A Medieval Week.

Two things I have been doing this week:

(1) Medieval stuff
(2) Playing with picture apps

On Thursday Tevye and I went for a walk in a village a few miles away where there is a castle site. I didn't even know it was there until a few months ago and had never been. Not much is known about the castle, except that it existed in the twelfth century and was probably a simple wooden keep and palisade that was never replaced with stone. The remaining earthworks show it was a classic motte and bailey castle. A small one!

The picture below was done with an iphone collage app called Moldiv, which I stumbled across when looking for something else. I mixed up shots of the castle with the surrounding countryside.

This picture is a collage of three panoramic views taken from the top of the motte. The white stone thing in the bottom picture is an Ordnance Survey triangulation point.


Today I was looking after an archive display in an adjacent town which had a weekend event focusing on its medieval history. This town was founded by King Henry I at the beginning of the 12th century and was the site of an important priory for the next 400 years. After the priory was dissolved in 1540 most of the buildings were destroyed, but the nave remained as the parish church. Imagine how imposing the original church must have been when it was complete.


There were a lot of middle ages re-enactors there, with booths demonstrating different aspects of medieval life and a recreation of a minor skirmish which took place in the town during the Wars of the Roses in the 15th century. I particularly liked the minstrel, who had an intriguing collection of early instruments. I now want a bowed psaltery. Or a lyre. Or both. As you can see from this picture I have also been playing with Instagram filters.


This panoramic view shows part of the encampment, with soldiers mustering ready or battle.


More Instagram filters on these pictures, trying to compensate for slightly fuzzy cropped distance shots. This Yorkist soldier was taking a breather between bouts of fighting.


And here the battle was raging.


I have also been working on some of these at work, so all in all a very medieval week.