Rambling through the past - is it a different place? - Sue Purkiss

 Ever since my first historical fiction book, Warrior King, which was about Alfred the Great, I've tussled with the question as to whether people in the past were basically pretty much the same as people in the present - apart, obviously, from not having smartphones. I think, when I was writing that - actually, come to think of it, people in the present didn't have smartphones then either - I felt that they probably were. So my Alfred was thoughtful and sensitive as well as being clever and brave; Cerys - my lovely silver-eyed Celt - was a freedom fighter as well as a semi-magical creature; Fleda (Alfred's daughter Aethelflaed, later to become the Lady of the Mercians and pretty much the definition of a warrior queen) was a determined, courageous, affectionate child. They were a nice lot, really. People you'd like to spend time with.

Some time after that, I considered writing a book about the young William the Conqueror. But the more I read, the more I decided that here was a very unpleasant character indeed. And his wife wasn't much better: her father didn't approve of William's suit, thinking that, being a bastard, he wasn't good enough. So William rode up to meet her as she was coming out of church and dragged her off her horse by her plaits. Apparently she thought this was great - what a guy! - and henceforth would have no other. As well as this, he was brutal in his treatment of the inhabitants of castles he besieged and captured - I don't remember the details, but they definitely involved cutting bits off people.

So I decided I really didn't want to spend any more time with him.

How nice it was, I thought, that things have progressed since then, and we don't behave like that any more. Hm...

The chained books

In the last couple of years, I've taken to volunteering at Wells Cathedral, mostly in the library, which was founded in 1424. It's a beautiful space, built above one side of the cloister. The arched wooden roof, the windows, and the carved heads which are portraits of contemporaries of the masons - all these are original, so almost six hundred years old. The books, some of which are chained (cf the library in the Unseen University of Terry Pratchett's Discworld books!), are mostly not as old as that: they've endured turbulent times, notably Henry VIII's Reformation, and the Civil War and its aftermath, and many were lost. But there are still some wonderful survivors:  notably an extraordinary polyglot bible (ie one written in five languages), an exquisitely illustrated Benedictine Rule, and a first edition of John Donne.

He looks a bit self-conscious, doesn't he? And look at his lovely big ears!

The annotation in red is in Archbishop Cranmer's own hand.

The original windows in the library, with Bishop Bubwith's crest.

I'm not that brilliant at remembering dates. But in quiet moments, when the past seems very close, I often wonder about the people who moved through the serene spaces of this most beautiful of cathedrals - those who built it, but also those who lived in the city and came here to worship. In those days, the magnificent West Front, with its layers of figures, saints, kings, angels, right up to the head man up at the top, would have been brightly coloured. Did the ordinary people - the tradesmen and women, the children, the pedlars, the beggars - did they come and stare at it and recognise the stories that it told? Were they allowed to wander round inside, and recognise their neighbours, carved in stone at the top of pillars - several with toothache, one stealing grapes, all with faces full of expression?

The West Front

One of the loveliest spaces in the cathedral - the staircase up to the chapterhouse, with its steps worn by centuries of footsteps.

Some local people...

There is little trace in the records of these people and what their lives were like. There's more of Bishop Nicholas Bubwith (1355-1427), who left money in his will for the building of the library. I think I have a sense of him. He was remarkable, but not in a showy sort of way. 

He was born in a little village in Yorkshire called Menthorpe, not long after the first major plague outbreak, which killed half the population and led to all sorts of unrest and turbulence. Little is known about his early life, but he entered royal service in the 1360s, and rose to become a significant figure - Lord Treasurer and Lord Privy Seal. Then in 1406 he became a bishop, first of London, then of Salisbury and finally of Wells. But he was still given responsibility by the King - by this time Henry IV - being sent as Ambassador to the Council of Constance, which was convened to sort out the mess the church had got itself into, with several would-be popes and considerable disagreements about doctrine.

But finally he came back to Wells, and busily set about sorting things out back home, improving education for the clergy (hence the library), regularising the cathedral's financial affairs, and looking round to see what needed to be done to improve the lot of the townspeople. In his will he left money to improve Somerset's roads (an ongoing endeavour!), to build almshouses, and for the poor back in Menthorpe.

