Category Archives: Timology
Runners and Writers
This week’s ramblings might seem at first disparate and irrelevant, but I assure you that this is only slightly the case… this blog, as you might have gathered, is often about links between things; not so much isolated interesting facts and snippets, but the tangleweb that connects them and us. If you wanted interesting facts, open an encyclopaedia, but it’s the connexions between things, the invisible covalent bonds of distraction that I find more stimulating.
This week I have been dipping into the BBC’s archive of Rev, a TV sitcom about a Church of England priest, played by Tom Hollander, and his inner city London church. The dialogue is excellent, and the characters feature an all too familiar line up of worthies, wastrels, and worshipers. The priest and his long suffering wife negotiate the machinations of the Archdeacon, mixed emotions of the lay reader, monetary meltdown of the parish, and even the manipulation of the local teacher’s breasts by the priest. There is even a cameo by Liam Neeson as God. It’s a gritty, humorous, and real portrayal of a “socially disunited” parish, and well worth a watch.
The church in question is know in the comedy as St Saviour in the Marshes, and is supposed to be in Hackney, East London. It is however actually filmed in St Leonard’s Parish Church in Shoreditch, located at the intersection of Shoreditch High Street and Hackney Road. The church was immortalised in the ancient nursery rhyme ‘Oranges and Lemons’ by the line, “When I grow rich, say the bells of Shoreditch“.
Most of the church dates from 1740, but the original sections could date from Saxon times. St Leonard’s has strong links with the theater, indeed it is the resting place for many a Tudor playwright and board creeper. Many believe Shakespeare may have worshipped there, and even that it might have inspired scenes in Romeo and Juliet. That is if you believe a word that The Gurinad tells you.
Some have speculated that large portions of the medieval church demolished in the 1720’s would have been familiar to Shakespeare and many of his contemporaries. The chances are that the ruins survive intact beneath the present church and surrounding land. However, due to cost and the technical difficulties of investigating beneath and around a listed building used for worship, no work has been carried out. But recently Professor Maurizio Seracini has proposed using non-invasive techniques to investigate the church and the surrounding area.
I first came across Seracini when I was working for a philantropist some years ago, and Seracini was conducting 3D analysis research into the lost Leonardo da Vinci mural The Battle of Anghiari, at the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence. It is hoped that this tine he may unearth finds similar to those from a 2012 nearby dig that found remains of The Curtain Theater, where Romeo and Juliet and Henry V were first performed.
But there is a third connection here… This week also saw the 60th anniversary of Sir Roger Bannister’s four-minute mile. On Thursday 6th May 1954 the 25-year-old medical student became the first person to break through the four-minute barrier, a feat that has only been achieved by 1,337 people since… fewer than have climbed to the summit of Everest. Sir Roger, now 85 years of age and suffering Parkinson’s disease, is still a friendly face around Oxford, and is beloved by the University and City. The radio commentary for the day remains an evocative classic:
“Result of event eight: one mile. First, RG Bannister of Exeter and Merton colleges, in a time which, subject to ratification, is a new track record, British record, European record, Commonwealth record and world record – Three minutes and …” the rest was drowned out by the cheering.
However the BBC has today been running a story claiming that Sir Roger might not have been the first man to run the mile in less than four minutes. Apparantly, as long ago as 1770 a certain James Parrott was wagered 15 Guineas that he could not run a mile in under four and a half minutes. The BBC paints wonderful picture of the race, describing how “with money on the line, it’s likely that umpires on both sides carefully checked the watches, locked them in a box to prevent tampering, and placed them in a horse-drawn carriage that would make sure they reached the finish line ahead of the runner.“ And that finishing line, was none other than the gates of St Leonard’s Parish Church in Shoreditch.
The result was reported in the Sporting Magazine of 1794: “1770 May 9th, James Parrott, a coster-monger, ran the length of Old St, viz. from the Charterhouse- wall in Goswell Street, to Shoreditch Church gates, (which is a measured mile) in four minutes.”
It’s the first known report of a four-minute mile. I wonder if he saw Liam Neeson on the way?
