I went to see a new exhibition yesterday that has opened this week in the Tudor room of the National Portrait Gallery called Concealed and revealed-the Changing faces of Elizabeth I.
A series of four paintings of Elizabeth that have been altered in some way from their original creation are on display and are painted at various times in her life from 1560's until her death in 1603.
An X-ray of one painting shows that Elizabeth was not the original sitter, a clear image of another face, behind and slightly higher can be seen. One painting was retouched in the 18th Century, it shows a very beautiful Elizabeth, younger too.
The highlight is the painting by an unknown artist that has not been seen by the public since 1921. It shows Elizabeth holding a serpent coiled around her right hand. It's a ghostly image as the painting has deteriorated which it was why it was removed from public display. The over painting shows Elizabeth holding a posy of Tudor roses but hidden underneath and before the varnish was applied is the serpent. A reconstruction of the serpent is placed alongside the painting to show what the original would have looked like.
Serpents held many meanings and symbolism in Tudor times. The image of Elizabeth was tightly controlled and the artist was probaly told by the controllers that it was too ambiguous for the population at the time so it was painted over. A case of Tudor spin doctors having their say.
The exhibition will run until September 26, is well worth a visit and admission is free.
http://www.tudorhistorytours.com/
Thursday, 18 March 2010
Tuesday, 9 March 2010
Cannons in the Weald
On a clear, crisp and very cold last Sunday morning where the temperature didn't get above 3C/38f, we set off with hats and gloves to find the iron making foundries in the High Weald of East Sussex. The ground was still a little icy in places under the trees and not too muddy in others, the footpaths were clearly marked and only once missed a marker and had to retrace our steps.
It is difficult to believe today that this Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty was the industrial heartland of England with many Iron making foundries 500 years ago in the Tudor age. The evidence is there to be discovered with place names like Huggets Furnace farm and Little Forge. The latter operated for over a hundred years from 1560 to 1667.
Making iron in the High Weald was very efficient because all the elements to make iron were there and still are. Walking through the hilly countryside, pausing for a moment when we came across a herd of deer and later on a couple of wild boars in the woods, we found a large number of Hammer ponds flowing into Ghylls. A Ghyll is a steep sided fast flowing stream with exposed sandstone. The sandstone contains the iron ore, we know this because the surface of the stone is rusty. The stone was quarried and only had to be transported a short distance to the foundry.
The Ghyll provided the motive power for the mill wheels that in turn operated the bellows and the hammers in the furnaces. The charcoal to fuel the furnaces was provided by the Chestnut coppices that are on a 7 year harvest cycle and still are. We came across a chap preparing a charcoal burning fire alongside a hammer pond, a skill practiced since Roman times in this area.
The first blast furnace was used in England at Ashdown forest in 1496 and in 1543 the first iron cannon was successfully cast from a clay mould in one piece at Buxted by father and son Ralph and John Hogge. These cannons were much stronger and safer than the previous guns made in sections and held together by bands and therefore Sussex cannons were able to corner the market. There is a small 16th century cannon in Mayfield village High Street that was recovered from the remains of the Mayfield furnace in 1864.
It can be said that all the cannons for Henry VIII's navy were cast in the High Weald and the guns that defeated the Spanish Armada were forged in the heart of Sussex.
Our walk also passed by a number of WWII pill boxes, small squat concrete and brick buildings sited in the woods and fields along the way, these were built to fight any German invasion of Britain in 1940.
After 3 and half hours we got back to the car a little tired and rosy cheeked from the cold but very satisfied to have found so much local history.
http://www.tudorhistorytours.com/
It is difficult to believe today that this Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty was the industrial heartland of England with many Iron making foundries 500 years ago in the Tudor age. The evidence is there to be discovered with place names like Huggets Furnace farm and Little Forge. The latter operated for over a hundred years from 1560 to 1667.
Making iron in the High Weald was very efficient because all the elements to make iron were there and still are. Walking through the hilly countryside, pausing for a moment when we came across a herd of deer and later on a couple of wild boars in the woods, we found a large number of Hammer ponds flowing into Ghylls. A Ghyll is a steep sided fast flowing stream with exposed sandstone. The sandstone contains the iron ore, we know this because the surface of the stone is rusty. The stone was quarried and only had to be transported a short distance to the foundry.
The Ghyll provided the motive power for the mill wheels that in turn operated the bellows and the hammers in the furnaces. The charcoal to fuel the furnaces was provided by the Chestnut coppices that are on a 7 year harvest cycle and still are. We came across a chap preparing a charcoal burning fire alongside a hammer pond, a skill practiced since Roman times in this area.
