Britain's First Museum Catalogue - Musaeum Tradescantianum, or, A collection of ra...

For some reason this is not on display at the new Ashmolean museum Founders Room



Musaeum Tradescantianum, or, A collection of ra...

Ancient Pictures as inspiration for Storyboarding.

As part of the M.A for Narrative Environments at Central St Martins we use storyboards as a technique for developing narrative projects.  Tutors on the course collected examples.  I looked at inspiration from ancient sources.

Bayeaux tapestry

The tapestry moves through time and space with a clear narrative. Different narrative layers are used. Simple conventions make it easier to read – the English for example have moustaches while the Normans have pudding basin hairstyles. Text is limited for example to crucial identification of leading characters. Places are not spelt out though can be identified by those who know by context and form.  The narrative structure is  linear and has beautiful clarity. The top and bottom strips allow additional information often decorative but often individual stories or symbols.

The following shows a scrolling video of the Tapestry:

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08zVsxjVEJY

Charles Duke of Orleans in the Tower

This is a single image but time is shown passing. This is indicated by the simple method of showing Charles in distinctive clothes so you can recognise the multiple occurrences of this person as time passes..

The duke is shown in prison in the Tower writing – is he writing his poetry (this is the frontispiece of his book of poetry) or is he writing a letter to his relatives saying 'Oi! I've been here 20 years while you fail to raise my ransom!' (he was imprisoned for 20 years after being taken prisoner at the Battle of Agincourt while his family raised the enormous ransom).

He is shown looking out of the window for the ransom money to arrive; he is shown greeting the money; He is shown riding out of the Tower to freedom; he is shown boating to freedom to a boat to take him home
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles,_Duke_of_Orl%C3%A9ans#/media/File:Towrlndn.JPG

Siege of Lachish British Museum

This is an alabaster relief which provides an extended portrait of a siege of a town in Palestine by King Senacherib of Assyria.   It is like a long camera pan across the battlefield but time passes as you move from left to right seamlessly but you also move geographically from the West to the East. So it doesn't have frames but in a single image the story of the siege is told seamlessly,. 

Here is a youtube illustration of the siege relief

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcLwoa19kLw

Trajan's Column

Trajan's Column shows a vast scrolling narrative of the invasion of Dacia by Trajan. It is full of detail and is used by Archaeologists to understand Roman military campaigns and methods of colonisation. The relief are quite subtle often using different viewpoints to elucidate information and can be used as a model of using images to tell a story. 

But what makes it interesting is that it would have been very difficult to read despite the fact that the Romans built 2 libraries to the side of it with viewing platforms. Trajan is depicted 58 times (in yellow above); his ashes were buried in a vault on the ground level, and a statue of him on top. So the public could never see all the detail and so the interpretation was that the primary purpose was to glorify the Emperor – the detail was as much to impress as to be read by the public. 

You can see a plaster cast in the Cast Courts of the V&A

This is an interesting article on the Column. http://www.nationalgeographic.com/trajan-column/article.html and you might enjoy this short stop motion animation documentary about building the Column

Building the column

By way of contrast, here is an interesting collection of story boards of iconic film

http://flavorwire.com/349534/awesome-storyboards-from-15-of-your-favorite-films

Izi.Travel Museum guided tour

I tested a museum's izi.travel guided tour. These were my conclusions.

The app worked very well as far as navigation was concerned. It provides a GPS based mapped route around the system.  There was a slight uncertainty as to how to start the tour but otherwise, mechanically, it looked professional and worked well.

The scripting was very professionally read by actors.  I think the main problem was that each stop was too long.  Some of them were 10 minutes long and this seemed like a bit of a slog to get through. I think it should be split up into 2 - 3 sections with optional extras if any one wants to explore.  I don't know if this is possible with the app.

I would have liked to have seen more images and less audio.

The script did not make it clear whether the spoken material by the characters was made up by the script- writer or quotes from a contemporary source.  I guess a mixture of both but the uncertainty devalued the quotations.


Another problem was that it wasn't very place orientated - I felt sometimes I might as well be in the cafe listening to it as standing on the spot prescribed by the app.

Overall, it worked but I'm not sure it made me what to seek out Museum guided tours on smart phone. It didn't offer enough. I'm left uncertain whether smartphone tours are the way forward.

But I will give it a go for one of my walks.


https://izi.travel/en

Record ID: NMS-63179C - EARLY MEDIEVAL inscribed object

'Dead is the Dwarf'  This is a Saxon runic inscription.

It appears to be a medical inscription to be worn as a talisman and references a illness characterized in the Saxon period as 'the dwarf'.  Presumably the 'dwarf' was driven out of the body and this runic plaque stops it coming back.

More information in the notes section at the bottom of the record in this link. and in British Archaeology Nov/Dec 2017. Page 52

Must Farm Documentary - Britains Pompeii - YouTube

Maybe that is an exaggeration but still very interesting documentary.



ᴴᴰ [Documentary] Britains Pompeii - YouTube

Archaeology and history walks upcoming!

These are the walks I am doing for London Walks for the forthcoming winter season:

Sat 2.30 4th Nov 2017
The Archaeology & History of the Bankside - from London Bridge to the Globe  - London Bridge  Tooley Street Entrance

Sat 2.30 18th Nov 2017
The Archaeology & History of Chelsea  - From King Offa to the Swinging 60s - Sloane Square Tube

Sat 10.45 2 Dec 2017
Myths, Legends and the Origins of London - Tower Hill Tube

Sat 10.45 16 Dec 2017
Exploring Roman London - a Literary & Archaeology Guide Tower Hill Tube

Sat 10.45 30 Dec 2017
Medieval & Reformation London  - Smithfield to the Guildhall  - Barbican Underground

Sat 10.45 13 Jan 2018
Cromwell and More's Tudor London - St Pauls Tube Exit 2

Sat 2.30 27 Jan 2018
William Shakespeare and Tudor & Stuart London -  Tower Hill Tube

Sat 2.30 10 Feb 2018
The Archaeology & History of Southwark - From London Bridge to Bermondsey Abbey - London Bridge - Tooley Street exit

Sat 2.30 24 Feb 2018
The Archaeology & History of Rotherhithe - Rotherhithe Tube

Sat 2.30 10 March 2018
Cornhill - City of London Ward Walk -  Bank Tube Station Exit 3

ZepplinEvents!

