The Faith Museum at Bishop Auckland

Yesterday’s Daily Telegraph had an interesting article about the new Faith Museum which has been created in the grounds of Bishop Auckland Castle. 

The castle, home for centuries to the Bishops of Durham, was sold off some years back by the penny-pinching egalitarian vandals who nowadays masquerade as the Church Commissioners. Remember what Edmund Burke wrote over two centuries ago about the triumph of “sophisters, economists, and calculators” and its consequences.

However Auckland has had a chivalrous saviour and the castle was, fortunately, together with its important collection of Spanish religious art, saved by being bought by Jonathan Ruffer. He has restored the castle, created a centre for the study of Spanish painting - opened by the King when he was still Prince of Wales accompanied by the Queen of Spain - created the Faith Museum and seeks through the Auckland Project to use this as a means to regenerate the area. Very similar in fact to the King with Dumfries House.

The article places the Museum in a wide cultural context and is by Neil MacGregor, formerly Director of the National Gallery and then of the British Museum. His own intellectual and practical involvement with the relationship between Art and Faith is outlined in his Wikipedia biography at Neil MacGregor

His review article is well worth reading and can be seen at Western Europe has turned its back on Christianity – and forgotten the power of religion

Military and financial resources of Europe in 1423

Medievalists.net has an article based on what appears to be a Venetian survey of the military and financial resources of the various European kingdoms and states, as well as some in the Near East, which dated from the 1420s. Probably for editorial reasons the current article opts for 1423; the early twentieth century edition it relies upon, and links to, is more cautious in merely assigning it to the 1420s.

The collection of such statistics ( and of course we all know the truth of “lies, damned lies and statistics” ) does look today like an anticipation of modern UN and OECD surveys and such like. Given its Venetian provenance it is probably as good an assessment as anyone could make at the time.

Concerned as it is with military resources and revenues with only glancing references in some cases to other factors in the life of the territories it refers to there is nothing in the report itself really to link to factors such as the English ascendancy in France, the crisis around Hussite Bohemia, the exacerbated tensions between the Teutonic Knights and Poland-Lithuania, the ever increasing threat posed by the Ottoman Turks in south-eastern Europe, the continuing tensions between the Italian states or the beginnings of Portuguese expansion into the Atlantic and Africa. Nonetheless what this survey does provide is an overview of the military and financial resources that lay behind those and so many other facets of fifteenth century life.

The Medievalists.net article, which has a link to its textual source, can be accessed at The Power of Medieval States – A Report from 1423

A ninth century brooch from Somerset

The Smithsonian Magazine reports about the impending display at the Somerset Museum in Taunton of a very fine example of an Anglo-Saxon brooch. It is dated to the ninth century and was found by a metal detector and acquired under the Treasure Act for the nation.

The sizeable silver brooch was discovered at Cheddar, which was a royal hunting estate in the ninth and tenth centuries, and as the brooch was found unaccompanied by other items was probably accidentally lost. Given its size and quality the owner  was probably someone of considerable standing.

Somerset in the ninth century was a significant component of the Kingdom of Wessex as it took on the leading role amongst the Heptarchy and then, after the Danish invasion, became the sole survivor under King Alfred and as it began to forge the bonds that led to a unified English kingdom in the tenth century.

The article about the brooch, and which includes an excellent photograph of the piece, can be seen at Rare 1,000-Year-Old Brooch Goes on Display in England

Did Shakespeare tread these boards?

Recent work at St George’s Guildhall in King’s Lynn has exposed part of the original early fifteenth century timber floor dating from the construction of the Guildhall in 1417-30. This is in itself a noteworthy survival, but it may well have been trod by Shakespeare and other members of the Earl of Pembroke’s Men when plague closed the theatres and drove them out of London in 1592 and 1593. Their refuge was to be found playing in King’s Lynn.

