tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57586494322418635302024-03-13T10:03:56.105+00:00A Clerk of OxfordClerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.comBlogger1120125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-70586556545079520372021-01-06T10:00:00.107+00:002021-01-06T10:00:00.147+00:00Earendel at EpiphanyBL Yates Thompson 3, f. 93vFor the Feast of the Epiphany, here's a curiosity for you. There are lots of medieval carols about the Epiphany ('Twelfth Day', as it was usually called in the Middle Ages) - I posted two last year, and you'll find more under this tag. This one, however, is a medieval pastiche - a carol written in a version of Middle English, with a bit of Old English thrown in, and Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-55742387800802865592020-11-29T15:00:00.092+00:002020-12-21T09:36:16.175+00:00'Time's handiworks by time are haunted'Today is the first Sunday of Advent, and it’s a strange one. Public worship is currently banned in England, though that’s supposed to end in a few days - but the first day of the new liturgical year will not begin in church, just as the most important feast of the Christian year couldn't be publicly celebrated back in the spring. We are in Advent where we were in Lent, preparing for a Christmas Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-1818810936129670592020-11-02T12:08:00.000+00:002020-11-02T12:08:12.190+00:00The company of the deadThere’s a particular horror in the idea of dying alone, and the fear of a lonely death haunts many of us. But in one or way another, death is always lonely. The grave is a solitary place, and death is a journey you have to undertake alone. Different cultures develop their own ways of lessening the loneliness of the grave, providing those who are grieving with some continuing connection to the Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-41204062604317258122020-09-18T14:55:00.000+01:002020-09-18T14:55:24.035+01:00The Lives of OthersFrom my latest column for History Today:‘One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other’, says the heroine of Jane Austen’s Emma,
playfully trying to reassure her ever-anxious father that other people
can enjoy amusements he would never himself like. In Austen’s novel
Emma is often wrong, but she is certainly right about this. Over the
past few months, it has been evident Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-75491860635554127232020-08-12T14:19:00.001+01:002020-08-12T14:19:21.409+01:00Abingdon If you were asked to guess the oldest town in Britain, you might not
think of Abingdon. But the market town, which lies six miles south of
Oxford, claims — and with some justice — to be the “oldest continuously occupied town”
in this country. Situated on a loop of the Thames, in a green river
valley, Abingdon was a densely-occupied and well-defended settlement by
the Iron Age, Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-15086037487332946582020-07-14T13:23:00.000+01:002020-07-14T13:53:48.307+01:00As a fantasy
'I wolde witen...'
I wolde witen of sum wys wiht
Witterly what this world were.
Hit fareth as a foules fliht;
Now is hit henne, now is hit here,
Ne be we never so muche of miht,
Now be we on benche, now be we on bere;
And be we never so war and wiht,
Now be we sek, now beo we fere,
Now is on proud withouten peere,
Now is the selve iset not by;
And whos wol alle thing hertly here,
This world Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-9179482075456668562020-06-21T13:28:00.002+01:002020-06-21T13:30:15.774+01:00The Summer-Long Day
A post on Midsummer isolation and 'The Wife's Lament', which is a shortened version of something I originally posted on Patreon.Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-29026929119441834262020-06-04T17:30:00.000+01:002020-06-04T17:30:40.120+01:00Wistful WhitsunJust sharing this piece, rather belatedly, at what would once have been the tail-end of Whitsuntide.
It doesn’t feel natural to go on living indefinitely in
unmarked time, without holiday or festival. Normal cycles of work and
leisure have been disrupted by this crisis: some people are working
harder than ever, under impossible stress, while others have found
themselves unemployed or on Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-88371761980896430992020-04-10T10:21:00.000+01:002020-04-10T10:48:58.618+01:00Good Friday Alone
The Virgin Mary and Christ, in a Book of Hours of c.1510-20 (BL Add MS 35214, f. 27)
Alone alone alone alone
Sore I sigh and all for one.
As I went this enders day [the other day]
Alone walking on my play
I heard a lady sing and say
'Woe is me and all alone!