Here is a series of Zepplin themed events in London.



The raid on Calmington Road by Zepplin in 1917 killed 12 people and destroyed 3 houses. 

   http://www.bridgetonowhere.friendsofburgesspark.org.uk/the-story-of-burgess-park-heritage-trail/heritage-trail-a-l/bomb-damage/ 





Events Listing | Bridge to Nowhere

English Heritage needs Interim Listing to avoid destruction of priceless heritage survival. oid potential listing

England needs Interim listing powers to prevent philistines like the developer who destroyed a 17th Century Building. English Heritage were able to do absolutely nothing about it because it was not listed, and it was demolished before they could list it. 





Press release: Developer mutilates Jacobean ceiling to avoid potential listing

Bronze Age Runnymede: Excavations at Runnymede Bridge - YouTube

Film on the excavations at Runymede - the story being told is that it is London's the Bronze Age Glastonbury.

Its a very opinionated documentary with very little in the way of presentation of the data. It is more an archaeological reflection on the Bronze Age than an analysis of the Runymede site and the viewer gets very little in the way of evidence that they can weigh up.  I also came away with little idea of the geography of the site.



Bronze Age Runnymede: Excavations at Runnymede Bridge - YouTube

Spy themed pop up bar The Bletchley opens in Chelsea, London | Metro News

Opened in March.  To get your cocktails you have to decipher the code.





Spy themed pop up bar The Bletchley opens in Chelsea, London | Metro News

A Hackney Autobiography / Home

This is a project to record the history of Centerprise - a Dalston radical institution set up in opposition to mainstream bookshops, cafes, education and so on.  There are interesting links to many projects they did before they closed in 2012.



Reading the archive it seems very 2017.



A Hackney Autobiography / Home

The Archaeology of Greater London online map

This an online map of finds in the London area.



The Archaeology of Greater London online map: The Archaeology of Greater London online map

1982 El Vino in Fleet Street lifted ban on women standing with male colleagues at bar | From the Guardian | The Guardian

I had no idea this was so recent - I thought it was about 1972.



30 years ago today: El Vino lifted ban on women standing with male colleagues at bar | From the Guardian | The Guardian

Essex Hoodie

The portable antiquities scheme has recorded a figure wearing what is thought to be a birrus britannicus,which is listed as one of Britain's leading exports in the reign of Diocletian.



Excellent to think the Essex Hoodie has such a pedigree



Record ID: ESS-33D3A2 - ROMAN figurine

Tunnel: The Archaeology of Crossrail - Tunnel: The Archaeology of Crossrail - Crossrail Archaeology Museum

Videos are well worth looking at.



Tunnel: The Archaeology of Crossrail - Tunnel: The Archaeology of Crossrail - Crossrail Archaeology Museum

The Elizabethan Court Day by Day - Folgerpedia

This is an amazing resource which gives a day to day account of Queen Elizabeth's reign compiled by:



Marion Colthorpe’s The Elizabethan Court Day by Day, published online in May and hosted by Folgerpedia



The Elizabethan Court Day by Day - Folgerpedia

Atlas of Hillforts

Just published 

Atlas of Hillforts

and to go on a walking tour:

https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2017/aug/07/walking-ancient-hillforts-wiltshire-downs-england-atlas-of-hillforts?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+main+NEW+H+categories&utm_term=238419&subid=1563368&CMP=EMCNEWEML6619I2

Going underground: London’s new Postal Museum and subterranean mail train | Travel | The Guardian

Reopened museum in Clerkenwell.



Going underground: London’s new Postal Museum and subterranean mail train | Travel | The Guardian

Story boards and the past

Story Boards examples from the Past

Story boards began as a tool for film makers but are now being used by a range of design disciplines. At CSM we use them extensively for the MA for Narrative Environments.  My question was are there any example from the past which might be useful for my students to consider.  These are my examples:

Bayeaux tapestry

The tapestry moves through time and space with a clear narrative. Different narrative layers are used. Simple conventions make it easier to read – the English for example have moustaches while the Normans have pudding basin hairstyles. Text is limited to crucial identification of leading characters. Places are not spelt out though can be identified by those who know by context and form.It is linear and has beautiful clarity. The top and bottom strips allow additional information often decorative but often individual stories or symbols.

The following shows a scrolling video of the Tapestry:

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08zVsxjVEJY

Charles Duke of Orleans in the Tower

This is a single image but time is shown passing. This is indicated by the simple method of showing Charles in distinctive clothes so you can recognise the multiple occurrences of this person as time passing..

The duke is shown in prison in the Tower writing – is he writing his poetry (this is the frontispiece of his book of poetry) or is he writing a letter to his relatives saying 'Oi! I've been here 20 years while you fail to raise my ransom!' (he was imprisoned for 20 years after being taken prisoner at the Battle of Agincourt while his family raised the enormous ransom).

He is shown looking out of the window for the ransom money to arrive; he is shown greeting the money; he is shown riding out of the Tower to freedom; he is shown boating to freedom to a boat to take him home
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles,_Duke_of_Orl%C3%A9ans#/media/File:Towrlndn.JPG

Siege of Lachish British Museum

This is an alabaster relief which provides an extended portrait of a siege of a town in Palestine by King Senacherib of Assyria.   It is like a long camera pan across the battlefield but time passes as you move from left to right seamlessly but you also move geographically from the West to the East. So it doesn't have frames. 

Here is a youtube illustration of the siege relief

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcLwoa19kLw

Trajan's Column

Trajan's Column shows a vast scrolling narrative of the invasion of Dacia by Trajan. It is full of detail and is used by Archaeologists to understand Roman military campaigns and methods of colonisation. The relief are quite subtle often using different viewpoints to elucidate information and can be used as a model of using images to tell a story. 

But what makes it interesting is that it would have been very difficult to read despite the fact that the Romans built 2 libraries to the side of it with viewing platforms. Trajan is depicted 58 times (in yellow above); his ashes were buried in a vault on the ground level, and a statue of him on top. So the main reading was probably to glorify the Emperor – the detail was as much to impress as to be read by the public. 

