This Saturday, 14th Nov 2015, Alison McHardy is talking about Richard II and the north. Dr McHardy’s interest in Richard II arose from her teaching of this reign at three universities: London, Aberdeen and Nottingham.She has published a source book, The Reign of Richard II: From Minority to Tyranny 1377-97 (Manchester UP, 2012), which is intended to be the students’ friend. Also some articles:
‘Haxey’s case, 1397: the petition and its presenter reconsidered’, in ‘The Age of Richard II’ (1997).
‘Richard II: a personal portrait’, in ‘The Reign of Richard II’ (2000)
‘John Scarle: Ambition and Politics in the Late Medieval Church’ in ‘Image, Text and Church ‘(2009)
Her main research interest is in the relations and interaction between crown and church, and she has been publishing on this since 1972. In 2010 she published, with Gwilym Dodd, her successor at Nottingham, a volume called ‘Petitions to the Crown from English Religious Houses’ for the Canterbury and York Society, and this is the best-selling volume in the Society’s history.
With Phil Bradford, Dr McHardy is editing the material relating to proctors for the clergy in parliament. The first of the two volumes will go into production in the new year. This is also for the Canterbury and York Society.
With Gwilym Dodd Dr McHardy is working on a volume of ‘Petitions from Lincolnshire’ for the Lincoln Record Society – which she describes as great fun.
The lecture will be held at the Swarthmore Centre in Leeds and starts at 2.00pm. Contact the Hon.Secretary, Bryan Sitch, for more details.
This Saturday, 10th October, Kate Giles will be talking about Antiquarians, Archbishops and Medieval wall paintings: the case of Pickering parish church.
In 1852, the traces of a remarkable scheme of 15th century wall paintings were uncovered during restoration works in Pickering parish church (North Yorkshire). Their discovery prompted a remarkable exchange between the then incumbent, the Rev. Ponsonby, local Antiquarians and the Archbishop of York which resulted in the attempted destruction of the paintings, which were only re-uncovered in the 1870s and extensively restored. Since then the paintings have attracted the scholarly attention of some of the country’s leading 20th century wall paintings experts including E.W.Tristram and E.C.Rouse. This lecture will tell the story of these remarkable paintings and in doing, seek to explain how and why an understanding of the study of the ‘English primitives’ is central to our understanding of the development of medieval archaeology today.
It is with great sadness that I report that Brian Donaghey, former editor and secretary of the Medieval Section, passed away on 28 August. Brian, who until his retirement worked in the School of English, University of Sheffield, was an active member of the Yorkshire Archaeological Society and the Medieval Section for a great many years. He was one of the Historic Buildings officers, monitoring planning applications, and also joined David Michelmore and Sylvia Thomas in running the popular Palaeography weekends during the 1970s and 1980s. Brian played a particularly important role in the Medieval Section, where he edited ‘Medieval Yorkshire’. Brian’s retrospective on thirty years of the section published in Medieval Yorkshire is a valuable source of information, enlivened by Brian’s wonderful, quiet sense of humour. I am going to put together an obituary for Brian, to appear in the next Medieval Yorkshire, and I’d like to make this appeal to members of the section to send me any memories they’d like to share of having worked with Brian, also a photograph of Brian at one of the Medieval Section events if possible. Please be aware I am in touch with Brian’s widow, Helen. Thank you.
An event likely to be of interest to members of the Medieval Section:- Wressle Castle was built around 1380 and owned for centuries by the Percy family, earls and later dukes of Northumberland. The castle still has substantial walls, although the majority of it was destroyed in the Civil War. It is in private ownership and few people will have visited it, although many will have seen it when travelling by train on the Hull/Selby line. However, following a recent programme of restoration by Natural England, English Heritage and other bodies, it is now possible for the first time in many years to visit the interior and the rest of the site. It has a great history, and there are descriptions of it from the 1500s as well as detailed drawings from the 1600s before it was ruined.
