Worthing Archaeological Society Journal on Line.

2011-11-19T12:55:00.001+01:00

Its Back. New articles of interest will be published here, do yo have something of interest, let e have i and get it on the Wide World Web !!!

This site does not replace Face-book site , go there for interactive chit chat.

More to follow.

Battle for the Skys 1940,Battle of Britain.

2010-09-08T10:12:00.007+02:00

The out break of War and the Battle for Britain, must not be forgotten, we owe such a lot to a so brave fighting force, would we be enjoying our hobby now if we had not won ??.

Link.The great few.

Link to film.London can take it, well worth a watch.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfFfY0GVj5M

Some rare photos in the woods at Slindon 1890s,

2010-08-02T16:31:00.004+02:00

Charcoal burning, history, click link.These are rare photos of times past on the estate, i have now some 500 i hope at some point to show on a dedicated site, there are some copyright issues first to address.

Wartime on the Slindon Estate.

2010-07-16T13:17:00.003+02:00

1st and 2nd World War at Slindon

First World War

During the First World War, Slindon House was used as an auxiliary hospital run by Lady Beaumont, the sister of Wooton Issacson.

A prisoner-of-war camp, guarded by Canadian troops, was established between the bottom of Nore Hill and West Gumber Gate (SU 9623 1175). The prisoners were used to clear trees from the area and the remains of the incinerator that served the camp is still visible.

Second World War

During the Second World War the house was again utilised as a hospital before being taken over for used by the army stationing troops who were later to take part in the Dieppe raid.

Tree felling also took place on quite a large scale with large beech trees being taken from Nore Wood from an area around the back of the folly: Previously unfarmed land was reclaimed and brought back into production this consisted principally of the area of cleared land next to where the First World War prisoner-of-war camp had been located, which had become covered in gorse and scrub. Even today these fields are still referred to as War Ag 1-4.

Apart from the troops billeted in Slindon House just before the Dieppe raid there were no other military camps on the estate for the duration of the war except for the build up to D-Day, where some were temporarily camped in the Park.

There was however, a dummy airfield constructed on the Gumber as a decoy from RAF Tangmere, which was sited nearby. The raid shelters built at the same time as the dummy airfield are still in existence.

List of Sites

Slindon Estate Base Camp

One of the wooden sheds is supposed to have been part of the First World War PoW camp and was purchased in an auction after 1918. Need to research and understand which building is being referred to and then survey in detail.

Also, located in the stable yard is a iron trolley, which is supposed to have formed part of the light railway installed on the estate to transport wood. Again this needs to be found, given a clean up, photographed and recorded.

Air Raid Shelter, Slindon Park

Located near the Ice House in Slindon Park was an Air Raid shelter. Need to visit to see if building is still in-situ and record accordingly. An AA battery may also have been located in this vicinity.

POW Camp, Nore Hill

Only known remain is the incinerator. This has been photographed, but needs revisiting and recording properly. Also, need to see what other evidence still remains on the ground for the PoW Camp i.e. concrete footings for buildings.

Airship Mooring Site, Northwood Cottages

Although not mentioned in the Whitfield report, there is photographic evidence of a First World War airship-mooring site somewhere close to the Northwood Cottages.

The areas to be investigated are the woods to the South and West of the cottages. The photos show a series of huts, so any remaining evidence will either be the concrete moorings for the airships (or observation balloons) or concrete foundations for the huts (the staff were housed under canvas).

This a brief report, more to be listed.

Stonehenge./ plus Matt pope.

2010-07-03T14:32:00.005+02:00

New bus service connecting Avebury and Stonehenge

A minibus service connecting Avebury and Stonehenge is being planned by the Devizes-based Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society. The society, which runs Wiltshire Heritage Museum in Devizes, hopes to have the service up and running by the Festival of British Archaeology in August.
     It is the brainchild of David Dawson, the director of the museum. He said: "It is still in the planning stage but we have submitted an application for funding, which we should hear about in two or three weeks' time. The route will run through August and September this year as a pilot. Depending on its success, we would want to run it throughout next summer and possibly make it all year round."
     The route will start at Avebury, travel through Beckhampton, with a side trip to Silbury Hill, West Kennett and the Sanctuary. Then it will head to Devizes, with stops at the museum and Wadworth's and on to Durrington, Amesbury and Stonehenge. The return trip from Stonehenge will also take in Alton Barnes White Horse and the recently opened Great Stones Way footpath. Tickets will be £10.To comment on the idea go to www.wiltshireheritage.org.uk

Dig to discover Jersey's Ice Age

A team of archaeologists have announced they are to investigate an Ice Age site in Jersey, a British Crown Dependency off the coast of Normandy (France). An initial 18-day dig is to take place at seven sites including La Cotte, where Ice Age remains have been found. The 21-strong crew includes researchers from Southampton University, University College London, and the British Museum.
     Matthew Pope, a team member, said the dig aimed to be the most systematic study of how human life evolved in Jersey in a generation. He said: "La Cotte de St Brelade is a very important site that we all learnt about doing our undergraduate courses. No-one has looked at it in 30 years, which is why we want to do a full survey."
     In addition to La Cotte, the team plans to dig at Les Landes, and sites along the south coast from St Helier to Seymour Tower. The team, which is working with Jersey Heritage, intend to explore the sites over several years.

A Hamlet, or a Village.

2010-07-01T19:28:00.000+02:00

Photo. Downend, a hamlet in the Cotswolds .

A hamlet is usually a rural settlement which is too small to be considered a village, though sometimes the word is used for a different sort of community. The name comes from Anglo-Norman hamelet(t)e; Old French hamelet, the diminutive of Old French hamel. Another diminutive of Old French ham is possibly a cognate with similar words of Germanic origin. Compare with Dutch heem, German Heim, Swiss German cham or -kon, Old English hām and Modern English home, all derived from the Proto-Germanic *kham.

Historically, when a hamlet became large enough to justify building a church, it was then classified as a village. One example of a hamlet is a small cluster of houses surrounding a mill.

In the United Kingdom, the word 'hamlet' has no defined legal meaning, although hamlets are recognised as part of land use planning policies and administration. A hamlet is traditionally defined ecclesiastically as a village or settlement that usually does not have its own church, belonging to a parish of another village or town. In modern usage it generally refers to a secondary settlement in a civil parish, after the main settlement (if any). Hamlets may have been formed around a single source of economic activity such as a farm, mill, mine or harbour that employed its working population. Some hamlets, particularly those that have a medieval church, may be the result of the depopulation of a village.

The term hamlet was used in some parts of the country for a geographical subdivision of a parish (which might or might not contain a settlement). Elsewhere, these subdivisions were called "townships" or "tithings".

In Scotland the term of Gaelic derivation, clachan, is often preferred to the term "hamlet".

In Northern Ireland the common Irish place name element baile is sometimes considered equivalent to the term "hamlet" in English, although baile would actually have referred to what is known in English today as a townland -- a geographical locality, not a small village.

Plugstreet Archaeological Project

2010-06-30T12:52:00.000+02:00

A Great War themed project exploring sites around Comines-Warneton and Messines in Belgium. The project is being led by members of No Man's Land - The European Group for Great War Archaeology and the Comines-Warneton Historical Society.

The Plugstreet Team are very pleased to announce the identification of the Australian Soldier recovered by the team.

In August 2008, archaeologists from the group No Man’s Land – The European Group for Great War Archaeology – recovered the body of an unknown Australian soldier missing since the Battle of Messines in 1917. Extensive detective work and close cooperation between the Group, professional partners and the Australian Army over the past 20 months has now revealed the soldier’s identity as 1983 Private Alan James Mather. Read More Click here.

2009-04-29T20:01:00.001+02:00

Alexander Selkirk - the Real Robinson Crusoe?

Frequently history is stranger than fiction and none more so than in the tale of Alexander Selkirk: the real-life Robinson Crusoe.

Born in 1676, the seventh son of a cobbler, Alexander Selkirk grew up in Lower Largo, Fife. At the age of 19 he found himself in trouble with the Kirk Session after his brother’s trick of making him drink sea water resulted in a family fight. Before his case was heard, Selkirk fled to sea hoping to make his fortune through privateering (effectively legalized piracy on the King’s enemies) against Spanish vessels off the coast of South America.
Within a few years his skill at navigation led to his appointment as Sailing Master on the ‘Cinque Ports’, a sixteen gun, ninety ton privateer. The expedition was a disaster. The captain of the ship was a tyrant and after a few sea battles with the Spanish, Selkirk feared the ship would sink. So, in an attempt to save his own life he demanded to be put ashore on the next island they encountered. In September 1704, Selkirk was castaway on the uninhabited island of Más a Tierra (today known as Robinson Crusoe Island), over 400 miles off the West Coast of Chile. He took with him a little clothing, bedding, a musket and powder, some tools, a Bible and tobacco.

At first Selkirk simply read his Bible awaiting rescue, but it soon became apparent that the rescue wasn’t imminent. He resigned himself to a long stay and began to make island life habitable with only rats, goats and cats for company in his lonely vigil.

After several years of isolation, two ships drew into the island’s bay. Selkirk rushed to the shore, realizing a little late that they were Spanish. Their landing party fired, forcing him to flee for his life although he managed to evade capture and the Spaniards eventually departed.

Finally On 1st of February 1709, two British privateers dropped anchor offshore. Alexander lit his signal fire to alert the ships, who dispatched a rather astonished landing party to find a ‘Wildman’ dressed in goat skins. Remarkably the privateers’ pilot was William Dampier, who had led the Selkirk’s original expedition and was able to vouch for the ‘Wildman’.

Selkirk had spent four years and four months of isolation on the island, yet seemed stable when he was found. The experience had, in fact, saved his life. From William Dampier he learnt that he had been right to leave the ‘Cinque Ports’, which had sunk off the coast of Peru with all of its crew drowned except the captain and another seven men, who had survived only to be captured and left to rot in a Peruvian jail.
Selkirk re-embarked on his career as a privateer and within a year he was master of the ship that rescued him. In 1712 he returned to Scotland £800 richer, and surprised his family as they worshipped at the Kirk in Largo. They had long given him up for dead and were astonished that he was alive, let alone alive in his fine, gold and lace clothes. In 1713 he published an account of his adventures which were fictionalized six years later by Daniel Defoe in his now famous novel: ‘Robinson Crusoe’.

Selkirk, however, could never really readjust to life on the land, and, in 1720, a year after he was immortalized by Defoe, he joined the Royal Navy only to die of fever off the coast of Africa.

A Glutton for Punishment

2008-11-30T13:32:00.001+01:00

A Glutton for Punishment

A former resident of Binsted, one Isaac Rawlins, was found guilty of crimes which would hardly warrant a mention in the Neighbourhood Watch News today. It was at a time during the early nineteenth century when, following the Napoleonic wars and the return of ‘demobbed’ soldiers and sailors, employment in agriculture had slumped because of the rise of imported food with a devastating effect on the population of the countryside many of whom were desperate, and rioting and civil disobedience worried the aristocracy and harsh measures were adopted to rid the country of undesirables and co-incidentally colonise partially-mapped Australia before the French could do so.

We do not know if Isaac Rawlins or his family were starving. He was born in Slindon in 1785 and appears to have married there although his indictments clearly state that he came from Binsted. He was probably a woodman and if he was working in woods at Binsted he might well have lived there in a ‘bivvie’ (short for bivouac) of hazel sticks with bracken cover. There was no affordable transport to work and this practice was still used up to the 1950s. It was essential for instance for charcoal burners to live by their ‘pits’ to damp down if the pile burst into flames in order to avoid finishing up with a pile of ash instead of charcoal. We know he was 5’8’’ tall, of stout build with hazel eyes and a long face.

His first crime was the theft of a grub-axe (mattock) value 1 shilling in 1819.

