Nevsky Prospekt: Part 2 – Obelisk to the Hero City Leningrad
Граждане! При артобстреле эта сторона улицы наиболее опасна Citizens! During shelling this side of the street is the most dangerous (Inscription stencilled on walls along Nevsky Prospekt during the Siege … Continue reading
Nevsky Prospekt: Part 1 – The Alexander Nevsky Monastery
There is nothing better than Nevsky Prospekt, at least not in Petersbug; for there it is everything. What does this street – the beauty of our capital – not shine … Continue reading
Kalops
Sweden, the land of Ikea and the ubiquitous Swedish meatball. Those bite sized balls of meaty goodness formed from beef, pork, onion, bread crumbs, egg, water, salt, and pepper, and served … Continue reading
Norwegian Fjords: A Select History
The defining feature of Norway’s coastline are the many fjords that cut into the interior of the country providing waterborne access inland. Fjords are so characteristic of Norway that two, … Continue reading
Svartedauden: The Black Death in Norway
In the Summer of 1349, Magnus Eriksson, King of Norway and Sweden, wrote to his subjects appealing to them to offer prayers, to fast, and to pay a penny to … Continue reading
Fårikål
Depending on the source consulted, sheep were first domesticated 8,000, 9,000, 10,000, or 11,000 years ago in either the ancient Levant, Mesopotamia, the Fertile Crescent, or Southwest Asia. Testament perhaps to the … Continue reading
Góða Ólavsøka
“On the one side of Kalf Arnason stood his two relations, Olaf and Kalf, with many other brave and stout men. Kalf was a son of Arnfin Arnmodson, and a … Continue reading
Beer, Bans, and Brennivin: Prohibition in Iceland
Late at night on May 10, 1988, and a dozen joyful Icelanders flash victory signs outside the Alþingi as the upper house votes to bring an end to a year long … Continue reading
Móðuharðinðin – “The Hardship of the Fog”: The Human and Environmental Disaster of the Laki Eruption, 1783-4
On 8 June 1873 the Laki mountain in the Grímsvötn volcanic system of southern Iceland was ripped apart by a volcanic eruption that opened a massive fissure and scores of craters. Over a … Continue reading
The First Cod War
London, 1883, and the respected biologist Thomas Huxley rose to address the assembled delegates at the International Fisheries Exhibition government. Since 1858 Huxley had been closely involved with the British … Continue reading
‘Iceland’s Pompeii’: Þjóðveldisbærinn Stöng
In 1104 Iceland’s most famous volcano Hekla erupted, covering the local area with tephra and destroying an entire district of farm complexes in the Þjórsárdalur valley. Among them was the farmhouse named … Continue reading
Scotland invented the bicycle (?)
Back in 2005 the British Broadcasting Corporation invited the listeners of its You and Yours programme to vote for their favourite invention. The winner by a country mile was the … Continue reading
‘The Apprehension of Sundrye Witches’ : The Prosecution of Witchcraft in Scotland, 1590-1727
Sixteenth and Seventeenth century Scotland, along with the rest of the British Isles and Continental Europe, saw a previously unparalleled increase in the number of people brought to trial and … Continue reading
The Antonine Wall
The Vallum Antonini or Antonine Wall runs for 39 miles west to east from Old Kilpatrick on the Firth of Clyde to Bo’ness on the Firth of Forth. Built between 142 … Continue reading
The Belfast Outdoor Relief Strike of 1932
Yes! We have no bananas, We have no bananas today. We’ve string beans, and onions, Cabbages and scallions And all kind of fruit, and say, We have an old fashioned … Continue reading
James ‘Jimmy’ Michael, Welsh Cycling Champion: Part 5 – Middling Jockey, Divorce, and Early Death
While 1898 was to see Jimmy continue to train as a jockey his ambition to race in silks was not to be fully realised for another year. There was still … Continue reading
James ‘Jimmy’ Michael, Welsh Cycling Champion: Part 4 – Trouble with Officialdom and the Hour at Last
By early February 1897 Jimmy had settled his affairs with the National Cycling Union (NCU) and with ‘Choppy’[1], returning to the States on the 13th via Paris where he visited … Continue reading
James ‘Jimmy’ Michael, Welsh Cycling Champion: Part 3 – American Dreams and the Race that Never Was
Jimmy’s reinstatement and return to racing did not see the end of his tribulations in 1896. In late July he failed to turn up at a meet organised by Leeds … Continue reading
James ‘Jimmy’ Michael, Welsh Cycling Champion: Part 2 – Successes and Scandals, January-July 1896
Sunday 15 December, 1895, had seen Jimmy suffer a rare defeat when he fell during the fourth lap of a 100 kilometre race at the Velodrome d’Hiver.[1] The winner, Willie … Continue reading
James ‘Jimmy’ Michael, Welsh Cycling Champion: Part 1 – Delivery Boy to World Champion, 1877-1895
Herne Hill, Saturday 30 June, 1894. Twenty-two competitors line up in the Summer heat for the Surrey Bicycle Club 100 Mile Invitation Race. Among them is a seventeen year old … Continue reading
The First Humans in Wales? Neanderthals at Pontnewydd Cave
Pontnewydd Cave in Denbighshire is the site of the oldest known human habitation in Wales and the most north-westerly hominin site of its period in Eurasia, dating back to 230,000 … Continue reading
Bikes, Dancing, Picnics and Races: Rhyl Cycling Club, 1879-1906
Picture the scene: North Wales, the seaside town of Rhyl on a sunny Whitsuntide Monday in 1885. Outside the Royal Hotel a group of cyclists from clubs in Rhyl, Oxford, … Continue reading
The Miners’ Strike in South Wales, 1984-85
“The policies of this government are clear – to destroy the coal industry and the NUM.” Arthur Scargill, President, National Union of Mineworkers “History will record that the British miner … Continue reading
Donetsk, isn’t it Boyo!