Filed under Oxford: The Perspiring Dream, Timology
Nostalgia, melancholy, and a pint in Rotherhithe: The Fighting Temeraire
‘The Fighting Temeraire’ is one of my favourite paintings… indeed in 2005 it was voted Britain’s favourite painting in a BBC poll. Not surprisingly, the vote coincided with the 200 year anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar.
By 1839 Turner was well in his sixties when he painted the 98 gun ageing battleship being towed from Sheerness to Rotherhithe to be broken up. The painting is staggering for its beauty and elegance, and is deeply evocative of a sense of loss; the graceful old warship slipping silent through the waters behind the prosaic, belching, little steam-powered tug. The gloaming combines dramatically with the twilight of Nelson’s era of rigging and rum, heralding the decline of British sea power in the minds of many at the time.
Temeraire had served her country well. She was one of the key ships that took part in the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, serving alongside HMS Victory, as Nelson ploughed straight through the French and Spanish lines. Following the battle the damage report showed that every sail and yard had been destroyed; only the lower masts were standing and they had been shot through in many places; the rudder had been shot off together with the starboard ‘cat-head’, from which the starboard anchor should have been suspended. Eight feet of her hull on the starboard side was stove in and the quarter galleries on both sides of the ship had been destroyed as she was crushed between the French ships.
But Turner did not want to show her scars, and was somewhat imaginative with the details of his masterpiece. As he watched, on the evening of the 6th of September 1838, the Temeraire was pulled up the Thames to Beatson’s ship-breaking yard. Despite the rain, he would have seen that she was in fact pulled by two tugs, not one, and that her masts, rigging, and most of her decks were missing. In the painting the ships are shown travelling east, away from the sunset, even though Rotherhithe is west of Sheerness, and besides there was little or no sunset that day according to other observers. Turner called the work his “darling”. But that’s not the point… details are rarely nostalgic, and should never be melancholy.
I am telling you all this because at the weekend I found the spot from which Turner watched her final journey. It’s just next to The Angel Pub in Rotherhithe, which if you happen to be passing, is well worth a stop for a pint! No comments about ‘battle scarred hulking old wrecks’ please…
Filed under Timology
My Amazing Find: The Ark of the Covenant
I have some serious and important news to share with you all:
I have found the final resting place of The Ark of the Covenant.
For those of you who are not Biblical scholars, the Ark of the Covenant is the chest described in the Book of Exodus as containing the Tablets of Stone on which the Ten Commandments were inscribed. The Biblical account relates that about a year after the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, the Ark was created according to the pattern given to Moses by God when Israel was encamped at the foot of Mount Sinai. The Israelite armies carried the Ark on their campaigns hidden under a large veil made of skins and blue cloth, always carefully concealed, even from the eyes of the priests and the Levites who carried it. It was captured for some time by the Philistines, before King David re-captured it, and it was placed in King Solomon’s Temple. In 597 BC, the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem, and Solomon’s Temple, and the Ark has never been seen again.
Of course that was until the Nazis found it, leading to the entirely factual account given in the documentary, Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. You can see it clearly shown here and on the promotional poster for the documentary.
At the end of the epic account the Ark is shown being wheeled carefully away for “study” by “experts” in a large warehouse in belonging to the US Government. But I have found it.
The Americans obviously gave it to the University of Oxford for research, as it is now in Christ Church Cathedral, as my photo below clearly shows. Obviously I did not lift the sacred covering, in the knowledge and fear of the fate of Uzzah (see here if you know not of which I speak…) but I am sure it is the Ark. I wonder if the University know that they still have it?
Filed under Oxford: The Perspiring Dream, Timology
Simla’s goat path to Empire
Many thanks to my friend, William Garrood, for this little gem of a quote from William Dalrymple’s latest offering, Return of a King:
“The existence of Simla was itself a comment on the astonishing complacency of the British in India at this period: for seven months of the year, the Company ruled one-fifth of mankind from a Himalayan village overlooking the borders of Tibet and connected to the outside world by a road little better than a goat path.”
You can follow William’s excellent collection of digital snippets and comments here.