Programme
9.30 Depart Durham Ox, Norwood, Beverley
10.15 Coffee and welcome Wressle village hall
10.30-12.15 The history of the Percies (Barbara English) and the history & archaeology of Wressle castle (Ed Dennison*)
12.15-1.00 Lunch
1.00-1.45 Wressle furnishings, gardens and household from 16th century sources, the Northumberland Household Book and John Leland (Margaret Pinder)
1.45 -3.30 Site visit to Wressle castle
3.30 Return to Wressle village hall, refreshments and close
4.15 Depart Wressle
5.30 Arrive Durham Ox, Norwood, Beverley
*Ed Dennison of Ed Dennison Archaeological Services has been closely involved with the recent works to Wressle Castle and is one of the leading authorities on the castle buildings and the site.
Tickets:
£45.00 including coach travel to and from Wressle, lunch, other refreshments, site visit and donation to charity (by request of the landowner).
£35.00 if travelling to/from Wressle by own transport.
To book this tour and for information on our other courses, please contact:
The Richard III Foundation, Inc. is pleased to announce its 2015 annual conference “England during the Reign of the Yorkist Kings”. Students of (high) Medieval Yorkshire will find much of interest in the programme, which includes some old friends from the Medieval Section lecture programme.
Saturday, October 17
Our conference will be held at the Dixie Grammar School in Market Bosworth. Registration begins at 8:30 with the conference starting promptly at 9 am and ending at 5:00 pm.
Our speakers and topics are:
Professor Peter Hancock—William, Lord Hastings and the Turbulent Summer of 1483
Group Captain Clive Montellier RAF—Sending King Edward to Military Staff College
Dominic Smee—Richard III: Sharing the experience of a King
Susan Troxell—”Wherefore the White Boar? Yorkist Symbolism
The Conference Package, which includes conference and membership in the Foundation for one year, costs £50.
To reserve your seat, please mail your registration form along with your check payable to “The Richard III Foundation, Inc.” and submit to Ms. Dorothy Davies, Half Moon House, 32 Church Lane, Ryde. Isle of Wight PO33 2NB. For further questions, please email the Foundation at Richard3Foundation@aol.com. Website: www.richard111.com.
Silver salver presented to Peter Muir. What happened to it?
The latest issue (June 2015) of Arrowhead, the newsletter of the Archer-Antiquaries, features an interesting article by Manchester Museum’s Curator of Archery, Wendy Hodkinson, about a silver salver awarded to a man called Peter Muir in 1878. The occasion of the award was Muir’s retirement from his position as Officer and Bowmaker to the Royal Company, a role he had held for more than fifty years in an exemplary manner. The salver is inscribed with the legend ‘Royal Company of Archers The Queen’s Bodyguard for Scotland’ above and ‘His Grace the Duke of Buccleuch Captain General’ below. The General Council and Members of her Majesty’s Bodyguard also presented Peter Muir with 450 sovereigns, which as Wendy points out in her article, is some golden handshake!
Muir was born in the west of Scotland in 1809 and was the only bowyer to win a gold medal for his products at the Great Exhibition of 1851. He was one three bowyers who dominated the trade in the 19th century. Muir competed in archery tournaments. He was champion in England in 1845, 1847 and 1863, and Scottish National Champion in 1859. One of his duties was to teach new members of the Company to use the bow. Yet Peter Muir seems to have to fallen into the position by accident. When the previous Bowmaker to the Company of Archers fell ill, enquiries were made of Peter Muir’s father to see if he knew of anyone who could fill the position, and he recommended his son. Peter Muir’s service lasted fifty years.
In the 21st century it may appear quaint, even a little strange that the Victorians attached so much importance to archery. The Victorians were fascinated with the Middle Ages because it seemed to them to have been a golden age before the horrors of the Industrial Revolution, when it seemed to them social relations had been more harmonious. If there were strict social divisions and people were expected to know their place, at least the great and the good had acted in the interests of the commoners out of a sense of ‘noblesse oblige’. Of course this was all utter nonsense, but it was very influential at the time. It is not for nothing that in the city centre of Leeds, there is a statue of the Black Prince (not that there is any connection with Leeds), Armley Gaol was built to look like a Medieval Castle, and in Thornton’s Arcade shoppers are treated to a clock that shows characters from Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe every hour. The popularity of Neo-Gothic architectural style as exemplified by the Houses of Parliament, Manchester’s Town Hall and our very own Manchester Museum shows how important Medievalism was to the Victorians.