His first 7 year transportation sentence at Petworth quarter sessions was in 1822 for stealing 11 gallons of wheat worth 5 shillings belonging to Francis Newland the Younger witnessed by Newland and Joseph Apps. Seven years were enough for most convicts and few risked the return journey and made a life in Australia but our ‘hero’ felt the urge to come back to England and is listed as crew (type ‘C’ for convict) on the Newcastle in 1823.

How he managed this is a mystery – possibly a pardon - but his bitter experience did not prove a deterrent because he was seen, in November 1833, taking away ‘one foot of timber value 9d’ in Rewell or Binsted Woods by Charles Sherwin who was wood-reeve for the Countess of Newburgh and lived in the cottage north of the A27 opposite the end of Binsted Lane (recently converted to a large house.) He also took a similar amount belonging to the Howard family. He was tried at Petworth on 30^th December 1833 and in spite of his plea

“I did not cut the timber off. I hope you will give me my punishment in Petworth gentlemen, if you please.”

he was sentenced to another seven years transportation and, at the age of 48 in those days would have been quite an old man with little hope of return. He spent a 132 day journey on ‘The Surrey 1’ with 260 other convicts during which, unusually, no-one died unlike a previous, notorious voyage of this ship when 56 died from typhus including the captain and both mates. The prospect of 3 weeks stay in Rio in spring, which the convicts experienced, sounds tempting today but not when chained up below decks in foul conditions.

Having spent his 7 years working hard in a form of bondage he received his ‘ticket of leave’ - a kind of probation – in October 1841 aged 56 whereby he could work for himself but must remain in the colony and we can only guess how he survived. I could find no record of his death.

John Heathcote

Mass Dials.

2008-11-26T11:37:00.000+01:00

Disappearing :Mass Dials on Sussex Churches

Mass dials have long been a feature on Sussex churches, usually found on south-facing wall of the church, often near the south doorway, and usually about a meter and half above the ground levels.
However, sometimes they are found in other places on the fabric of the church, for over periods of time they have been moved during rebuilding work; so do not always assume that where they are now, is where they have always been positioned.
About 8 or 9 inches across and rather roughly cut, mass dials come in a wide variety of designs, from semi-circles of dots to complete circles with associated radii. Their chronology is difficult to determine but simple versions with only four or five lines are early whilst those with numbers round the edge (rare) are late.
The gnomon, invariably missing, pointed straight out horizontally and so the dial would not record the same hours at all times of the year. The mass dial is usually regarded as an event marker for the church services rather than a timepiece .
It is thought that the earliest mass dials may be a simple carving of four or five lines from the gnomon hole, possibly with circle or arc later. Ashton-under-Hill, Worcsand Wootton, Kent is typical early examples. The Ashton-under-Hill stone also includes an example of 'four holes in a row'; the row of dots would originally have been horizontal with the gnomon stuck into a mortar line above.
There are many examples throughout Sussex to be found, except that today that may not be so easy, the reason for this is that over the passage of time, and air pollution in many areas, the dials have almost disappeared. A good example of this is at Edburton church, this little church is located in the hamlet of Edburton on the road between Fulking and Small Dole, virtually opposite the World Famous Springs Smoked Salmon shop..
The dials are on the south porch of the church, there are two in this location and another on the North side of the church, this is a curious one, for one must assume that it is not in its original position, and therefore in much better condition.
The dials on the south porch are in now poor condition, I remember seeing them for the first time some twenty years ago, and at that time were in good condition, now they are not. What has happened is that the stone has started to flake away, therefore taking with it layers of the original carving into the stone of the dial, if this process carries on, in a very few years time they will all but disappear completely.
The question is can they be saved for future generations to marvel at and appreciate; it will be difficult to stop the deterioration, one solution is to treat the areas with a polycarbonate solution, in effect give them a light plastic covering, which can breath.
It is important that mass dials are saved from further erosion, they are an important part of the history of the church and the Christian faith.

Shoreham Castle.

2008-09-24T13:34:00.000+02:00

Shoreham Castle.

A Motte or castle perhaps existed in Shoreham, a interesting map of the area published by J.Edwards in 1789, does show a mound on the north side of the town, it is in the angle where the present Mill Lane and Southdown road meet; it is possible that this was the remains of an earth motte, which was built in that position to guard the approaches to the town.
Today there are no remains of this mound to be seen, but it is interesting that this position was at the junction of the road from Steyning, Shoreham and Steyning would have that time been major trading towns, Shoreham a port with goods coming in and out, and Steyning being a major market town, with a long history of trading, and not forgetting that the River Adur once flowered much closer into the town of Steyning, there being a port and a Mint there.
The site in Southdown Road was excavated in the 1970s, this being possible due to the building of a garage in the garden of no 42 Southdown Road, the excavation did revel a flat bottomed ditch, this ditch is shown of the map by Edwards, it was not possible to excavate to any extent, but a well was discovered on the site, it was difficult to excavated it fully, but material removed from it included Samian dated to the late 1st /early 2nd century, there were also some sherds of course ware, other material was dated to the 4th century.
The ditch itself had a few finds within the layers, two sherds of pottery; these was dated to the 14th century, but over all the finds were thin on the ground.
It is interesting to note the construction of the well is dated to around 1st/2nd century, this is important as it is our first indication of a Roman building in the area, especially as there were a few finds of tessera found.
The ditch is difficult to understand as it was not very deep, and dug into quite soft clay, depth approximately 1.1m deep, if you look at the size of the ditch and its depth, it would only produced a mound in the region of 2m high, the ditch is dated to the 14th century, and therefore it is not so likely that this was the site of an early Motte.

In conclusion, was this site of the Motte in Shoreham, is it a site that now because of the buildings that now cover the area, it difficult to understand.
The area is an ideal spot for a defensive structure, but the evidence is on the ground not that strong, but this does not mean that we should dismiss it, perhaps the real Motte or even a larger castle did exist somewhere in the area, and through time and research we may learn more about the Castle of Shoreham..

Rodney Gunner. 2008

Parham.

2008-09-24T13:32:00.001+02:00

The history of Parham landscape during the later Middle Ages, is very sketchy, there seems to be little in the written resources to consult at the present time.

The principle buildings where at this time the two house of the Westminster and the Tregoz estates, they were thought to be on more than about 200 meters apart., and centred on the present-day church and manor house. In 1365-7 the Westminster Abbey buildings were said to comprise a thatched hall, with a chamber and kitchens: it is possible that these were the present east wing of the present Parham house, but a resent survey of this part of the building may conclude that is not the case, further work has yet to be undertaken.

The SMR records record the site of a deserted settlement immediately south east of the church, is stated that there were buildings there as late as 1778-9, and earthworks were present in 1873.

A geophysical survey undertaken in 1969 identified possible structures, a pit was dug, and thirteenth century pottery/fourteenth was excavated.

As in most locations early manor houses were usually very near churches, and often abandoned or converted to other uses as the owner ship of the estates changed hands.

It is very possible that the platform was the site of the Tregoz manorial centre and that the deserted settlement was a collection of later cottages.

There would have been other buildings associated with both the Westminster grange, and the Tregoz estate, the location of theses is not known.

The evidence for the removal of the village because hygiene (stated in documents of the period) is not convincing, the removal of the inhabitants’ to Rackam less so, as there is no evidence to date that a village was established there, except that a mill has stood in Rackham for a great many years (Rackham mill).There was a chapel there, but according to maps of the period, this was a ruin by 1724.

It is certain that the village was removed so that the estate could be imparked, the same applied at the estate at Wiston.

At this point in the history of the estate and the village, it worth looking at the state of villages before enclosure, and after enclosure, and what it meant for the families living in the village, and there employment and livelihood.

Site changes.

2008-08-30T00:19:00.000+02:00

Site is changing to include site reports, past and present.

The site excavation reports and background history of sites are to be published here, they will not be full reports, mainly interim ones.
There will be some from our archives, many never before published.

The site will from now on contain some adverts, this will help cover costs of running our sites.

True, !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-08-24T00:09:00.001+02:00

An archaeologist is the best husband any woman can have. The older she gets, the more interested he is in her.

Sun Dials.

2008-02-05T13:13:00.000+01:00

Shepherds Sun-dials of the South Downs.

About twenty years ago I spent a few days at Burpham, on the South Downs, not far from Arundel.

One of the interesting things I noticed was that some of the old time shepherds actually constructed sun-dials in the turf.

They had learned to do this in the old days before watches were cheap.

This is how it was done.—Having selected a fairly smooth bit of turf, the shepherd marks a rough circle about 18 inches in diameter, with a pointed stick, leaving the stick perpendicularly in the ground in the centre.

Due south of this he fixes another stick, about twelve inches long, on the periphery of the circle.

The various land marks, and their bearings, are so well known to shepherds, that they need no compass; and as a matter of fact, nearly every shepherd can tell the approximate time without any watch or dial and even on dull day.

Having fixed the South stick, he places another due West, and still another due East, so that we get a sundial with gnomons on the edge of a circle instead of being centre.

As the uses of this form of dial are connected with the tending sheep, it follows that its use is not required at all late, for the collecting and folding for the night of a large flock of sheep, naturally takes time.

Author unknown, document dated, 1890s.

Young Lovers.

2007-12-27T12:45:00.000+01:00

It could be humanity's oldest story of doomed love.

Archaeologists have unearthed two skeletons from the Neolithic period locked in a tender embrace and buried outside Mantua, just 40 kilometres south of Verona, the romantic city where Shakespeare set the star-crossed tale of Romeo and Juliet.

Buried between 5000 and 6000 years ago, the prehistoric lovers are believed to have been a man and a woman and are thought to have died young, as their teeth were found intact, Elena Menotti, the archaeologist who led the dig, said.

"As far as we know, it's unique," Menotti said. "Double burials from the Neolithic are unheard of, and these are even hugging."

The burial site was located on Monday during construction work for a factory building in the outskirts of Mantua.

Alongside the couple, archaeologists found flint tools, including arrowheads and a knife.

Experts will now study the artefacts and the skeletons to determine the burial site's age and how old the two were when they died, she said.

From the Sydney Morning Herald

Parham village.

2007-12-06T12:00:00.000+01:00

Parham estate.

Early this year the Parham estate contacted us with a proposal to undertake the research and an excavation of the lost village of Parham, I think it’s important to understand what a lost village is, and an understanding of what it may have been like for the inhabitants during the period of occupation.

Firstly what is a deserted medieval village, the term used to describe such a place is a DVM, this term is really misleading, as not all deserted villages date from the medieval times, many such settlements were only finally abandon as late as 1950s, while many others have been deserted since the 5^th or so century.

One of the most famous medieval villages to be researched and excavated is Wharram Percy in Yorkshire; this site has been a focus of extensive archaeological investigations that has spanned over forty years. Only the church is clearly visible above the ground, although the surrounding landscape clearly shows the layout of the original village.

A deserted medieval village or DMV is really a ghost settlement, an abandoned location where partially erected houses and crop remains but the inhabitants have long moved on to other places.

In England there are some 3.500 DMVs, and that is at the last count, in Sussex alone there are around 115, but this is not set in stone as there will many others that to date, have not been recorded - discovered to date.

Throughout the medieval period, villages consisted of from 10- 60 families, mainly living in very rough huts-at best; wooden-framed with wattle and daub walls-on dirt floors, with no chimneys or glazes windows. The furnishings would have been sparse, beds on floors softened with straw of leaves.

Water would have come from a local river or stream, often also the main sewer from the village, sometimes they may have been a well, water would have been collected in wooden buckets.

In most cases one end of the hut would be given over to livestock, which would have been kept in the hut over night, this in the cold periods of winter would have given extra warmth to the family living in the hut, but during hot periods it would have very smelly, and very unhygienic.

Clothes made of wool, flax and animal skins were rarely changed. Only the elite, the lord of the manor, the priest the Lords steward and perhaps some of the wealthier peasants, enjoyed superior housing and clothes.

The diet at this time would have been poor, mainly porridge, cheese, black bread, and some home grown vegetables, a lot of the food would have been dried and smoked, and this food would carry them throughout the winter months.

