Hello from Downie Towers, where I'm enjoying a few days at home during a spell of rushing about. Some of the travelling is for family reasons but the trip to Greece was pure pleasure. You might not guess from my photography, but it wasn't hard to see why Hadrian was such a Grecophile.
Back in the UK I've also been visiting the Temple of Mithras under the new Bloomberg building in the City of London. It's well worth seeing but if you can't get there, there's a link below where you can look at many of the splendid finds close up in the comfort and privacy of your own home.
And finally, speaking of privacy - yes, as inescapable as That Wedding but not half as much fun, there's the new Data Protection Legislation. I've always tried hard to make sure that nobody gets this newsletter who didn't ask for it, so I won't ask you to opt in all over again, but if you're reading a version sent by a friend and you'd like your own next time - you can sign up here.
If you'd like to opt out, please don't hesitate to scroll down to the foot of the email and click 'unsubscribe'. The very moment you do this, Mailchimp, the system I use to send these newsletters, will remove you from the list. I know, because while trying to figure it out, I accidentally deleted myself and had to sign up all over again.
Like everyone else, I've also been pondering my Privacy Policy, and it's on my website, here.
Best wishes,
Ruth
Travellers' tales
Above: the theatre at Epidavros, a day's sail from Athens (although we cheated, because our boat had an engine). The photo was taken as we proved that you really can sit and the back and hear what's being said on the stage.
Zeus, or perhaps Poseidon, forever frozen in the act of hurling - a thunderbolt? A trident? This statue would already have been 500 years old when Hadrian visited the city, and it's now in the National Archaeological Museum - handily, just across the road from our hotel.
The Arch of Hadrian in Athens: one side reads, "This is Athens, the ancient city of Theseus". The other reads, "This is the city of Hadrian, and not of Theseus." The remains of the elegant buildings that Hadrian commissioned in the city can still be visited today, which leaves me faintly resentful that all he gave Britain was a very long wall.
Closer to home, here are the remains of the Mithraic Temple under the new Bloomberg building in the City of London.
It's free to visit, and well worth it. The display includes one of several writing tablets that were found to be still legible (I wrote about them on the blog) and this one bears the first known mention of the name of London.
You can see it, and all the other finds, by using a phone or tablet to look up case.londonmithraeum.com
Book news
Many thanks to everyone who's taken the time to read Memento Mori, and especial thanks to the people who've said kind things about it, or who've taken the trouble to leave an online review.
For anyone who's been waiting for the whole series to reappear in Britain - good news! All eight books are now back in ebook with super new covers, and paperbacks will follow shortly. They can be found here on Amazon UK
Friends across the Atlantic should be able to find the whole series in all the usual places, and here are some of them - Barnes and NobleKobo Amazon.com
For more info about the books, please come across to my website where all will be made clear (I hope).
Yes, it's back...
Always a fantastic weekend with lots to see and enjoy - here are some photos from last year. The full programme is out now on the Yorkshire Museum site, and it looks great. If you're there, the Hospitium will be full of writers and allegedly we'll have a tea stall, too. Come and say hello!
Meanwhile, if you've read this far, thank you, and if you haven't, take heart - there are all sorts of things you can click on below, and one of them is the 'unsubscribe' button.