New exhibition on the Vikings in northern England

The BBC News website has an article about the opening of a major exhibition at the Yorkshire Museum in the grounds of St Mary’s Abbey in York. The exhibition, entitled Viking North will run for the next two years, and there is no additional charge to visit it. 

The display brings together items from the collection in York and from other museums. It includes items recently discovered and not previously on public display. The aim appears to be to show the whole range of life in the region  between the beginning of major Viking settlement in 866-868 with the invasion of those years and the Norman Conquest two centuries later.

The article about the exhibition can be seen at York exhibition tells story of Viking Age in the North

Fr Ray Blake - Daily Telegraph obituary

Last weekend I wrote in my post Fr Ray Blake RIP about my memories of the much esteemed Brighton priest who had died the previous week. 

The Daily Telegraph now has an illustrated and judicious obituary of him which brings out his character as both priest and human being. It can be seen at Fr Ray Blake, priest who was unafraid to air his controversial views from the pulpit or in his blog

Medieval cellarage in Southampton

The BBC News website had a very interesting article recently about a striking twelfth century cellar in Southampton which is one of the surviving fragments of the castle. It was constructed to hold barrels of wine imported for the use of the King’s court. This was presumably.from Gascony after 1154, although some may have come directly across the Channel from Normandy or the Loire.

Southampton still has impressive remains of the town walls and was an important trading centre in the medieval centuries. This was not just for wine but also for the range of luxury goods  from the Mediterranean imported by Genoese and Venetian merchants.

The article can be seen at Secret Hampshire: Inside city's largest medieval vault

The Monomachos Crown

Live Science has a short article about the Monomachos Crown, apparently made in the years 1042-1050, and which features the Byzantine Emperor Constantine IX Monomachos and his two co-Empresses, his wife Zoë and her sister Theodora.

The crown was found in what was then northern Hungary, and is now Slovakia, in 1860 it is displayed in the National Museum in Budapest.

The article describes the crown and links to discussions as to its authenticity- which it appears to favour - or otherwise. It also discusses how the gold plaques may have been mounted originally.

Although it is short the article does serve as a useful introduction to what appears to be a precious survival from the eleventh century.

The article, with its illustration and relevant  links  can be seen at Monomachos Crown: The 1,000-year-old crown honoring 'the one who fights alone' found by a farmer in a field

Fr Ray Blake RIP

I was very sorry indeed to hear last Thursday that Fr Ray Blake, formerly parish priest of St Mary Magdalene in Brighton, had died earlier that day.

I first became aware of Fr Ray through his blog, and it was one which influenced me to start this one. Some time later I was due to attend the wedding of two friends in East Sussex on an August Daturday and, as the next day was my birthday, arranged to stay overnight in Brighton and join another friend, who worshipped at Fr Ray's church, for the Solemn Mass. This was followed, after I had joined in moving some pews around the church, by a very convivial lunch at a Tapas bar in The Lanes. 

On a number of occasions thereafter I went on day or overnight visits to attend Mass at St Mary Magdalene’s, including the church’s 150rh anniversary, or for their patronal feast.

I also encountered Fr Ray when we found ourselves in the crowd watching pope Benedict XVI travel from Westminster Hall to Westminster Abbey on his visit. Like so many others at Fr Blake’s church one was immediately made welcome and drawn into a wide and diverse circle of interesting and friendly people. I would be greeted as “Ah, the Clever Boy” and made to feel at home at his parish events.

On his blog and in person he was forthright, but at the same time gentle and attentive - maybe not everyone understood that and he sometimes, unfairly, attracted misunderstanding and hostility. To those who knew him, even slightly, as I did, he was a faithful and fearless priest of the type we need.

I regret that in recent years I was less able to meet up with him, and his health began to decline. The last time I saw him, at the ordination of a mutual friend in 2019, he was still the gregarious man I had encountered in his blog, and still with a glass and cigarette in hand.

I wish I had lived close so that there might have been more opportunities to meet or to attend his celebration of the Mass in its traditional form.  He will be sadly and sorely missed by many.

Eternal rest grant onto him, O Lord.

St Leonard’s Hospital in York

There have been two reports online recently about the discovery of foundations of part of the buildings of the medieval Saint Leonard‘s Hospital in York. 

This late Anglo-Saxon foundation survived until the dissolution of the monasteries and related institutions in the sixteenth century. Unlike the great mediaeval hospitals of London this York foundation was suppressed and largely destroyed. Although parts of the site have been investigated since the early nineteenth century the only remains above ground out of part of the gate house and the adjoining chapel, dated to about 1240, adjacent to the City Library. The remainder lies under.Duncombe Place, the Theatre Royal and adjoinhg buildings, and adjacent to the York Oratory.

The VCH for York has an article describing the various religious precinct of the mediaeval city, including that of St Leonard’s, together with a map. This can be accessed here

There is more about the history and buildings of the hospital from the York Archives at History in the remains: A look at St. Leonard’s hospital

By 1300 the Hospital had up to 225 inmates, ministered to by thirteen chaplains and eight sisters. However in 1350 the buildings were said to be in great disrepair. 

I recall reading in the VCH volume on the City of York - which I cannot find online - that a few days before the battle of Towton in 1461 King Henry VI and Queen Margaret together with the Dukes of Somerset and Exeter, and, I assume, others of the Lancastrian court, attended Vespers in the chapel of St Leonard’s.

In 1515 the chapel and other buildings were described as dilapidated. The foundation was surrendered to the Crown in 1540, and after sale and repurchase a branch of the Royal Mint was established on part of the site in 1546.

In January 1556 the City Council petitioned Cardinal Pole for the re-establishment of the Hospital, but without success before the end of the Marian Restoration.

The recent online articles can be seen, from Archaeology Magazine, at Sinkhole in York uncovers remains of medieval St Leonard’s Hospital, one of northern England’s largest and, in a very similar account, from GB News at Archaeologists discover remains of medieval England's largest hospital after sinkhole opens up in historic British city

A Roman wrist purse from Moravia

The Greek Reporter website has an interesting account of the discovery in Moravia of the remains of a bronze Roman wrist purse for coins that would have been worn by a junior officer or someone concerned with supplies and provisions. 

Coins were found scattered nearby from the reign of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, who had a forward military present in the area in the years 172 to 180. This was with a view to extending the Roman presence into Moravia. Resistance by the local tribes led Marcus Aurelius to withdraw and his son and successor Commodis subsequently abandoned the whole project. It is perhaps interesting to speculate what would’ve happened if the Roman had established themselves in this part of central Europe at that time.

The illustrated article can be seen at Rare Roman Soldier’s Wrist Purse Discovered in Czech Republic