Cabinet of Curiosities - Harry Potter: A History of Magic at the British Library by Charlotte Wightwick

So I’m cheating a bit this month. The Cabinet of Curiosities is supposed to be one object which I’d love to have for myself. However I couldn’t resist talking about the current exhibition at the British Library on Harry Potter; A History of Magic, which is itself a compendium of incredible objects.

It’s a fantastic exhibition, making brilliant use of archive material, historical artefacts and modern technology to create an experience unlike any I’ve been to before. It combines original Harry Potter archive material and memorabilia with historical manuscripts and objects, setting J.K. Rowling’s fantasy world into the context of real historical beliefs about magic, with technology providing an interactive experience for those who want to try their own hands at ‘magic’.

So, for instance, the exhibition includes hand- and type-written excerpts from J.K Rowling’s original manuscripts (complete with editorial suggestions and some entirely unknown scenes which were cut from the final books), novel plans and some of her own early drawings of characters and locations – an absolute treasure trove for fans and fellow writers. There are also a large number of original drawings and paintings from the illustrated versions of the books by Jim Kay, with sound effects and objects from the films too.

The exhibition is organised into a number of different rooms, each of which is dedicated to an individual Hogwarts’ ‘lessons’ – Potions, Charms, Defence Against the Dark Arts, etc. In each case, Rowling’s archive material is cleverly interspersed with manuscripts and objects which explore ‘real life’ historical beliefs surrounding magic.

For example, the Herbology room includes Jim Kay’s illustrations of the greenhouses as Hogwarts; J.K. Rowling’s own drawing of Professor Sprout and some stunningly beautiful Herbals from the British Library’s Collection. The Care of Magical Creatures room is another highlight for anyone who loves medieval bestiaries and illuminated manuscripts.

The Astrology room contains stunning early globes, astrolables and orreries, as well as medieval manuscripts with illustrations of centaurs and other mythological creatures relating to the constellations. One of my favourite items in the exhibition was the sixteenth century ‘volvelle’ – a beautiful rotating paper model – of an astrological chart with a dragon at its centre, from Petrus Apianus’ Astronomicum Caesareum. The dragon could be spun in order to determine the latitude of the moon, or to cast horoscopes.

Similarly, the Divination room contains a whole raft of artefacts and manuscripts showing how different practices to determine the future have been used through centuries and across continents (another great feature of the exhibition is that it doesn’t restrict itself to European traditions of magic, but looks across continents and civilisations) – and makes use of modern technology to allow younger visitors the chance to look into their own futures.

So, which would be my one object to take home for my Cabinet of Curiosities, if I was allowed? Its tricky. The spinning astrological dragon would have to be up there. But then I’m also enough of a Potter fan to covet one of J.K. Rowling’s own drawings. The beautifully intricate gold filigree case containing a bezoar stone was also stunning.

But the thing I did actually take away with me, apart from a head full of wonder? The exhibition book. As well as beautiful colour photos of many of the exhibits, it also contains some fascinating essays by authors as diverse as astronaut Tim Peake, TV wildlife expert Steve Backshall, and author Anna Pavord. The exhibition’s curator, Julian Harrison, provides the overall foreword. He also tweets regularly, including about his favourite objects from the exhibition, and is well worth a follow @julianpharrison. 

My object for my Cabinet of Curiosities!

The exhibition book, published by Bloomsbury

To find out more about the exhibition (including whether there are any tickets left! It closes at the end of February) the website is:

https://www.bl.uk/events/harry-potter-a-history-of-magic

If you do get the opportunity, I really would encourage you to go. It’s a wonderful example of how stories, even those set in with a supposedly fantastical backdrop, can stimulate our imaginations about the truth of history and of the world around us.

Of Lions and Literature - by Gillian Polack

I was going to write about Black Friday this month, but it’s too depressing. Black Friday in Australia has nothing to do with sales (except in the minds of a few retailers who don’t know nearly enough about history) but is the name of one of the worst sets of bushfires of all time. Since we’re heading into bushfire season, there will be time for fires. Too much time for fires. Instead, I’m going to make time for a little Medievalism.

‘Medievalism’ in this case means when someone modern (or modernish) writes about the Middle Ages. This means that today’s post is a Medievalist committing Medievalism about Medievalism, which makes me strangely happy.

 Last night, I was teaching a group of students about bestiaries. It was a class about medieval heroes and monsters and magic and miracles. I needed a book to illustrate and I grabbed a perennial favourite off my shelf and…  the class not only learned about medieval bestiaries, they learned about how two modern fiction writers committed Medievalism.

The two modern writers are CS Lewis and TH White. Both had intimate knowledge of the Middle Ages. CS Lewis was an expert (in a scholarly way) in medieval literature and TH White translated a bestiary. I peppered my class with examples from their fiction, because it was much more fun to explain religious allegory using Aslan and Narnia than to use traditional methods.

This was all begun by White’s The Book of Beasts (the bestiary in question) which opens its narrative with the lion. Lions were handy, teaching-wise. They helped me explain how the structure of the bestiary worked and also to make the allegory and metaphorical nature clear, and they always have really excellent entries (and fun pictures!) in medieval bestiaries. We read TH White’s entry on the lion aloud in class and discussed. In fact, it was the building block for the whole class. It linked back to work on world view and cosmos that we’d done earlier this term, and White is (as ever, for this is the same TH White who wrote the story that became Camelot) a wonderful stylist. Every now and again I would interject a thought I’d just had on Narnia. And Lewis. And the nature of allegory. This is because the description of the lion in that particular bestiary could have been the blueprint for so much of Aslan.

