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The two gold rings, thought to be about 600 years old An interesting article about two beautiful gold medieval rings caught my eye. The article explains how the rings, thought to be about 600 years old were found in a field in Dorset. The larger one would have been worn over a glove while…
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You may know or suspect from a previous post in Murrey and Blue, that Sir James Tyrrell, Richard’s henchman, was a direct descendant of Sir Walter Tyrrell, the ‘Killer Baron’, who fled during a hunting expedition with King William II (Rufus) after shooting him with an arrow. It is not known whether this was an…
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I’m afraid I wouldn’t be capable of reading the original entries in these rolls. My interest, as those who know me are only too aware, is the late mediaeval period, specifically Richards II and III). I would dearly like to be able to understand the source material for “my” period, but haven’t the know-how. But, if you…
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Richard’s coins are, inevitably, rare. He didn’t reign long enough for there to be all that many. However, one of his “long cross pennies” is up for auction, and can be viewed from noon, Monday, 4th September 2017, at the Emmanuel Centre, 9-23 Marsham Street, Westminster, London SW1P 3DW. Cheque books and plastic at the…
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Even for Richard, wild boar were a memory. Does this mean that because of their reintroduction to England, we can see what he never did? The above photograph was taken in the Forest of Dean, which isn’t far from where I live. My daughter and granddaughter had a confrontation with two adult boar and two…
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I love toby jugs. My grandmother had a lot of them, in all sizes. They were proper toby jugs, of course, in three-corner hats and 18th-century clothing. In fact, everyone seemed to have at least one of them when I was growing up. Every mantelpiece sported a rotund toby. Now, of course, toby jugs aren’t…
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Above are the Venerable Bede and King Cnut, who are concerned in the following extract from Medieval Man by Frederick Harrison:- “…Only Bede wrote about such subjects as astronomy and geography; and his knowledge of these was conditioned by the teaching of the Church. As time went on, as much reliance was placed on charms as…
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Unicorns do not exist. They never have. Well, that is the general consensus. They are mythical beasts, along with the dragon, centaur, phoenix and so on, but in the medieval period the unicorn was believed in. It was thought that to hunt the unicorn was perhaps the greatest hunt of all, surpassing even the white…
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Here is another fine article by Matthew Lewis, concerning whether or not Richard III was a villain, or a good king. Matt is, as always, excellent to read, and puts forward the strong case that Richard was good. Well, we all know this to be so, but some of the comments following the article are a little…
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