The first blast furnace was used in England at Ashdown forest in 1496 and in 1543 the first iron cannon was successfully cast from a clay mould in one piece at Buxted by father and son Ralph and John Hogge. These cannons were much stronger and safer than the previous guns made in sections and held together by bands and therefore Sussex cannons were able to corner the market. There is a small 16th century cannon in Mayfield village High Street that was recovered from the remains of the Mayfield furnace in 1864.
It can be said that all the cannons for Henry VIII's navy were cast in the High Weald and the guns that defeated the Spanish Armada were forged in the heart of Sussex.
Our walk also passed by a number of WWII pill boxes, small squat concrete and brick buildings sited in the woods and fields along the way, these were built to fight any German invasion of Britain in 1940.
After 3 and half hours we got back to the car a little tired and rosy cheeked from the cold but very satisfied to have found so much local history.
http://www.tudorhistorytours.com/
Thursday, 4 March 2010
Syon House
March 3rd 1415 Syon House was founded by Henry V, that glorious year in which he fought and won the battle of Agincourt. Originally an Abbey and the only Brigettine House in the country in th 15th Century. Syon has remained in the Percy family since 1584 and is situated within a beautiful park on the river Thames not 10 miles from the centre of London.
Syon House plays a large part in the Tudor century. It became Crown Property in 1539 after the suppression of the Abbey. Catherine Howard, Henry VIII's 5th wife was incarcerated there on her way to prison and execution at the Tower of London in 1542.
In 1547 the body of King Henry VIII lay for a night in the abbey church on it's way to Windsor for burial and fulfilled a gruesome prophecy from a Franciscan Friar William Peto in 1535. A dog was found licking up certain remains that had leaked from the coffin, yeuk!
The Duke of Northumberland proclaimed Lady Jane Grey as the true monarch at Syon following Henry's death. Nine days later Mary had the throne and Lady Jane Grey was executed at the Tower the following year.
Tudor History Tours visits Syon at the start of the Six wives of One king tour in May and September.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
Syon House plays a large part in the Tudor century. It became Crown Property in 1539 after the suppression of the Abbey. Catherine Howard, Henry VIII's 5th wife was incarcerated there on her way to prison and execution at the Tower of London in 1542.
In 1547 the body of King Henry VIII lay for a night in the abbey church on it's way to Windsor for burial and fulfilled a gruesome prophecy from a Franciscan Friar William Peto in 1535. A dog was found licking up certain remains that had leaked from the coffin, yeuk!
The Duke of Northumberland proclaimed Lady Jane Grey as the true monarch at Syon following Henry's death. Nine days later Mary had the throne and Lady Jane Grey was executed at the Tower the following year.
Tudor History Tours visits Syon at the start of the Six wives of One king tour in May and September.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
Friday, 26 February 2010
Inside the Body of Henry VIII
There was an excellent program on the History Channel this week called Inside the Body of Henry VIII.
It was made last year and presented by historian Robert Hutchinson, medical historian Steve Bacon(see our blog on the Parham House study day23 September 2009)with Dr Lucy Worsley and Dr Catherine Hood.
The program looked at the health of Henry from his childhood up to his death and Henry was a tough character indeed. He was exposed to tuberculosis when young, he contracted smallpox and malaria during his lfe, and had a head injury whilst jousting when younger.
What finally made him give up jousting was the accident that knocked him unconcious for two hours in January 1536, he was 45 years old at the time, what was he doing on a horse in armour at that age? It was from this second head injury that his moods began to change and he became the tyrant and despot that history remembers him by.
The accident was gruesomely recreated by dropping at 1500lb weight from 14 feet in the air onto the carcass of a pig, yuk!
From this accident, the King did not take any more exercise but cointinued to eat as much as 5,000 calories a day and was 28(178Kilos) stone when he died, he also showed all the symptons of late onset type 2 diabetes. Lucy went round a supermarket and gathered up a typical week's food for the king, there was lots of it and plenty of alchohol too.
Robert and Steve dismissed the notion that Henry had Syphilis, there is simply no evidence in the household accounts for the purchase of any mercury which was the only recognised cure for the disease at the time and there were also no medical notes in the physicians reports either of treatment for external sores that characterises the disease.
The CGI graphics of the autopsy on the body were excellent and revealing, all in all a very well researched and presented program and well worth watching.
There was no mention of the Cushings syndrome theory(see our blog again) I must ask Robert about that the next time I see him.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
It was made last year and presented by historian Robert Hutchinson, medical historian Steve Bacon(see our blog on the Parham House study day23 September 2009)with Dr Lucy Worsley and Dr Catherine Hood.
