Category: Archaeology

Posted on

London Before London and DNA

Photo of the Petrous part of the temporal bone

I have just given a guided walk and a virtual tour of London in the prehistoric period. I rashly promised, as follow-up, a booklist. I have many books that I have found pivotal in shaping my own opinions, but I find myself very reluctant to recommend them in the light of the remarkable new, and recent, DNA discoveries.

The cause of this ‘revolution’ is the Petrous Bone – a small bone in/near the ear from which scientists can extract, without too much damage to ancient skeletons, a reliable source of ancient DNA. Previous studies were done on modern DNA and extrapolating backwards. Now, archaeologists can, relatively cheaply, investigate (and often debunk) archaeological theories about the spread of human cultures.

It is a salutary story. Early archaeologists had, what you might call, a colonial, diffusionist model of the past. So when a new culture was identified, normally on the back of the arrival of a new form of pottery. It was interpreted as being spread by diffusion, normally from the ‘civilised’ fertile crescent to barbaric pre-literate Europe. Hence, Stonehenge was thought to be built by a prince from Mycenae, on the basis of the Lion Gate in Mycenae having vague similarities with the Trilithons at Stonehenge (and other diffused cultural markers). And with a viewpoint, that the uncivilised Britons would not be able to build something so amazing!

Archaeologists in the 1970s rejected this imperialist model and preferred to think that cultures need not depend on advances from their betters, nor should ‘invasion’ be allowed to be the main means of technical and cultural advancement. The advent of Radio Carbon Dating profoundly affected how the past was dated, and showed that diffusionist chronologies, often, did not stand up. And thus Stonehenge was freed from cultural imperialism, and we Brits could take all the credit. And Prehistory lost a whole host of ‘invasions’ and ‘migrations’, and a start was also made on diminishing the centrality of the ‘invasions’ at the core of the Anglo/Saxon/Viking migrations into Briton.

Along comes the petrous bone and the development of the study of Ancient DNA, and we discover, in the last couple of years, that:

  1. The ancestors of Britons were dark to black skinned
  2. Farming was indeed introduced from the Continent, around 4000BC and the DNA of the UK was largely (but not completely) replaced by incomers. So it was not the Mesolithic hunter gathers who adopted farming but the ‘Western Neolithic’ people who settled bringing in sheep, cows, goats, pigs, wheat, oats, rye, barley, polished axes and pottery.
  3. The Beaker Folk, DNA now tells us, came from abroad around 2,500 BC. Originally from the Steppes via the Netherlands, and their DNA replaced all but 10% of the Western Neolithic DNA. This happened at about the same time as Stonehenge was remodelled with the giant Trilithons.
  4. Another influx of people from around 1300BC to 800BC replaced around 50% of the DNA of Britain.

So we now have at least 3 major population replacements before the coming of the Romans, Saxons, Vikings and Normans. Very annoying to find that those old-fashioned imperial archaeologists of the early 20th Century had it more correct than the enlightened archaeologists of the Late 20th Century.

London before the Romans
View of London from the SE as it might have looked before the Roman Invasion

So to my book list. Firstly, you will have noted above that I have linked the stories to reliable websites, so you can get further information. Here are a few other important websites:

Neolithic Houses at the Horton site at the Wessex archaeology site

Archaeology of Heathrow Terminal 5 https://framearch.co.uk/

Bronze Age Bridges at Dorney: https://heritageportal.buckinghamshire.gov.uk

Vauxhall Mesolithic and Bronze Ages Structures: https://www.vauxhallandkennington.org.uk/

Principle Place Feasting Site?: https://www.independent.co.uk/

Hill forts in the London Area: https://hillforts.arch.ox.ac.uk/

As to books, I suggest the best start is to read Mike Parker Pearson’s ‘Stonehenge A Brief History, Bloomsbury Academic 2023’ because it is up-to-date and Pearson has considered the DNA studies noted above.

For similar reasons and for a more general introduction to Britain in the Prehistoric period, you could try:

Roberts, Alice ‘Ancestors: A Prehistory Of Britain In Seven Burials ‘ Publisher: Simon & Schuster Ltd 2022

which has good reviews, but I have not yet read it.

I know that neither is about London, but the only ‘book’ on Prehistoric London I have is:

Merriman, N ‘Prehistoric London’ Museum Of London, 1991

And this is more of a booklet than a full academic book. There is another book, but then it was published in 1914:

Prehistoric London : its mounds and circles / by E.O. Gordon ; with appendices by John Griffith. Volume c.1 1914

For the period just before the Roman Invasion, I would highly recommend reading Julius Caesar’s opinions on Prehistoric Britain.