Village lives revolved around the agriculture calendar.

In the spring the animals grazed in the pasture, and seed sown. Summer was the busiest time; particularly when the harvests of wheat, barley, rye, hay, vegetables and fruit were being gathered.

In the autumn the animals grazed on the remains of the crops, providing manure for the fields, and it is at this time other types of marling were applied.

Winter was the time when families and those animals not killed for meat stayed indoors.a

There are several arrangements for the village as we know it, a village in the round, IE around a church, the village arranged along street, and a village around a square, as in Wisbrough Green, what we have at PARHAM is a village perhaps around a church, or a village arranged along a street.
The village arranged around a church is often there from much early times, especially if the church is on a mound, as this then denotes the period of occupation perhaps to Pagan times.

A village along a street often goes back to Roman times, when settlements grew up along well known trading route. Or even an ancient track way, another trading route, perhaps where travelers stopped over night. Many of the roadside settlements of Roman Britain were abandoned in the troubled times of the Saxon Conquest, but when ever possible during settled periods ,villages sprang up again at crossroads, at river crossings, and wherever somebody thought he had something to gain from passing traffic.

So what do we have at Parham, I think it’s a village along a street, an old road or track way, the church is dated to around to around the early 12^th century.

Peacehaven.

2007-11-18T12:50:00.000+01:00

Race is on to excavate Bronze Age barrow.

Archaeologists are in a race against time to excavate a
4,000-year-old burial ground discovered just 20ft from a crumbling
cliff edge. The Bronze Age barrow was unearthed at Peacehaven
Heights, east of Brighton (East Sussex, England), where cliffs are
eroding at the rate of 2ft a year. The mound is inching ever closer
to the edge and will begin falling 200ft into the sea within ten
years.

READ MORE Follow LINK

Source: The Argus (5 November 2007)
http://tinyurl.com/2gvumk

William Penn.

2007-11-17T13:18:00.000+01:00

My Dear Wife and Children

by William Penn, August 4, 1682

Warminghurst, 4 August 1682

My dear Wife and Children.

My love, that sea, nor land, nor death itself can extinguish or lessen toward you, most endearedly visits you with eternal embraces and will abide with you forever. And may the God of my life watch over you and bless you and do you good in this world and forever. Some things are upon my spirit to leave with you, in your respective capacities, as I am to one a husband, and to the rest a father, if I should never see you more in this world.

My dear wife, remember thou was the love of my youth, and much the joy of my life, the most beloved, as well as most worthy, of all my earthly comforts. And the reason of that love was more thy inward than thy outward excellences (which yet were many). God knows, and thou knows it. I can say it was a match of providence’s making, and God’s image in us both was the first thing and the most amiable and engaging ornament in our eyes. Now I am to leave thee, and that without knowing whether I shall ever see thee more in this world. Take my counsel into thy bosom and let it dwell with thee in my stead while thou lives.

Ist. Let the fear of the Lord, and a zeal and love to His glory, dwell richly in thy heart, and thou will watch for good over thyself and thy dear children and family, that no rude, light, or bad thing be committed, else God will be offended, and He will repent Himself of the good He intends thee and thine.

2dly. Be diligent in meetings of worship and business; stir up thyself and others herein; it is thy day and place. And let meetings be kept once a day in the family to wait upon the Lord, who has given us much time for ourselves. And my dearest, to make thy family matters easy to thee, divide thy time, and be regular. It is easy and sweet. Thy retirement will afford thee to do it, as in the morning to view the business of the house and fix it as thou desire, seeing all be in order, that by thy counsel all may move, and to thee render an account every evening. The time for work, for walking, for meals, may be certain, at least as near as may be. And grieve not thyself with careless servants. They will disorder thee. Rather pay them and let them go if they will not be better by admonitions. This is best, to avoid many words, which I know wound the soul and offend the Lord.

3dly. Cast up thy income and see what it daily amounts to, by which thou may be sure to have it in thy sight and power to keep within compass. And I beseech thee to live low and sparingly till my debts are paid, and then enlarge as thou see it convenient. Remember thy mother’s example when thy father’s public-spiritedness had worsted his estate (which is my case). I know thou loves plain things and are averse to the pomp of the world, a nobility natural to thee. I write not as doubtful, but to quicken thee, for my sake, to be more vigilant herein, knowing that God will bless thy care, and thy poor children and thee for it. My mind is wrapped up in a saying of thy father’s. “I desire not riches, but to owe nothing.” And truly that is wealth; and more than enough to live is a snare attended with many sorrows.

I need not bid thee be humble, for thou are so; nor meek and patient, for it is much of thy natural disposition. But I pray thee, be often in retirement with the Lord and guard against encroaching friendships. Keep them at arm’s end; for it is giving away our power, aye, and self too, into the possession of another. And that which might seem engaging in the beginning, may prove a yoke and burden too hard and heavy in the end. Wherefore keep dominion over thyself, and let thy children, good meetings, and Friends be the pleasure of thy life.

4thly. And now, my dearest, let me recommend to thy care my dear children, abundantly beloved of me as the Lord’s blessings and the sweet pledges of our mutual and endeared affection. Above all things, endeavor to breed them up in the love of virtue and that holy plain way of it which we have lived in, that the world, in no part of it, get into my family. I had rather they were homely than finely bred, as to outward behavior; yet I love sweetness mixed with gravity, and cheerfulness tempered with sobriety. Religion in the heart leads into this true civility, teaching men and women to be mild and courteous in their behavior, an accomplishment worthy indeed of praise.

5thly. Next, breed them up in a love one of another. Tell them, it is the charge I left behind me, and that it is the way to have the love and blessing of God upon them; also what his portion is who hates, or calls his brother fool. Sometimes separate them, but not long; and allow them to send and give each other small things, to endear one another with once more. I say, tell them it was my counsel, they should be tender and affectionate one to another.

For their learning, be liberal. Spare no cost, for by such parsimony all is lost that is saved; but let it be useful knowledge, such as is consistent with truth and godliness, not cherishing a vain conversation or idle mind, but ingenuity mixed with industry is good for the body and mind too. I recommend the useful parts of mathematics, as building houses or ships, measuring, surveying, dialing, navigation, etc.; but agriculture is especially in my eye. Let my children be husbandmen and housewives. It is industrious, healthy, honest, and of good example, like Abraham and the holy ancients who pleased God and obtained a good report. This leads to consider the works of God and nature, of things that are good and divert the mind from being taken up with the vain arts and inventions of a luxurious world. It is commendable in the princes of Germany, and [the] nobles of that empire, that they have all their children instructed in some useful occupation. Rather keep an ingenious person in the house to teach them than send them to schools, too many evil impressions being commonly received there. Be sure to observe their genius and don’t cross it as to learning. Let them not dwell too long on one thing, but let their change be agreeable, and all their diversions have some little bodily labor in them.

When grown big, have most care for them; for then there are more snares both within and without. When marriageable, see that they have worthy persons in their eye, of good life and good fame for piety and understanding. I need no wealth but sufficiency; and be sure their love be dear, fervent, and mutual, that it may be happy for them. I choose not they should be married into earthly covetous kindred. And of cities and towns of concourse beware. The world is apt to stick close to those who have lived and got wealth there. A country life and estate I like best for my children. I prefer a decent mansion of a hundred pounds per annum before ten thousand pounds in London, or suchlike place, in a way of trade.

In fine, my dear, endeavour to breed them dutiful to the Lord, and His blessed light, truth, and grace in their hearts, who is their Creator, and His fear will grow up with them. Teach a child (says the wise man) the way thou will have him to walk; and when he is old, he will not forget it. Next, obedience to thee their dear mother; and that not for wrath, but for conscience sake. [Be] liberal to the poor, pitiful to the miserable, humble and kind to all. And may my God make thee a blessing and give thee comfort in our dear children; and in age, gather thee to the joy and blessedness of the just (where no death shall separate us) forever.

And now, my dear children that are the gifts and mercies of the God of your tender father, hear my counsel and lay it up in your hearts. Love it more than treasure and follow it, and you shall be blessed here and happy hereafter.

In the first place, remember your Creator in the days of your youth. It was the glory of Israel in the 2d of Jeremiah: and how did God bless Josiah, because he feared him in his youth! And so He did Jacob, Joseph, and Moses. Oh! my dear children, remember and fear and serve Him who made you, and gave you to me and your dear mother, that you may live to Him and glorify Him in your generations. To do this, in your youthful days seek after the Lord, that you may find Him, remembering His great love in creating you; that you are not beasts, plants, or stones, but that He has kept you and given you His grace within, and substance without, and provided plentifully for you. This remember in your youth, that you may be kept from the evil of the world; for, in age, it will be harder to overcome the temptations of it.

Wherefore, my dear children, eschew the appearance of evil, and love and cleave to that in your hearts that shows you evil from good, and tells you when you do amiss, and reproves you for it. It is the light of Christ, that He has given you for your salvation. If you do this, and follow my counsel, God will bless you in this world and give you an inheritance in that which shall never have an end. For the light of Jesus is of a purifying nature; it seasons those who love it and take heed to it, and never leaves such till it has brought them to the city of God that has foundations. Oh! that ye may be seasoned with the gracious nature of it; hide it in your hearts, and flee, my dear children, from all youthful lusts, the vain sports, pastimes and pleasures of the world, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. You are now beginning to live-what would some give for your time? Oh! I could have lived better, were I as you, in the flower of youth. Therefore, love and fear the Lord, keep close to meetings; and delight to wait upon the Lord God of your father and mother, among his despised people, as we have done. And count it your honor to be members of that society, and heirs of that living fellowship, which is enjoyed among them-for the experience of which your father’s soul blesses the Lord forever.

Next, be obedient to your dear mother, a woman whose virtue and good name is an honor to you; for she has been exceeded by none in her time for her plainness, integrity, industry, humanity, virtue, and good understanding, qualities not usual among women of her worldly condition and quality. Therefore, honor and obey her, my dear children, as your mother, and your father’s love and delight; nay, love her too, for she loved your father with a deep and upright love, choosing him before all her many suitors. And though she be of a delicate constitution and noble spirit, yet she descended to the utmost tenderness and care for you, performing in painfulness acts of service to you in your infancy, as a mother and a nurse too. I charge you before the Lord, honor and obey, love and cherish, your dear mother.

Next betake yourselves to some honest, industrious course of life; and that not of sordid covetousness, but for example and to avoid idleness. And if you change your condition and marry, choose with the knowledge and consent of your mother, if living, guardians, or those that have the charge of you. Mind neither beauty nor riches, but the fear of the Lord and a sweet and amiable disposition, such as you can love above all this world and that may make your habitations pleasant and desirable to you. And being married, be tender, affectionate, and patient, and meek. Live in the fear of the Lord, and He will bless you and your offspring. Be sure to live within compass; borrow not, neither be beholden to any. Ruin not yourselves by kindness to others, for that exceeds the due bounds of friendship; neither will a true friend expect it. Small matters I heed not.

Let your industry and parsimony go no farther than for a sufficiency for life, and to make a provision for your children (and that in moderation, if the Lord gives you any). I charge you to help the poor and needy. Let the Lord have a voluntary share of your income, for the good of the poor, both in our Society and others; for we are all His creatures, remembering that he that gives to the poor, lends to the Lord. Know well your incomings, and your outgoings may be the better regulated. Love not money, nor the world. Use them only and they will serve you; but if you love them, you serve them, which will debase your spirits as well as offend the Lord. Pity the distressed, and hold out a hand of help to them; it may be your case, and as you mete to others, God will mete to you again.

Be humble and gentle in your conversation; of few words, I charge you; but always pertinent when you speak, hearing out before you attempt to answer, and then speaking as if you would persuade, not impose.

Affront none, neither revenge the affronts that are done to you; but forgive, and you shall be forgiven of your Heavenly Father.

In making friends, consider well, first; and when you are fixed, be true, not wavering by reports nor deserting in affliction, for that becomes not the good and virtuous.