So he survived life at court - and my guess is that this was because all three monarchs under whom he served recognised his value as someone who absolutely wasn't in it for himself; someone who was an effective administrator who spent his life trying to make things better for other people, not for himself.

So - we can look back at this period of British history, which was turbulent and must have been harsh in so many ways. But here we find also someone who was just getting on with things, doing the best he could, not just for himself but for other people too. Which is what, despite all the awful things that are happening in the world at the moment, most of us are trying to do.

At least, I hope so. 

PS - I am indebted to Austin Bennett, another volunteer at Wells, for his comprehensive notes on Bishop Bubwith. 

A walk in the woods: Sue Purkiss

Ironically, the beginning of the lockdown coincided with the beginning of spring - and with a spell of glorious sunny weather. I'm lucky enough to live on the slopes of the Mendip Hills, with the double bonus of a large garden, so I've been able to enjoy it: I know that many haven't.

I always love spring. Winters seem increasingly dreary, and so once the first crocus appears, I breathe a deep sigh of relief in the knowledge that the days are beginning to lengthen and life is about to begin again. So this year, as the lockdown began, I decided to post each day on Facebook a picture, usually of a flower, either from the garden or from my morning walk, to remind myself and others that life goes on and spring keeps on springing - it sounds trite, but I think this year in particular it's a useful message to hear.

Blackthorn blossom

A side effect has been that I've taken much more notice of what I'm seeing. I think, quite frankly, that I'm a bit dozy, and that any normal person would have noticed these things years ago. For instance, I've finally discovered the difference between blackthorn and hawthorn: with blackthorn, the blossom comes before the leaves, so it's much earlier. Hawthorn blossom comes after the leaves - now, in fact.


I've also noticed far more places on our hill where bluebells grow - I've always thought they were a rarity, but not so; if you only look, they're all over the place. But this is not the case with primroses. I've noticed in previous years that they're few and far between, and this was still the case this spring. One day, as I ambled through the wood, I wondered why this should be so. On Exmoor a couple of years ago we walked along the River Barle, and primroses were everywere along the river edge.

And that made me think of rivers. The Mendip countryside has so much, but it doesn't have rivers like the Barle on Exmoor or the Dwyfor in North Wales. And that must be at least in part because the Mendips are made of porous limestone - so the water sinks down underground, and that's where it spends much of its time, meandering through caves and 'caverns measureless to man' (thank you, Coleridge), before it emerges at, for example, the bottom of Cheddar Gorge or in the gardens of the Bishop's Palace in Wells.

Cheddar Gorge

So, still wandering through the woods with an eye out for primroses, I started to think about that. And it struck me that this geological circumstance has had an enormous part to play in the settlement and history of this area. Cheddar Gorge itself, for instance. (With a little research, I've found out more about how its actual formation was due not just to glaciation but to the limesone - but stay with me here, I'm still back in the wood, just thinking.) The underwater rivers created the caves, which were to be used by people at least 9000 years ago: one of them was famously buried there, and his skeleton is now in the British Museum; astonishingly, one of his direct descendants still lives in Cheddar. The skulls of others, more disturbingly, have marks on them which suggest cannibalism. So presumably the caves played a part in the origin of Cheddar as a settlement; they must have been a place of safety. (Well, except, obviously, if you were the original owner of one of the cannibalised skulls.)

The reconstructed face of the ancient skeleton, and his modern descendant, Adrian Targett - who, very fittingly, is a retired history teacher.

And then there's Wells, which must have a claim to being one of the smallest, but most beautiful cities anywhere. There is something special about Wells. I'm not particularly spiritual - you won't catch me in a druidical cloak or a goddess's garland - but when I go to Wells, it makes me feel better. I don't know why, but it does. Very noticeably.

Water in the Bishops' Palace Gardens

And perhaps Wells is actually there because, thousands of years ago, people came across the three wells where water emerges from its long journey underground, anmd thought that here was something that was not only useful, but also magical. Those wells still exist; one is in the market place, the other two are in the grounds of the cathedral, nor the Bishop's Palace Gardens. Because of them, the city is where it is; because of them, it became a spiritual centre where eventually one of the loveliest cathdrals in Britain was built. And now, those wells form the centrepiece of an enchanting garden, which provides pleasure and spiritual sustenance to those who visit it. At the moment, of course, there are no visitors. Its springtime glory - the banks by the moat sprinkled with cyclamen, narcissi, crocuses and primroses; the tulips in the quiet garden; the snowdrops, bluebells and orchids in the orchard - they're all still blooming, of course, but not, this year, for us.

