Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Wednesday 8 April 2020

5G - What Goes Round Comes Round

The recent reports about people setting fire to 5G masts in Birmingham and on Merseyside because of conspiracy theories on the Internet about the signal either reducing people’s immune systems or that it is spreading the coronavirus have drawn condemnation as clearly ridiculous. I would merely comment as a historian that this is just the latest version of very old societal phobias. In the middle ages during epidemics some of the credulous believed that the disease was caused by the Jews going round poisoning the wells.....Not even the extreme end of the Labour Party has come up with that one - yet.

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