Colchester Castle

Roman Wales

Mar 1, 2024

anniversaries, archaeology, battles, buildings, culture, religion

Anne Neville, British tribes, caerlent, Caerleon, Cardiff Castle, Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire, Christianity, Colchester Castle, conversion, Demetae, Despensers, Gower Peninsula, Kent, Llanelli, Magnus Maximus, Monmouthshire, Normans, Ordovices, Richard III, River Usk, Robert Curthose, Roman Britain, rugby, Silures, Swansea, Time team, Tower of London, tribes, Wales

The first thing to note about Roman rule in Wales is that it started in 48 AD, a few years later than in England, which is a consequence of the Claudian invasion having started in Kent. It is likely to have finished a little earlier too, in about 383, as the general Maximus Magnus sought…
A late mediaeval “decade ring”

Aug 5, 2020

art, buildings, religion

artefacts, Colchester Castle, decade rings, Epping Forest Museum, jewellery, religious devotion

Here is a guest post on the Colchester and Ipswich Museums website, by Jill Holmen, Collections Manager of Epping Forest Museum. It depicts a “decade” ring, used for a form of devotion in ten stages and dates from 25 years either side of 1500, recently borrowed by Colchester Castle Museum and was on display there…
Britain’s Lost Battlefields (with Rob Bell)

May 29, 2020

archaeology, battles, television reviews

“Tudor” era, 5Select., arquebus, Bannockburn, Battle of Hastings, battlefields, Boudicca, Channel Five, Charles I, Colchester Castle, Edward II, English Civil War, handguns, Harold II, Iceni, Kett Rebellion, Maurice, Mousehold Heath, muskets, Naseby, Nero, Norwich, Oliver Cromwell, Parliamentary army, Rob Bell, Robert I, Robert Kett, Roman Empire, Rupert, Sir thomas Fairfax, Watling Street, William I, Wymondham

Channel Five’s reputation for history programmes has risen greatly over the past few years. At the heart of this, first in a Great Fire of London series with Suzannah Lipscomb and the ubiquitous Dan Jones, has been the “engineering historian” Rob Bell, who has toured bridges, ships, buildings and lost railways in his own amiable,…
Visit to Rayleigh and Hadleigh – 20th July 2019

Mar 23, 2020

anniversaries, buildings, heraldry, religion

“Princes”, Anne, bells, Colchester Castle, Edmund Bonner, Edward III, Elizabeth Wydeville, Essex, executions, Hadleigh Castle, Hadleigh Essex, Henry III, heresy, Holy Trinity Church, Hubert de Bergh, Hundred Years War, hunting, John, Kent, Martyrs’ Memorial, Queenborough Castle, Rayleigh, Rayleigh Mount, Rayleigh Museum, Rayleigh Windmill, Richard III Society

via Visit to Rayleigh and Hadleigh – 20th July 2019
Digging up Britain’s Past

Feb 20, 2020

archaeology, battles, buildings, religion

Alex Langlands, Armada, Auckland Castle, Battle of Falkirk, Boudicca, Catterick, Channel Five, Colchester Castle, Durham, Edward I, Elizabeth I, garrisons, Helen Skelton, HMS Invincible, horses, Iceni, Lady Eleanor Talbot, Napoleonic wars, Nero, prince bishops, Raksha Dave, Roman Britain, Roman roads, Scotland, Silchester, Sir Andrew Moray, Sir William wallace, stables, Stirling Bridge, Sudeley Castle, Time team, war horses, warships

This Channel Five documentary has just completed a second series, with Alex Langlands and Raksha Dave, late of Time Team, in place of Helen Skelton. One particular episode was about Auckland Castle, where the “Prince Bishops” of Durham have lived for centuries and where archaeology is being carried out around the building. One of these…
Haunted Essex

Mar 2, 2019

buildings, culture, religion

Colchester Castle, Cross Keys Saffron Walden, Essex, executions, Green Man Harlow, Harwich Redoubt, haunting, Howards, James Parnell, Kelvedon Nuclear Bunker, Manningtree, Matthew Hopkins, Mistley Pond, North Weald Station, Red Lion Colchester, Rose and Crown Colchester, St. Osyth, Ursula Kemp, Valence House Dagenham, White Hart Coggeshall, witchcraft

Some of the venues in this article are surprising and the nocturnal visits sound very expensive but they include some classic historical venues. In Colchester, the Castle and (Howard) Red Lion are included, as is the Redoubt at Harwich, although the Kelvedon Nuclear Bunker and North Weald Station are much newer. In the north of…
William the B … er, Conqueror

Oct 15, 2017

anniversaries, battles, buildings

Anglo-Saxons, Battle, Battle Abbey, Battle of Hastings, Bayeux Tapestry, Canterbury, castles, Chepstow, chivalry, churches, Colchester Castle, Coronation, death, Domesday Book, executions, famine, Harold II, height, Henry I, Marc Morris, Matilda of Flanders, mediaeval buildings, Normans, Scotland, slavery, St. David’s, Tayside, Tower of London, usurpation, Wales, Waltheof, William I, William II

This piece, by Marc Morris in History Extra, describes the events that followed the previous usurpation from France. A lot more violent, indeed, than the early reign of the first “Tudor”, although his son and grandchildren changed that …