Watch against anger; neither speak nor act in it, for like drunkenness, it makes a man a beast and throws people into desperate inconveniences.

Avoid flatterers; for they are thieves in disguise. Their praise is costly, designing to get by those they bespeak. They are the worst of creatures; they lie to flatter and flatter to cheat, and, which is worse, if you believe them, you cheat yourselves most dangerously. But the virtuous-though poor-love, cherish, and prefer. Remember David, who asking the Lord, “Who shall abide in Thy tabernacle; who shall dwell in Thy holy hill?” answers, “He that walks uprightly, works righteousness, and speaks the truth in his heart; in whose eyes the vile person is condemned, but honors them who fears the Lord.”

Next, my children be temperate in all things: in your diet, for that is physic by prevention; it keeps, nay, it makes people healthy and their generation sound. This is exclusive of the spiritual advantage it brings. Be also plain in your apparel; keep out that lust which reigns too much over some. Let your virtues be your ornaments; remembering, life is more than food, and the body than raiment. Let your furniture be simple and cheap. Avoid pride, avarice, and luxury. Read my No Cross, No Crown; there is instruction. Make your conversation with the most eminent for wisdom and piety; and shun all wicked men, as you hope for the blessing of God, and the comfort of your father’s living and dying prayers. Be sure you speak no evil of any; no, not of the meanest, much less of your superiors, as magistrates, guardians, tutors, teachers, and elders in Christ.

Be no busybodies; meddle not with other folks’ matters but when in conscience and duly pressed, for it procures trouble, and is ill-mannered, and very unseemly to wise men.

In your families, remember Abraham, Moses, and Joshua, their integrity to the Lord; and do as [if] you have them for your examples. Let the fear and service of the living God be encouraged in your houses, and that plainness, sobriety, and moderation in all things, as becomes God’s chosen people. And, as I advise you, my beloved children, do you counsel yours, if God should give you any. Yea, I counsel and command them, as my posterity, that they love and serve the Lord God with an upright heart, that He may bless you and yours, from generation to generation.

And as for you who are likely to be concerned in the government of Pennsylvania and my parts of East Jersey, especially the first, I do charge you before the Lord God and his only angels that-you be lowly, diligent, and tender; fearing God, loving the people, and hating covetousness. Let justice have its impartial course, and the law free passage. Though to your loss, protect no man against it, for you are not above the law, but the law above you. Live therefore the lives yourselves you would have the people live; and then you have right and boldness to punish the transgressor. Keep upon the square, for God sees you; therefore do your duty; and be sure you see with your own eyes, and hear with your own ears. Entertain no lurchers; cherish no informers for gain or revenge; use no tricks, fly to no devices to support or cover injustice, but let your hearts be upright before the Lord, trusting in Him above the contrivances of men, and none shall be able to hurt or supplant.

Oh! the Lord is a strong God; and He can do whatsover He pleases. And though men consider it not, it is the Lord that rules and overrules in the kingdoms of men; and He builds up and pulls down. 1, your father, am the man that can say, he that trusts in the Lord shall not be confounded. But God, in due time, will make His enemies be at peace with Him.

If you thus behave yourselves, and so become a terror to evildoers and a praise to them that do well, God, my God, will be with you, in wisdom and a sound mind, and make you blessed instruments in His hand for the settlement of some of those desolate parts of the world — which my soul desires above all worldly honors and riches, both for you that go and you that stay, you that govern and you that are governed — that in the end you may be gathered with me to the rest of God.

Finally, my children, love one another with a true and endeared love, and your dear relations on both sides; and take care to preserve tender affection in your children to each other, often marrying within themselves, so [long] as it be without the bounds forbidden in God’s law. That so they may not, like the forgetting and unnatural world, grow out of kindred and as cold as strangers; but, as becomes a truly natural and Christian stock, you and yours after you may live in the pure and fervent love of God toward one another, as becomes brethren in the spiritual and natural relation.

So my God, that has blessed me with His abundant mercies, both of this and the other and better life, be with you all, guide you by His counsel, bless you, and bring you to His eternal glory, that you may shine, my dear children, in the firmament of God’s power, with the blessed spirits of the just, that celestial family, praising and admiring Him, the God and Father of it, forever and ever. For there is no God like unto Him: the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob; the God of the Prophets, the Apostles, and Martyrs of Jesus; in whom I live forever.

So farewell to my thrice dearly beloved wife and children. Yours, as God pleases, in that which no waters can quench, no time forget, nor distance wear away, but remains forever.

William Penn

“Wherefore, my dear children, eschew the appearance of evil, and love and cleave to that in your hearts that shows you evil from good, and tells you when you do amiss, and reproves you for it.”

Neanderthals.

2007-10-28T11:24:00.001+01:00

Scientists claim some Neanderthals had red hair and fair skin

Holger Roempler of Harvard University and the University of Leipzig, Carles Lalueza-Fox of the University of Barcelona and Michael Hofreiter of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology have challenged the commonly-accepted image of Neanderthals, claiming that some of the extinct hominids could have had fair skin and red hair.

Roempler, Lalueza-Fox and Hofreiter have been studying DNA samples taken from Neanderthal fossils found in Italy and Spain. During the course of their study, the researchers had found a mutation that can affect skin and hair pigmentation.

This mutation, according to Roempler et al, reduces the function of the gene known as melanocortin-1 receptor (MC1R), which is one of the key proteins regulating hair and skin color. The catch here is that a slightly different mutation in that gene causes red hair and fair skin in modern humans.

Buoyed by last year's discovery that Neanderthals also possessed the gene known to influence modern speech in humans, Roempler, Lalueza-Fox, Hofreiter and the other members of their team have been continuously working to analyze Neanderthal DNA-dubbed as "the blueprint of life" in the hopes of better understanding these ancient people.

Neanderthals

2007-10-03T11:59:00.000+02:00

Neanderthals trekked all the way into Siberia

By Will Dunham.

Neanderthals, the stocky kin of modern humans, were far more widespread geographically than previously thought, with some trekking into southern Siberia before vanishing about 30,000 years ago, scientists said on Monday.

Researchers led by Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, found that Neanderthals spread 1,250 miles further east than scientists had commonly believed.

The scientists used genetic tests to determine that three fragmentary bones previously found in the Altai region of southern Siberia were indeed those of a Neanderthal. They also confirmed that a child's skeletal remains from Teshik-Tash in the Central Asian nation of Uzbekistan were from a Neanderthal.

Scientists previously had established that Neanderthals lived in Europe, the Middle East and parts of Asia before their disappearance, perhaps after some type of competition with modern humans who had migrated out of Africa.

"Intriguingly, their presence in southern Siberia raises the possibility that they may have been present even farther to the east, in Mongolia and China," the researchers wrote in the journal Nature.

Since the discovery in the 19th century of Neanderthal remains in the Neander Valley near Dusseldorf, Germany, scientists have struggled to understand just who were these stockily built archaic humans and why did they die off.

Scientists also are aiming to clarify the evolutionary relationship between modern humans, who left Africa and quickly spread around the world starting roughly 100,000 years ago, and Neanderthals.

"They are our closest relatives," Paabo said in a telephone interview. "If you saw one in the street, she or he would strike you as very robust and muscular, with a big brow ridge and bigger musculature. But they had, for example, just as big a brain as we have."

Traits typical of Neanderthals appear in remains dating from 400,000 years ago, and Neanderthals disappeared about 30,000 years ago, the researchers said.

Paabo, a leader in the field of ancient DNA research, also is instrumental in an effort launched last year to complete a first draft of the Neanderthal genome.

The fact that their geographic range was even bigger than previously thought makes their disappearance all the more mysterious, Paabo said.

Slindon Estate Yard Saw Pit.

2007-04-20T11:13:00.000+02:00

The old estate yard at Slindon has many interesting features; it would have been at one time a hive of activity, with carpenters, blacksmiths, all working at there trades supplying the needs of the great house and the estate in general.
Now this has gone, but there are reminders left of this bygone age, one in particular is the saw pit, here wood felled on the estate would be brought to be sawn into planks for various uses, it would have been hard work sawing often massive timbers into planks, and the worse job would have been at the bottom of the pit, for all the saw dust would fall upon you, and the hardest work, for you had to pull the massive saw on the downward stroke, the top man keeping a straight cut.
The saw pit at Slindon will be fully excavated later this year.

Notes.
'Top dog' is synonymous with the similar, if now archaic, phrases, 'upper dog' and 'over dog'. Clearly it is also the antonym of 'under dog' (now usually spelled as a single word) and its synonym, 'bottom dog'.
We have here a golden opportunity for those who consider plausibility to be enough evidence to hang a phrase derivation on. When wooden planks were sawed by hand, two men did the job using a two-handed saw. The senior man took the top handle, standing on the wood, and the junior took the bottom - in the saw-pit below. Add to this the fact that the irons that were used to secure the wood were called dogs and that the bottom position was much the more uncomfortable, and we can jump from this scene to the origin of 'top dog' and 'underdog'.
That may be true. The problem with it as an explanation is that no one has found evidence to back it up. There are printed references to saw-pits and to this form of work, going back to the early 15th century in England and the 19th century in America. None of these have any mention of 'top dog' or 'under dog'. Hardly likely that everyone, including Shakespeare, who referred to saw-pits in The Merry Wives of Windsor, would have ignored these colourful phrases, had they been in use at the time. For example, this extract from the 1876 Yale Review describes saw-pits in some detail makes no mention of 'top dog':
"The saw-pit was a rude structure about seven feet high, made of strong posts set in the ground wide enough apart to hold one or two pieces of heavy pine timber, and the sawyers, one above and one beneath, sawed out one hundred feet per day."
In fact t here are no known references to 'top dog' or 'under dog' in the context of wood sawing until well after the practise was superseded by mechanical sawing.
There are printed references to these terms going back to the days that the pits were still in use, but these all refer to fights of some sort, particularly dog fights. Here's a piece, for which the word doggerel might have been invented, that appeared in several US newspapers in 1859, under the name of 'David Barker':
The Under Dog In The Fight
I know that the world, the great big world,
From the peasant up to the king,
Has a different tale from the tale I tell,
And a different song to sing.
But for me - and I care not a single fig
If they say I am wrong or right wrong,
I shall always go for the weaker dog,
For the under dog in the fight.
I know that the world, that the great big world,
Will never a moment stop.
To see which dog may be in the fault,
But will shout for the dog on top.
But for me I shall never pause to ask
Which dog may be in the right
For my heart will hear, while it beats at all.
For the under dog in the fight.
Perchance what I've said I had better not said,
Or 'there better I had said it incog.
But with my heart and with glass filled up to the brim
Here's health to the bottom dog.

Slindon Estate.

2007-04-06T19:17:00.000+02:00

Photos taken on the estate over the past few years are starting to be listed on a web album, click on this link to take you there, more will be added from time to time, .
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/archresearch

Life in the Middle Ages.

2007-01-11T19:02:00.002+01:00

Daily Life in the Middle Ages.