Filed under Timology
Royal Mail Ships and the last few pink bits on the map.
I like to think of this site as a kind of ‘cabinet of curiosities’ on the web; of no especial purpose or relevance, but perhaps interesting and worth of the distraction… anyway, I was musing the other day about how to go about visiting some of the more remote islands around the world that are still painted pink on the map. Ben Fogle wrote a highly entertaining book on the subject called ‘The Tea Time Islands‘ some years back, and I can recommend it. (Ben must be a good chap to meet in a pub BTW; he seems genuinely charming, and among his achievements has rowed the Atlantic Ocean in 49 days and crossed Antarctica by foot in a race to the South Pole.)
So, after a little bit of research it seems that the best way to get to the Falkland Islands is, of course, to enlist in the RAF and hope (!) to be posted to RAF Mount Pleasant… This RAF station is currently home to between 1,000 and 2,000 British military personnel, and is located about 30 miles southwest of Port Stanley. To help you while away the time, you can entertain yourself along the world’s longest corridor; half a mile (800 m) long, that links the barracks, messes and recreational and welfare areas of the base. I bet the time flies past… while a trip to Diego Garcia in the service of HM Armed Forces might involve such cultural highlights as, “providing a visible demonstration of United Kingdom sovereignty on the behalf of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and a number of civil functions ranging from policing to customs and excise.” Where do I sign?
However it researching was how one might get to St Helena that gave me most pleasure. Do you remember those evocative names of old steam ships? The sort of Blue Riband, Cunard Line / Union-Castle line, ladies of the oceans… Mauretania, Olympic, Persia, Titanic, Lancastria? Well, almost all of them were Royal Mail Ships, and used the RMS prefix. Any vessel designated as “RMS” had, or has the right both to fly the pennant of the Royal Mail when sailing and to include the Royal Mail “crown” logo with any identifying device for the ship. The designation “RMS” has been used since around 1840, and was seen as a mark of quality and a competitive advantage, because the mail was supposed to be on time. How things have changed.
Anyway, the shift in recent years to air transport for mail has left only an handful of ships with the right to the prefix or its variations. Queen Mary 2 was conferred “RMS” by Royal Mail when she entered service in 2004 on the Southampton to New York route as a gesture to Cunard’s history, while the Royal Mail has allowed British Airways to use their logo and crest on a plane’s fuselage, usually alongside their registration markings. But the ship that interested me was the RMS St Helena which sails between Cape Town and Saint Helena with regular shuttles continuing to Ascension Island. Her website is wonderful, and you can even follow the ship’s progress in real time (slow) on a map! The ship is a far cry from the floating ‘gin places’ one usually associates with cruise ships, indeed the site boasts that, “there are no theatres, no casinos, no golf ranges… Life on board is far from frenetic.” Its not cheap mind you, with cabins costing between £770 and £3,418 for the Ascension to Cape Town leg, but Ascention has to be one of the more bizarre holiday destinations anyway! You can find out more about her, and life abroad here.
Filed under Timology
Visit Ukraine
With the troubling news from Kiev and Ukraine filling our news feeds these last few weeks, I was amused to find this little gem in the dark recesses of my laptop… I think it’s best to let things calm down a bit first though…
Filed under Timology
Green Sheds and Goddesses: The Seven Pillars of Wisdom Trust
I have recently been lead down a rabbit hole of research. It involved, as many of my goose-chases do, chasing Lawrence of Arabia around London, and ended up in the archives of the British Museum, starting from a much more unlikely venue; a dark green wooden shed in the middle of a central London road junction.
Some months ago I was visiting a friend, not a million miles from Lords’ Cricket Ground, on Warwick Avenue. I was waiting to meet her in a conspicuous place near the Underground entrance, and chose to shelter from the rain under the awnings of a green wooden shed. On the side of the shed was a brass disc, that claimed that said shed was a “Cabman’s Shelter” and further that it had been restored in 1994 by “The Cabmen’s Shelter Fund, the Heritage of London Trust, and the Seven Pillars of Wisdom Trust.” This set my mind wandering off towards an enormous grant from the Trust to wander the Hejaz, looking for the trains destroyed by Lawrence. (I know you can still find some of them, and it has long been my desire to go and locate them… the small matter of a bloody civil war in Syria has thus far thwarted me.) But then my friend arrived, and we dashed off for a pint.