The program looked at the health of Henry from his childhood up to his death and Henry was a tough character indeed. He was exposed to tuberculosis when young, he contracted smallpox and malaria during his lfe, and had a head injury whilst jousting when younger.
What finally made him give up jousting was the accident that knocked him unconcious for two hours in January 1536, he was 45 years old at the time, what was he doing on a horse in armour at that age? It was from this second head injury that his moods began to change and he became the tyrant and despot that history remembers him by.
The accident was gruesomely recreated by dropping at 1500lb weight from 14 feet in the air onto the carcass of a pig, yuk!
From this accident, the King did not take any more exercise but cointinued to eat as much as 5,000 calories a day and was 28(178Kilos) stone when he died, he also showed all the symptons of late onset type 2 diabetes. Lucy went round a supermarket and gathered up a typical week's food for the king, there was lots of it and plenty of alchohol too.
Robert and Steve dismissed the notion that Henry had Syphilis, there is simply no evidence in the household accounts for the purchase of any mercury which was the only recognised cure for the disease at the time and there were also no medical notes in the physicians reports either of treatment for external sores that characterises the disease.
The CGI graphics of the autopsy on the body were excellent and revealing, all in all a very well researched and presented program and well worth watching.
There was no mention of the Cushings syndrome theory(see our blog again) I must ask Robert about that the next time I see him.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
Thursday, 18 February 2010
Mary Queen of Scots
18 Febraury 1587 on this day, Mary Queen of Scots was executed at Fotheringay castle and was buried at Peterborough Cathedral. The same grave digger performed the duty 50 years after he interred Catherine of Aragon. It was a grand death as Mary was dressed in a vivid crimson silk bodice and petticoat, the colour of martyrs. She gave a speech in defence of her catholic faith before putting her head on the block.
She had been a thorn in the side of her cousin Elizabeth for nearly 20 years constantly involved in plots to either get back her Scottish crown or usurp the throne of England. Elizabeth vacillated for so long before signing the death warrant and was said to be distraught when told that the deed was done.
Mary must be having the last laugh as when her son James I became King on the death of Elizabeth, he had her remains taken from Peterborough and placed in Westminster Abbey in a much grander tomb than Elizabeth's at the Abbey. It is also worth remembering that our present Soveriegn is decended from Mary as the Tudor dynasty ended with Elizabeth.
Peterborough Cathedral is on the tour itinerary of our Six Wives of one King tour.
http://www.tudorhistorytours.com/
She had been a thorn in the side of her cousin Elizabeth for nearly 20 years constantly involved in plots to either get back her Scottish crown or usurp the throne of England. Elizabeth vacillated for so long before signing the death warrant and was said to be distraught when told that the deed was done.
Mary must be having the last laugh as when her son James I became King on the death of Elizabeth, he had her remains taken from Peterborough and placed in Westminster Abbey in a much grander tomb than Elizabeth's at the Abbey. It is also worth remembering that our present Soveriegn is decended from Mary as the Tudor dynasty ended with Elizabeth.
Peterborough Cathedral is on the tour itinerary of our Six Wives of one King tour.
http://www.tudorhistorytours.com/
Wednesday, 17 February 2010
Rochester Cathedral
Rochester Cathedral is the second oldest in England after Canterbury, founded in 604 by Bishop Justus. Rochester lies on the direct route from London to Dover and overlooking the Cathedral is the mighty Norman keep of Rochester castle, besieged by King John in 1215. The present Knave dates from Norman times and is built of stone imported from Caen, the home of William the Conqueror in 1086.
Amung its many memorials is one to Charles Dickens who mentions the Cathedral in his writing, there is also Colonel John Chard VC Royal Engineers, hero of the battle of Rorkes drift in the Zulu wars.
The Cathedral plays a prominant role in the Tudor story, with not one but two of it's bishops becoming martyrs after being executed by the monarch. Bishop Fisher, stalwart defender of King Henry's first wife Catherine of Aragon, was beheaded 22 June 1535 on the orders of Henry VIII for refusing to acknowledge that the King was head of the Church in England. Bishop Fisher died as a catholic, curiously Bishop Ridley died as a Protestant, executed by Mary 20 years later 16 October 1555. Ridley was burnt at the stake during Bloody Mary's reign of terror against protestants and he had the double misfortune to have supported Lady Jane Grey during her 9 days as Queen.
