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.


Sunday 6 November 2022

An instance of kinship in Roman Britain


The Past has an article about the results of the DNA analysis of three skeletons found in one grave from Roman Britain. It was discovered at Cheddington in Buckinghamshire in 2018. Such multiple burials are unusual in themselves but this one revealed an interesting familial connection between three generations. The article can be read at Ancient DNA reveals family relationships in Late Roman grave

The lives of the two women and the male infant  are inevitably lost but the possibilities suggested by what we do know gives us an idea of family life and maybe of a family tragedy some sixteen or so centuries ago.


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