These sheds used to be quite common in London, and you can see what they have been used for more recently in a BBC magazine video here. The Cabmen’s Shelter Fund was established in London as long ago as 1875 to run shelters for the drivers of hansom cabs and later hackney carriages. By law, cab drivers at the time could not leave the cab stand while their cab was parked there. This made it very difficult for them to obtain hot meals and could be unpleasant in bad weather. The Earl of Shaftesbury and other worthies therefore took it upon themselves to set up a charity to construct and run shelters at major cab stands, but I somehow can’t imagine he frequented them too often. There are still 13 of these dark green sheds around London (and a couple in Oxford, for you eagle eyed Oxonians) The shelters were originally provided with seats and tables and books and newspapers, most of them donated by the publishers or other benefactors. Most could accommodate ten to thirteen men, but gambling, drinking, and swearing were strictly forbidden! Now these shelters are Grade II listed buildings.
“Fascinating!” I hear you cry, but what of the Seven Pillars of Wisdom Trust?
Well, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom Fund is now a charity that awards grants for archaeological, environmental, and other academic projects. There were originally two Trusts, both set up in 1936 by A. W. Lawrence, who was the sole beneficiary under the will of T. E. Lawrence, and thus inherited the copyright of all his brother’s works. To the ‘Seven Pillars of Wisdom Trust’ he assigned the copyright in Seven Pillars of Wisdom, which was shortly afterwards given its first publication. To the ‘Letters and Symposium Trust’ he assigned the copyright in all his brother’s letters. The two Trusts were amalgamated in 1986.
So, apart from rebuilding Green Sheds in central London what else have they been up to? Well, I might be wrong, but seemingly not a lot… they hardly advertise themselves, but did make a contribution towards the purchase of a stunning 19th Century BC Babylonian relief, called the Queen of the Night, for those luck people at the British Museum. And she is stunning.
The nude female figure is depicted with tapering feathered wings and talons, standing with her legs together, and sporting a sort of bizarre headdress of four pairs of horns topped by a disc. She is ‘supported’ by a pair of addorsed lions above a scale-pattern representing mountains, and is flanked by a pair of standing owls. Quite what this has to do with Lawrence, or green sheds, I have no idea!
Filed under Timology
Rest and Roof Restoration
A little glimmer of good news for you all in this miserable weather; the Oxford University Museum of Natural History is set to reopen its doors to the public on Saturday 15 February.
The museum has been closed for a full 14 month restoration project on its fabulous roof which should prevent the glass-tiled roof of the museum from leaking rainwater into the courts below. The £2 million roofing work involved more than 8,500 glass tiles being individually removed, cleaned and resealed with a mastic silicone. Where necessary, replacement glass tiles have been handmade to match the Victorian originals. While all this has been going on the museum staff have been able to complete successful conservation work on a number of whale skeletons, which were lowered from their position above the court, treated for the first time in over 100 years, and then raised again in a new configuration. Additional lighting has also been installed throughout the public areas of the museum, including specially designed rings of LEDs attached to the underside of the building’s original gas-lamp fittings. They have even got round to opening a small cafe run by Morten’s (who basically run all the other cafes in Oxford…)
If you have not been to the museum, you really must go… I describe it as a Cathedral to Nature, something Sir Henry Acland, The Regius Professor of Medicine, would have agreed with. He initiated the construction of the museum between 1855 and 1860, to bring together all the aspects of science around a central display area. In 1858, Acland gave a lecture on the museum, setting forth the reason for the building’s construction. He believed that the University should offer a chance to learn of the natural world and obtain the “knowledge of the great material design of which the Supreme Master-Worker has made us a constituent part“. This idea, of Nature as the Second Book of God, was common in the 19th century. The museum was funded through the sale of Bibles by the University, and also houses the Pitt Rivers Museum through a rabbit hole door at the rear… In 19th-century thinking, it was very important to separate objects made by the hand of God (natural history) from objects made by the hand of man (anthropology). But more on that, and the Pitt Rivers on another occasion.