Alone alone alone alone
Sore I sigh and all for one.'
To that place I drew me near
Of her song somewhat to hear.
There sat a lady withClerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-58773346110002738582020-03-31T13:09:00.002+01:002020-04-01T21:02:11.333+01:00The Long Lent and the History of Quarantine
Christ in Quarantine (British Library, Royal MS 1 D X, f. 52v)
Strange new events call for new vocabulary, and over the last few weeks and months we have all been getting used to some novel and unfamiliar language: self-isolation, social distancing, lockdown. In my own mind, I've taken to calling this whole situation 'the Long Lent' - mostly because it sounds less frightening than 'global Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-38129410602537874572020-03-19T18:28:00.000+00:002020-03-19T18:28:19.279+00:00Stella celi extirpavit
The Virgin Mary in a fourteenth-century manuscript, BL Royal MS 6 E VII Part 2, f. 479
Back in Advent, I revisited the poems of the 15th-century friar James Ryman in order to write this post. I read a number of Ryman's poems which I hadn't really looked at before, and kept a record of those which interested me with an eye to future blogposts. One struck me as unusual, and I took note of it, Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-85639562870446087762020-01-05T14:00:00.000+00:002020-01-22T23:15:11.158+00:00'So glorious a gleam, over dale and down'
The Adoration of the Magi, British Library, Add. 18850, f. 24v
Two carols for Twelfth Night, the eve of the Epiphany. The visit of the Magi to the infant Jesus is a very popular subject in medieval carols, perhaps partly because of the appeal of the dramatic details of the Gospel narrative - the urgency of the questing kings, their tense interaction with Herod, the atmosphere of danger in Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-27546817689936649362019-12-22T14:41:00.002+00:002020-01-22T23:17:48.870+00:00'With my darling 'Lullay' to sing'In the Christmas edition of the Catholic Herald, I've written a short piece about the medieval carol 'Lullay, Myn Lyking' ('I saw a fair maiden'), often heard today in this beautiful setting by Gustav Holst:
Holst wasn't the first to set this medieval text to music, but his setting is very well-loved. In my piece I discuss the link between the carol and the woman in whose book Holst found it, Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-41924530026222586972019-12-15T18:28:00.000+00:002020-01-22T23:12:08.138+00:00An Advent Carol: O Orient Light
Annunciation (BL Add. 29433, f. 20)
Here's an Advent poem from a collection of carols which was compiled by James Ryman, Franciscan friar of Canterbury, at the very end of the fifteenth century. I've often posted carols from Ryman's extensive collection (his manuscript contains more than 150 carols, all accessible here), and they're suitable for all seasons for the year. Far from being for Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-71457128787217309482019-11-02T17:09:00.000+00:002019-11-02T18:23:07.885+00:00HallowtideThe ossuary at St Leonard's, Hythe
All Souls, and a rainy November day in the season of remembrance. The three-day season of Hallowtide - Hallowe'en, All Saints, All Souls - is medieval in origin, as a time for remembering the dead both known and unknown. Medieval literature is rich in serious, profound meditations on mortality, on death, on transience, and in the later Middle Ages, particularly,Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-15533220591661378542019-10-30T19:10:00.000+00:002019-10-30T19:10:11.733+00:00A little local museum
My latest column for History Today can be read online here. Here's a taste:
If you recognise the type of town museum I mean, you will know just what kind of displays it boasts. There will always be cases of assorted Roman and Anglo-Saxon stuff: tweezers, strings of beads, pins and brooches, anything not quite important enough to be claimed by a bigger museum. There will be stones from a Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-58772628140878933172019-10-18T06:30:00.000+01:002019-10-18T13:13:18.553+01:00An Alternative History of England
Cnut fights Edmund Ironside in a 13th-century manuscript CCCC MS. 26, f.80v
October is the season of conquest anniversaries. Four days after the anniversary of the Battle of Hastings falls a less well-known date: on 18 October 1016, a Danish army led by Cnut defeated the English king Edmund Ironside in battle at a place called Assandun in Essex, the last battle in Cnut's conquest of England. Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-78525225494845688492019-10-16T19:24:00.000+01:002019-10-16T19:24:03.436+01:00Beowulf - and more
Just a short post to say that I've written a piece on Beowulf for this month's issue of the BBC History Magazine (not online at the moment, but I'll add a link if it turns up on their website.) It's very much a basic introduction to the poem, but I tried also to suggest some of the complexities of the poem's worldview and its approach to legend and history.
