and ‘contemporary architecture’ are not mutually antagonistic concepts. The difference is that whereas many historic towns have modern buildings that result from short-term commercial values, the college and university authorities seem to have a sense of stewardship and of building for posterity, hiring creative architects of some renown and not skimping on materials.

Whether or not that has always resulted in buildings of real merit that will stand the test of time is one of the issues explored throughout this book — the authors constantly pose the question: does it work, which here as often as not means ‘does it offend or enhance the spirit of place’, which in turn begs the question ‘what is that spirit?’ — arguably what makes Oxford especially, but Cambridge as well, such rich cities to explore is their daringly bizarre architectural styles and juxtapositions.

Sadly, that fact seems to have been lost on those who have commissioned or designed Oxbridge buildings in the twentieth century: many of those featured in this journal lack the bravery of a Sheldonian Theatre or a Radcliffe Camera; all too often the buildings are nicely crafted from quality materials, but end up bland.

The same cannot be said for some of the designs that ended up on the cutting floor. Denys Lasdun’s towers for the New Museums Site in Cambridge would have livened up the city’s skyline no end, and created a splendid dialogue with the pinnacles and buttresses of King’s College Chapel. As it was, the towers were deemed by the City Council to be ‘outside the precepts of neighbourliness’, and so were never built, whereas the desperately ugly and not-fit-for-purpose Sidgwick Site (in which Salon’s editor spent far too much time in his youth), the derivative and greenhouse-like History Faculty (bad for books; bad for people) and the blot on the landscape that now occupies the New Museums Site all did get built, to the great detriment of the city’s appearance.

If there is little enough here that really sings, the book cum journal itself is first rate: through its pages you encounter again the great architectural battles of the twentieth century, the controversies of the day, the reception of the designs, what critics said about these buildings at the time, and what they have made of them since.

Twentieth-century Architecture 11: Oxford and Cambridge, edited by Elain Harwood, Alan Powers and Otto Saumarez-Smith; ISBN 9780955668739; Twentieth Century Society, 2013
 
 

Folkestone to 1500: a town unearthed


Edited by Fellow Ian Coulson, this book tells the story of a well-planned and executed community archaeology project, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, amongst others, and winner of the Current Archaeology Live! 2013 Award for ‘Rescue Dig of the Year’. Few such projects have made such a tangible contribution to knowledge and to the concept of community-focused archaeology: it is no exaggeration to say the whole town was involved in excavating Folkestone’s cliff-top Iron Age and Roman sites (as Director, our Fellow Keith Parfitt coped admirably with hundreds of volunteer participants). One legacy is a community that wishes to continue the work that the project began, through the medium of the newly created Folkestone Research and Archaeology Group. Another is this book, an accessible and academically credible account of Folkestone’s archaeology and early history up to the end of the Middle Ages.

The trigger for the project and the book was the wealth of new information that came to light about Folkestone’s past as a result of archaeological fieldwork undertaken in association with the construction of the Channel Tunnel terminal complex and high-speed rail link. The Folkestone Unearthed project set out to find out more about the pre-Roman farmsteads and their associated burial plots that were now shown to be abundant in the town’s hinterland, about the local Greensand quern industry, and about the ways in which the several large stone-built villa complexes that were built after the Roman conquest operated and related to each other.

The results of this investigation, based on new fieldwork, are given in the first third of the book; the second third of the book is based on documentary research tracing the development of the post-Roman to medieval town, its castle, priory, churches, merchants and fishing community. The last third is a fascinating history of the many ways in which Folkestone’s history has been interpreted in the past, not least through the writings of Arthur Mee and Rosemary Sutcliffe, who mythologised the town’s cliff-top villa as the sentinel palace of the Admiral of the Saxon Shore, keeping watch over the Romano-British fleet or of Carausius, the rebel who usurped power in 286, declaring himself emperor in Britain and northern Gaul. The lucky folk of Folkestone now have two stories to tell: the myth-history and the less romantic, but no less interesting, one that this project has revealed.

Folkestone to 1500: a town unearthed, edited by Ian Coulson; ISBN 9781870545273; Canterbury Archaeological Trust, 2013
 
 

Medieval York 600—1540


Adding to York’s already rich bibliography, Fellow David Palliser’s book on the history of England’s second city covers the 1,000 years from the post-Roman revival of the settlement to the end of the Middle Ages, and asks how York compares to other similarly sized places in Europe, in terms of its rich heritage of walls, houses, churches, guildhalls, coinage, art, architecture, stained glass, festivities and religious drama.

David gives as his reasons for embarking on such a book the fact that there is no reliable book-length survey of York’s archaeology and history, though there are numerous particular studies of buildings, sites, periods and themes; and that much has been found in recent years that modifies what has been published in the past. To quote one example, our Fellow Richard Hodges wrote in 1989 that there was no evidence to support Alcuin’s description of eighth-century York as a major trading settlement: poor old Alcuin, like Gildas and Bede, is doomed to be picked apart by the very scholars who should be defending him, accused of making it all up and writing fantasy and hearsay, rather than history. Yet three years later, in 1992, excavations at Fishergate turned up evidence for just such a trading emporium in abundant quantities.

Another example is found in David’s section on sub-Roman York, where it has been speculated that flooding in the Vale of York due to a rise in sea level might have made much of Roman Eburacum uninhabitable in the fourth to sixth centuries. That idea was also dismissed as lacking evidence: until, in 2004, Fellow Robert van de Noort published evidence for a major marine ingression in the Vale and in the Humber wetlands dating from the second half of the fourth century.

Acknowledging that there might be more than a grain of truth in older ideas, David paints a full and detailed picture of sub-Roman York in the years 600 to 865 as a corrective to the popular idea that it all began with the Vikings. In fact, the book as a whole is a powerful corrective to the idea that England has but one historic city and that every historic event of any importance originated in London: whether discussing the medieval wool trade or ecclesiastical architecture, music or public health, religious drama or the power struggles of the Wars of the Roses, York comes across in this book not as a second city, but as a city state like Florence or Siena, with its own distinctive culture and a proudly independent citizenry.

Medieval York 600—1540, by D M Palliser; ISBN 9780199255849; Oxford University Press, 2014
 
 

Vacancies


National Trust: members of Council
Closing date 28 March 2014
The National Trust is seeking to recruit seven new members to the fifty-three person Council that acts as the Trust’s ‘guardian spirit, making sure that we uphold the vision of our founders while facing the challenges of an exciting but uncertain future’. Further details can be found on the National Trust’s website.

British Academy: Secretary
Closing date: 31 March 2014

Dr Robin Jackson's term of office as Secretary of Britain's premier humanities and social sciences fellowship is coming to an end and a successor is sought with the ability to lead the British Academy's activities and strengthen its impact. For further information, see the website of search consultants Perrett Laver, quoting job ref 1500.
 
 

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