THE ORANGE AND LEMON CHURCHES OF OLD LONDON

Reblogged from A Medieval Potpourri sparkypus.com Old London – City of Churches.   Bow Church can be seen to the left.  Part of the The Visscher Panorama of London, 1616. Image Peter Harrington Rare Books.   Orange and lemons say the bells of Saint Clement’s You owe me five farthings say the bells of St Martin’s…

A view of Powderham Castle in Devon….

Fifteen miles downstream of Exeter, Powderham Castle faces over the estuary of the River Exe, having originally risen “from the ashes of the Great Plague, but that wouldn’t be its last brush with adversity”. At the beginning it was a true castle, set in 50,000 acres. Alas, after weathering wars, sieges and other troubles, it has…

The church of St Martin-cum-Gregory

If you go to York and enter Micklegate Bar heading towards the City Centre, you will see a wonderful medieval gem on your right, the church of St Martin-cum-Gregory, of which Richard III was patron (below left). Its name is due to the fact that the present church is the result of two different churches’…

THE CROSSRAIL RAILWAY PROJECT – A PORTAL INTO OLD LONDON

UPDATED POST ON sparkypus.com A Medieval Potpourri https://sparkypus.com/2020/05/14/crossrail-a-portal-into-medieval-london/ No doubt archaeologists thought all their Christmases had arrived at once when first they heard  breaking news of the building of Crossrail, Europe’s largest infrastructure  –  which will be called the Elizabeth line and will open in phases from late 2018 – and the exceptional opportunities the…

The Abbey of the Minoresses of St Clare without Aldgate and the Ladies of the Minories

Anne Montgomery nee Darcy.  One of the much respected Ladies of the Minories from the window of Holy Trinity Church, Long Melford, Suffolk. Shakespeare said ‘all the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players’.  Following on from that if we may be allowed to say that the Wars of the Roses were…

Coming up this year:

As you can see, Kit Harrington will soon portray Robert Catesby in a BBC drama about the Gunpowder Plot. Catesby, shot while resisting arrest, was one of the lucky ones. Then again, our folk memory of the seventeenth century is not entirely accurate. Here it is.

The Propaganda of Charles II

Guest author Richard Unwin explains the context behind the discovery of those convenient bones: Charles II came to the throne in 1660 after the period of Commonwealth when England, and particularly its entertainments, had been suppressed by Puritan authority. The security of the new reign was precarious and there were many in the country opposed…