Daily life for us peasants is generally pretty hard. I get up each morning at dawn, eat a quick breakfast of homemade bread and ale and then I'm off to the fields for a full day of work. We have to plant, tend, and harvest at least one good crop a year or we will starve in the winter. We usually try to plant and harvest at least two crops each year. After working all day, I sometimes stop in the village tavern for a bit of socializing before heading home to have my dinner, and then off to bed.
Elizabeth gets up at the crack of dawn as well. She has my breakfast ready for me before I leave. After that, her day is full. There's the vegetable garden to tend, clothing to wash, bread to bake for tomorrow, cloth to weave, and a house to keep clean. Rebecca and Samuel help her by tending to the animals (we have some pigs, a cow, some chickens, and a couple sheep), and doing other chores. Mathew usually works in the fields with me. He's learning to be a farmer so he can support his own family some day. When Samuel is about 10, he'll come to the fields to work too. Until then, Samuel attends school at the village church to learn some prayers and songs, and how to do a bit of math.
Peasants worked long hours every day, rain or shine, to ensure that their families had enough to eat. Most peasants were farmers, although a few were millers, blacksmiths, and tavern owners. Peasant farmers were the backbone of medieval society. They worked land leased to them by wealthier land holders in the nobility. The farmers produced all of the food, and paid most of the taxes. Their lives weren't all hard work though. They had feasts on holidays, and celebrated births and marriages. They rested each Sabbath day and attended church.
Where They Lived
Peasants lived in small towns or nearby farms on a lord's manor. The average peasant lived in a two room cottage that was constructed of mud plastered branches and straw or of stone and wood with a roof of thatch. The rooms had dirt floors and a few furnishings such as stools, a table, and maybe a chest to hold clothes in the common room. In the other room, sacks of straw served as beds for the entire family. A wealthy peasant might own a bed stand and a few iron pots. In the winter, the common room was shared with the livestock, who helped provide warmth. An open kitchen hearth was also located in the common room. Windows were small slits and didn't have glass in them. The interior of the cottage was lit by candles made of tallow (and probably smelled pretty icky).
What They Wore
The clothing of the peasants and other lower class people was usually made of rough wool or linen. Peasant women spun wool into threads and wove cloth that was turned into clothing for their families. Peasants probably had only one set of clothing, two at most. Men wore coarse tunics, and long stockings or leggings. Women wore long dresses of coarse wool, and stockings. Some peasants may have worn linen undergarments to offset the uncomfortable wool clothing. The outer garments were almost never washed, though the undergarments were laundered regularly. Wood smoke permeated the clothes and acted as a kind of deodorant for peasants. The base for the cloth was usually a russet (brown), so most clothing was a fairly drab combination of browns, reds, and grays, with only small variations. Children were dressed as miniature adults. Both men and women wore wooden clogs or shoes made of thick cloth or leather. In cold weather, peasants would have worn sheepskin or woolen cloaks, woolen hats, and woolen mittens to keep out the rain and cold. Many peasants died during the winter months from over exposure to the elements.
What They Ate
Peasants had a fairly unchanging diet of baked bread, porridge, stew, seasonal vegetables, and some meat. If a peasant lived near a stream or ocean, he may have caught fish to supplement his diet. Otherwise, he ate what he could grow. Peasants mainly grew crops of corn, beans, and wheat. Each family also had a vegetable garden near their home that provided lettuce, tomatoes, peas, beans, radishes, carrots, and other vegetables. Some peasants may have had fruit trees as well. Peasants also harvested acorns and other nuts and berries from the nearby forest. Peasant women made butter and cheese from the milk of cows as well. In the fall, they slaughtered most of the animals for their meat. If it was too rainy or too dry for a good crop to grow, peasant families had a very good chance of starving to death.
Children and Schooling
Birth and infancy were the most dangerous stages of life for people in the Middle Ages. Records from the time period suggest that approximately 20% of women died during childbirth and 5% of infants died during delivery with another 10-12% dying in their first month. Healthy children were regarded as a gift from God. Most families wanted sons, who would one day carry on the family name, as opposed to daughters, who would require a large dowry when they married. However, many parents probably rejoiced at the birth of a daughter as well, especially if they had been childless for many years or their infants had died.
Childbirth during the Middle Ages was very dangerous for both the mother and the infant. When the mother went into labor, a midwife, generally a townswoman who was experienced in delivering babies, attended her. If the delivery went well, so much the better, but in the event of complications the midwife could do very little. There were no Caesarean sections and no advanced medical equipment to help mother and child. Many women died during childbirth and many infants died during delivery.
If both mother and infant survived childbirth, the child was usually bathed in lukewarm water and then swaddled in warm cotton or wool fabric. If it was thought the infant would not live, it was immediately baptized by the midwife or by a man nearby, often the father. If the infant was thought to survive it was baptized several days after its birth in a local church. Here it was named, often after a close relative or a saint, and was promised to be brought up as a Christian.
After the baptism, the child was brought home and life returned to normal. Its mother or a wet nurse generally nursed the infant at home. In peasant families, where every person was needed to work the fields, infants were sometimes left alone in the home for long periods of time, or in the care of a brother or sister who was as young as 2 or 3. Many accidents befell infants left alone or in the care of other children, helping to account for the high infant mortality rate.
If the child lived through the first year, it was soon walking and talking. Young children would have been given small chores like feeding the chickens or washing the dishes, but were otherwise free to play up until the age of around seven. Peasant children whose families were almost always poor wouldn't have had many toys. Fathers and older siblings might make a child a wooden spinning top, a doll, or a set of blocks. Most of the time though, children played with what was available and used their imaginations.
Around the age of seven, children began to learn what they would need to know for their adult lives. Younger male children might attend a village school run by the local church. There they would learn important prayers and songs, and a smattering of Latin and mathematics. When a male child was old enough to be useful, he would go to work with his father or another villager as an apprentice. As an apprentice, the boy would learn everything he would need to support himself and his family. Most male children, especially the eldest, worked the same job as their father. Girl children didn't usually receive formal schooling. Instead, they stayed home with their mothers and learned how to be a good housewife and mother. They learned how to weave cloth, cook, grow vegetables, make butter, clean house, tend children, and other necessary things.
Marriage and Divorce
Marriages of all classes of people were arranged by the parents of the couple. Marriages were contracted to join two families together, and no family would leave such important matters to be decided on the emotions of the people involved. Peasant girls could marry as young as 12 and boys as young as 14. Most of the time though, girls married around 17 or 18 and boys in their late 20's or 30's. The groom was almost always much older than his bride. The prospective bride and groom would probably have already met and known each other for some time as peasants tended to live in or close to the same village their whole lives.
The couple were married in a simple ceremony unlike the elaborate marriage ceremonies today. The actual ceremony differed from place to place. In the early part of the Middle Ages, the Church was not very involved in the marriage ceremony and it was usually conducted at home with several witnesses present. Over the course of the Middle Ages, the Church became more and more involved in the marriage ceremony and by the end of the period, a Christian marriage ceremony almost always accompanied a wedding.
Once the wedding was over, married life began. It was undoubtedly awkward for both the husband and the wife for a time until they got to know each other better. Mutual friendship and respect eventually developed among most married people and sometimes the partners also grew to love each other.
The man was the head of the household in the Middle Ages and the wife was legally his property. A man was allowed and even expected to beat his wife, as long as she lived through the experience. Husbands had complete control over all of their wife's belongings and any other property that was owned by the family. The husband had the final say in all matters. However, many husbands asked for and heeded the advice of their wives.
Husbands were allowed to divorce their wives for many reasons, the most popular being adultery. Wives, on the other hand, could not divorce their husbands. Towards the end of the Middle Ages, this changed slightly, and wives were allowed to divorce husbands convicted of certain crimes or away on a long campaign of warfare. In the peasant class, where everyone knew everyone else, adultery and divorce were less common then in the upper classes where the husband was often gone for long periods of time.
Celebrations and Holidays
Life wasn't all hard work though. The Catholic Church had many holidays that were observed. On these holidays, peasants had feasts, sometimes provided by the lord of the nearby manor, and socialized with their neighbors. They danced, sang songs, and generally had a good time. Peasants also celebrated the birth and baptism of a new child, marriages of family members, and other important events.

References:
• Brooke, Christopher. The Structure of Medieval Society. McGraw-Hill Book Company. New York. 1971.
• Carrol, Sharon. Women's Clothing in the Middle Ages. http://www.millersv.edu/~english/homepage
/duncan/medfem/cloth.html.
• Gies, Frances and Joseph. Marriage and Family in the Middle Ages. Harper and Row. New York. 1987
• The Middle Ages--Clothing. http://www.learner.org/exhibits/middleages/clothing.html
• Oakes, Catherine. Exploring the Past: The Middle Ages. The Hamlyn Publishing Group. Orlando. 1989.
• Reynolds, Laura. Marriage in the Middle Ages. http://www.millersv.edu/~english/homepage/duncan/medfem/marriage.html
• Reynolds, Laura. Marriage in the Middle Ages II. http://www.millersv.edu/~english/homepage/duncan/medfem/marr.html
• Shahar, Shulamith. Childhood in the Middle Ages. Routledge, Chapman, and Hall Inc. New York. 1992.
• Smith, Rebecca. The Medieval Childhood. http://www.millersv.edu/~english/homepage/duncan/medfem/rlspaper.html
• Sobol, Donald J. The First Book of Medieval Man. Franklin, Inc. New York. 1959.
• Stiles, Ben. Clothing Makes the Woman. http://www.millersv.edu/~english/homepage/duncan
/medfem/clothing.html.
• Wincovitch, Christy. A Little About Wet Nurses. http://www.millersv.edu/~english/homepage/duncan/medfem/wet.html

The River Arun.

2006-12-18T23:43:00.000+01:00

Visualising the past in 3D: The River Arun

Archaeologists at Wessex Archaeology have completed a 3D animation
that reveals a prehistoric landscape, now submerged under the English
Channel, as it might have appeared 8000 years ago.
At the end of the last ice age the River Arun in West Sussex
flowed a further 8 miles out. Archaeological survey has revealed the
lay of the land, and what plants and trees grew there. The complex
evidence has been turned into a compelling animated tour showing how
the landscape might have looked and how families made a living from
the land and the sea.
The Seabed Prehistory project was established to research ways
of identifying evidence of prehistoric landscapes in and around
aggregate dredging areas. This dredging provides many of the raw
materials, such as gravel, needed for the buildings industry. The
project was designed to see if equipment that is commonly used by the
offshore industry could also identify archaeological remains. It was
an opportunity for archaeologists and the aggregate industry to work
together to gain a better understanding of the archaeology under the
seabed. The results of this project will inform future proposals for
new aggregate dredging licences.
The picture is built up with data collected as part of the
project, or inferred from other research. Geophysical survey
identified the different geological layers in the study area,
revealing the shape of the land. Vibrocores were used to gather
evidence from the buried landscape. Vibrocores are tubes that are
pushed into the seabed. The column of sediment that is caught within
the tube contains layers of ancient soils.
The researchers were able to identify a layer of sediment dating
to the Mesolithic period. This deposit corresponds with a geological
layer found in the geophysical survey. Trapped with those layers were
seeds and pollen from the trees and plants that grew at the time. By
mapping where individual species are found, scientists can plot
particular habitats and so build up a detailed picture of the
landscape.
The video is available on YouTube

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcGBnVI0gM0).

Stonehenge.

