Gary (Devore) sent me this picture from the outing to Housesteads Roman fort taken by the Binchester Field School on Sunday – the sheep clearly quite at in with the impending rainstorm. I am reminded of waiting for a train at Cambridge station some time ago, sleet driving horizontally up the platform. One ticket guard…
borderlands
chorography – media materialities
Gallery – [water pigment paper] Working on my text accompaniment to the guide to Paul Noble’s art work, on display currently at Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, has had me reflecting again on just how we might describe an encounter, in this case with a world of the imagination, a curiously enigmatic cosmopolis. (As an archaeologist…
Flodden Field
Today is the 500th anniversary of Flodden Field – the battle near the village of Branxton in Northumberland, just south of the Scottish border. Here is what I wrote about the site on a visit back in 2007 [Link] In the tracks of northern antiquaries, summer 2007 September 9 1513: in the low rolling hills…
the face of the Roman past
I am missing being at the the Binchester excavations this summer [Link], not least because they have thrown up a remarkable sculpted head in sandstone [Link] It is quite reminiscent of one found at the outpost of Benwell on Hadrian’s Wall back in 1862 and identified as the Celtic god Antenociticus: Another indication of how…
Itinerarium Septentrionale
I have started the publication of my work in the English/Scottish borders with a three volume visual chorography. The first is now available. Itinerarium Septentrionale – A Northern Journey. Volume One – Coast Here is how I describe the project: Itinerarium Septentrionale: a northern journey through the English/Scottish borders. An itinerary: a schedule, a list,…
The Field Marshal, the artist, and an old edition of Walter Scott
Matters of the presence of the past — haunting presences. A couple of editions of Walter Scott’s poetry have arrived from my favorite bookseller – Barter Books of Alnwick, Northumberland UK. The first is an 1866 edition of Scott’s poem, Marmion, about the days before the disaster of Flodden Field in 1513. It is illustrated…
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