You can see a plaster cast in the Cast Courts of the V&A. 

This is an interesting article on the Column. http://www.nationalgeographic.com/trajan-column/article.html and you might enjoy this short stop motion animation documentary about building the Column

Building the column

And in case you want some proper film storyboards have a look at these:
 

http://flavorwire.com/349534/awesome-storyboards-from-15-of-your-favorite-films

The V& A new entrance

The V & A has revealed its new entrance.  

 The architect is the Amanda Levete Architect. It provides a new entrance from Exhibition road, and a lovely white open space courtyard with good views of the Henry Cole Wing.

 Below is a new temporary exhibition Gallery,

and it integrates various routes through the Museum.

On a personal level it is great to see the blight caused by the work coming to an end and allows my V&A guided walk to be restored.  I'm particularly pleased to see the Ceramic Staircase restored. I hope it isn't long before the Cast Court is reopened.

This is what the V&a says about the project: 

https://www.vam.ac.uk/info/exhibition-road-building-project.

And here the Guardian.  The V&A

Neolithic people wiped out by Bell Beaker folk.

The latest study of DNa suggests Beaker folk are not a distinct people in Europe but in Britain Bell Beaker DNA replaces Neolithic DNA.



 

Ancient-genome study finds Bronze Age ‘Beaker culture’ invaded Britain : Nature News & Comment

Days in the Archives

This looks like a really nice set of archive sessions in the archives at the Bishopsgate Institute.

http://www.bishopsgate.org.uk/course/3080/An-Excursion-to-the-Great-Exhibition-(1851)?utm_source=Events+and+courses+list+-+newsletter+subscribers+and+visitors%2Fstudents&utm_campaign=d135b8c65d-Summer+Term+at+Bishopsgate+Institute&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_3732698dac-d135b8c65d-127520037

Virtual Auto-Icon

Have fun rotating Jeremy Betham, and remember its for the Greater Good.



Virtual Auto-Icon

The World's first land Survey - Cromwell's Ireland

Homepage of The Down Survey Project

Watch this video of a discovery of a 17th Century interior

This is an amazing handheld vid of an exploration of an ordinary house which turns out to be 17th Century.

Watch it!


(7) A hidden treasure is revealed.. - YouTube

Remains of five 'lost' Archbishops of Canterbury found - BBC News

Amazing images of the los crypt in St Mary at Lambeth.



Remains of five 'lost' Archbishops of Canterbury found - BBC News

Huge collection of Celtic warrier images

(164) Pinterest • The world’s catalog of ideas



Huge collection of Celtic warrier images

Introducing the Freud Museum - YouTube

New introductory film on the Freud Museum



Introducing the Freud Museum - YouTube

Eric Gill exhibition to confront child sex abuse | Museums Association

This is an important issue - can you show work by artists who did despicable acts?  Can we dance to Gary Glitter?  or go to an Eric Gill exhibition?  The last question will be answered if you go to this exhibition.







Eric Gill exhibition to confront child sex abuse | Museums Association

“In with a bang and out like fools!” Sheep farming

Now that I am taking some country tours I'm trying to find out about farming.  This is very useful





Year on a Sheep Farm | National Sheep Association: “In with a bang and out like fools!”

Crackdown spells the end of 'free' walking tours where the guides force you to tip

Some, and only some, walking tour companies don't follow good practice.



Crackdown spells the end of 'free' walking tours where the guides force you to tip



London Walks by contrast are brilliant.

Spy report that criticised Marlowe for 'gay Christ' claim is revealed online | Stage | The Guardian

This is the document a spy recorded about Elizabethan Playwright (and spy) Christopher Marlowe a few days before he was murdered with a knife through the eye in a Tavern in Deptford.



It provides a motive.



Spy report that criticised Marlowe for 'gay Christ' claim is revealed online | Stage | The Guardian

Chelsea Buns

To my mind, with Lardy Cake (and Worcestershire Dripping Cake) the king of pastries. If I were a Little Englander I would blame the Belgian Bun and the Danish Pastry for their disappearance from mainstream bakers and Cafes. 

Occasionally, they have them at the British Library Cafe and Cafe Oto. 

Fragrant as honey and sweeter in taste!
As flaky and white as if baked by the light,
As the flesh of an infant soft, doughy and slight.

Swift



London Food History: Chelsea Buns | Londonist

An ancestor at Agincourt?

John Flude listed as an archer with the Earl of Salisbury fought in France in 1417. The battle took place in 1415 but I'm hoping the date might be when the record was made not when he served.



Have a look for your own



Medieval Soldier

Stonehenge a healing centre - tribute to Geoff Wainwright who died recently.

The Healing Stones of Dyfed - YouTube

The Destruction of the Country House

Salon IFA had an interesting report on the export of British Heritage.

'In 1974 Harris, Roy Strong FSA and Marcus Binney FSA co-curated the Destruction of the Country House exhibition at the V&A, which encouraged the founding of SAVE Britain's Heritage, of which Binney is currently Executive President and Harris a Trustee. Now, according to the Observer, Strong and Harris are hoping Britain’s ‘lost heritage’ can be tracked down.

From the 1880s to the 1940s entire historic interiors were shipped across the Atlantic, to be bought by the likes of William Randolph Hearst, John D Rockefeller, JP Morgan and Henry Frick. The owners of Gwydir Castle, Conwy, have been searching for 16th-century decorative carved oak panelling, stripped from the castle and sold to Hearst in 1921, without success. Strong told the Observer: ‘There were ship-loads of early English portraits exported, not just grand things. There’s English sculpture – how much of that went to America? We don’t know. There were no export controls. A large proportion of Britain’s art history from the 16th to 18th centuries may be missing.''

Roadkill and lawnmower exhibitions: The weird ways museums are finding funding - BBC News

Interesting ideas.



Roadkill and lawnmower exhibitions: The weird ways museums are finding funding - BBC News: London's Museum of Curiosities.