2006-11-23T18:04:00.000+01:00

Stonehenge 'No Place for the Dead'

A leading expert on Stonehenge based at Bournemouth University has breathed new life into the controversy surrounding the origins of Stonehenge. In his new book Stonehenge: The Biography of a Landscape (Tempus Publishing) Professor Tim Darvill, Head of the University's Archaeology Group, suggests that the ancient monument was a source and centre for healing and not a place for the dead as believed by many previous scholars. Professor Darvill also makes a case for revellers who travel to be near the ancient monument for the summer solstice in June to reconsider. Instead, he believes that those seeking to tap into the monument's powers at its most potent time of the year should do so in December during the winter solstice when our ancestors believed that the henge was 'occupied' by a prehistoric god - the equivalent of the Roman and Greek god of healing, Apollo - who 'chose' to reside in winter with the Hyborians, long believed to be the ancient Britons.
The basis for Professor Darvill's findings lies in the Preseli Mountains in west Wales where he and colleague Professor Geoffrey Wainwright have located an exact origin for the bluestones used in the construction of Stonehenge some 250 km away. "The questions most people ask when they consider Stonehenge is 'why was it built?' and 'how was it was used?'" says Professor Darvill. "Our work has taken us to the Preseli Mountains to provide a robust context for the source of the bluestones and to explore various ideas about why those mountains were so special to prehistoric people."
"We have several strands of evidence to consider. First, there is folklore in the form of accounts written in the 14th century which refer to a magician bringing the stones from the west of the British Isles to what we know as Salisbury Plain. It was believed these particular stones had many healing properties because in Preseli there are many sacred springs considered to have health-giving qualities. The water comes out of the rocks used to build Stonehenge and it's well established that as recently as the late 18th century, people went to Stonehenge to break off bits of rock as talismans. Also, around the Stonehenge landscape there are many burials, some of which have been excavated and amongst these there are a good proportion of people who show signs of being unwell. Some would have walked with a limp or had broken bones - just the sort of thing that in modern times pressurises people to seek help from the Almighty."
Dr Raimund Karl of the University of Wales, Bangor, questioned whether finding the remains of sick people in and around Stonehenge proves it was intended to be a place of healing. "It's a possibility that it was a place of healing, but whether there was a predominance of sick people buried there I'm not so convinced. Many prehistoric burial grounds everywhere show various signs of illness because people in prehistoric times didn't have a modern health service and many of them had lots of illnesses."
Prof Darvill suggested the deity worshipped at Stonehenge would have been a pre-historic equivalent of the Greek and Roman god of healing, Apollo. He added, "Although his [Apollo's] main sanctuary was at Delphi in Greece, it is widely believed that he left Greece in the winter months to reside in the land of the Hyborians - usually taken to be Britain. Altogether, and with the incorporation of the stones from Wales, Stonehenge is a very powerful and positive place of pilgrimage, although whether the monument's healing power actually worked is a matter for further discussion."
Professor Timothy Darvill and Professor Geoffrey Wainwright, formerly Head of Archaeology at English Heritage, will expound their theories further during an open lecture at Bournemouth University on Thursday 30 November at 5.30pm when the subject will be Beyond Stonehenge: Carn Menini and the Preseli Bluestones. Admission to the lecture is free. All are welcome. Pre-booking is recommended by emailing bulectures@bournemouth.ac.uk or by telephoning (01202) 9610933.

Sources: Bournemouth University Press Release

Wilmington Priory.

2006-11-22T19:19:00.000+01:00

This is from an old quide published by Sussex Archaeological Society 1961.

WILMINGTON PRIORY was formerly one of the possessions
of the Benedictine Abbey of Grestain in Normandy. This Abbey was founded in 1050 by Herluin de Conteville, whose son, Robert de Mortain, accompanied his half-brother, William the Con¬queror, to England, and received from him the Rape of Pevensey. Robert was a liberal benefactor to his father's foundation and amongst his gifts to the Abbey was, as appears from Domesday Book, 1086, the Manor of Wilmington. From its convenient situatjon near the sea, this soon became the headquarters for the Abbot of Grestain's representative in England. The first Prior of Wilmington whose name we know was John who is mentioned in a deed of 1243 in connection with the purchase of lands in Westham. In all probability there were only two Monks normally resident in England and they and their household would live at the Priory, going on journeys from there to inspect the Abbot's other properties. During the wars with France in the 13th and 14th centuries, the King took possession of all alien Priories. He used Wilmington as a source of revenue, letting it to the highest bidder. The object of these lay owners was to get money out of the Priory lands, and naturally, they were apt to let the buildings fall into disrepair. Walter Brystowe was the last Prior; he took the oath of obedience to the Bishop of Chichester in 1401. In 1413 the Priory and lands were granted to the Dean and Chapter of Chichester, and remained in their hands for 150 years. Towards the end of this period (1541) we find that the Vicarage house of Wilmington was in a portion of the old build¬ings. In 1565 Wilmington passed to Sir Richard Sackville and was later let to Thomas Culpepper, who, with his widow and nephew, is buried in the Church. In 1635 another house was built for the Vicar. About 1700 the Wilmington estates passed to Spencer Compton, afterwards Earl of Wilmington, and then by marriage to the Cavendish family. During this time the farmer lived in the Priory buildings. The Duke of Devonshire sold the farm to Co!. R. V. Gwynne and in 1925 conveyed the Priory to the Sussex Archreological Trust, which, under the guidance of Mr. Walter Godfrey, C.B.E., F.S.A., laid out a large sum upon it in necessary preservation work.

From this account of the history of the Priory, it will be seen that the building was planned more like a Manor House than the usual Monastery. But it must be considered as forming one structure with the Church, to which it was connected by the South Aisle of the latter. The 12th century Chancel of unusual length was no doubt the Monks' Quire, while the nave was in use for parochial worship. No part of the 12th century domestic buildings has come• to light, but portions remain of what was probably the Great Hall built in the 13th century (see plan).
After passing through the arched doorway, on the far side of the front lawn (tickets being obtained at the custodian's door immedi¬ately to the left) we turn right through the Well House Court to the North-East Wing, which is now a roofless building but originally of two storeys, with a vault below. The vault is now entered by a doorway leading from the front lawn. This vault, which dates from c. 1300, is larger than the superstructure, which was built a century later, and may have supported the solar of the early house. Notice in the vault the old doorway, with holes for an internal bar. This was probably the way by which stores were brought in. High up in the vault there are three windows which have recesses for shutters. In the room over the vault there are window openings in both the east and west walls and also the remains of a 14th century doorway, which possibly led to a cloister connected with the Church. Against the north wall is the oven of the farmhouse.
The Well House Court was the outer kitchen of the old farm¬house. This Court occupies part of the old Hall and may have been divided off from it when the 14th century Hall was built. It was originally roofed with great oak beams carried on the existing triple stone wall shafts with 14th century capitals. A section of the wall post of one timber truss remains. There is an oak doorway in the south wall. This room was probably the kitchen of the Vicarage built by the Dean and Chapter before 1541.
Retracing our steps and turning right at the custodian's door we pass a timber supported undercroft. On the left is the main entrance doorway of the Hall that consists of three beautifully moulded orders, supported by three shafts on each side and is of 13th century (Early English) work. Adjoining it to the south, is a fine Gatehouse' Of' Porch of two storeys, which is clearly of later date than the doorway, as its vaulting ribs and walls completely disregard the position of the doorway and the windows. There is a similar clash between the outer doorway and the vault, and it may be that there was an earlier porch here contemporary with the doorway and

windows of the old Hall and that it was enlarged when the new Hall was built. The west wall of this room has been largely rebuilt and a chimney inserted. There is, however, in it the reveal of a window with holes for iron bars, which probably represents a hatch com¬municating with the west building. Note the 14th century corbels with heads of monks carved on them.
Leaving the Gatehouse and turning round the left hand comer, we come to the Undercroft of the new Hall built in the 14th century. The Hall was situated on the first floor with rooms below but only the south end and part of the east wall remain. There is a doorway on the east side which seems to have led into the old Hall. In the turrets of, the south wall are spiral staircases. The principal staircase, which was probably at the kitchen end, has disappeared. Stone seats can be seen on either side of the large window, which shows signs of having been altered in the time when the Dean and Chapter had possession. The Tudor bricks used in the western turret show that they did repairs here.
East of the Gatehouse the space between it and the east wing was enclosed on the south perhaps as early as 1500. The south wall of the old Hall seems to have been partly rebuilt in the 14th century and at its east end is a door jamb which was either the entrance to a ground-floor room or to a staircase. The fellow of this jamb has been refixed to form part of the open fireplace in the 16th century kitchen which used to be here. A fine oak chimney beam goes right across it. This kitchen and the room over it are mentioned in Mrs. Culpepper's will, dated 1606.
Passing through a door in the east wall, we enter the inhabited part of the house, where there is an 18th century staircase with a curious balustrade of a Chinese interlacing pattern. This leads to a landing where the rear arch of a 14th century window may be seen with one jamb beside it and also part of the arch of a doorway. This door seems to have led to a gallery running to the east wall of the Prior's Chapel, where is the lower part of the north jamb of a door, or they may both be the doors of separate staircases. Notice the 14th century king-post similar to the one in the Church; it may be seen from the Prior's Chapel, by switching on the light by the entrance to the Museum Room.
Entering the Museum Room notice a large chimney stack inserted in the west wall with an iron wheel fixed to it for turning a spit. Going up some steps we come to the room in the upper storey of the porch which was probably the Prior's Chapel. Here is the greater part of a 14th century three-light east window. There Was at one time an entrance to this Chapel in its west wall leading from the new Hall, but the communicating door has disappeared.

Portrait of the Poor.

2006-11-13T12:56:00.000+01:00

Portrait of the Poor
Art Review by Judy Cox,
Review of 'Below Stairs', National Portrait Gallery, London
Wandering through the National Portrait Gallery is always fascinating, and free. You pass kings and queens, politicians, explorers, diplomats, aristocrats and, in the later rooms, sports and film stars.
What you don't see very much of is poor people. Until cameras became cheap, very few working people could have their image reproduced. Portrait painting was overwhelmingly about celebrating the achievements, power and wealth of the elite, with the odd poor poet or footballer made good. But this new exhibition, which you do have to pay for, shows that throughout the centuries a handful of servants did have their portraits painted. And this collection shows them to be a fascinating glimpse of the hidden world below stairs, and class and power relationships.
The earliest portraits date back to the 1600s. These tended to feature the servants in the lord's retinue, just as minstrels, jesters and champions, many of whom would themselves come from high-ranking families. The servants who waited, washed and worked were largely invisible. These portraits tended to come from outlying rural areas of the country where feudal links between master and some servants lasted longer.
By the 18th century households had become more segregated. There was a developing gap between 'upper' and 'lower' servants. Upper servants - such as nannies, gardeners and cooks - often had a close relationship with their masters and had their portraits painted.
In 1790, 90 percent of servants were female. But 90 percent who had their portraits painted were male and most closely associated with their masters' leisure interests, such as gamekeepers.
One of the finest paintings is by Willam Hogarth, famous for his pictures of the darker side of life for the lower classes in 18th century London. Servants became a popular subject in the 19th century, when moralising pictures were the norm. Some show wicked servants getting their just deserts, but others are compassionate pictures of the exhaustion and constant humiliation suffered by many women servants. Some even deal with the widespread sexual exploitation of women servants, brought to attention by Richardson's novel Pamela.
One of the most interesting sections of the exhibition focuses on black and Asian servants. By 1750 there were around ten to 20 thousand black people living in London and other large towns, most brought in as slaves. It became fashionable to have a young black servant boy, and they are painted here like cute little lap dogs. Many suffered a cruel fate when they became too old to be cute and were shipped off to slave plantations.
There is a constant tension that emerges in this exhibition. On the one side is the image of the loyal, trusty servant, like Bridget Holmes, painted when she was 96. Bridget was the 'necessary woman' to generations of royals, emptying their chamber pots.
On the other side were the unruly servants. There seems to have been a constant fear among the 'well to do' that their servants were cheating them, stealing their booze, nibbling their dinners, and disrespecting them. The exhibition includes fierce tirades against naughty servants by the writers Jonathan Swift and Daniel Defoe.
The rich needed servants. They had to be waited on hand and foot and the size of their household was a barometer of wealth and status. But by having servants they brought the class struggle right into their own parlours - and bedrooms, kitchens and stables.
Servants are making a comeback. The numbers employed as domestic workers are going up again, although nothing like the 1931 figure, which showed 1.3 million domestic servants in Britain, most of them women.
Today they are more likely to be the subject of reality TV shows and period dramas. But this exhibition reminds us of how miserable, powerless and poor servants were and how, despite everything, they constantly managed to get one over on those who considered themselves the rightful masters.

Secret Sussex.

2006-11-06T21:50:00.000+01:00

Secret Sussex

Smuggling Sussex

Five and twenty ponies, Trotting through the dark—Brandy for the Parson, Baccy for the Clerk. They ask no questions are not told a lie—Watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!
Rudyard Kipling.

A view of smuggling as seen around the turn of the 20th century, expressed by writers of the time often taken and quoted from much earlier writers,
Charles Lamb wrote “I like a smuggler”,” He is the only honest thief.”