Caesar, Julius (ed Anne & Peter Wiseman). ‘The Battle For Gaul’ Chatto And Windus Ltd, London 1989

Peter Wiseman was my Professor at University, and it is an excellent introduction, still available new but also cheaply second hand at Abebooks.

You will find some interesting, relevant passages in my book:

Flude, Kevin ‘In Their Own Words – A Literary Companion To The Origins Of London’ D A Horizons, 2009

You can buy a hardback copy from me for £5 plus postage (email me, kpflude@chr.org.uk) or from Amazon in a Kindle version.

I will add more as I find them!

Cover of Kevin Flude's 'In their Own Words'
A Literary Companion to the origins of London
Posted on

31st October Halloween

From the Perpetual Almanack of Folklore by Charles Kightly

This is a revision of a page I wrote on 31st October 2022.

I began my perpetual Almanac of the Past two years ago on the 31st October 2021. This was the first line:

‘This blog is to celebrate the Year. I will post, hopefully, once a day, so we can follow the seasons, as they happen naturally, and as people in Britain and Ireland have responded to the changes in the year.’

It was inspired by Charles Knightly’s book, which is a pot-pourri of folklore taken mostly from old Almanacs. I haven’t managed to post every day, nearly managed it in the winter but falling badly behind in the Summer when I take Road Scholar groups around the UK. My plan is to improve key posts and repost, and to fill in the gaps. Another aim is to give my Almanac more London specific content.

Cover of Charles Knightly's Perpetual Almanac
Cover of Charles Knightly’s Perpetual Almanac

I started on Halloween because Samhain (pronounced Sow-in) was the beginning of the year for the Celtic world. It may mean Summer’s End. In Wales, it is Calan Gaeaf (first day of winter) and Kala Goafiv (beginning of November in Brittany).

For the Romans, it is the day that Adonis is injured hunting a wild boar, against his lover, Venus’s advice, he descends to the underworld. Nature withers and dies until he comes back. His blood stains a flower and was transformed into the Crimson Anemone. There is a similar story in Babylon of Ishtar and Tammuz.

By Alexander Marshall, crimson and other anemones
Binyon 1898-1907 / Catalogue of drawings by British artists, and artists of foreign origin working in Great Britain (5(c))

He comes back again on May Day when he meets Venus again the world flourishes and is bright and warm.

Julius Caesar says the Gauls venerated the God Dis Pater on this day – an aspect of Pluto, the God of the Underworld, ruler of the Dead. There was a Roman Festival on the Kalends of November dedicated to Pomona, the goddess of the fruit of trees. This may influence the use of Apples, which are prominent in Halloween festivities.

Posted on

The End of Hardy’s tree

From the Guardian Article

I published the following post about Hardy’s Tree on 28th December 2022. Here, follows the original post and an update which suggests the tree and the gravestones were not erected by Thomas Hardy.

This is the day that Herod ordered the slaughter of the Innocents, or Childermas, and I am glad to see that my Grandson is now older than Herod’s prescription.

Hardy’s Tree in St Pancras Church, Camden, London has fallen down. Hardy was an architect and worked in London for a while, where one of his jobs was to supervise the clearance of the graveyard. Several poems of Hardy refer to the removal of graves from their original positions and in this case, the gravestones were set around an Ash tree that inspires many, including my Central St Martin’s students who used it in a project recently. So, I was shocked to read a Guardian article (since deleted) which noted the sad demise of the Tree.

Extracts from one of several Hardy Poems about moving graves and gravestones follow, but I need to update the post about the connection to Hardy. The Guardian has now got an article which suggests the connection with Hardy is a more recent one than previously thought (Guardian article).

I (and I think the Guardian) were alerted to this by the work of Lester Hillman, who wrote a Churchyard Guide and a recent pamphlet about the Tree, which is reported in ‘Context ISSN 1462-7574’. This is the Journal of the City of London Archaeological Society. Evidence proves that the Ash Tree dates to the 1930s, and that the mound of gravestones is from burials relocated from St Giles in the Fields, and therefore unlikely to have been in St Pancras at the time Hardy was responsible for clearing it.

So it is not ‘the’ Hardy Tree, but then nor was the tree at Sycamore Gap anything to do with Robin Hood. What it was, was a beautiful piece of nature, in a poignant setting. May she rest in peace.