Ministry of Stories & Parliament’s Education Service team up

Ministry of Stories

Parliament’s Education Service has teamed  up with the Ministry of Stories, based in

Hoxton, to help promote the art of writing  and delivering speeches.

As part of its Young People Speak Up  scheme, aimed at promoting confidence in

public speaking, students from the Bridge Academy were asked to turn their passions

into speeches, which they presented in Parliament.

Meg Hillier MP said ' I was proud to hear the fantastic speeches delivered by the students'.

STAND UP FOR STONEHENGE WITH TONY ROBINSON! - YouTube

STAND UP FOR STONEHENGE WITH TONY ROBINSON! - YouTube

The Commonwealth Institute becomes the Design Museum - magnificent but.....

 I think the Guardian sums it up nicely - The Design Museum review – a magnificent achievement, but…



It is an achievement to preserve it.  Wait a minute. This is one of the great London Modernist buildings - in some ways the only great London Modernist building. and we are gratefully that it was not demolished or ruined. Instead it has been saved, against the odds. So magnificent achievement.

But. bits of it demolished, the surviving block squashed between two dull modern buildings.  On entry the fantastic roof slab is hidden behind a square set of wooden floors. It looks like what it is, modern structures squatting in a wonderful interior. You glimpse the wonderful interior from the front. From the front the original roof is not show cased.   This is very disappointing if you are interested in the Commonwealth Institute building. If you are interested in the Design Museum building then what a great entry.

Up the stairs crowded displays and in between glimpses of a magnificent arch a wonderful roof, in places the views are fantastic, in other areas the structural elements are put in ugly boxes, elsewhere the original structure is hidden.

Strangely successful failure.

The Commonwealth Institute | Post-War Buildings

The Royal Exchange Murals!

If you have a spare moment pop into the Royal Exchange at Bank, go upstairs and wander around the perimeter to look at these paintings.





Save The Royal Exchange Murals! | Spitalfields Life

What's the Moon doing at Stonehenge

I take a lot of people to Stonehenge. I have a fairly good idea what the sun does in relation to the landscape and the stones. But the moon has been beyond me.  So I have been trying to work it out.



 draw
a little diagram with the sun over to the left, the earth over to the
right and put the moon orbiting the earth, with the new moon between the
earth and the sun and the full moon on the other side of the earth and
the half moons at right angles.

That really helps

Moonrise

The moon takes a month to go around the
Earth. At new moon the moon is near the Sun, and it therefore rises
at Sunrise and sets at Sunset but is not very visible because it is
near the sun.

At full moon by contrast the moon is on
the opposite side of the earth to the Sun – hence we see the entire
moon reflecting the sun light. Therefore the moon rises at sunset,
and sets at sunrise.

In between these times the moonrise
gradually changes.

So waxing crescent moon the moonrise is
2hours after sunrise, sets after the sunset

Half moon the moon rises in the late
afternoon and is up most of the night

Full moon rises at sunset and sets at
sunrise

waning gibbous moon Rises after
sunset, sets after sunrise

waning half moon rises at midnight,
sets at noon

waning crescent moon rises 2 hours
before sunrise, sets couple hour before sunset.

New moon – rises at sunrise sets at
sunset.

The lunar cycle does not divide neatly
into the sun cycle because 29 does not go into 365. Every 19 years
the cycles come back together because 19 years = 235 months. Meton of
Athens worked this out, the B Baylonians knew it, and they created a
metonic cycle of 19 years made up of 125 30 day months and 110 29 day
months.

I also read that the moon repeats
itself every 18.6 years. I'm not sure how these relate to each other.

Stonehenge is at the exact latitude
whereby the midsummer axis (NE-SW) hits the northernmost moonset and
southernmost monnrise(NW - SE)  at the major standstill (whatever that is) at a
right angle. This is marked by the 4 station stones.

Standstill is a phrase used by
Alexander Tom who invented the idea that Stonehenge is a astronomical
computer. It simple means the same thing as a solstice, the extreme
point whereby the moon begins to got back the other way

So at the summer solstice the line that
points to it through the middle of Stonehenge (NE-SW)  is a rightangles to the
lines that go through the station stones pointing to the extreme
northern moonset and the extreme southern moonrise (NW-SE). This isn't true at other latitudes apparently.

Also look at:

What's the Moon doing?

Why are England's heritage bodies supporting the Stonehenge Bypass? - Apollo Magazine

Good article explaining that the proposed tunnel should extend the
entire length of the World Heritage Site, not just the NT property.
Please take the time to object to these proposals and suggest a longer
tunnel.



'What is certain is that Stonehenge needs a revised
proposal that tackles its traffic problem. This might loop the route of a
new bypass wholly outside the boundaries of the WHS, or bore a longer
tunnel below its full width. What is uncertain, as they face this first test, is whether England’s new frameworks for heritage protection are robust enough to meet this need.

Highways England’s six-week public consultation on the Stonehenge
Bypass closes on 5 March. You can contribute your views through their
website. '

https://highwaysengland.citizenspace.com/c…/a303-stonehenge/'

Why are England's heritage bodies supporting the Stonehenge Bypass? - Apollo Magazine

The Window Tax - a tax on light and air

You paid tax for 10 windows or more, and a higher rate for 20 windows or more.  At some point it was lowered to 6 then raised again to 8, then abolished in 1851 as it was felt to be a tax on 'light and air.



What was the The Window Tax?: It was a banded tax. For instance, in 1747 for a house with ten to fourteen windows, the tax stood at 6d. per window, fifteen to nineteen windows, 9d., and exceeding twenty or more, 1s.. The tax was raised six times between 1747 and 1808. By then the lowest band started at six windows. This was raised in 1825 to eight windows.

What to do with your slides

Paul Stamper FSA has a useful proposal:
(.Salon380
The Society of Antiquaries of London Online Newsletter (Salon)
‘In part’, he writes, ‘it’s the sheer number of slides which can be so daunting. I’d suggest the only way forward is to be ruthless, and to do a rapid triage. First, family slides, including ones where offspring are providing scale against ruins, should be passed to relatives. The great mass which might be termed “Where I went on my holidays” – views of Exeter cathedral or the Leaning Tower of Pisa – plus slides copied from books for lecture purposes, could (and should) be binned with the clearest of consciences. This would then leave the third category, which is material potentially of interest to posterity such as pictures of excavations, or of lost or changed vernacular buildings, townscapes and industrial landscapes.