So popular was archery in 19th century Scotland that there was a long list of archery societies with names as eccentric as the sport was archaic: the Kilwinning Papingo (!), the Ardrossan Archers (before 1845), the Dalry Archers (c.1842), the Irvine Toxophilites (1802-1866), the Paisley Archers (1805-1815; 1858-1910; 1968+), the Saltcoat Archers (c.1856) and the Zingari Archers of Kilmarnock (c.1860). I mean you couldn’t make it up could you?
I would read the vogue for archery, including the inauguration of a Royal Bodyguard or Company of Archers as but one rather quaint component of their Medievalism. However, the fact that such a large amount of money and a silver salver were presented to Muir, and the elevated social circle in which he operated show that archery was taken very seriously. As an adjunct to royalty and the highest levels of the Establishment, Victorian archery was akin to another popular Medieval sport, falconry. Muir described himself as a ‘working-man’ and there is nothing unusual in that, in the same way that royalty today happily rub shoulders with jockeys in pursuance of ‘the sport of kings’.
Wendy ends her fascinating article about Peter Muir with an appeal for members of the public to come forward if they know what happened to the silver salver given to Peter Muir. It is known not to be in Archers’ Hall in Edinburgh. It’s not in the Beechin Wood Collection. Nor is it in the Museum of Scotland. So where is it? Over to you dear reader…..
In writing this blog I have drawn heavily on Wendy’s article in Arrowhead, the newsletter of the Archer-Antiquaries, issue 129 for June 2015, pp. 6-10. I am grateful to her for sharing her archery expertise.
Our speaker at this Saturday’s lecture meeting at Claremont is Samantha Sportun. Sam has 18 years’ experience in Museums and currently manages the collection care team (Conservation/Workshop technicians) at Manchester Museum. Before taking up this post she ran the Sculpture Conservation workshop at National Museums Liverpool looking after their wide and varied sculpture collection as well as taking on the conservation of some of the iconic monuments in the North–West.
She is currently a part-time PhD student researching digital touch in Museum, exploring ways of using 3D technology to share objects stories through handling and touch. The interest in this area of research started at the time that St Christopher was conserved by the team in the Conservation Centre.
St Christopher is the largest stone sculpture that survives from the medieval period. Art historians have generally dated it to a period of around 1380 – 1400 on stylistic grounds. Come along to what promises to be a fascinating lecture to close our annual programme.
We are grateful once again to John Cruse for drawing to our attention the following event:-
Saturday 20th June 2015
Rahtz Lecture Theatre, King’s Manor, York
In 2014 the JORVIK Viking Centre celebrated its 30th birthday. For three decades it has welcomed visitors to the site of the Coppergate dig, an undertaking that revolutionised approaches to Viking-era England both within and beyond the academy, through a range of new investigative and interpretative techniques. But where do we stand in 2015?
This one-day, interdisciplinary conference will bring together heritage professionals and researchers in such related fields as archaeology, history and public history to explore a range of current themes in early medieval research covering the period up to and including the early twelfth century, as well as the real or potential impacts of this research in the public sphere.
Confirmed keynote speakers:
David Petts, Lecturer in the Archaeology of Northern England, University of Durham
Edmund Southworth, Director, Manx National Heritage
Julie Gibson, Lecturer and County Archaeologist for Orkney, University of the Highlands and Islands
Registration from 9am, 10am start and a 4pm finish
£25 adult, £20 student / conc. / Friends of YAT
Ticket price includes morning/afternoon refreshments and lunch
Add to your experience with a VIP wine & cheese reception and private
group tour of JORVIK with the opportunity to see and handle finds
from Coppergate. Ticket upgrade £10 per person. Reception starts at
6pm at JORVIK.
Pre-booking essential:
visit http://www.jorvikbookings.com or call 01904 615505
Banner for Richard III Man and Myth exhibition at York
With the Making Monuments on Rapa Nui: the Statues of Easter Island exhibition open I had the unaccustomed luxury of spending a free weekend in York and was delighted to see that there is a new exhibition about Richard III at the Yorkshire Museum. It seems almost gratuitous to say that the Richard III: Man and Myth capitalises on the incredible discovery of Richard’s remains in a car park at Leicester and the recent reburial which was covered on prime time TV. Readers of this blog who have been members of the Medieval Section over the last couple of years will be familiar with the story because Bob Woosnam-Savage from Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds spoke to us a year ago last Christmas and presented what were then very recent findings from the detailed examination of the last Plantagenet king’s skeleton. The Richard III Man and Myth exhibition occupies several of the rooms facing onto the Chapter House section of the Museum where the Medieval objects are displayed so it is worth pointing out that this is a relatively small exhibition, but it is a welcome extension to the earlier exhibition about Richard that was featured on this blog.