My students were happy with this approach. In fact, they very carefully forgot to remind me about tea break, because they wanted to explore as much of the book as possible.

All day (even while teaching another class on an entirely different subject) I’ve been thinking about bestiaries. They’re not just handbooks of the natural world. They’re guides to how the animal kingdom works as part of the medieval universe. It’s not just that the lion is a noble beast and not tame, it’s what the lion says about the nature of medieval religion and about human morality. 

CS Lewis has summed up the symbolism and explanations for the lion in his Aslan. A lot of the Christian elements in Narnia are drawn from books like this. I have to admit, it doesn’t mean I enjoy the religious elements any more, but it means I understand where they come from and what Lewis is trying to do with them. The bestiary explains why it’s so important that Aslan is not a tame lion and why the lion is so very much more important than other animals.

I wasn’t expecting to get such a strong insight into favourite books of my childhood when I taught last night’s class, however.

You can find information about White’s work here: https://uwdc.library.wisc.edu/collections/histscitech/bestiary/ It’s still in print. I suggest it’s one of those books worth owning, for his writing is – as always – wonderful, and it’s very good to sit in an armchair and read a bit and stop and think and read a bit and stop and think. There are other and better books about bestiaries, but there isn’t another that gives such an insight into the work of two very important British fiction writers and how they see history.

'Return of the Medieval Beast' by Karen Maitland

‘Sorry I’m late,’ a family member said, rushing breathlessly into the train station late the other night. ‘I was held up by a wallaby on the road.’

If you're reading this post in Australia, this is probably an excuse you hear regularly, but we were in the middle of Devon, a rural English county not noted for its wild wallabies.

‘Are you sure it wasn’t a large squirrel?’ I asked, somewhat testily.

When we reported the sighting to the local police, I thought they might take the same sceptical line. But no, they had already had several reports of a wallaby hopping long the perilously narrow Devon lanes that evening. ‘But we don't know what we can do about it,’ they said, leafing through a copy of 'The Dangerous Dog Act' which, thanks to a Government oversight, singularly fails to cover marsupials, dangerous or not.

Devon has its fair share of strange animals, not least the fictional Hound of the Baskervilles, said to be based on the legend of the great spectral dog, the black shuck. And then there have long been rumours of the mysterious big black cats roaming across the moors, More recently warnings have been posted in several areas of Devon about what do if you encounter wild boar on walk, as they are now breeding in the forests.

But more controversially wild beavers have mysteriously returned to Devon and established a family, causing much debate about whether these creatures, should be removed before they start to change the landscape. One side argue they will cause flooding by damming streams, while others say that they will help to stop flooding by bringing back the wetlands that used to protect us.

But unlike the wallaby, beavers were native to Britain. The town of Beverley in Yorkshire derives its name from ‘beaver stream’, while Beavercoates in Nottinghamshire means ‘beaver huts’. But during the Middle Ages beavers were driven to extinction in Britain through hunting. They were killed for their scent gland which produced the valuable castoreum and also for food, because the Church declared that their tails were ‘fish’ and could therefore be eaten in Lent and on other fast days, when meat was prohibited. Recipes of the period suggest stewing their tails with ginger. After beavers were wiped out in England, a huge market grew up importing the glands and tails into England from the rest of Europe, through ports such as Bishop’s Lynn

Medieval Beaver shown with 'fish' tail

(now known as King’s Lynn) on The Wash.

The castoreum or castor extracted from the beaver gland was burned by the Romans to bring about abortions and used to help suffers of epilepsy. (This is not to be confused with the oil called castor that comes from Castor oil plant, which is used today as a food additive) In the Middle Ages, they believed castoreum from the beaver could increase the honey production of bees. There may have been some truth behind this since it has been found to have strong antibiotic properties and might have protected the bees from disease or acted as deterrent to bee-mites.

Medieval physicians also used beaver castoreum to relieve headaches, hysteria and impotency. In later centuries, it was used a basis for perfume making and often found in the bottles of quack medicine sold by peddlers in the America who would mix American beaver castor with alcohol or spices and claim it was an elixir which could cure just about anything.

Hunted Beaver biting off its own testicles

There is curious legend about beavers to be found the medieval bestiaries which is also recorded in ancient Greece. In Medieval times both the animal and its oil were known as castor meaning ‘castrated’. It was believed that this oil was to be found in the beaver’s testicles. If hunted, the beaver would chew off its own testicles and fling them at the huntsman to save its life. Thereafter, the castrated beaver would turn round, stand up and expose itself to any huntsman, so that he could see its testicles were missing and it was not worth pursuing.

In fact the castoreum doesn’t come from the testicles but from a gland near base of the tail which is used for scent marking. But the beaver’s testicles are internal so it would appear to our ancestors to have been castrated. And it is interesting that the legend not only persisted down through the centuries, but was employed by the Church who used the beaver as a symbol of chastity.

Beaver exposing himself to the huntsman to show he is castrated.

‘Every man who would live chastely must cut himself off from all vices and lewdness as does the castor and fling them in the face of the Devil. Thereupon the devil shall depart from him.

Perhaps the next wild animal that might return to Devon will be the wolf. Though last time he lived in England he fared no better than the beaver.

'If a woman does not desire you and you would arouse her and make her lust after you, take the genitals of a wolf together with the hair on its cheeks and eyebrows and burn them together. Then give the ashes to the woman to drink in such a manner that she does not suspect. Then she will desire you and no other man.'

But that’s another story.