Introduction to Select Bibliography of Published London Diaries | British History Online

Here are a few London diaries to get through.



Introduction to Select Bibliography of Published London Diaries | British History Online

Did the Mona Lisa have syphilis? | Art and design | The Guardian

The Guardian quotes the Old Operating Theatre Museum as its source for Snail - water which the Mona-Lisa is recorded as purchasing.  And as the Snail Water at the Museum was used for syphillis then makes the case that she had syphillis.



I think this is very much a distant maybe. Because firstly does a woman buying a medicine always buy it for herself? Secondly, snail water was not just used for syphilis, it was used for a variety of ailments in that region of the body.



This is part of what the Guardian says.



Did the Mona Lisa have syphilis? | Art and design | The Guardian: Perhaps it was the disgusting, punitive nature of this concoction that made it seem a pungent cure. Snail water was still being used in the 18th century; books from the time are very specific about its medicinal value. The Pharmacopœia pauperum (1718) gives this recipe:

Take Garden-Snails cleansed and bruised 6 Gallons, Earth-Worms washed and bruised 3 Gallons, of common Wormwood, Ground-Ivy, and Carduus, each one Pound and half ...

More herbs are added to give the vile brew, credited to Dr Richard Mead, a physician at St Thomas’s hospital in London, a better flavour. Other 18th-century recipes concur in the use of snail water for treating such ailments,as you can see for yourself at the excellent Old Operating Theatre Museum and Herb Garret, where examples of the recipe and its use for venereal disease are on display.

Portraits of Female Scientists at the Geology Society.

This looks like fun!



Raising Horizons is a photographic exhibition organised by
TrowelBlazers, in collaboration with photographer Leonora Saunders and
supported by Prospect Union.




The exhibition consists of 14 contemporary female scientists
photographed as their historical counterpart. The portraits show the
real diversity of women working today, at the same time as drawing
striking visual connections to their forebears.



The Geological Society

The Kiosks Of Whitechapel | Spitalfields Life

Excellent photos o the The Kiosks Of Whitechapel | Spitalfields Life in an article by the Gentle Author

Mobile Devices: engaging your audience on the go.

Digital Futures Training Programme Museum of London

Mobile Devices: engaging your audience on the Go.

I attended a half day training course at the Museum of London. These are some notes I made, It was give by Rhiannon Looseley, and Josh Blair from Museum of London Digital Learning and organised by Alec Ward. Any mistakes in these notes are mine and this has not been proof read or approved by them.

Summary – the training showed how easy it was to include a digital element to educational workshops. There are lots of free apps which can be used for creative elements of a workshop. The apps are so simple that they hardly need to be taught, and in a 20 minute section of a workshop can help reinforce learning in a fun way and which will allow the participants to take something home to show or share with friends and parents. Ideas were also given as to how additional content to a visit can be created using digital.

Don't do Digital for Digital's Sake

Why its good for engaging young people:

1. Digital can engage and excite some young people
2. Allows for different learning styles
3. Active learning
4. Portable and moveable around the museum
5. Can mix with other activities, like object handling, drawing, drama, story-telling etc.
6. Can combine Film, animation, collage, audio, etc.

Examples for use in Workshops – these examples were on I pads but Android could also be used. Participants could work one per iPad or share 2 or 3 per iPad. So for a group of 15 might need 5 tablets. But of course it could be set up for people to bring their own devices.

App – Pix Collage – this is a free app

The app makes it easy to make picture collages.

Session might start with object handling session on say Victorian nursing

Then participants create a collage using historic photos of nurses and wards and medical objects and also using the the iPad cameras in the museum

The software is very easy to use, and can be taught in less than 5 minutes

Creation of collage reinforces the learning and gives students something to take away

App – animate-it – Cost £1.49

This is a very simple animation programme. It is again very easy to use and allows the participant to make 20 sec animations using 100 stop motion photographs.

Session might start with story of the Great Fire of London.

Then, in groups, students create an animation of a story they make up about the Great Fire.

They would be given some resources – background photos for example, and either Lego figures or perhaps play-dough, or pencil and drawing to create a simple stop motion animation. Normally done in teams, a director, a camera person, and the person who moves/models/or draws the figures.

The software is very easy to use, and can be taught in less than 5 minutes and animation could be done in 20 minutes

Creation of collage reinforces the learning and gives students something to take away

App – Photo layers – free app

This is a very simple image creation programme. It is again very easy to use and allows the participant to make green screen images in 20 minutes or so.

Session might start with Operation Demo.

Then participants create an image in which they place themselves into an historic scene. For example, give them an operation scene and they can add themselves as observer, surgeon or patient.

The tablet is supplied with suitable background photos. The students take photograph of themselves possibly in costume against a green screen. (portable green screens cost around £100). Using the App, the historic photo is imported as the background, and the green screen image of the student is edited to get rid of the green background to leave the image of the student who can then be imported to become part of the background scene. This creates a realistic image of the past with the student included in it.

The software is slightly more complicated to use, but still easy and images could be done in 20 minutes or less

The green screen could also be used by ordinary visitors to create a postcard to send home (perhaps for a fee).

Part 2 Using Devices to provide additional content in the displays

Several ways have been tried:

1. QR codes. A black and white 'bar-code' like square is used to display additional content via the visitor's internet browsers to the web page associated with the object. Problems are installing readers of users phones, and the need for good Wifi. But easy way of giving visitors extra information about objects
2. I beacon – becoming fashionable. A device is located at the display and it pushes a message to the users phone or iPad by blue-tooth. I beacons cost £100+ for a pack of 20 or so. The Hidden Museum was a ibeacon project in Bristol Museum done with Ardman animations
3. Txting/Whatsapping interaction. Brooklyn Museum did a AsktheCurator session in which visitors could whatsapp or txt curators for information on museum objects at particular times of the day or on special occasions. The Horniman did something similar. The BM had a Whatsapp game where families were sent on tasks around the museum by a Games Master and they sent images of the success of their quests to each other via whatsapp, and the games mistress gave them marks for achievement. Tasks were not 'intellectual' as such but might be something find a happy object or a green object.
4. Virtual Reality Breadcrumbsgame,com set up treasure trails for museums and Gamar are doing VR tours for museums. Project Tango: Google's VR tour offering is being developed/ Singapore Art Gallery created an amazing Sumatran Tiger VR tour. Blippar is another one. Pokomon Go was used by Birmingham Museum who encouraged the pokomon go community into the museum at lunch times.
5. Guided tour software Izutravel and Geotour are two examples of software to create guided tours
6. Create your own app Is it worth it? High cost and lots of free stuff out there to mash up your own without the development costs. But special (and well funded projects can argue a special case.)

