A few repairs & a look at this months BBC History Magazine

Firstly, I’ve had to make a number of minor repairs to rushtonspencer.info this week having broken a few links and deleted the JavaScript that links to Google’s Analytics – Google’s free web stats analysis package. So for a few days it looked as though I was getting no traffic, and the gallery was inaccessible, on the bright side it gave me the opportunity to add some missing page titles and a few other little bits and pieces.

Another five years of Baptisms & Burials (for the period 1780 – 1784) have just been put online as well this week end which leaves just the period 1785 – 1789 to complete to make 100 years.

The content of BBC History Magazine which is of most interest to me this month is the cover features Inside the Medieval Mind – What kept our forebears in the middle ages awake at night? Which considers how, people in the Middle Ages perceived the world. A companion article The map of medieval Britain looks at the Gough Map on of the earliest and by far the most accurate and detailed maps of Britain. These two articles are to support/promote BBC Four’s Medieval Season which starts this week, more of which to follow.

BBC Four’s Medieval Season (part 1)

BBC Four’s medieval season starts to night with;

In Search of Medieval Britain (part 1 of 6) at 7.10pm – medieval art historian, Dr Alixe Bovey, uses the oldest surviving route map of Britain to make a series of journeys through Britain in the Middle Ages.

In this first episode, she follows the trail north from York to the hotly contested Scottish border, and uncovers tantalising clues to Medieval Britain’s most dangerous war zone.

On Monday we have;

Stephen Fry and the Gutenberg Press at 9.00pm. Stephen Fry goes in search of the story behind the inventor of the printing press, Johann Gutenberg, travelling across Europe to find out how Gutenberg kept his development work secret, and how his approach started a cultural revolution.

In order to fully understand the man and his machine, Stephen assembles a team to help him build a copy of Gutenberg’s printing press as well as learning how to make the paper and type so that they can print as Gutenberg once did.

Saints at 12.00am – The Catholic Church is the only Christian persuasion with an official saint-making process, overseen by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints. Hinduism and Buddhism have something akin in the idea of the holy man and the guru and the Islamic Sufi tradition not only recognises Christian saints but actively celebrates them. Vatican priests, academics, sacristans and pilgrims debate the worldwide idea of sanctity.

Wednesday brings;

The Saint and the Hanged Man at 9.00pm – Rob Bryden investigates the strange case of a Catholic holy court in Hereford that convened to decide whether a 14th-century dead bishop, who reputedly performed miracles including the resurrection of a hanged man, should be sanctified.

On Thursday we have;

In Search of Medieval Britain (part 2 of 6) at 7.30pm – Dr Alixe Bovey heads west from Gloucester into Wales, following in the footsteps of the huge armies of Edward I. She uncovers evidence of a lawless borderland, a medieval arms race, and reveals clues to the origins of the map itself.

Inside the Medieval Mind (part 1 of 4) at 9.00pm – Professor Robert Bartlett, one of the world’s leading authorities on the middle Ages, looks at how our medieval forebears viewed the world; as a mysterious and even enchanted place, where sightings of green men, dog heads, and alien beings were commonplace. But as the middle Ages grew to a close, the world became a place to be mastered, even exploited.

Crusades (part 1 of 4) at 10.00pm – Pilgrims in Arms: Terry Jones sets out to discover what really happened 900 years ago. Following the route of the Crusaders, he travels to Byzantium.

These are the listings published on BBC Four’s website at the moment I’ve not included any repeat viewings and will post more as they become available.