So where am I going on this ramble? Well, first, the extent to which the geography of a place shapes its subsequent history has never been so clear to me. It should have been; there's nothing remotely new about what I'm saying, and I'm sure that somewhere, a geography teacher is sighing in despair.

And secondly - forgive me for stating the obvious. But perhaps nothing makes you quite so aware of something as when there is a possibility that you might lose it. Perhaps this awful pandemic will be a wake-up call. Perhaps this closer relationship with nature which many of us have experienced -  whether it leads to a discovery of the blindingly obvious or to people making pesto from wild garlic -  will have an effect, long after the pandemic is over. Perhaps we will become more careful stewards of this extraordinary world.

Hope so.

Time and the Hour - by Katherine Langrish

My husband's Uncle Bill Dilger was a watch and clockmaker-cum-repairer, and his workshop, in a small back room in his Victorian Manchester home, was a fairy palace dedicated to Time. You walked through the door and found yourself immersed in a sussuration of soft ticking from walls crowded with clocks - mahogany-cased wall clocks with sober cream faces and slow-swinging brass pendulums; elaborately carved grandfathers looming up to the ceiling with their painted moons and suns and ships; busy gilt carriage clocks tick-tick-ticking away; great dark rustic cuckoo clocks with pine-cone weights and little half-open doors (family history proudly states that the Dilgers were one of two Black Forest families who claim the invention of the cuckoo-clock); a Mickey Mouse clock with eyes that flicked from side to side;  a clock with a ballerina who spun around on her pointed toe to the tune of the Blue Danube; an antique novelty clock shaped like a clockmaker holding a timepiece under his arm: big clocks, little clocks, old clocks and new clocks, clocks in the process of being mended, and clocks which would never work again, clocks ready to be claimed and clocks whose very owners, it seemed, had left them here long ago and vanished into time themselves.

In the middle of the small room, under a low-hanging, glass-shaded light, was Uncle Bill's wooden worktable, covered in small, intricate, shining parts - cogs and springs and watch-cases.  Those he wasn't currently working on would be protected from the dust by a collection of upturned crystal sherry-glasses whose stems had snapped. Everything gleamed.

We always tried to arrive just before noon.  Bill would welcome us and we would all crowd into his workshop, adults and children alike, and wait, breathless and smiling. There would be a strange whirring. Then the first shy chime. And then one after another every working clock in the room would clear its throat and strike.  Ding, ding, ding - dong, dong - bing, bing, bing - cuckoo, cuckoo - interrupting one another in a delightful, clashing crescendo and diminuendo of shrill and rapid and slow and mellow, till finally the last cuckoo ducked back in as the little doors whipped shut, and all that would be left was the constant tick-tick-ticking. It was something that could never fail to give pleasure.

Isaac Peabody - illustration by A.R. Whitear

Uncle Bill's clock room often used to remind me of Isaac Peabody's workshop in Elizabeth Goudge's novel 'The Dean's Watch' which is set in the 1870s in an unnamed fictional cathedral city which combines elements of both Wells and Ely.  Isaac is described as 'a round-shouldered little man with large feet and a great domed and wrinkled forehead. ...His eyes were very blue beneath their shaggy eyebrows and chronic indigestion had reddened the tip of his button nose.  His hands were red, shiny and knobbly, but steady and deft.'  As for his workshop:

The shop was so small and its bow window so crowded with clocks, all of them ticking, that the noise was almost deafening. It sounded like thousands of crickets chirping or bees buzzing, and was to Isaac the most satisfying sound in the world.

But old Isaac has a secret.  Brought up by a stern father in the fear of an angry God, he is terrified of the great cathedral, and even though he is fascinated by the Jaccomarchiadus (the mechanically-operated figure that strikes a bell on the outside of a clock) which adorns its tower, he is too afraid ever to go inside the cathedral and see the clock for himself:

The Jaccomarchiardus stood high in an alcove on the tower, not like most Jacks an anonymous figure, but Michael the Archangel himself.  He was lifesize and stood upright with spread wings... Below him, let into the wall, was a simple large dial with an hour hand only. Within the Cathedral, Isaac had been told there was a second clock with above it a platform where Michael on horseback fought with the dragon at each hour and conquered him. But not even his longing to see this smaller Michael could drag Isaac inside the terrible Cathedral. No one could understand his fear.  He could not entirely understand it himself.

