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  • Apocalypse Demographics in Fiction and Film July 12, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Actualite
    Apocalypse Demographics in Fiction and Film

    There are a series of apocalyptic scenarios in literature and film that involve a portion of the world’s population disappearing or dying and the minority left behind having to fight for survival. For example, the graphic novel The Y: The Last Man describes the destruction of all men and a world where women rule: there […]

    The Knight, the Lance and the Lightning Bolt July 11, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Medieval
    The Knight, the Lance and the Lightning Bolt

    ***dedicated to Typhon who asked this question*** You are a knight, a protector of the realm and an important local landowner.  You are, as befits your station, mounted and covered from head to toe in plate armour: the only thing you see is the narrow line of sight afforded to you by the eye slot in […]

    Close Encounter of the Zeppelin Kind July 10, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Contemporary
    Close Encounter of the Zeppelin Kind

    In the 1960s, date unspecified, a southern English paper the Hackney and Kingsland Gazette published the following letter, a memoir from one Mr S.C. Thomas, who had lived in the area in the First World War. His memories had taken him back to October 1916 when he and Hilda Cavanagh had gone out for a […]

    Seeing Fairies is Out: Lost Manuscript Found July 9, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Contemporary, Modern
    Seeing Fairies is Out: Lost Manuscript Found

    A bragging post today. This morning a copy of Marjorie Johnson’s Seeing Fairies: From the Lost Archives of the Fairy Investigation Society arrived by express delivery: major kudos in the village when the red van drives up and the courier demands a signature, the butcher and the baker came out to watch. Regular or perhaps […]

    Burning Libraries: A Saucy Roman History Book July 8, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Ancient
    Burning Libraries: A Saucy Roman History Book

    This blogger remembers some sweaty hours reading Robert Graves’ translation of Suetonius’ The Twelve Caesars, Roman history reduced to salacious tabloid gossip. The sex, the violence, the sex, the poison, the magic, the sex and, of course, that swimming pool… But once Suetonius stops writing Roman history lovers have almost nothing until Ammianus Marcelinus’ surviving […]

    Immortal Meals #15: Full Up at Ferrara July 7, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern
    Immortal Meals #15: Full Up at Ferrara

    As noted in a recent post late medieval and early modern feasts often had as their point not the consumption of simply massive quantities of food, but the ostentatious displays of simply massive quantities of food, most of which would not be touched by human hands: at least once they had come out of the […]

    Nineteenth-Century Gravegoods in Somerset July 6, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern
    Nineteenth-Century Gravegoods in Somerset

    The burial of children is always extremely melancholy. The very tragedy of putting a loved child in the ground – memories of an Anglo-Saxon grave in Oxfordshire covered previously by this blog – leads relations, siblings and particularly parents to an unusual pitch of grief and in that grief they sometimes make unusual decisions. Certainly, […]

    The Ten Stupidest Duels in History July 5, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Contemporary, Modern
    The Ten Stupidest Duels in History

    Duelling was a sensible institution that, from the sixteenth to the twentieth century, reminded young men, and sometimes women, of a particular social class that – never mind how they had been spoilt growing up – words and actions had consequences. Most individuals who paced around in Hyde Park  slashing the air with their swords, […]

    Treasure Dragon Graffiti in Orkney July 4, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Medieval, Prehistoric
    Treasure Dragon Graffiti in Orkney

    Maeshowe was a Megalithic tomb on Orkney. At some point our Viking ancestors broke in and desecrated the innards of Maeshowe with their tiresome graffiti. We have visited some of these graffiti before while in search of an axe. However, of special interest today is the treasure graffiti: translation Bruce Dickinson. It is true what […]

    First World War Began in Restaurant in France? July 3, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Contemporary
    First World War Began in Restaurant in France?

    ***Dedicated to Ricardo who sent the photos and the story*** The Bibent is a plush restaurant in central Toulouse: on Trip Advisor it had got (at least as of this evening) a very respectable 178 Excellents out of 537. Of course, no place could go 150 years without picking up some history, in the same […]

    Three Wellingtons To Rule Them All and Hair Jewellery July 2, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern
    Three Wellingtons To Rule Them All and Hair Jewellery

      I came across this story while looking into the history of magic rings. It is some, shall we say, marginalia, written into the back of a volume that was subsequently scanned by Google. This is not the first time I’ve come across an intriguing reference on an online scan, but this one begged more […]

    Beachcombed 49 July 1, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Beachcombed
    Beachcombed 49

    Dear Reader, just finished my single summer course and now have two free-ish months for writing. Mrs B’s nausea has receded: we found that ripe melons somehow work for her. The baby is almost at six months, by the end of July it will be ‘viable’: serious kicking began last week. Little and Tiny Miss […]

    Index Biography #8 June 30, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern
    Index Biography #8

    The Index Biography is a new form of biography pioneered by this blog and introduced in a previous post. The creator must find a biography of a famous individual from history, they must turn to the index and write down eight peripheral facts about the individual’s life. We offered up previously here Sheridan le Fanu and Joseph […]

    Review: Seven Myths About Education June 29, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Actualite
    Review: Seven Myths About Education

    There is a lovely story from a successful scholarship school in New York. When the head was asked how he had managed to keep standards so high at his institution, when other nearby schools had lost their edge, he replied that it was simple. Every time a new instruction from the Department of Educaton or […]

    Fighting Over a Tennis Court June 28, 2014

    Author: Beach Combing | in : Contemporary
    Fighting Over a Tennis Court

    Battles have been fought in some odd places: in sewers, on iced lakes, in factories, across impossibly high mountains… But a battle on a tennis court is surely unique? Other strange examples: drbeachcombing AT yahoo DOT com The scrap in question took place in April 1944 at the bungalow at Kohima and was one of […]