And Did Those Feet

North Southwark/Bermondsey  has a unique collection of industrial buildings of the 18th, 19th and 20th Century.  These need to be preserved as a set - and we must not allow the developers to pick them off one by one.  We need to set up a thoughtful planning process whereby examples of all periods are kept. For example in Bear Gardens there was a series of industrial buildings, most of which have been preserved except  a 1960's concrete building was pulled down - probably because no one thought it had an architectural merit but it was the only one from that period and as such was a great example of modernism. So the stock of industrial buildings needs to be studied as a set and preservation issue determined as a set with a view to preserving not just the quaint old ones but also some of the harsh modern industrial ones. Southwark gains its uniqueness from a diversity of building types and styles and that the atmosphere of the area is ruined if they are a...

Society of Antiquaries London'  Salon 289 reports: ' Star Carr was far bigger than we thought Also challenging previous interpretations is the paper in Antiquity on Star Carr by Chantal Conneller, Barry Taylor and Fellows Nicky Milner and Maisie Taylor, which ‘rewrites the character of Early Mesolithic settlement in Europe’, throwing into contention our picture of small mobile pioneering groups colonising new land and establishing small seasonal camps. In 9000 cal BC, Star Carr extended for nearly 2ha (5 acres) and involved the construction of a large timber platform, extending for an estimated 30m along the lakeside waterfront, with at least one post-built hut structure with signs of long-lasting or repeated occupation. In addition, since less than 5 per cent of the site has been excavated, and the archaeology of the larger, dryland component has hitherto been neglected, there is considerable potential for additional hut structures to be uncovered in the co...

SALON - the Society of Antiquaries of London Online Newsletter Salon 289 Reports: 'The latest issue of Antiquity , for December 2012, contains a paper by our Fellows Tim Darvill, Mike Parker Pearson and Geoff Wainwright plus Peter Marshall on the sequence of construction at Stonehenge, based on recent excavation and carbon dates modelled using Bayesian algorithms. Five prehistoric stages are now proposed, in place of Atkinson’s four and Ros Cleal’s three (some of which were further subdivided), and perhaps the most radical departure from earlier interpretations is the placing of the construction of the sarsen trilithon horseshoe at an early stage in the sequence. During Stage 1 (3000―2620 cal BC), the authors argue, Stonehenge consists of an earthwork enclosure bounded by a bank and ditch, within which are simple timber structures, pits and the fifty-six Aubrey holes, whose function remains enigmatic: the authors say they might even have been dug before the d...

My next walks are ideally suited to get your out of the house after Christmas 10.45 Sun Dec 30th 'Roman london' Barbican Tube 10.45 Sun Jan 6th 'The origins and Archaeology of the City of London' Tower Hill underground

From the Liber Monstrorum (9th-10th century) 'Sirens are sea-girls [marinae puellae] who deceive sailors with the outstanding beauty of their appearance and the sweetness of their song, and are most like human beings from the head to the navel, with the body of a maiden, but have scaly fishes' tails with which they always lurk in the sea.' (Translation from Andy Orchard _Pride and Prodigies: Studies in the Monsters in the Beowulf-Manuscript_ (University of Toronto Press, 1995, repr 2002) pp 262-3) From a posting in Britarch by John Clark Norman carving of a mermaid from Norman Chapel Durham http://www.sacred-destinations.com/england/durham-castle-photos/slides/eos_146pl

Excellent archive of images. Mopic