Issues

Do you buy equipment or get people to use their own (BYOD)? Schools have equipment but will they remember to bring them, and will they pre-load the software reliably? Equipment needs to be set up, maintained and cleaned afterwards physically and of any trace of the schoolchildren, so images and emails need to be deleted etc. to safeguard the children.

Copyright Infringement Risk, if you use museum objects and images do you have copyright permission? Are you happy to take the risk that a participant will abuse the copyright? Are you insured for copyright infringement fines?

Do you ask for a deposit for loan of the iPad? Will parents want their children to use their iPad?

Kevin Flude

10^th Nov 2017

Agatha Christie in the Isokon building

This surprised me Agatha in this temple of Modernism. Quite a surprise.





Isokon building - Wikipedia

"A Pioneer and a Founder": Remembering Ivor Noël Hume | Making History

"A Pioneer and a Founder": Remembering Ivor Noël Hume | Making History

London museum told to stop displaying skeleton of Charles Byrne | Daily Mail Online

Interesting issue on the display of human remains. Although in this case, given that we know Byrne's wishes, the case is stronger.



London museum told to stop displaying skeleton of Charles Byrne | Daily Mail Online

Lockwood Kipling: Punjab and London

The image below is one that has intriqued me for a long time.  Every since I worked at the V&A and started giving Guided tours I have looked at this and wondered who they all are.

 

Henry Cole, the first Director is the third person from the left.  This article identifies others as Francis Fowke and Godfrey Sykes. I imagine others include Gamble and Poynter.  The fifth person is thought to be Kiplings Father.

 

Salon IFA wrote this about him.

 

Lockwood Kipling: Punjab and London

John Lockwood Kipling (1837–1911), writes Julius Bryant FSA introducing a weighty book which accompanies a new exhibition, ‘is part of the fabric of the Victoria and Albert Museum.’ Artist, writer, museum director, teacher, conservationist and influential Arts and Crafts figure, Lockwood has been the subject of a three-year international research project led by V&A Senior Research Fellow Sandra Kemp. Bryant, who is Keeper of Word and Image at the V&A, and Susan Weber FSA, founder and Director of the Bard Graduate Center, New York, have curated the free exhibition, Lockwood Kipling: Arts and Crafts in the Punjab and London (at the V&A 14 January – 2 April). John Lockwood Kipling: Arts & Crafts in the Punjab and London, edited by Bryant and Weber, is published by Yale University Press.

The book offers a timely intellectual feast of analysis, information and illustration. Kipling began his career at the South Kensington Museum as an architectural sculptor in 1861 (he trained in the Staffordshire potteries, Tristram Hunt will have noted). This was just four years after the museum first opened, and nearly 40 years before it was renamed the Victoria and Albert Museum. Kipling now parades in a terracotta panel on what was the museum’s original entrance front (1868, at top), featuring ten South Kensington worthies: he is, I think, the fifth gentleman from the front, preceded by the museum’s first director, Henry Cole, its architect Francis Fowke, and Godfrey Sykes, who designed the tiles (the book is not clear, can anyone name all ten?).

In 1865 Kipling and his pregnant wife, Alice (née MacDonald), left for Mumbai, then known as Bombay (their son Rudyard was born there). He had a three-year contract to teach architectural sculpture at the Sir Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy School of Art. He stayed there for a decade, and then spent 18 years as Principal of the Mayo School of Industrial Arts in Lahore (today Pakistan’s National College of Arts) and Curator of the Lahore Museum. The book and the exhibition, through Kipling and his varied talents and interests, bring together a mass of new material to inform inquiry and debate into the creative relationships between imperial Britain and India. Kipling recorded, preserved and inspired in India and shipped to Britain some lovely and precious things; his own art is competent, and valuable especially, perhaps, as documentary illustration.

‘Even the most well-meaning denizens of British India,’ writes Jan Dalley in the Financial Times, ‘are hard put to escape the taint of empire. The continuing controversy about Rudyard Kipling – was he an apostle of the Raj, or its critic, or simply a realist about its complexities? – applies equally to his father. But now, on his home territory, this exhibition should go some way to re-establishing the name of John Lockwood Kipling.’

The drawing (detail) shows a woodcarver, from a collection depicting craftsmen of the Indian north-west provinces, by Lockwood Kipling (1870).

• Another India: Explorations and Expressions of Indigenous South Asia, opens at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge, on 8 March.
  

Positive Deviance Initiative

Adam Thorpe introduced me to an approach to research invented in the 70s and very successful in challenging malnutrition (first used in Vietnam).



Its called:  Positive deviance 



'(PD) is an approach to
behavioral and social change based on the observation that in any
community there are people whose uncommon but successful behaviors or
strategies enable them to find better solutions to a problem than their
peers, despite facing similar challenges and having no extra resources
...'



 

Positive Deviance Initiative

Digital transformation in the museum industry | AXIELL ALM

Free report to download





Digital transformation in the museum industry | AXIELL ALM: Digital transformation in the museum industry
Chrissie Leahy
22 July 2016
Collections Management
0 Comments
The status of digital transformation in the museum industry 2016 and using digitalisation to increase visibility

Download the full PDF report here.

Digital transformation can take many forms, from enabling museum visitors to use smartphones or tablets throughout the site to enhance their experience, to digitising the collection and making it available online, to engaging with people before or after their visits via online channels.

