Durham Miners Gala

Durham City UK The annual celebration of a great industry and labor movement, once a living force, now a memory, nostalgically inspiring at best, after Thatcher’s neo-liberal ideology and political spite closed all the coal mines in the UK and devastated the pit villages. More photos – [Link]

Hadrian's Wall | Stanegate | Vindolanda

(Use the controls to navigate through the panorama.) In the North East of England for the Binchester excavations – Vinovium.org. Just to the north of our site. Looking southwest, the Stanegate (Roman, named “stone road” in early medieval times) runs from the left of the picture, through the fort of Vindolanda and then straight up…

Binchester 2010

The excavations of Binchester – Vinovium – continue this month as the international team arrive from Stanford, Texas Tech and a host of other universities. Community involvement is substantial this year too, with 20 people a week joining the project. website – Vinovium.org website – dur.ac.uk/binchester.fort blog – binchester.blogspot.com/

Dere Street | Chew Green

In the North East of England for the Binchester excavations – Vinovium.org. Dere Street, the Roman road that passes through Binchester, here runs north across what is now the English-Scottish border. There was a medieval village – Kemblepath – up here in the wilds of Upper Coquetdale. On the site of Chew Green, the Roman…

spectral stone

The Coquet Valley in Northumberland is fascinating me. [Link] Around Lordenshaws, across from the market town of Rothbury, are many carved rock surfaces, typically associated with farming communities from the fourth to and millennia BCE, maybe earlier and maybe later. Birky Hill I met Stan Beckensall, school teacher in Rothbury, rock art enthusiast, some thirty…