The Levelled Churchyard
Thomas Hardy

O Passenger, pray list and catch
Our sighs and piteous groans,
Half stifled in this jumbled patch
Of wrenched memorial stones!

We late-lamented, resting here,
Are mixed to human jam,
And each to each exclaimed in fear,
I know not which I am.

Where we are huddled none can trace,
And if our names remain,
They pave some path or porch or place
Where we have never lain!

Posted on

Legend of the Holy Cross September 14th

One of my favourite places to go is the Chapel of Guild of the Holy Cross at Stratford-upon-Avon. It offers a convenient place for a group to sit down and listen to further information about Shakespeare, and the fascinating story of the Guild Chapel.

This is an appropriate place to look at Roodmas which is celebrated today on May 3rd and September 14th because Rood is another word for the Cross. Parish Churches used to have a Rood Screen separating the holy Choir from the more secular Nave. This screen was topped with a statue of the Crucified Jesus.

Roodmas commemorates two events:

The Discovery of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem in 326 by Queen Helena, wife of Constantius Chlorus and mother of Constantine the Great. Most of the Cross was sent back to the care of Constantine the Great.

The part of the Holy Cross that was left in Jerusalem was taken by Persians but recovered by the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius in 628.

The Guild Chapel, built in 1269 and developed in the 15th Century, was dedicated to the legend of the Holy Cross which held, that seeds from the Tree of Knowledge were grown on Adam’s Grave, honoured by the Queen of Sheba, buried by King Solomon, possibly used in the building of the Temple, and used as the Cross to crucify Jesus. Then buried and found, with the nails, and the crown of thorns by Queen Helena. She knew it was the real thing we a deathly sick women was revived by contact with the timber of the Holy Cross.

Over the years the cross was shivered into ever smaller pieces as Emperors, Kings, Dukes, Counts, Popes, Bishops, Abbots and Abbesses swopped relics with each other. The fragments were cased in beautiful reliquaries and had enormous power for those of faith and those who could be helped by healing by faith.

This post is still, really, in draft form.

For the story of Charles III, his coronation, and the true cross please look here:

Posted on

August – Time for Ice Cream (And, First Try, AI)

Photo of Ice House in grounds of Keystone Pub, York, from Doubletree Hilton
Ice House in grounds of Keystone Pub, York, from Doubletree Hilton

From my hotel room in York which overlooks the City Wall, near Monk Bar, I noticed a strange brick building dug into the bank in front of the City Wall. ‘Very curious.’ I thought, as I looked, ‘It’s either a kiln or an Icehouse. ‘ A ridiculous place for a kiln, I concluded, and as the weather was nice, I went out to explore.

By Monk Bar (Bar means Gate in York) I found a pub called the Keystones, and through its yard I could see the round brick structure, you can see below.

Ice House in grounds of Keystone Pub, York
Ice House in grounds of Keystone Pub, York

‘Icehouse!’ I thought to myself with increasing confidence, and the ladder to the cavernous conical hole beneath it proved the point. It dates to about 1800.

Detail of Ice House in grounds of Keystone Pub, York

I wrote a brief history of Ice Houses in November 2022, which you can read here.

But it doesn’t say much about ice cream. I have been meaning to write a piece on that subject since I got a great article on the history of Ice Cream from the Friends of the British Museum magazine. I intended to précis it and do a little research and include here.

But, in the meantime, I received an email from ‘Jetpack’, a plugin for WordPress users, that offered me an AI plugin, which I wanted to try. So this is the first AI generated piece of information I have ever used.

WARNING AI GENERATED TEXT!

Ice cream has a long and fascinating history. It’s believed that the ancient Chinese were the first people to eat a form of ice cream, flavoured with fruit and honey. The Persians also had a version of ice cream using ice and grape syrup. In the 13th century, Marco Polo brought the idea of ice cream to Europe from China. The dessert became popular in Italy, where early recipes called for flavoured snow and ice. By the 18th century, ice cream was regularly served in English and American households. Today, ice cream is enjoyed all over the world in many variations and with a plethora of flavours.

Jet Pack AI Generated Text Ends (I’ve improved its UK spelling and grammar.)

Now, settle yourself down with that pistachio and ciocolata gelato and read real writing on the subject of the origins of Ice Cream from the British Museum, and please notice that the ice house pictured below is also, weirdly, just by a City Wall.

British Museum Blog ice-cream-inside-scoop

Blog Page from British Museum showing picture of an ancient Mesopotamian Ice House by a defensive wall.