Produced in conjunction with Museums & The Web, this report draws on the views of more than 70 professionals working in museums across the world to explore the digital strategies of today’s museums and how they link to visitor engagement plans and focus areas for investment.

At Joseph Harker’s Paint Studios | Back Cloth painting studio

The Gentle Author writes:



'At Joseph Harker’s Paint Studios | Spitalfields Life: In 1905, Joseph Harker (1855–1927) the pre-eminent scenic artist of his age – celebrated for his work for Henry Irving’s company at the Lyceum – built paint studios in Walworth for his own use and to his own specification. Remarkably, these studios survive with all the essential fixtures in place just as Harker knew them.'

Questions at Shakespeare’s Curtain Theatre

Attended LAMAS lecture on the excavations at the Curtain Theatre. Very interesting lecture which was very well presented. But, I had a lot of questions at the end of it.

I asked the question, 'if you did not know this was the Curtain, what would make you think it was a Theatre.'

There is a lot of documentary evidence to say the Curtain is here abouts but the archaeology seemed to me to be less than totally convincing.

For example, the speaker talked about the stage, the galleries and showed a very schematic image of the rectangular theatre, with post-holes showing where the gallery is. But we were shown no archaeological photos which demonstrated these 'facts' they seemed to be self-evident.

The two side gallery was evidenced by what looked like one post-hole.

The stage was said to be a stage but didn't hear any evidence to show what it is identified as a stage.

One range of foundations seemed to continue beyond the building outlines in the schematics as the 'Curtain'.

It just needs a few photos to show the evidence and maybe I was the only one to want actual evidence to say this was the Curtain. They did find ceramic money boxes similar to those found at the Glove and Rose, so there is certainly a facility here that needed an entrance fee, but not sure this proves that the rectangular space excavated was that theatre. So I think still some doubt as to whether the Curtain has been found.



Initial findings from excavation at Shakespeare’s Curtain Theatre revealed | MOLA

Chris Grayling gives go-ahead to road tunnel under Stonehenge | UK news | The Guardian

This is a big decision. The point being they should have paid for a longer tunnel which does less damage to the archaeology around Stonehenge.


Chris Grayling gives go-ahead to road tunnel under Stonehenge | UK news | The Guardian

The Celebrated Murderer - SARAH MALCOLM

Fascinating murder that took place in 18th Century Fleet Street

SARAH MALCOLM

Stonehenge Alignment

Stonehenge Sun Temple ~ June 21 - YouTube

No Man's Land Pubs

The pub's in No man Land are 'Jack Straws Castle which is sadly closed down and turned into luxury apartments, although Spaniard's Inn is nearby and still open.

In Chalk Farm is the Red Bull. I cannot find any pub with that name in the area, the closest is the Bull and Gate in Kentish Town. However, Sheila Hancock says Pinter never went to the pub. So maybe its a fruitless search.

No Man's Land (play) - Wikipedia

Open Education - Free courses

I'm taking the 12 Apps of Christmas - apps for use to help teaching.

Blackboard Learn

Story Maps: Hemingway in Idaho

This is an app which allows you to use maps as a navigation device - or as an adjunct to a story.

Quite interesting although I guess you could do this without the app as a web site or app.

Not sure what it offers over other technology.

Pointed out to me by CSM MANE students.

The Amazonian Travels of Richard Evans Schultes

Here is one with a literary theme Hemingway in Idaho

http://uidaho.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapJournal/index.html?appid=8372c1acd90749a489cd937795d788a5

Charterhouse opening free to the public in Jan 2017

This is good news and will be a good end to guided tours in Smithfield.

Visit Us - The Charterhouse

Great Fire Doc questions whether Hubert was a Hugonaut

The Museum of London has acquired a handwritten document of evidence on the causes of the Great Fire of London.

This contains the following line which suggests for the first time that Robert Hubert who was hanged for starting the Great Fire might not even have been a Catholic. It was also reported that he was not in England at the time the fire started.

Rare find offers glimpse of London after the Great Fire - The Wharf: “That this Monsyer Hubert, lived a Papest & died one: all though if ever given out ye He was a Huginet....” is not found in the published versions and appears to be unique to this scribed report.

Witches' marks in Shakespeare's House

The marks, pentangles and flower like decorations made with compasses have been found in an increasing number of medieval and post-medieval timber framed buildings. They seem to stop being created when better oil based lanterns came into use. The suggestion being that darkness was a major cause of fear of ghosts and witches.

The marks in Shakespeare's house are on the stairs to the cellar and might have been created after Shakespeare's time when the house was a pub.

Witches' marks: public asked to seek ancient scratchings in buildings | Culture | The Guardian

Tell me a story: augmented reality technology in museums | Culture professionals network | The Guardian

This is an article about the use of Virtual Reality and Digital Story telling. The idea is to create persona based on visitor surveys and created digital content for those persona.




Tell me a story: augmented reality technology in museums | Culture professionals network | The Guardian

Sotheby's Museum Network

This is Sothebys Museum TV network - free videos from Wallace Collection, Tate and other Museum networks.

http://museumnetwork.sothebys.com/

Museum Network - Network-Museums.Com

Network-Museums.Com says:



'Network Museums is the place to get the answers. It brings museum staff, volunteers and students together to solve your problems and provides additional resources to make your museum successful.'

How Do You Develop A Story That’s Worth Telling - Raindance

Here are some sensible words about writing stories.



How Do You Develop A Story That’s Worth Telling - Raindance: How Do You Develop A Story That’s Worth Telling

Ghostsigns - faded painted signs on walls

Ghostsigns. This site is dedicated to  'the typically fading remains of
painted advertising on walls. The aim is to raise awareness and
understanding of ghostsigns through a variety of projects, including
research, publishing, tours and events.  '

Museum of Walking | the art is in taking part

Interesting web site that sees the Art in Walking.



They say:



'Museum of Walking | the art is in taking part: We are a family run business that develops and delivers walking events. Our walks are mainly artist led, depending on the event you choose there will be a mix of drawing, bricolage and learning. Our focus is to be creative using walking as the art form. Participants come and explore an area, learn something new and develop skills. Group participation is fun and stimulating and you will be part of a walking performance. ‘The art is in taking part’ which we call ‘walking creatively‘.'

