Miserable Morning

It’s pittling it down this morning, and it isn’t even properly light.

I’d meant to take the dog out first thing, and although the elements don’t normally deter me, I think we’d be soaked to the skin after 30 seconds in this. Not fun.

To add insult to injury I just checked Twitter to find a reference to this, an interview with Sir Ranulph Fiennes where he is very rude about Yorkshire (offending section begins around 6.30 in) and everyone who lives here.  He also pronounces Bridlington “Bridge-Lincton.”  Not quite sure how serious he is, but if he is serious, then I am very disappointed.

On a more cheery note, I am looking forward to visiting the Borthwick Institute this evening as part of my local history course at the University of York. Wonder if I can manage to write 1000 words of my work in progress before then.  I think it’s worth a try.

Magic Tomato Chutney

My kitchen is a place which, at this time of year, is the scene of magical happenings.  (It also sees diabolical disasters, but this post is not about those.) The main magical happening is really that I am compelled, on dark, cold autumn evenings when I should be in front of the telly watching Sharpe re-runs on the Yesterday channel, to spend hours in the kitchen cooking stuff to fill my cupboards for winter.  Strange but true, and I even enjoy it.

My kitchen is small – about ten square metres in all, give or take, but with all the essential stuff in it, and a good variety of cooking pots.  It’s nice retreating there to do cooking for fun as opposed to the obligatory stuff. Last night, for example,  I made chutney, and although I am of course way too Northern to be overly mystical, I have to tell you that among the ingredients were five large cooking apples, plucked fresh from the tree in a rain storm.  Had the other ingredients been of a similar ilk, I might have been muttering  ”Fire burn and cauldron bubble!” as I was stirring the pot, but the two nets of tomatoes on buy one get one free from Morrisons kept me grounded.

Despite the lack of incantation, and very unexotic tomatoes, the magic still worked and my winter stores are now supplemented with three jars of splendid tomato (and apple) chutney.  It  seems though that the rainstorm is forecast to last all weekend and there are plenty more apples on the tree.  Will there be more magic to come?  Maybe so, I’ll be checking if Sharpe’s on first next time though.

In which I talk to Ian McMillan about dee dars

People in Barnsley and other places around Sheffield apparently call Sheffield folk dee dars.  I know this because I got to chat to Ian McMillan last night, and he told me so.

He also did a brilliant bit of proper Sheffield speak, to which I actually had to listen really hard to totally understand, while at the same time feeling massively at home with it as I could hear the voices of my great-uncle and grandmother (both from Sheffield, both long gone) all the time he was speaking.

I’d no idea that Sheffield accent proper substitutes d for th – so instead of thee and thou (or thar in that accent) they actually say dee and dar hence the term dee dar (I’d argue it’s not a full d, but a sort of softened one). Grandma and Uncle Joe never actually did this, but when they got together (she’d moved away to Leeds and he to Romiley in Cheshire) their speech became a lot more noticeably Sheffield - darn for down and *lots* of thees and thars.

Ian was in Borders York last night along with the cartoonist Tony Husband, to promote “Yorkshire Humour,”  a book of funny Yorkshire snippets from the Dalesman magazine.  While I was talking to Ian about dee dars, Tony actually drew me one, complete with whippet and flat cap.  I’m rather pleased with it.

A few links: Ian McMillan’s site Tony Husband’s site Yorkshire Humour on Amazon

Wind

Got up this morning to find the patio set parasol had been lifted right out of the table, and had blown half-way down the garden.  Put it back in, with difficulty, and it got blown straight back out again.

Where did this force 8 gale suddenly spring from? And will it manage to knock down the neighbours’ abnormally huge silver birch tree that blocks the sunlight out of our garden? No offence to silver birch trees, but in this instance, I hope so.

Owls

There are owls that hunt over the fields at the back of our new house.

This is a matter of some excitement for me, as I love owls but have never encountered one in the wild, having always lived in cities and built up areas before.

It’s since the fields have been harvested that I’m hearing them – really loud screechings sometimes. I think they are most likely to be barn owls, as they hunt over open land, where as tawny owls, the most common, stay around trees.

Wonder if I’ll get an actual glimpse of one soon – I hope so.

The Staffordshire Hoard

The Staffordshire Hoard, c700AD, discovered Jul 2009, made public Sept 2009

I am officially blown away.

For the past few days I’ve been glued to the emerging news about the hoard of gold and silver artefacts found in Staffordshire, in the heart of what was once the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia. Found by a metal detectorist in a recently ploughed field, some of the treasure was just lying on the top of the ground, but a lot more was buried. There are in fact more than 1,300 pieces, and a total 5kg of gold. Not only that, it’s all totally beautiful. My imagination was instantly caught by the engraved gold strip bearing a bible verse, pictured below – the lettering is amazing, and it’s hard to believe it was made about thirteen centuries ago. Then there’s the scabbard bosses inlaid with garnet (bizzarely, I have a pair of Indian gold earrings that don’t look dissimilar), others with a black and white glass inlay, helmet pieces, crosses, intricately carved designs, animals … Apparently the museum curator who was first presented with the finds was a bit lost for words and couldn’t stop saying “Wow.” I’ve been suffering from a bit of that, meself.

The story behind the treasure seems to be that these are spoils of battle, hidden for safekeeping, but never reclaimed. The taking of scabbard bosses as war trophies is documented in Boewulf, and all the finds are military paraphernalia, presumably stripped from corpses by the victors. The gold and amazing craftsmanship seems to indicate a noble military elite, with large numbers of warriors bearing gold – I can’t wait for some artists impressions, my imagination is already running riot!  The Anglo-Saxons were richer than anyone previously thought! It certainly opens up questions about the ship burial at Sutton Hoo, thought to be the resting place of an Anglo-Saxon king, probably King Raedwald. If it was common for other nobles to have large amounts of gold, there could be a much wider range of candidates.

On the Staffordshire Hoard website, former British Museum curator Leslie Webster is quoted as saying, “This is going to alter our perceptions of Anglo-Saxon England in the seventh and early eighth centuries as radically, if not moreso, as the 1939 Sutton Hoo discoveries did. ” There have also been claims it could lead to a surge of huge interest in this historical period, and you can see why. The Dark Ages suddenly seem quite a lot brighter and have now been brought infinitely closer to us. Although I’m engrossed in all things Roman at the moment for my current writing project, I think I might have to move forward a century or two for the next one.

Sword Hilt Mounts and Inscribed Strip from the Staffordshire Hoard

Photos by David Rowan, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, and courtesy of the Staffordshire Hoard Website.

Brimham Rocks

We went to Brimham Rocks at the weekend, a place I loved as a child.  The rocks are in the Nidderdale area of outstanding natural beauty, not far from Pately Bridge and are still as beautiful and mysterious as ever.  The rocks were formed in these bizzare shapes millions of years ago, in millstone grit.

We didn’t get to do the full ramble round the rocks this time, as I’ve torn a muscle in my calf, and had to take it really easy.  This also meant I couldn’t climb anything, so I was a bit of a mardy bum. I had to console myself with taking photos instead.  We’ll have to revisit soon; I’m told my leg should be mended in a couple of weeks.

Impossible to resist a climb. My husband and daughter at Brimham.