Perhaps not.  But here is the dial on the outside north wall of Wells cathedral, and here - below - is the west entrance, and I think you can see that there is, or could be, something awe-inspiring, even terrible, about its beauty.  You might well feel a bit of an ant, approaching it as Isaac does through the small streets of his anonymous city: 'Like a fly crawling up a wall Isaac crawled up Angel Lane, scuttled across Worship Street, cowered beneath the Porta, got himself somehow across the moonlit expanse of the Cathedral green and then slowly mounted the flight of worn steps that led to the west door...'

Eventually, right at the end of the book, Isaac does manage to conquer his fear and enter the cathedral. And there it is, the other clock.

It was just as it had been described to him. Above the beautiful gilded clock face, with winged angels in the spandrels, was a canopied platform. To one side of it, Michael in gold armour sat his white horse, his lance in rest and his visor down. On the other side the dragon's head, blue and green with a crimson forked tongue, rose wickedly from a heap of scaly coils. They waited only for the striking of the bell to have at one another. It was a wonderful bit of work. ...And to think he had lived in the city all these years and had not seen it!

Here is the one at Wells.  It dates to the late 14th century. Around the dial you may just be able to make out the four angels in the corners, who hold the four cardinal winds.

 

On the hour, every hour, armoured knights ride around the platform you can see at the top, jousting with one another, while higher up the wall to one side, the Jack perches in his alcove, striking his bell.

After I had taken these pictures, one of the cathedral clergy came out and spoke to the gathered onlookers. He didn't preach, not in a specifically Christian way, but he did ask us to consider the value of time in our lives, and to make good use of it. It was a suitable message.  In Goudge's book, old Isaac makes friends with the great Dean of the cathedral, whose clocks he comes to wind. The Dean is a sick man, who knows he has not long to live.  He pays a visit to the clock-shop and listens to Isaac talking about horology:

He delighted in Isaac's lucid explanations and he delighted too in this experience of being shut in with all these ticking clocks. The sheltered lamplit shop was like the inside of a hive full of amiable bees. ... [The clocks] spoke to him with their honeyed tongues of this mystery of time, that they had a little tamed for men with their hands and voices and the the beat of their constant hearts and yet could never make less mysterious or dreadful for all their friendliness. How strange it was, thought the Dean, as one after another he took their busy little bodies into his hands, that soon he would know more about the mystery than they did themselves. 


Dear Uncle Bill was nothing like poor frightened Isaac, but a truly happy man and a faithful Catholic who willed his best and favourite clock, the massive black grandfather which stood in his living room, to the Catholic Bishop of Salford. It was a typical gesture which I hope the Bishop appreciated, but I expect he did, as - just as Isaac does for the Dean - Bill used to go regularly to wind the Bishop's clocks.  Bill used to joke sometimes, that he didn't know what he'd do in heaven.  "I don't know what I'll do in heaven," he'd say in his soft Manchester accent, with a twinkle in his eye. "There's no clocks there!" He died at the age of ninety-? contented to the last, and would have both enjoyed and deserved the genuine epitaph that Elizabeth Goudge quotes at the beginning of 'The Dean's Watch':

Epitaph from Lydford Churchyard

Here lies in a horizontal position

The outside case of

George Routleigh, Watchmaker,

Whose abilities in that line were an honour

To his profession:

Integrity was the main-spring,

And prudence the regulator

Of all the actions of his life:

Humane, generous and liberal,

His hand never stopped

Till he had relieved distress;

So nicely regulated were all his movements

That he never went wrong

Except when set-a-going

By people

Who did not know his key;

Even then, he was easily

Set right again:

He had the art of disposing of his time

So well

That his hours glided away

In one continual round

Of pleasure and delight,

Till an unlucky minute put a period to

His existence;

He departed this life

November 14, 1802,

aged 57,

Wound up,

in hopes of being taken in hand

By his Maker,

And of being

Thoroughly cleaned, repaired and set-a-going

In the World to come.