Start A Festival - Free Film Festivals

This is a web site which coordinates and helps encourage film festivals.





Start A Festival - Free Film Festivals

Excavation (1957) British Pathé - St Albans Shepherd Frere

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWCuhzjPzqA

Its not just Art History A Level that is being dropped its Anthropology, Electronics, Creative Writing, Science in Society, Archaeology, Classical Civilisation and Statistics.

 AQA, an educational charity  announced that it was dropping a total of 20 A Level subjects. Media commentators bemoaned the loss of History of Art, but many others are being given the boot, including Anthropology, Electronics, Creative Writing, Science in Society, Archaeology, Classical Civilisation and Statistics.

Vulgar - the exhibition that is not vulgar

Great Costumes shame about the bullshit.

Vulgar was simply the title it was not  tasteless,  nor was it  gross, or  crass, and certainly not unrefined. There was nothing tawdry, or  garish, or even  brassy. As to  kitsch,  or tinselly, never. I say nothing glaring, brash, loud, or  harsh;

At times it was ostentatious, flamboyant, over-elaborate, overdone, showy, flashy, gaudy, garish, brassy. But it wasn't sexy or  flaunting, 

It might have been about fashion adopting the extreme, or going over the top, or even playing with the vulgar. But what it was not about was vulgarity.

Each section had an introductory text, which was very happy with itself  and then there was a lovely set of costumes which often had nothing to do with the introductory text, and had scarcely anything to do with vulgarity.   There were two shows, a show of costume and a display of one person's reflection on the word vulgarity.  Very little contact between the two. 

It was as if someone had collected a good collection of costume and then scattered them around empty rooms introduced by showy labels. 

The labels liked to go around in a circle. Vulgar is this and that is vulgar. Oh! how clever!


It didn't lay a finger on vulgarity.  Nice dresses.  Were there ANY male clothes?  Are we not vulgar?

The 10 Manliest High Tide Sea Shanties | The Art of Manliness

Really good collection of sea shanties

The 10 Manliest High Tide Sea Shanties | The Art of Manliness

Jane Austen Music

Here is a good list of Music Jane Austen would have heard/sung/played.



Jane Austen Music

London’s Olympics, 1908 - Most amusing Olympics of all time.

1. The British 400 yard Gold medalists won a rerun final running alone as the 3 Americans boycotted the re-run.



2. The American tug of war team accused the British team of  cheating by wearing special boots whien in fact they were all Policemen wearing their work shoes.



3. Champagne was served as refreshment for the Marathon



4. The Marathon was stretched from 25 to 26 miles and 300 odd yards because the Princess wanted it to start underneath the Royal Nursery in Windsor.



 5. Women participated for the first time.



6. The Winter Olympics were held in Kensington



7 There were medals for Watercolouring and running deer shootting

8 the Oldest goldmedalist was 68









London’s Olympics, 1908 | History Today

the Watercolors of John White and the lost colony of Roanoke

John White and John Smith - I think I have them combined as one in my mind.



White was the grandfather of Virginia Dare, and governor of Roanoke, Raleigh's colony in America.  John Smith is the  governor of James Town and friend of Pocahontas.



White was also a skilled watercolour painter.



Res Obscura: Images of a New World: the Watercolors of John White

Shadwell and Shad Thames the meaning of their names

According to Wikipedia Shad Thames is named after St Johns at Thames Church, but across the river:



Shadwell - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: EtymologyIn the 13th century, the area was known as Scadflet and Shatfliet[1] – derived from the Anglo-Saxon fleot, meaning a shallow creek or bay – the land was a low lying marsh.[2] A spring, issuing from near the south wall of the churchyard was dedicated to St Chad, and filled a nearby well.[3] The origin of the name is therefore confused, being associated with both the earlier use and the later well. Shadwell was formerly called Chadwelle.[4]



I think it much more likely that  they both derive from a similar source, and shallow creek does fit.

The London Rich: The Creation of a Great City, from 1666 to the Present by Peter Thorold — Reviews, Discussion, Bookclubs, Lists

Interesting book about the London Rich.



Goodreads | The London Rich: The Creation of a Great City, from 1666 to the Present by Peter Thorold — Reviews, Discussion, Bookclubs, Lists

How the super rich are affecting London.

London's elite 'pushed out of exclusive postcodes by super rich' | Money | The Guardian

Mosley Tries Again (1962) - YouTube

This shows Dalston during a fascist Oswold Mosely rally.





Mosley Tries Again (1962) - YouTube

Only Secretary of State ‘call-in’ can stop Soho demolition now - The Victorian Society

I am really disappointed that the new Mayor, Sadiq Khan, has  allowed the  Soho demolition.

London is not Singapore, we need a diverse mix of modern and old and in areas like this too many of the buildings that have some distinctiveness about them are going.

I thought Boris Johnstone was much to blame and I am very, very disappointed that Khan has not put up a signal that he will do things differently.

We need to save London not destroy it.


The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government should ‘call-in’ the demolition of a chunk of a Soho conservation area which includes the former Foyles building. 

 

Show Don't Tell say Creative Writing Tutors

Well I suspect that

Zadie Smith
Nick Hornby
Martin amis
Orhan Pamuk
Jane Austen
Margaret Attwood

E.F. Benson

Evelyn Waugh

do a lot of telling.

 

Hull Heritage betrayed - listed building is rejected | Hull Daily Mail

Hull has been let down. Firstly, if Heritage England reject a listing they should make a strong case for its retention on the grounds of local diversity. Secondly, the people of Hull will be better served by a range of buildings both new and old. Braves Hall is a positive feature in the town.



Bid to make Victorian Braves Hall in Hull a listed building is rejected | Hull Daily Mail

The Krays in London: 15 sites associated with the twins - Telegraph

The Krays in London: 15 sites associated with the twins - Telegraph

X-rays reveal 1,300-year-old writings inside later bookbindings | Books | The Guardian

This could be so exciting - think of the Roman and Greek manuscripts that might turn up!



X-rays reveal 1,300-year-old writings inside later bookbindings | Books | The Guardian