OUR anniversary story begins in 1322, when Thomas, Earl of Lancaster was defeated by the unpopular Edward II at the Battle of Boroughbridge in modern-day North Yorkshire. It was 700 to 4,000 in the royal favour and the rebels, hemmed in by the River Ure, didn’t stand a chance. Lancaster was beheaded and later venerated almost as a martyr; Edward was deposed five years later.
Before he had the chance to offend anybody, a nine-month-old baby became Henry VI, 600 years ago. A century later, 42 fully-grown men were the first to circumnavigate the globe aboard Victoria, a Spanish carrack, and when the Palace of Whitehall, built by a much larger Henry (VIII), burnt down in 1698, the only architectural survivor was Inigo Jones’s Banqueting House, which opened 400 years ago with a performance of Ben Jonson’s The Masque of Augurs. Hoare’s bank was founded by Sir Richard Hoare 350 years ago, now run by 11thgeneration descendants. Moll Flanders was published 300 years ago, not attributed to Defoe until after his death; he based the story on the life of a thief he met in Newgate Prison.
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der December 29, 2021-Ausgabe von Country Life UK.
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Diese Geschichte stammt aus der December 29, 2021-Ausgabe von Country Life UK.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