Shocking as this might be to Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-90008633819195092582019-09-29T06:00:00.000+01:002019-09-29T12:17:46.676+01:00Birds and Angels
St Michael, with bright wings (BL Royal MS 18 D II, f. 161v)
Today is Michaelmas, the feast of St Michael and All Angels - a beautiful feast at perhaps the loveliest time of the year. In honour of the day I want to post a medieval English poem which I stumbled across for the first time recently. It's not strictly for Michaelmas (it's set in the spring) but by the time you reach the end of it Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-14582237473756637572019-09-18T18:06:00.002+01:002019-09-18T18:19:13.536+01:00On the coast of Yorkshire on a September dayIt's the time of year for a favourite story of mine, which seems like a good opportunity to break a long blogging drought. Here's a short summary of an episode which I discuss in further detail in my book, as a taster to induce you to notice that it's currently on sale...
Harold Hardrada's army landing in England, in a 13th-century English manuscript(CUL MS Ee.3.59, f.31)
On or around 18 Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-42874385819778012892019-05-19T11:29:00.000+01:002019-05-19T11:30:05.296+01:00The Owl and the Nightingale
'An hule and one niȝtingale...':
the beginning of this poem in BL Cotton Caligula A IX, f. 233
A quick break in a long blog silence to link to my latest History Today column, which can be read online here. It's about the Early Middle English poem The Owl and the Nightingale, and if it whets your appetite to read this lively, spirited poem, there's a longer introduction to it and a full Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-57819141097160406132019-03-05T07:00:00.000+00:002019-03-05T07:00:06.381+00:00Twittervillus
My latest column for History Today can be read online at this link. Most of it is about Piers Plowman, but here's the final paragraph:
This poem’s concern with wasteful words is part of a wider conversation in medieval society about the misuse of speech. Many medieval writers condemn what they call ‘janglers’ – an expressive descriptor for people who use words in a wasteful or destructive wayClerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-55924537683654785502019-01-26T15:51:00.000+00:002019-01-26T15:54:03.675+00:00An Icelander in Lincoln
My latest column for History Today is now available to read online at this link: Learning in Lincoln. Here's a taste:
Some time around 1160, a young Icelander arrived in England to study at the cathedral school in Lincoln. His name was Thorlak Thorhallsson. Before coming to Lincoln he had spent a few years studying in Paris; in his future was a career as a bishop back in his native Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-59975768820110252402018-12-26T11:38:00.001+00:002018-12-26T11:44:52.831+00:00'Mary hath borne alone'
Virgin and Child, from a 15th-century Book of Hours (BL Add. 50001, f. 119v)
Mary hath borne alone
The Son of God in throne.
That maiden mild her child did keep
As mothers doth echone, [as all mothers do]
But her dear son full sore did weep
For sinful man alone.
She rocked him and sung 'Lullay',
But ever he made great moan.
'Dear son,' she said, 'tell, I thee pray,
Why dost thy weep alone?'Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5758649432241863530.post-27147388682307295892018-12-22T17:14:00.000+00:002018-12-26T09:27:03.697+00:00The Anglo-Saxon O Antiphons: O wondrous exchange
Grimbald Gospels, made in Canterbury in the 11th century, BL Add. 34890, f. 115
This is the last section of the Anglo-Saxon poem inspired by the Advent O Antiphons. It follows directly on from the section in my last post (comprising lines 416-439 of the poem), and is based on the antiphon 'O admirabile commercium', which has been set to music by a number of composers.
Eala hwæt, þæt is Clerk of Oxfordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08919708325900229717noreply@blogger.com0