As an example of the “respectability” of the smugglers, friends, Alexander Pope, in 1717,writes to John Caryll, a. Sussex squire; “I beg to do me a familiar or rather domestic piece of service. It is, when a hogshead of good French wine falls into your hands-whether out of the skies, or whatever element that pays no customs-that you would favour me with about twelve dozen of it at the price you give,”

Many churchyards in and around Sussex ports bear witness to the constant warfare between the custom men (revenue officers) and the smugglers, they were a mere handfall, but were very brave men, trying to do an almost impossible job. In the churchyard of All Saints, Hastings, is the epitaph of a smuggler, he was shot at sea by a revenue officer. “May it be known, tho, I am clay, a base man took my life away; but freely him I do forgive and hope in heaven we shall live.”

Places of Interest.

Beachy Head is the highest cliff in the South of England, it is very impressive from below as it falls sheer to the beach. The name Beachy has nothing to do with the beach; it is in fact a corruption of Beau Chef.

Belle Tout, The old lighthouse was built in 1831,the great height of the light was an advantage in good weather, but in poor conditions was often a problem to navigators as low cloud would make it become obscured .The lighthouse was built by Jack Fuller, a strange Sussex squire who lies under his pyramid in Brightling churchyard.
Before either of the lighthouses were built there existed, Parson Darby’s Hole, a cave reached by means of steps. There is a lot of uncertainty as to its true purpose. It has been variously suggested that it was built to provide a refuge for shipwrecked sailors, a primitive lighthouse to guild ships, and even a lookout to guide smugglers and keep them informed when the coast was clear.

R.Gunner

Baybridge Canal.

2006-11-06T21:48:00.000+01:00

The Baybridge Canal
(River Adur)

Like other Sussex rivers the Adur was a natural navigation route for a long time before the age of the canals, in 1825,the Baybridge Canal Company was formed, this was so that a navigable cut or canal could be formed from the river Adur at Bines Bridge to Baybridge a distance of some 3 ¾ miles.

Strictly speaking, what was built was not so much a canal but an improvement of the north- west arm of the river, this being widened and dredged.
Two locks were built and a small wharf at Baybridge.The northeast arm of the Adur was navigable to Mockbridge, 2miles north of Henfield on the A281.

The canal was built so that the local commodities could be sent to the markets more easier and quicker, this being wheat and high quality timber, especially oak, the canal was in use for about 35yrs,it was abandoned in 1875,but it had not really been used since around 1861,about the time the Shoreham-Horsham railway line opened.

The Canal is worth a visit, there are various areas that have survived the passage of time, the best preserved part is the Lock at Partridge Green, here can be found a brick lock-chamber, the brickwork is very fine, also there are remains of iron fitments. The best way to explore this canal is to walk the entire length, from Baybridge to Binesbridge a little over 3 miles ,refer to OS sheet197,or any good map of Sussex.

R.Gunner

Parkminster.

2006-11-06T21:46:00.001+01:00

Parkminster

In February 1873 Mr Boxall of Parknowle near Cowfold stood on his doorstep ready to receive the man who had bought his house, a Russian baron and general.
The buyer was indeed Baron de Nicolai but he was also a Carthusian Monk!
The order had thought it unwise to inform Mr.Boxall, who was known to be a strong protestant, of the true identity of the buyers. It was said that Mr.Boxall did see the funny side of it.

In the succeeding years the country house became an impressive Cathusian monastery and ten years later the monks settled down to regular life under their first prior Don Victor.Parkminster as it was now known, became the first Carthusian monastery in England since the sixteenth century and has remained until only very recently the only Carthusian monastery in the English speaking world.

Parkminster is dedicated to Saint Hugh who was prior of the first English Charterhouse in 1178, Hugh who later became Bishop of Lincoln is justly remembered for his bold defence of the poor and his stand against Kings and Barons
A stole, worn by him is kept at Parkminster.

The life of a Carthusian monk is strict; the monk lives almost entirely on his own in a “cell” which in fact is a small two-story house. He believes that he has been called to this life. There are some thirty-five cells at Parkminster; each has a workshop on the ground floor and a small garden. He studies, and prays, and sleeps on the first floor.
The monk may at times visit the library and the chapel; he may also on special occasions take exercise outside the monastery. Occasionally the white habited monks can be seen walking in pairs around Cowfold, Shermanbury, and West Grinstead

Rodney Gunner.

Mary Rose.Visit.

2006-08-20T21:52:00.000+02:00

The Mary Rose, and Henry V111.

The Mary Rose is well worth visit; there is a new visitor’s centre and more to come later this year, there will be a visit there in the spring, this will not be a coach tour, but an organized visit limited to 20 members, travel will be by train, or make your own way. Details later.

The Mary Rose sank in the Solent on 19th July 1545, just over a mile from the dock where she was built in 1509 for Henry V111. During the excavation of the wreck more than 20,000 finds were recovered from the seabed. Over 1,000 of the objects recovered from the ship are displayed in the Mary Rose Exhibition.
The Mary Rose is now situated in Dock 3 alongside HMS Victory. When visiting the Mary Rose you are given a wand which gives you audio commentary about the ship as you go along by it. The Mary Rose Museum Houses many artefacts from the ship and models of the ship. There is also a movie to watch which details how the ship was recovered from the sea.
On the 11th October 1982, millions watched on television as the Mary Rose was recovered from the sea bed just off of Portsmouth where she had laid for 437 years.
King Henry VIII ordered the ship to be constructed in 1509 and named the ship after his sister. In the Summer of 1545 the Mary Rose set sail with 700 men on board, she sank just off Southsea Castle, with King Henry watching from the castle.
The Mary Rose was built in Portsmouth in the first dry dock in the world. In 1536 the Mary Rose was uprated to 700 tons and fitted with more efficient guns. In 1545 the Mary Rose sank just off of Southsea Castle. In 1836 divers John and Charles Deane discovered the site of the wreck. From 1965 to 1971 divers lead by Alexander McKee searched the ship using sonar equipment. From 1971 to 1979 the Mary Rose was excavated and in 1979 the Mary Rose Trust was formed with H.R.H. Prince Charles as its president. By 1982 the ship had been excavated and on 11th October 1982 the Mary Rose was raised from the sea bed.
The hull is now housed in Dry Dock 3, it was not until 1984 that the ship was turned upright after lying on its side. The hull has been restored with all the timbers recovered from the site. The Mary Rose was equipped with 200 marines, 185 soldiers and thirty gunners. The rate of pay on board ship compared well with shore wages. The wages of a mariner in January 1545 were raised from 5s to 6s 8d a month. A large collection of materials from the barber surgeon have been found and put on display along with many other artifacts.

The Mary Rose.

On a visit to see the Mary Rose , Henrys V111 great ship, I discovered a couple of interesting facts, the cat of nine tails that unfortunate sailors would be punished with for all sorts of misdemeanours, would have to be made by the said victim the night before a flogging, and placed in a canvas bag.
What is interesting is where the sayings come from, letting the cat out of the bag, and “not enough room to swing a cat around.”

Simple explanation, letting the cat out of the bag, comes from on the morning of the punishment, the cat of nine tails would be removed from the bag it was kept it, therefore letting the cat out!.

Second saying “not enough room to swing a cat means that the area of punishment is too small to swing the cat of nine tails, therefore more space is needed to swing the cat, to administer the punishment.

Phil Harding.

2006-07-23T12:33:00.000+02:00

Phil Harding archive article, on his interest in Flint knapping
It has been recovered from an old IBM disc, written using wordwise.

Flint is 98% amorphous silica which sometimes encloses fossils or micro fossils. Flint is always found in association with chalk although its origins are less understood. The biological origin of the surrounding chalk matrix is undisputed so the fact that flint is found within chalk and the fact that many creatures of the zooplankton have salicaceous exoskeletons strongly suggests a biological origin for flint but gives no hint as to how the silica is concentrated and mineralized into glassy nodules.
Flints have been worked since the beginning of human prehistory, either won directly from the chalk or gathered, washed and smoothed, from river beds. Tool making and tool using has been implicated in the development of human intellect, human appearance and human physique. That the soil on which early man stood and one of the minerals he first used should both be composed of the recycled remains of earlier life forms are just two of many observations that beg an anthropic explanation of our worlds origin and development.
Whilst I have known these facts for years Synchronicity (an acausal connecting principle -- the simultaneous occurrence of two meaningfully but not causally connected events -- a coincidence in time of two or more causally unrelated events which have the same or similar meaning) has conspired to reawaken my interest in stone age technology.
Reading 'Stig of the Dump' and 'Tool Maker' to Marie was the first link of a new chain of coincidence.
Years ago as a teenager I was involved in excavating the debris cone of a Deanne Hole. Dene holes are common features of chalk lands in the South East of England. They consist of vertical shafts that widen out into cloverleaf chambers thirty feet or more below the surface. For many years there was controversy about how or why they came to exist. One idea was that they were natural cavities cut through the chalk by acidic water, possibly later enlarged by man. Other suggestions were that they were dug by Druids for religious ceremonies or more recently, in the 17th century, as hidy holes for priests or royalists. The final consensus was much less fanciful. It is now believed that they were chalk wells dug in that form to minimise the labourers effort. The vertical shaft reduces the amount of top soil to be removed, or disturbed, to get at the chalk. When the shaft has been sunk to its maximum depth, deep enough to make the roof safe and self supporting, several men worked outwards and upwards in different directions so the chalk they cut fell down and back coming to rest below the centre shaft where it could be loaded into baskets hauled straight up to the surface. The clover leaf shape was the result of the miners working outwards in different directions.
The subject of early man came up again when our American relatives were here, in England, for their summer holiday. A wet Sunday at the end of July produced the simultaneous suggestion, from our two families, of visiting Chislehurst Caves in Kent. Following an official guide we learnt that the caves were miles of man made tunnels, dug through the local chalk in various periods of history, including Celtic, Roman and modern times. Some of the tunnels were started as Dene holes which were enlarged and then linked up with other tunnels or Deanne hole complexes. The caves were excavated for various purposes, including the mining of flints to Knap for flintlock guns and tinder boxes.
On Friday the 4th of August, for the first time in months, I looked through the radio section of the next weeks radio and TV times. I noted the listing of a program called 'The flint Knappers Tale' a conversation with Phil Harding - Flint Knapper. The programme was to be broadcast on Saturday the 5th, with a repeat on Monday the 7th. I missed the Saturday broadcast. On Sunday the 6th of August we, and our American in-laws drove to a craft and country fayre held near Guilford in Surry, this was in part because it was there and in part to meet up with some other relatives. The other relatives were in the process of moving from their previous address but were not fully moved into their new home and the fayre was conveniently placed to meet them, near but away from their new house. At the fayre there were demonstrations by many traditional craftsmen including potters, thatchers, wheelwrights, blacksmiths, wool spinners and wood turners. Then I discovered, sitting by himself on a chair, out in the sun, Phil Harding - Flintknapper. In appearance he looked like an aging hippy with long hair tied back behind his head. He wore tatty Doc Martins and rough khaki trousers but was naked from the waist up, his face and torso both looked used to being exposed to the elements. About his neck was a leather thong with a barbed, flint, arrow head hanging from it. Some examples of finished tools were displayed on a table beside him, tools he had knapped from flint, and in some cases also ground and polished, While I gathered first impressions P.H. silently worked a piece of flint, selected from a pile behind his chair. His booted feet were becoming immersed in a growing mound of flint shards as he worked the initial lumps of flint into blades, sharp edged slivers of flint that could be used as they were or else be further worked into such items as arrowheads, scrappers or piercing tools. When questioned he was happy to engage in conversation. Phil Harding lives in Whiltshire and has the appropriate accent. Through conversation and observation that afternoon, and finally by listening to the radio programme on Monday 7th August, I learnt a lot about flint, flint knapping and the flint Knapper. He described himself as a semi professional Flint Knapper. It transpired that he had obtained a qualification in archaeology seventeen years ago and his day job often involves sorting and identifying prehistoric artifacts. Knapping flint helps Phil to understand and appreciate the work of our stone age ancestors. He also makes money providing a service that few others can offer. It isn't just stone age tool replicas that are required, older buildings, or copies thereof, may be finished in flint or have flint quoins or mouldings. Ancient though the use of flint is, it defies working with 2Oth century tools so knapping will never quite disappear. A recent commission given to P.H. was to manufacture 12 metres of flint mouldings for a Sussex College building which was designed to blend with earlier architecture. The specification required a cross section to the flint that P.H. would have claimed impossible to produce by knapping, except for the recent unearthing of a long lost cargo of flints, exported from Grimes Graves when knapping was still HiTec.
To work flint P.H. sits with a core on his knee or in his hand. He hits the core with a hammer which is either a harder stone or softer bone or antler. He protects his hand and his knee with a piece of leather. His eyes are not protected though his bag contains safety specs, he claims he uses specs when on his own but doesn't like to spoil his macho image in public. The choice of core and hammer comes down to experience and the intended end product. Flint is a difficult material to `read', pieces with major flaws can be discounted by the dull noise they make when struck but many apparently faultless flints shatter due to internal stresses or microscopic flaws. It isn't always essential to use a hammer harder than the flint as flakes can be removed by applying sufficient pressure to the right point, and the correct angle. The effectiveness of the end product was shown by small cuts that Marie and James sustained by handling flakes, then I used a larger flint flake to split an apple, using less effort than if I had been using a kitchen knife. P.H. claims to have used flint tools to chop small trees and to skin a Roe deer (the animal had not been killed for the purpose). The absolute worth of flints as tools is something he doesn't like to be drawn on, for as he says it was irrelevant when there was no alternative and when the raw material for new tools was immediately to hand, when the need arose. He also believes that the degree of finish of many museum exhibits indicates they were prized by their owners for reasons other than their practical efficiency.
Some archaeologists have made extended studies of how early men made and used their tools. Nicholas Toth examined the volcanic lava implements made at Koobi Fora (Northern Kenya) to find out such factors about their makers as whether they were right or left handed. N.T. has used stone implements for butchering big game, including elephants, and also for digging the ground so he could find the strengths and limitations of various types of tools. In practice many were found to be surprisingly efficient. Perhaps we should not be surprised by the efficiency of flint tools as electron microscopists still use glass `knives' for cutting ultra thin sections. Glass is chemically and physically similar to flint and `glass knives' are used in microtomes because freshly broken glass is sharper than steel, but the knives have to be replaced frequently because the glass will not keep it's edge.
Stone age hunter gatherers societies with low population densities would only live in areas where food was relatively plentiful, otherwise they would move on. This means that even without vacuum cleaners, washing machines, freezers or other modern labour saving devices they ought to have had an excess of leisure time to invest in making implements which were aesthetically pleasing, over and beyond any improvement in function. The importance of stone and stone tools to hunter gatherers is demonstrated by the fact that scientific examination of raw stones, part worked stones and finished stone artifacts shows they were often transported considerable distances from their point of origin.
I am fascinated by stone age technology because flint working was mankind highest technology for thousands of years and has remained the highest technology for some primitive peoples until the present day. If some global catastrophe could end modern western civilisation, without destroying all of humanity, flint knapping may yet again become man's supreme technology. As Einstein once remarked "I don't know what weapons will be used to wage the 3rd World War but I am sure sticks and stones will be used for the 4th." Thousands of years after our history has ended stoneware will make up the bulk of remains left for our successors, or visiting aliens, to evaluate our civilisation.