Richard III Man and Myth exhibition at the Yorkshire Museum
The exhibition is divided into several sections looking at ‘the Man’ and ‘the Myth’. It uses several well-known and beautiful exhibits from the Yorkshire Museum’s collection including the gold and sapphire reliquary pendant known as the Middleham Jewel, a silver gilt boar badge from Stillingfleet and the hoard of coins from Ryther in North Yorkshire.
Late Medieval hoard of silver coins
As the introduction makes clear, the challenge is to try and untangle what we know for certain about Richard the man from the myth that has grown up around him, not least because of the way he is presented in Shakespeare’s play as a man ‘whose thoughts were evil and actions diabolical’. Was he a tyrant and a murderer or a fair and benevolent ruler, much maligned by history? The exhibition leaves it up to the visitor to decide.
Richard’s life was shaped by the Wars of the Roses, the civil wars between the Houses of Lancaster and York between 1455 and 1485. Richard was born at Fotheringhay Castle on 2nd October 1452. His father Richard Duke of York was killed at Sandal in 1460 and his elder brother Edward was killed soon after. This was a time of great danger for the family. Following the Yorkist victory at Towton in 1461, Richard was made Duke of Gloucester by his brother Edward. Richard was eight years old. This part of the Wars of the Roses is shown by one of the skeletons recovered from a burial pit close to the battlefield of Towton.The study of the skeletons shows that the men were mistreated by their captors before they were killed.
Micklegate Bar in York where Richard of York’s head was displayed
Richard entered the household of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick at Middleham castle in North Yorkshire to be brought up as a nobleman. There he met his future wife Anne, the Earl’s daughter, and Middleham became their home when they married in 1472. Richard was steadfastly loyal to his brother Edward and shared his exile when Warwick conspired to replace Edward with the second brother George in 1470 and to bring Henry VI back to power. Richard led one of the battle lines at the battle of Tewkesbury in May 1471. The Lancastrian threat was all but eliminated.
When he was appointed Lord President of the Council of the North in 1472 Richard became the most powerful man in northern England. The council met in a number of places including York. One of the most fascinating exhibits in the exhibition are minutes of York Council meetings known as minute books. They provide valuable information about the relationship with Richard. The volume between 1480 and 1486 shows the city council sent gifts of food and wine to Middleham and provided hospitality. Richard for his part intervened on behalf of the city in disputes and legal cases. As the exhibition points out: ‘it seems unlikely that the relationship was altruistic, or motivated entirely by affection or loyalty to the city’. That the relationship was more one of realpolitik was made clear when Edward and Richard, having returned to the North of England via Ravenser at Spurn Point in East Yorkshire to recover the throne in 1470, were hardly welcomed with open arms by the city. Edward had to ‘blag’ his way in. This should put any claim that Richard deserved to be reburied at York rather than Leicester because of his special relationship with the city into context. As is stated in the exhibition Richard had much to gain from securing the support of the leading men in the city at the centre of his powerbase. The city too derived real benefit in having the support of so powerful a nobleman as Richard, even more so after he became king.
Following the unexpected death of Edward IV, Richard became Protector of the Realm and moved quickly to secure his nephew the son of Edward IV. Richard’s behaviour at this time is hard to fathom. Was he plotting all along to usurp the throne or was he simply responding to actions taken by his in-laws the Woodvilles to secure the person of Prince Edward? Whoever had the prince in their control was in an extremely powerful position. A coronation was planned but then doubt was cast on the princes’ legitimacy when it was claimed that Edward IV had been married previously before he married Elizabeth Woodville.
White boar livery badge for Richard III (replica)
Richard was crowned king in London on 6th July 1483 and made a royal progress around the kingdom, arriving in York with his entourage on 29th August. Of course, it was at this time that the Princes in the Tower disappeared in mysterious circumstances and the interpretation of this is decisive in any evaluation of Richard’s reign. During the three week stay, on 8th September, Richard and Anne’s son Edward of Middleham was invested as Prince of Wales. Eight hundred badges showing Richard’s heraldic insignia were issued and a further 13,000 were sent to York for distribution during his stay. One of these badges can be seen in the exhibition.
