Newsletter 2024

posted in: Family | 0

The year began with Rachel, Sean and boys moving in while their kitchen was rebuilt and other work done. It was all great fun – here we are in early morning mode But the job took a lot longer than … Continued

Mitchel Troy

Amy and I set off to Mitchel Troy, just south of Monmouth, to look for this https://twitter.com/johnevigar/status/1716331933066572125 which the wonderful John Vigar posted on Twitter back in October. It’s a medieval church, probably part of the great Norman rebuilding of … Continued

Grandparenting 2023

posted in: Family | 3

Seth and Ethan are both growing – which means they are more able to play together. Here they are at St Fagan’s last summer And here sharing the joy of puddles and jigsaw puzzles (at which they are both pretty … Continued

Fforest Fach

This is yet another of those ‘medieval forest boundaries I have walked past dozens of times without recognising them’ posts (see also https://www.heritagetortoise.co.uk/2022/11/forest-boundaries/, https://www.heritagetortoise.co.uk/2022/11/coed-rhiwr-ceiliog/, https://www.heritagetortoise.co.uk/2022/12/fforest-ganol/ ). Fforest Fach runs between the ridge of Rhiwbina Hill and the little valley of … Continued

Seth and Ethan

posted in: Family | 0

When Seth first saw Ethan, a morning just before last Christmas, he put his hands on his hips and said ‘Well, I never!’ Ethan adores Seth, perhaps too much – whatever Seth is playing with Ethan wants to play too, … Continued

Rees John of Cefn Llwyd

posted in: Family | 0

Some more of our family history has turned up in the papers of my late cousin David Morris. My mother’s reminiscences (downloadable at https://www.heritagetortoise.co.uk/2017/11/betty-john-cefn-llwyd/ ) described how her family moved from Michaelston-le-Pit to Cefn Llwyd in Michaelston-y-Fedw in 1908, and … Continued

The Story of the Fox Inn, Juniper

posted in: Family | 0

(photo (c) Snidge, from https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/75/Juniper_Hill_-_geograph.org.uk_-_344120.jpg) Here are two inventories of the contents of a little public house on the Oxfordshire-Northamptonshire border. The first, dated 1882, is a probate inventory, a very detailed valuation of the contents of the pub and … Continued

More on portable/movable fonts

posted in: Uncategorized | 0

A couple of additions to the post on small fonts at https://www.heritagetortoise.co.uk/2022/06/portable-fonts/. The Penrhys font is about 9 kg in weight – I would describe it as movable but not really portable. We had a very fruitful discussion on the … Continued

Grandparenting 2021

posted in: Family | 0

Seth has had a busy year in spite of lockdowns and restrictions. He likes being out in all weathers – snow rain … exploring the stream – in all weathers watching the trains with his best friend Nell the spaniel … Continued

Picturesque tourism and industry: some links

posted in: Uncategorized | 0

These are links to the online texts that I’m using in my lecture to the Oxford House Industrial Archaeological Society Richard Warner, A Walk Through Wales  https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=AdcQh0l41XoC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false (p. 232) The anonymous ‘Northern Tour, or, Poetical epistles’ is at https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=s_Q7AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false (p. … Continued

Seth

posted in: Family | 2

Grandparenting in a time of Covid Seth’s first full year has been a very strange one. From restaurant meals and church play group to lockdown – videochats working from home and a WhatsApp birthday. But there was still fun – … Continued

The pilgrim game

posted in: Pilgrimage | 5

When I was an undergraduate, way back when, we played board games like Risk, sometimes all night. We still have the odd game of Monopoly at Christmas, but I hadn’t realised that board games were a Thing until my daughter … Continued

Limericks and haiku

posted in: Family | 0

The limericks from the wedding competition rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(1) rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(2) rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(3) rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(5) rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(6) rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(7) rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(8) rhyt_22-08-2016_13-14-34_MFDNPT1(9)

An Honourable Estate

posted in: Family | 0

Some more wedding photos – and another speech. Photos are all from the online album – lots more at  http://www.wedpics.com/album/GI4TGNZWGIZQ . Here we are in the porch the amazing bus that Sean’s dad arranged to get us into Cardiff Rachel … Continued

Grave London

posted in: Graveyards | 0

Mostly photos for the next few blogs – a wonderful week in London spent mostly in https://heritagetortoise.files.wordpress.comyards, with a meeting of the Church Monuments Society for light relief. Old St Pancras: the Hardy Tree this lovely little angel on a … Continued

Devauden and the Vedw

posted in: Welsh History | 4

Another treasure from the newsletter archive of the Gwent County History Association. This is a contribution from Ann Wareham about the Vedw villages where she lives: that unique Gwent borderland, neither entirely English nor entirely Welsh but entirely magical. Aspects … Continued

Llangwm School

posted in: Welsh History | 0

Continuing with extracts from the newsletter archive of the Gwent County History Association: Children of the Parish Gwent historians owe a great deal to the Rev. William Price of Llangwm, the late nineteenth-century clergyman who was responsible for restoring Llangwm … Continued

On leaving memories behind

posted in: Family | 0

I now have my mother’s ashes in a neat little box on my bookshelf, between Ralph Griffiths’s Principality of Wales in the Later Middle Ages and the skull of a medieval nun from Cambridge. It’s a very small box to … Continued

Caerleon Campus History Lectures 2014

posted in: Uncategorized | 0

University of South Wales (Caerleon Campus) History Public Seminar Programme Spring 2014 Wednesdays, 6pm  A chance to share in some of the recent research from the History team at Caerleon: the lectures will be followed by informal discussion  Wednesday,29 January … Continued

Inhabiting the past

posted in: Heritage (General) | 0

Off to the National History Museum at St Fagans, ostensibly  to talk about the Welsh background to Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall. My plan was to challenge some traditional ideas about Cromwell and the Acts of Union and to look at … Continued

Heritagising dissent

posted in: Heritage (General) | 0

Michael Heseltine – flak jacket wearer, Tory leadership challenger, hero of the Westland Helicopter affair – seems to be turning into a sort of Dear Old Man. My university has just given him an honorary doctorate. When I got over … Continued

The Women’s Race for Life

posted in: Family | 0

Well, the tortoise and hare thing didn’t work, but we had fun anyway. About 2,000 women running, jogging and walking 5 km around the park in Cwmbran to raise money to fight cancer. We like the Cwmbran Race for Life … Continued

Early Medieval Inscribed Stones

posted in: Archaeology | 0

I have the final volume of Nancy Edwards’ Corpus of Early Medieval Inscribed Stones to review. Of course, it’s brilliant, the illustrations are magnificent – what can I say? I have to think of something a little bit critical (not … Continued