Celebrating Maundy Thursday in Medieval Durham (2018)
Today is a beautiful sunny Maundy Thursday in Durham. In light of the day, we’re reposting this Flower from a few years back: How did the medieval monks of Durham celebrate Maundy Thursda...
Flower of the Month
Each month, we post an amusing, interesting, or noteworthy entry drawn from our discoveries in the archives of the North East.
Flower of the Month: Beverley’s Benevolence to Henry VIII
King Henry VIII visited Yorkshire only once in the course of his long reign, in the summer and autumn of 1541, and seems to have been prompted to travel so far only by the perceived need to calm (and ...
Update (stop the press): even earlier plough ceremonies from Durham?
In an update to REED N-E’s earlier ‘Flower of the Month’, we’ve discovered that Durham might have even older evidence for plow ceremonies than those mentioned last week (see E...
Epiphanytide in Medieval Durham
The Feast of Epiphany celebrates the revelation of God’s earthly presence to the Gentiles, through the revelation of the Christ-child to the Magi: et ecce stella quam viderant in oriente anteced...
‘No No my Lord’: Northumberland will have no turnings or windings
‘No No my Lord’ Anyone frustrated by current arguments in the news might benefit from reading the following spirited letter from the ninth Earl of Northumberland to William Cecil, second Earl of S...
Flower of the Month: Leeds’ John Harrison – good Christian benefactor or ‘the very knave of knaves’?
A standard search of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography for “John Harrison” produces twelve results. Among scientists, artists, a horologist, a naval officer, clergymen, conspirat...
Flower of the Month: Youths playing ‘badly’ in Berwick-upon-Tweed
This month’s Flower comes from the Northumberland border town of Berwick-upon-Tweed. The borough account book records some youthful shenanigans in the streets of Berwick in the early 1540s. An u...
Flower of the Month: Celebrating Corpus Christi in Medieval Durham
Today, 15 June, is the Feast of Corpus Christi. This feast, traditionally celebrating the ‘Body of Christ’ represented by the bread and wine of the sacrament of Communion, has been a highlight of ...
Flower of the Month: Stylish Yorkshire wedding celebrations: Elizabeth Nevile, 1526.
Among the papers of the Strickland-Constable family of Wassand Hall in the East Riding of Yorkshire, now lodged at the East Riding Archives (ERA) office in Beverley, is a modest little booklet, of pap...
The Devil of Doncaster
The Devil of Doncaster In 1614, Brian Cooke, ‘gentleman’ of Doncaster, complained to the Court of Star Chamber that Thomas Bevett, Original Bellamy, and twelve others, ten of them musicians, had d...