Are you ready for the country?

...cause it's time to go!I will not be blogging for the next two weeks, unless I post some more tod...

Lowry in Berwick

Long ago, Berwick-on-Tweed was a prize in the Anglo-Scottish wars over old Northumbria. For centuries now it has been English, but the casual visitor (me) has a hard time telling which kingdom it belongs in (Northumbria?). The big social issue seems to be whether dogs should be...

Another review of Noel Fallows' book on jousting in Iberia

This reviewer, writing for the online Medieval Review, also has a high opinion of it. Fallows, Noel. Jousting in Medieval and Renaissance Iberia.Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2010.  Pp. xix, 541.  $99.00.  ISBN:9781843835943.  Teofilo F. Ruiz       University of California, Los Angeles       tfruiz@history.ucla.eduIn...

A wonder of the 1850s

The Beamish winding engine. More on this later, I hope. And here (updated) is some mo...

Inexorable doom?

A fearful story from Stonekettle Stati...

A BBC documentary on the Syrian opposition

HereThanks to Syria Comme...

Modern Medieval: (inflammatory) language has consequences

Crusading rhetoric, then and n...

Ideology

Boris Johnson in the Telegraph, on the Norwegian "Templar:"It is not enough to say he is mad. Anders Breivik is patently mad: no one in their right mind would behave as he has done. Nor is it enough to say that he is evil. If the word evil has any meaning at all, then it must obviously apply to a man who can go to a lake island summer camp, call innocent young people to run towards...

Crusader

The Norwegian terrorist considered himself a Knight Templar, thought "multiculturalists" were traitors, and expressed admiration for the effectiveness of al-Qaeda.Another member of the "rivers of blood" gang. And oh so self-righteous with it.zUpdate: An older post on the rivers...

The Atlantis mission-- end of an era

Let's hope a new era succeeds it.Again, brilliant photography from the Big Pictu...

Marinus Green

Seen today on the Detroit River, a ship evidently named after a cousin of Sirius Bla...

Summer, Park Avenue, 1930

From Ephemeral New Yo...

An 18th century challenge between the armies

At the historic site called Beamish, in County Durham, there is a gentleman's house recreated to the era of the 1820s. It's not very big or very impressive, but it has pretention. Part of that is mediocre but fashionable -- or maybe just past fashionable -- art in the form of engravings.One of them is a single sheet illustrated and captioned recording the 18th century military...

Heavy armor

A BBC article on the weight of armor has got just about all my Facebook friends chattering.Some of the professional historians think this is "pope is Catholic" junk science, and ask why in this time of disappearing funding for scholarly history, need this money be spent in this way? And were any historians consulted anyway?Some of the reenactors are more interested, but the more...

Beamish and Puffing Billy!

In County Durham there is an amazing outdoor museum called Beamish, where various structures have been relocated and restored. So there is an Edwardian high street, a coal mine of the 1850s, a "home farm" of the late 19th century, a Georgian-era gentleman's country house of the...

Guy Halsall asks...

Why do we need the barbarians?My contribution to these sessions is essentially to sum up by asking you one big question: why do we need the barbarians?  For it seems that we really do need the barbarians.  The answer was found, or at least suggested, in 1904 by C.P. Cavafy in his famous, much quoted, poem “Waiting for the Barbarians” (even quoted, inexplicably, in the...

Teargas poems from Egypt

And the Arabist:I loved these revolutionary poems, by Egyptian poet Kareem Abdulsalam and translated by Elliott Colla over at Jadaliyya. The first two probably deal with events that took place on January 28. The last one speaks to the longing for Midan Tahrir as a place in which everything seemed possible, and everyone felt purposeful (a longing that as we've seen has led...

Places I didn't visit in or near York

...despite multiple opportunities:OsbaldwickSlug and Lettuce RestaurantReflex--the 80s BarPlaces I did:Maltings (a pub)Victoria Hotel (another pub)University of York LibraryWhip-ma-whop-ma-g...

Anyone who remembers the Vietnam war won't be surprised by this

From the Globe and Mail's long-time correspondent in Afghanist...

Miscellaneous York

Most oppresive monument in York: a very fine medieval style pillar commemorating -- the South African (Boer) War. I have passed it many times this week and it bugs me every time. Perhaps because it reminds me of more recent colonial wars? I have found the new statue of Constantine-as-Caligula and its slouching treatment is pretty creepy, but the South African War monument gets...

The real steam

No punk about it--the National Railway Museum in York. And free admissi...

Goodricke and Constantine without honor in their own city

Today I went on a free guided tour of York, provided by one of the many volunteers who have been providing this service since 1950 (!). Well worth the time and I'm grateful to the organization and our guide.However, I must say that he had me biting my tounge more than once with his version of York history (and of his weakness for terrible folk etymologies no more will be said)....

Advice to Arab democrats

Juan Cole lists ten mistakes made by the USA that he hopes can be avoided by the young revolutionaries of the Arab world. In the course of it he says what must not be said:5. Make a bill of rights central to your new constitutions, and be specific about what rights people have and what actions infringe against those rights. Include electronic rights to privacy, such as freedom...

The churches of York

The last time I was in York it was 1972. The town, with its medieval walls and street layout, overpowered me. I was particularly impressed by the cathedral, York Minster, the biggest piece of medieval architecture I had seen yet. But as a budding medieval historian I was seriously...

On the waterfront, Windsor

Seen: The Peter R. Cresswell out of St. Catharines, going upriver.(on another occasi...

Yoga on TV

Last night while watching one hour-long crime show, I saw three different ads where yoga was used to stand for a healthy lifestyle. Two of them I'd never seen before. It's everywhere. And if you want a truly hypnotic yoga TV experience, try Namaste Yoga. An amazing piece of cinematographical design and quite inspiring yoga. And of course the yogis are something el...

Big spending liberals/social democrats?

Brian Topp in the Globe and Mail sees it another way, taking off from the Greek crisis: The details have been well covered here on globeandmail.com. It is Papandreou's conclusions about the future that merit thinking about next. “Are we too weak to deal with the financial and banking system?” he asked. “Are we too weak to deal the need for transparency in the financial markets?...