I wonder how many Russian nationalists know of the Welsh heritage of the industrial city of Donetsk, birthplace of pole-vault legend Sergey Bubka, shoe banging Nikita Krushchev, and Yevgeny Khaldei, the photographer … Continue reading
The Cucking Stool at Wootton Bassett
While browsing through the contents of archive.org I came across a copy of The Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine, Volume I, 1854, and my eye was drawn to a chapter … Continue reading
Anglo-Saxon Easter
Easter, as for all Christians, was the most important ceremony in the Anglo-Saxon liturgical year. For monastic communities abstinence and penitential repentance began on Septuagesima, the ninth Sunday before Easter … Continue reading
Devizes Pie
Devizes is a market town in Wiltshire, England, and the place of my birth. Its unusual name comes from the description of the castle that was built there by Osmund, … Continue reading
Hic:Est:Wadard
I am perhaps absurdly pleased by the fact that there is a link between the Bayeux Tapestry and my home town of Swindon in Wiltshire, England. The knight Wadard appears … Continue reading
The ætheling Æthelstan’s deathbed will of 1014
On the Friday after the feast of midsummer in 1014 Ælfgar, the son of Æffa, brought the reply of King Æthelred Unræd to his son, the ætheling Æthelstan. The ailing prince … Continue reading
Skuldelev 3: Viking merchant shipping in the 11th Century
At some point between 1070 and 1090 AD, five ships were loaded with stones and scuttled to form a defensive barrier in the Peberrenden channel of Roskilde Fjord. These medieval … Continue reading
Danish flint daggers: Technology and society in late Neolithic and early Bronze Age Denmark
Finds of flint daggers from Late Neolithic and early Bronze Age Denmark represent what many archaeologists regard as the pinnacle of flint knapping technology in the Stone Age, surpassing the … Continue reading
Feuersturm: Hamburg under the bombs, 1943
On the night of July 27, 1943, the Royal Air Force carried out the second of three major raids against the city of Hamburg. In the space of fifty minutes … Continue reading
Hanse
The ‘Steel-yard’ at London, now the site of Cannon Street Station, was once the western terminal of the Hanseatic trading system that linked England with Germany, Scandinavia, and Russia, and … Continue reading
Sild: Herring fisheries in the medieval Baltic
Let all the fish that swim in the sea, Salmon and turbot and cod and ling, Bow down the head and bend the knee, To herring their king – to … Continue reading
Wendenkreuzzug: The Wendish Crusade of 1147
Between 1140 and 1143 some dozen noble Saxon families from the county of Holstein began a process of subjugation of the neighbouring Wends as they pushed into Wagria, establishing themselves … Continue reading
Mietskasernes: Working Class Berlin, 1871-1922
Following German unification in 1871 Berlin was transformed from a provincial city, capital of the Kings of Prussia, to an international, bustling, industrial metropolis in a few short decades. Its … Continue reading
Lucas Cranach the Elder
Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553) arrived in Wittenberg in 1505 as an already accomplished artist having been appointed court painter to the Elector of Saxony Friedrich III, der Wiese. It … Continue reading
Aaron Cripps’ Fab Five: A Childhood Favorite, a Specter, a Pope & More
Originally posted on Yesterday Unhinged:
Hello, like our host my name is Aaron and I’d like to thank him for inviting us to contribute to his Fab Five series. I…
Gesellenstechen
While reading around the subject of The Reformation in Germany during the early 16th Century I came across this painting by Jost Amman (1539-1591) in Martin Kitchen’s, The Cambridge Illustrated History … Continue reading
The Bombing of Dresden: Morality and Air Power in World War Two
The primary object of your operations should now be focused on the morale of the enemy civil population, and in particular on the industrial workers. Air Staff Directive No. 22, … Continue reading