Medieval pottery in the Richard III Man or Myth exhibition.
Although no record of the feast eaten at Richard’s arrival in York has survived the exhibition not unreasonably draws upon accounts of Richard’s coronation celebrations as an example. This an opportunity to show an impressive selection from the Yorkshire Museum’s impressive collection of Medieval pottery against a painted backdrop.
On 23rd August following news of the battle of Bosworth, the council wrote to the Earl of Northumberland saying ‘King Richard late mercifully reigning upon us was through great treason of the duc of Norfolk that turned ayainst hyme with many other lordes and nobiles of this north parties, was piteously slain and murdered to the great hevynesse of this city.’ This looks like a genuine expression of grief for the king in circumstances in which such declarations might seem ill-advised but the context of the relationship between Richard as powerful nobleman and the city council makes it clear one shouldn’t read to much into the letter.
In one respect this differs from the earlier exhibition in showing an image, not the 3D facial reconstruction of Richard based on the remains recovered from the car park in Leicester. This may be as close as we can come to seeing Richard’s likeness. As the exhibition points out, coins are of no help in providing a portrait of the king because they were standardised, whilst the painted portraits of Richard that have survived post date his death, and in some cases appear to have been tampered with in order to show his deformity. As Bob Woosnam-Savage said in a Christmas lecture to the section Richard’s scoliosis need not have been visible to people in the street and may only have been known to his tailor.
Richard III: Man and Myth runs from 27th March to 2nd October
David Asquith at Claremont with copies of Medieval Yorkshire
If you are wondering what our Honorary Joint Editor is smiling about, it’s the opportunity to acquire back-copies of the section journal Medieval Yorkshire for free. Yes all those obscure back numbers of the journal that you’ve been scouring second hand book shops, Amazon and ABE in search of, you may find being given away at the next section AGM on Saturday April 11th at 2pm.
Last Saturday at our most recent committee committee meeting we considered what to do with previous issues of Medieval Yorkshire and other section publications such as Medieval Dairying. This is in response to the main society asking the sections to think about what needed to kept and what could be disposed of when Claremont is eventually sold and the society moves into new premises.
Now that electronic publishing is a viable option we can provide researchers with a pdf in return for a payment on PayPal without having to maintain a large stock. We already have four issues scanned and with Axel Muller’s assistance we are working on scanning the rest. We shall of course keep a couple of issues of each volume for future reference but it does mean we can be a bit more economical space-wise.
Back copies of Medieval Yorkshire
If you’d like back copies of Medieval Yorkshire we’ll be giving them to members at the next AGM so do come along, to take part in the meeting, at which some new faces will be presenting themselves for election, and you can also enjoy the next presentation in our lecture programme by Richard Thomason about ‘Hospitality in a Cistercian Abbey: the Case of Kirkstall in the Later Middle Ages’. So do come along.
Sadly we had some hiccups with the latest mailing of the new look Medieval Yorkshire (New Series). Due to circumstances beyond our control we only have enough to distribute to fully-subscribed members and a few extra copies for review. It looks unlikely that we shall have many to sell to non-members. Of course, a pdf download copy of Medieval Yorkshire can be provided for the more modest sum of £5.50.
For little more than £10 extra you can subscribe to the section and enjoy up to eight top quality lectures about different aspects of Medieval Yorkshire and elsewhere. That’s just £1.25 per lecture, though I noticed recently that people who are not members of the section have been taking liberties and attending the lectures as prospective members repeatedly. Without wanting to be too officious about this the committee thinks it is perfectly acceptable to come to one or two lecture meetings to see if it is ‘for you’ but after that someone who comes along should really make a contribution to the cost of organising the lecture. At least £2. Otherwise those members who have paid their subscriptions are effectively subsidising prospective members and that simply isn’t fair. We would always wish to make joining the Medieval Section by payment of the annual subscription (£16) the most cost effective option for people. And don’t forget that in addition to the lectures paid-up members also receive the section journal Medieval Yorkshire. I can’t think of many societies where you would receive all these benefits for such a modest subscription.
Medieval Section of the Yorkshire Archaeological and Historical Society 