Posted on

15th July Festival of Castor and Pollux

The Ashwini kumaras twins, sons of the sun god Surya. Vedic gods representing the brightness of sunrise and sunset Wikipedia

I have been away leading a tour of Quintessential Britain for Road Scholar and have fallen behind. And I had a few almanac days waiting for the right day to come! And now they have passed. But, I need them in the Almanac, so here is the beginning of a July catching up exercise.

The Divine Twins, aka the Dioscuri, were horsemen, patrons of calvary, athletes and sailors, one of many indo-european twin gods.   Pollux is the son of Zeus and Leda (raped by Zeus in the guise of a swan). His twin brother has a different and mortal father, the King of Sparta to the same mother, Leda.  So they are examples of heteropaternal superfecundation as Mary Poppins probably didn’t sing.

One is therefore immortal and the other isn’t.   They had many adventures including sailing with Jason as Argonauts.

According to some version of the story Castor was mortally wounded, and Zeus gave Pollux the option of letting his brother die while he spent his eternity on Mount Olympus. The alternative was to share his immortality with his brother. He did the good thing, and the twins spend half their year as the Constellation of Gemini and the rest, immortal on Mount Olympus.  Thus, they are the epitome of brotherly love.

Their sisters were, no less than Helen of Troy, and Clytemnestra. They were also twins, Helen the divine daughter of Zeus and, Clytemnestra, mortal daughter of the King of Sparta. The Swan was being pursued by an eagle, so Leda protected the Swan and took it to bed on the same night she slept with her husband Tyndareus of Sparta. Two eggs were fertilised, each split in two to give two sets of twins.

Leda and the Swan, 16th-century copy after the lost painting by Michelangelo

Neither mind the Brothers, what Sisters! Helen you know but Clytemnestra was the wife of Agamemnon, the arrogant leader of the Greeks.  On the way to retrieve Helen from Troy, the Greek Fleet is becalmed. So Agamemnon sacrifices his own daughter, Iphigenia, on the island of Aulis to get a fair wind to Troy. (read Iphigenia at Aulis by Aeschylus, a great play which I studied in Classical Studies at University)

painting of Clytemnestra after she has slaughtered her husband Agamemnon _by_John_Collier,_1882 (Wikipedia Guildhall Museum)
Clytemnestra_by_John_Collier,_1882 (Wikipedia Guildhall Museum)

Meanwhile, Queen Clytemnestra, abandoned at home broods on her husband’s heartless fillicide. She takes a lover. After 10 years of war Agamemnon comes back, in triumph from the destruction of Troy, with his prize the Trojan Princess, Cassandra. Strutting with arrogance he demands Clytemnestra prepare him a bath and she gives him the hottest bath possible and, with the help of her lover, hacks Agamemnon to pieces. 

Cassandra prophesizes that she too  will be killed, but she has been cursed with ability of accurate prophecy twinned with the inability to get anyone to believe her. So she is also slaughtered.

I visit John Collier’s painting regularly and am fascinated by her grim expression. (Sadly she has recently come off display at the Guildhall Art Gallery).

In the 18th/19th Century rich people were into ‘attitudes’.  For example, Emma Hart, later Lady Hamilton, would be invited to present an attitude in front of a dinner party of mostly male aristocrats.  She would dress up in a flowing revealing unstructured classical gown and stand on a table presenting herself as: Helen or Andromache or some other classical beauty.  She would assume an appropriate facial expression and posture to everyone’s pleasure. 

Detail of Emma Hart modelling as Iphigenia by George Romney in ‘Cimon and Iphigenia’

Clytemnestra is more difficult! I imagine Collier’s model being  prompted to look both sad at the loss of the daughter; outraged at the arrogance of the husband; horror at the gore of the murder but overall to portray a grim satisfaction that the bastard got exactly what he deserved.

Lord Leighton had a famous model who was exceptionally skilled at adopting poses for his paintings. He determined to help her with an acting career. As part of the plan he helped improve her cockney accent and it is said this inspired Bernard Shaw’s story Pygmalion which, in turn, inspired My Fair Lady and Eliza Doolittle. 

The model was called Dorothy Dene.  She became a famous actress, outstripping the fame of Ellen Terry and Lily Langtry. She modelled for the famous painting ‘Flaming June’ which sold 500,000 print copies in 1895.  Lord Leighton went somewhat out of fashion and the original painting was purchased for £50 by the rather marvellously named Museo de Ponce, Puerto Rico where she still resides.