The BBC News website reports on the floor and the evidence for Shakespeare, then in his late twenties, in north west Norfolk with his acting companions in Shakespeare's stage found, claims Norfolk theatre

The Papal response to the Dubia

 

Since I posted yesterday about the Dubia submitted by five Cardinals the Zenit website has shared the text of the Pope’s reply. Itcan be read at On the eve of the beginning of the Synod Pope responds to 5 “dubia” of cardinals: full text of response - ZENIT - English

Questionable Church Ales

Christopher Howse has an article in the Daily Telegraph about how the now popular idea arose that in the medieval period it was usual to hold social events, such as fund raising Church Ales, in the naves of parish churches. This notion is now increasingly discounted by serious historians such as Nicholas Orme. That is not to deny that naves did on occasion host non-religious events ( even if the diocesan reprobated such things ) and, in the case of cathedrals, on occasion parliamentary meetings such as the first one of the States General in 1300 in Notre Dame in Paris and the Irish Reformation Parliament in 1541 in Holy Trinity Cathedral ( now Christ  Church ) in Dublin.

Howse has some entertaining examples of what dis happen on occasion and also cites the development of thr Church House, especially in the south-west of England, in the later middle ages, although they are described at a much earlier date.

The article can be read at Pouring pints in church may be controversial, but it’s nothing new

Dubia in respect of the Synod on Synodality

I was alerted by Rorate Cæli to the Dubia submitted by five senior Cardinals to the Pope in respect of the status of received doctrine, of the forthcoming meeting of the Synod of Bishops and integral issues about Holy Orders and Confrssion. Having been submitted in July the answer received has led the Cardinals concerned to submit them again in an amended version. They still await a response.

The text of the Dubia can be read on the Rorate Cæli website at Full Text of New Dubia Sent to Francis by Cardinals Brandmüller, Burke, Sandoval, Sarah, and Zen

The same story has been picked up by Anthony Stine on his Return to Tradition videos. He examines the texts submitted by the Cardinals and moments on the issues at BREAKING NEWS: Cardinals Burke & Sarah Issue New Dubia! Does This Torpedo The Synod?

In his video Anthony Stine also refers to his previous video which refers to some of the matters raised in the Dubia as well as to its main focus on the suitability of Cardinal Fernández for his new position as head of the doctrine and discipline of the Church. That video can be seen at Fernandez Faces Protests As His Evil Past Comes To Light

Identifying the carver of the Jelling Stone runes

Arkeonews reports on recent work in Denmark which thinks it has established the identity of the carver-scribe of the runes on the tenth century Jelling Stones, and related them to other contemporary inscriptions. 

One might think that one rune looks very much like another, but techniques specific to one individual stonemason can apparently now be quantified and assigned to a particular craftsman.

Identifying the handiwork of the artist has also enabled links to be established between the two Jelling Stones and other runic inscriptions, and a new realisation of the importance of Queen Thyra, the wife of King Gorm the Old and mother of King Harald Bluetooth. It was King Harald who commissioned the second Jelling Stone with its celebration of his achievements. The Jelling Stones are often presented as the foundation stones of the Kingdom of Denmark.

Wikipedia has an illustrated account of the Jelling Stones, their inscriptions and iconography at Jelling stones

The National Museum of Denmark website has an illustrated article about the Stones at The Jelling Stone. This also has links to other pages about the other parts of the Jelling complex. 

Viking Archaeology also has an introduction to the site at Jelling at Jelling | Viking Archaeology

A few years ago the splendid British Museum exhibition about the Vikings included a full size copy of the Bluetooth Stone from Jelling. This facsimile had been painted as it is believed the original once was and it brought out how very striking a feature the original must once have been.

A modern copy in the National Museum of Denmark of the King Harald Bluetooth Stone painted as the original would have been.

Image: Wikipedia 

The Arkeonews article about this latest research into the carver of the runes can be read at Using 3D scanners, archaeologists have identified the person who carved Jelling Stone Runes