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.


Friday 30 September 2022

A fifteenth century King’s flagship


The waters of the Baltic have yielded up another historic shipwreck, that of the Gribshunden, which was apparently the flagship of King John (Hans) of Denmark and Norway, and, on occasion, of Sweden. The ship was one of the first carvel built vessels in the Baltic and also one of the first designed from the beginning to carry artillery. It sank off the coast of south-east Sweden in 1495 whilst the King was ashore at Kalmar seeking to re-establish the Union of all the Scandinavian realms agreed there in 1397. The sinking may have occurred after an explosion of gunpowder.

There is an online biography of King John on Wikipedia at John of Denmark

Wikipedia also has an account of the Gribshunden and of funds and items recovered, including apparently the figurehead,  made in recent years at Gribshunden

The latest discoveries on the wreck are described in a Live Science article which can be seen at 15th-century Baltic warship served as a 'floating castle' for an intrepid king


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