I have one of those half million prints on my bedroom wall.

Print of Flaming June by Lord Leighton

Before we finish do have a look at John Collier’s Wikipedia because he is the most ridiculously well connected painter you can imagine! Related to half the Cabinet and married to TWO daughters of Darwin’s Bulldog T.H.Huxley (grandfather of Aldous Huxley).

European Twin Gods

It is suggested that twin male gods are a feature of indo-european religions, and that the Twins are associated with horses/chariots and are responsible for moving the Sun and the Moon. Their use of a horse above the water means that they can rescue  people lost at sea.   St Elmo’s fire was said to be the way they manifested their divinity to sailors.   Diodorus Siculus records that the Twins were Argonauts with Heracles, Telamon, and Orpheus. Further, he tells us in the fourth book of Bibliotheca historica, that the Celts who dwelt along the ocean worshipped the Dioscuroi “more than the other gods”.

Posted on

June 21st Midsummer

I have revised my Midsummer post which you can see below. Also shocking news from France.

June 21st Midsummer

Salon IF reported a shocking destruction in France – this is the report, verbatim from Salon IF issue 514.

Fury in France at Destruction of 7,000 Year-Old Standing Stones

Dozens of standing stones, erected over 7,000 years ag

o, have been demolished to make way for a DIY store near Carnac, in Brittany, in North West France. Some 37 stones, measuring between 0.5 – 1.5m tall, were removed despite the fact the site had long been on France’s National Archaeological Map. The stones, moreover, had been submitted to the tentative list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites (although the application had not yet been approved).

The region of Carnac is famous for its ancient ‘menhir’ – heavy, raised standing stones. Indeed, the area is often described as ‘the French Stonehenge’, with over 3,000 stone megaliths at the two sites of Menec and Kermario. There, the stone columns are arranged in long, straight rows and, according to the Carnac Tourist Office, it is the largest gathering of this type of standing stone in the world.

The land at the centre of the recent controversy, along the Montauban activity zone, had been granted a building permit by the local mayor’s office in August 2022 and construction of the new store, ‘Mr Bricolage’, was already underway. According to local amateur archaeologist, Christian Obeltz, who had originally raised concerns about the ‘brutal developments’, a bulldozer destroyed the stones overnight.

The Regional Office of Cultural Affairs for Brittany, the body responsible for the protection of the monument, said ‘Given the uncertain and in any case non-major character of the remains, as revealed by

checks, damage to a site of archaeological value has not been established’, but Obeltz maintains that archaeological investigation into the area had not been sufficient.

‘The Chemin de Montauban site included two intersecting rows of small granite stelae, each spreading out over fifty meters in length. One had been exactly in its original place for 7,000 years,’ according to Obletz. ‘The small menhirs of the Chemin de Montauban were undoubtedly one of the oldest sets of stelae in the town of Carnac’ believed to date between 5480 and 5320 BC, ‘the highest dating obtained for a menhir in the west of France’.

Posted on

June 14th Moneywort

MONEYWORT
Moneywort. Photo by Kurt Stüber Wikipedia

Calm weather in June
Sets corn in tune.

When it is hottest in June, it will be coldest in the corresponding days in February.

(Weather Lore by Richard Inwards 1895)

Moneywort flowers in June/July. It is, also known as Creeping Jenny, Wandering Jenny, Creeping Joan, or Wandering Sailor. All names alluding to its rapid trailing over the Ground.

It’s also called Herb Tuppence or String of Sovereigns and variations. ‘Herbe 2 pence’ was the name given by William Turner in the earliest English scientific Herbal, 1551. He learnt his medicine in Italy in Ferrara and Bologna and went abroad again, in exile from Mary 1st’s religious intolerance.

frontispiece of William Turner's 'A newe herball' containing descriptions of 238 English plants, 1551
William Turner’s ‘A newe herball’ containing descriptions of 238 English plants,

Its Latin name is Lysimachia nummularis (from the Latin for money nummulus) Mrs Grieve suggests that the two pence idea comes from the leaves which ‘look like rows of pennies, and the golden flowers which give the name String of Sovereigns.’

There was said to be ‘not a better wound-herb’, and that wounded serpents would wrap themselves around it. Hence, yet another name is Serpentaria. Also, it was thought to be good for stomachs, and against whooping cough.

It can be used both fresh or dried, but if to be dried, collect in June. It prospers in damp conditions and self-spreads.