Since the AGM on 27th April the members of the new committee have been busy on your behalf organising a programme for the coming year. Lecture meetings will be held at the Yorkshire Archaeological Society at Claremont on the second Saturday of every month at 2-3pm.
I thought I’d give you some advance details of what we’re planning so that you can reserve dates in the diary. Some of the details are still provisional as the speakers have yet to confirm wording of titles but there is already a strong Yorkshire medieval battlefield flavour to the autumn programme.
As the battlefield of Fulford is very much in the news at the moment we could organise an excursion to walk the site with Chas Jones. Whilst we would normally meet on 14th September, the 21st September works better for Chas. We could have a quick look at Riccall, have a talk and battlefield walk about Fulford and then see Stamford Bridge but Chas tells me it would be a very full afternoon! Please let me know what you’d like to do and we could organise a coach. We might have to leave at 1pm if not earlier. Maximum of 30 people.
On 12th October Pam Judkins of Wakefield Historical Society will talk to us about ‘Retracing of the 100-mile Route of the Funeral Procession of Richard, Duke of York’.
On 9th November in ‘Aethelfrith of Northumbria’s lost battlefield?’ I’ll talk about the study of human remains in the Manchester Museum collection that appear to be evidence of the Battle of Chester, described in Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People.
Our Christmas meeting on 14th December will be addressed by Bob Woosnam Savage, Curator of European Edged Weapons, Royal Armouries, Leeds, who will talk to us about ‘Richard III the violent death of a king’.
Do let me know if you’d like us to hold the traditional section high tea that afternoon and we’ll make plans. The very least that Janet will let us get away with is mince pies and mulled wine!
If you intend to come to this lecture please let me know in advance as a large audience is expected because we can only seat 50 – the maximum for Health and Safety reasons. Do let me know if you’d be willing to bring along some nibbles.
In the New Year on 11th January Simon Tomson of Pontefract Archaeological Society will talk to us about ‘Finding Pontefract ‘s Black Friars’; and on 8th February Stuart Wrathmell will discuss ‘New approaches to Anglo-Saxon settlement and place-names: the Vale of Pickering and the northern Wolds’.
On 8th March I’m hoping to invite a speaker from the Portable Antiquities Scheme to tell us about recent finds from Yorkshire. However, if because of maternity leave this proves to be impossible, Alison Leonard of the Department of Archaeology, King’s Manor at the University of York, has kindly agreed to talk to us about why it is that Yorkshire presents such a frustrating problem for Scandinavian studies compared to other parts of the country.
On 12th April Dr Hugh Willmott, Senior Lecturer in European Historical Archaeology in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Sheffield, will talk about ‘Recent work at Monk Bretton Priory‘. This talk would have to double up as our AGM too now that the accounts are completed in the spring.
Finally on 10th May, Professor Joyce Hill of the University of Leeds, will talk to us about work on an Anglo-Saxon hoard from the Vale of York.
Do let me know if this line-up is of interest, whether you’d like to go and see the battlefield of Fulford and whether the prospect of a traditional section high tea at Xmas appeals. We’ll distribute a programme once everything has been confirmed.
Thanks to Sue Alexander there is now a dedicated email if you’d like to contact me: yas.medievalsec@gmail.com
Do take a minute or two to send me an email so I can contact you in future. Email is much easier and cheaper to use – though we’ll still contact members by post if they prefer.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Bryan Sitch
Hon Secretary
Medieval Section
Medieval Section of the Yorkshire Archaeological and Historical Society 