Note.
All means possible have been unsuccessful in identifying the original author.
Full credit is given in absence.

Ancient history of trips to the dentist

2006-06-29T16:43:00.000+02:00

Ancient history of trips to the dentist.An interesting article.Click link to view.
Click.http://www.britarch.ac.uk/ba/ba43/ba43feat.html

2006-06-07T11:19:00.000+02:00

Introduction .

This is the first stage of a project to list, and show all the medieval glass remaining in churches in West and East Sussex, some is listed in various publications, but they tend to be of the more spectacular ones.
There is a lot of small fragments remaining often high up in windows, and out of view.
For instance there is a small fragment in Bunton Chapel near Wiston in West Sussex, its high up in the Chancel window, and only consists of two or three pieces of dark green glass, but none the less a fragment of a much larger stained glass window.
The project will take considerable time to complete, information being added as and when churches are visited.

History of Stained glass.

In 680 A.D., according to Bede, who had been his pupil, Benedict Biscop (c. 628-629) sent messengers into Gaul, to fetch makers of glass thence, that by a craft until then unknown in Britain, they might glaze windows of a church, and the cloisters, and the refectory.
This was the beginning of the art of stained glass making in the country, the French glassmakers came over and taught the art to the builders of the churches at this time, this was something new. The first church to have stained glass used in its windows was St. Peters, Monkwearmouth, where building had begun in 674, and at St. Paul’s, Jarrow, founded in 681-2.
The amount of stained glass used was very small, for at this time, glass used was difficult to make into large sheets, and the process was expensive. While some early churches were having stained glass windows installed, although in small areas, the vast majority of the population would have to wait many centuries before windows in any buildings had glass in them.
The documentary evidence provided by Bede remained unsupported by fact until excavations of the Saxon monastic buildings at both sites revealed specimens of coloured glass, thought to date to the seventh and eighth centuries.

Both monasteries were destroyed in raids from Scandinavian invaders, circa 875.
Some, 450 pieces of glass were found at these sites, some being made by the millefiori technique, some were of amber coloured glass decorated with white trails, but it is interesting that none showed any signs of paint. Fig no.1.

Medieval Techniques and Materials

To fully understand the importance of medieval glass in churches, it is important to understand the method used to produce the pictures.
In the first quarter of the twelfth century, a German monk, who adopted the pen name Theophilus, wrote a description of the techniques of making stained glass. The basic methods have hardly changed since. Glass was made by melting sand, potash and lime together in clay pots. lt was coloured by the addition of metallic oxides - copper for red, iron for green, cobalt for blue and so on. This is called pot-metal glass. Pot-metal glass, especially red glass, was often too dark to transmit much light. To overcome this, 'flashed' glass was made by dipping a lump of white glass on the blowpipe into a pot of red glass and then blowing, This provided sheets of glass with a thin surface layer of colour. Later, parts of this layer could be removed by grinding with an abrasive wheel; this produced two colours, red and white, on the same piece of glass. Because paper was scarce and parchment very expensive, the full scale outline of the design for a stained glass window was drawn out on a whitened flat survice, such as a table top. The designer would indicate the principal outlines of his drawing, the shape and colour of the individual pieces of glass to be used, and the position of the lead strips (called calmes) that would eventually hold all the pieces of glass together. The panes of coloured glass were cut to shape with a 'grozing iron' and laid on top of the drawing. Through the glass, details of the drawing - faces, hands, drapery etc. - could be seen and these details were traced with an iron oxide pigment on the surface of the glass. After painting, the pieces were fired in a small furnace for sufficient time to fuse the paint to the surface of the glass, and then re-laid on the table and assembled by the glazier, using strips of lead H-shaped in section, which allowed the glass to be slotted into the grooves on each side. The lead provided a strong but flexible bond. The intersections of all the lead strips were then soldered, and oily cement was rubbed into all the joints in order to make them watertight. The panels were then held in place in the window openings by a grid of iron bars set into the masonry. From the early fourteenth century a further range of colours varying from a pale lemon to a deep orange could be achieved on one piece of glass through the discovery of 'silver stain', a silver compound painted on the back of the glass and then fired in a kiln. By the mid sixteenth century many different coloured enamels were being used. As a result, windows began to be painted like easel pictures on clear glass of regular rectangular shape, with lead calmes no longer an integral part of the design. These methods prevailed from the seventeenth to early nineteenth centuries. However, the earlier techniques were revived in Victorian times .

Sussex Churches with some medieval glass in the windows:

The list contains identified medieval glass, but there are more yet to be confirmed:

Bosham, Holy Trinity. four medieval roundels of angels.
Brede St. George. Window above porch has medieval glass.
Cowfold. St. Peter. late 12th and 13th century glass in the Chancel.
Eastergate. St. George. Medieval glass heraldic glass, c1360s.
Etchingham The Assumption and St. Nicholas.late 13th –14th century.
Isfield. St. Margaret. Fragments in South window.
North Stoke. very fine early medieval glass in East window of South Transept:
Poynings. Holy Trinity several windows have ealy glass , but date of some is yet to be confirmed.
Salehurst. St. Mary. Some very tiny birds drawn in brown glass in the tracery of the South east window.
Ticehurst. St. Mary 14th century glass, north side of chancel.
Warbleton. St. Mary. 13th century glass East window of chapel.
West Firle. St. Peter.13th century glass East window of South aisle.
West Grinsted. St. George. 14th century fragments.

North Stoke Church.

The church is in the hands of the Churches Conservation Trust.

Medieval Stained Glass in Sussex Churches.
North Stoke church is interesting the medieval glass is in windows high up in the south transept.
In the care of, The Churches Conservation Trust.
North stoke is set in the loop of the river Arun where the river breaks through an attractive stretch of the South Downs.
Three more churches are within the area, St. Michaels Amberley, to the northeast South Stoke, to the south -east and Houghton to the north.
The village of North stoke takes its name from stoc which means simply a place, but sometimes a holy place.(Stoch in Domesday Book.)
Both North stoke and South Stoke sites properly originate as strongholds guarding a strategic fording place across the river.
It was here at North Stoke in 1834 as some workmen were digging a sewer that they discovered an ancient British boat; formed from a hollowed trunk of a singe oak tree, in shape that of an Indian canoe. This is now on show in the British Museum.

This church is a fine example of early English and Decorated style.
The large aumbry, and unusual double niche in the south transept-the church being cruciform-a bowl-shaped font, and traces of old stained glass in the east window.
Most interestingly, the chancels arch of hard chalk, and are Early English.
The tracery of early Decorated windows should be noted, as well as a low-sided window.

Chancel,East Window.

In the central light is the crowned figue of the blessed Virgin mary and a crowned male figure. Fig.no.2.
Both have a hand raised in blessing.It is noted that some of the glass pieces forming thier robes may not be in their originall positions.
It is belived by many experts this is a part of a scene of Our Ladys Coronation;others have suggested that the male figue could even be King David,from another sceen.
The glass has been dated c.1290-1310, this makes this a very rare survival form this period.
The border is made up of assorted fragments, note the little bird in the top left hand corner.

Chancel, North-West Window and South- West Windows.

Set in grisaille patterns are the finials which formed the apex of former canopies, which would have almost certainly set above figures of saints.

South Transept ,East Window.

The crowned heads of a female and male. She appears to have her original robed body; his head has been cleverly placed upon another robe from elsewhere.

North transept, North Window.

The quatrefoil at the top retains its original grisaille patterns in place.

North Transept, East Window.

Medieval Stained Glass in Sussex Churches.
Several small fragments, some painted leaves, have been arranged in the tracery.

Rodney Gunner 2006. Copyright protected.

Nuclear Secrets.

2006-06-05T22:38:00.000+02:00

York Bunker Reveals its Nuclear Secrets

Rare surviving example of Britain's nuclear history is restored to its former nerve centre glory.
Following a complex restoration programme, the semi-sunken York Bunker will offer visitors the opportunity to learn the fascinating and intriguing history of how Britain responded to deepening international tensions during the Cold War.

Church Archeaology.

2006-06-05T22:26:00.000+02:00

A Future for Historic Church Buildings.

The English Heritage Inspired! campaign is the
most strategic and ambitious attempt yet to
tackle the problems facing this country’s
14,500 historic places of worship and is
supported by all the faith groups with listed
buildings in England.

Welcome.

2006-05-22T12:33:00.000+02:00

This is the on line Journal of Worthing Archaeological Society; here you will find articles of interest, covering a wide range of subjects.
Most articles are subject to copyright of the author, so please ask if you want to reproduce them in any form, whatsoever.
Editor: email. Arch.research@ntlworld.com