The museum was built between 1885 and 1886, and is a stunning piece of Victorian architecture. It consists of a large square court with a glass roof, supported by cast iron pillars, which divide the court into three aisles. Cloistered arcades run around the ground and first floor of the building, with stone columns each made from a different British stone. The ornamentation of the stonework and iron pillars incorporates natural forms such as leaves and branches, combining the Pre-Raphaelite style with the scientific role of the building. Interestingly, Irish stone carvers O’Shea and Whelan were employed to create lively freehand carvings in the Gothic manner. When funding dried up they offered to work unpaid, but were accused by members of theUniversity Congregation of “defacing” the building by adding unauthorised work. According to Acland, they responded by caricaturing the Congregation as parrots and owls in the carving over the building’s entrance. I hope the new roof makes them easier to spot!
Filed under Oxford: The Perspiring Dream, Timology
Contact with the future
A few months ago I wrote a piece about Google’s new ‘Google Glasses’, waffling on about how they might potentially be used to collect invasive amounts of information, and the pervasive creep of such smart technologies into our lives. It seemed to capture the zeitgeist and concerns of a lot of readers (well… both of you…) and it got punted about t’internet for a short time. Now however those clever folks at Google have come up with something far more interesting, and there has been barely a whisper (or beep) about it.
They are developing a kind of ‘Smart Contact Lense’ with integrated sensors and circuitry that are able to monitor blood sugar levels. While this might not sound the most exciting technological development (when, say, compared to being able to play ‘Candy Crush’ on your Google Glasses while appearing to all intents and purposes to read the newspaper, or listen to your Great Aunt’s laments about her angina…) but it could be revolutionary for those with diabetes.
Diabetes is a metabolic disease in which a person has high blood sugar, either because the pancreas does not produce enough insulin, or because cells do not respond to the insulin that is produced. There are two main types, early onset, mostly in children, and later onset in adults. Basically it’s pretty grim, and there really is no known cure. Instead, management concentrates on keeping blood sugar levels as close to normal (“euglycemia”) as possible, without causing hypoglycaemia. This is done through injection or intake of insulin to lower ‘spikes’ in blood sugar. The problem is that people with diabetes have to vigilantly monitor their blood-glucose levels or they risk major problems like passing out, and in extreme cases, coma, or such trivialities as death. And the bad news is that these ‘spikes’ can be caused by pretty much anything; eating, exercise, sweating, drinking, etc, etc.
Those that are not able to regulate their own blood sugar levels have to monitor themselves frequently, often by drawing a very small blood sample from the tip of their finger… mostly painless, but a pain in the backside, and not exactly romantic on a first dinner date. So these cunning contacts lenses monitor bloody sugars in the tears of the eye; here is what the Google X team has to say for itself:
“We’re now testing a smart contact lens that’s built to measure glucose levels in tears using a tiny wireless chip and miniaturised glucose sensor that are embedded between two layers of soft contact lens material. We’re testing prototypes that can generate a reading once per second. We’re also investigating the potential for this to serve as an early warning for the wearer, so we’re exploring integrating tiny LED lights that could light up to indicate that glucose levels have crossed above or below certain thresholds. It’s still early days for this technology, but we’ve completed multiple clinical research studies which are helping to refine our prototype. We hope this could someday lead to a new way for people with diabetes to manage their disease.”
While this technology may be five years or more from any potential general release, Google is in talks with the Food and Drug Administration in the US. We have indeed come a long way since 1508 when that ‘visionary’ (sorry…) da Vinci thought up the idea of inserting a thin film of glass over the eye to correct his vision, and 1823 when the British physicist John Herschel came up with the first practical design for contact lenses! Interesting too that Google appear to be moving into the realm of technological medicine, but as a contact lense wearer, and one with a history of diabetes in the family, I see this as no bad thing. If, that is, I have my lenses in!
Filed under Timology
Tim Myatt 