Henry VIII first met Anne of Cleves here in the Bishops Palace within the precincts of the Cathedral, that meeting led to Henry saying "I like her not!" but was it him that said the she was the flanders mare? That line probably came much later on. (see our blog of 27 December). The Cathedral holds Tudor festivals with music and dancing from the period and of course Henry gets to meet with Anne again.
Tudor History Tours visits Rochester during the Elizabeth I tours on four occasions during this year. See our tour program on our website for further details.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
Amung its many memorials is one to Charles Dickens who mentions the Cathedral in his writing, there is also Colonel John Chard VC Royal Engineers, hero of the battle of Rorkes drift in the Zulu wars.
The Cathedral plays a prominant role in the Tudor story, with not one but two of it's bishops becoming martyrs after being executed by the monarch. Bishop Fisher, stalwart defender of King Henry's first wife Catherine of Aragon, was beheaded 22 June 1535 on the orders of Henry VIII for refusing to acknowledge that the King was head of the Church in England. Bishop Fisher died as a catholic, curiously Bishop Ridley died as a Protestant, executed by Mary 20 years later 16 October 1555. Ridley was burnt at the stake during Bloody Mary's reign of terror against protestants and he had the double misfortune to have supported Lady Jane Grey during her 9 days as Queen.
Henry VIII first met Anne of Cleves here in the Bishops Palace within the precincts of the Cathedral, that meeting led to Henry saying "I like her not!" but was it him that said the she was the flanders mare? That line probably came much later on. (see our blog of 27 December). The Cathedral holds Tudor festivals with music and dancing from the period and of course Henry gets to meet with Anne again.
Tudor History Tours visits Rochester during the Elizabeth I tours on four occasions during this year. See our tour program on our website for further details.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
Wednesday, 10 February 2010
Eltham Palace
Eltham Palace, the boyhood home of Henry VIII and what a truly unique place it is. It's really two palaces in one seamlessly joined together, but you step from one world to another in the blink of an eye.
It is the first place ever that I have been instructed to put on blue plastic overshoes before entering to protect the floors. Recorded in the Domesday book of 1086 as being owned by Bishop Odo the half brother of William the Conqueror. The Palace has changed hands many times, it was owned by Edward II from 1305 and Charles I was the last king to visit here. After the Civil War the place began to decay and fell into a state if decline and disrepair.
The Palace was largely rebuilt in the 1930's by Stephen and Virginia Courtauld in a magnificent Art Deco style with some incredible marquetry inlaid panels and the master bedroom has hand painted relief wall paper that would make you feel like you were sleeping in Kew gardens.
Step through a doorway into the Great Hall and you are transported back over 500 years to when it was built in 1480. The Hammerbeam roof was the third largest built at the time after Westminster Hall and Hampton Court Palace. It was lucky to survive a direct hit from a German bomb in 1940, you can still see the scorch marks on the minstrel gallery floor.
Half a dozen gardeners were hard at work preparing the grounds for the spring, when the place will be a blaze of colour. Much of the Old Palace ruins can still be seen within the grounds especially along by the sunken rose garden. With the bridge crossing the moat you can easily imagine Henry VIII as a boy fishing for the huge carp that lazily swim there.
A really remarkable place and I look forward to the spring time when the weather is warmer and the gardens are in full bloom.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
It is the first place ever that I have been instructed to put on blue plastic overshoes before entering to protect the floors. Recorded in the Domesday book of 1086 as being owned by Bishop Odo the half brother of William the Conqueror. The Palace has changed hands many times, it was owned by Edward II from 1305 and Charles I was the last king to visit here. After the Civil War the place began to decay and fell into a state if decline and disrepair.
The Palace was largely rebuilt in the 1930's by Stephen and Virginia Courtauld in a magnificent Art Deco style with some incredible marquetry inlaid panels and the master bedroom has hand painted relief wall paper that would make you feel like you were sleeping in Kew gardens.
Step through a doorway into the Great Hall and you are transported back over 500 years to when it was built in 1480. The Hammerbeam roof was the third largest built at the time after Westminster Hall and Hampton Court Palace. It was lucky to survive a direct hit from a German bomb in 1940, you can still see the scorch marks on the minstrel gallery floor.
Half a dozen gardeners were hard at work preparing the grounds for the spring, when the place will be a blaze of colour. Much of the Old Palace ruins can still be seen within the grounds especially along by the sunken rose garden. With the bridge crossing the moat you can easily imagine Henry VIII as a boy fishing for the huge carp that lazily swim there.
A really remarkable place and I look forward to the spring time when the weather is warmer and the gardens are in full bloom.
www.tudorhistorytours.com
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