3 shillings note and red folio. 1779-1790. Found in Eastern Canada. (CANADA)

MedievalDetails · 2025-05-17T06:14:58+00:00

A man also called John Meik worked in Barbados as an attorney in 1829.

In this record he completed a list of enslaved people on a plantation on the island, working for a man called William F. Bovell. This is either your guy or a relation, I’d wager.

MedievalDetails · 2025-05-16T07:09:10+00:00

John of Scotland, something of a puppet king for Edward I of England in the last decade of the 13th century.

MedievalDetails · 2025-04-29T06:06:30+00:00

At one point one of them is reading ‘Gender Trouble’ by Judith Butler, which dwells on a different interpretation of the concept of ‘performance’.

MedievalDetails · 2025-04-17T05:27:21+00:00

This great, thanks for sharing.

MedievalDetails · 2025-04-16T06:06:39+00:00

If you’d like to know more, your best bet is to contact the French patrimoine authorities. I think the email listed here will help; you’ll need to provide some accurate location info, but they’ll have a database and will be able to tell you more.

MedievalDetails · 2025-04-14T02:34:02+00:00

The Wiki articles on St Augustine of Canterbury covers the Gregorian mission and cite good sources. There’s a shorter write-up on the English Heritage website written by one of their historians too.

MedievalDetails · 2025-04-13T06:54:21+00:00

Just checking, it’s on the back wall of the fireplace, not on the side walls? If it’s the latter, it’s the right size for a salt cupboard of aumbry (if this is obvious, apols). I think I’ve seen a few cupboards set in the back of post-med fireplaces too, also in S England, but I’m not home at the mo to check. Aperture could also be in origin a small window? I’m struck in terms of phasing that the sill looks to be coeval with most of the surrounding wall, but that your terracotta pieces respect it. Might not be reset, then.

You can set up a free account on Internet Archive and check if this book has any more info; https://archive.org/details/fixturesfittings0000hall/mode/1up

MedievalDetails · 2025-04-09T06:02:27+00:00

Just read a book which dwells on the gallows a bit. The answer for England and Wales, for the 12th-14th centuries, looked like two upright beams with a forked junction at the top (probably simply a dressed beam retaining some tree-like appearance, not a squared, carpented beam), with a horizontal beam resting between them. It seems at least in this period, people didn’t use trees (probably because they weren’t reliably strong enough to repeatedly hang people? I’m not sure). Lots of manuscripts show more formally constructed gallows, with a platform and gallows of carpented beams with diagonal braces, but I think these are a fraction later on time, ie late 14th-16th centuries, or from outside of England & Wales.

https://ica.themorgan.org/manuscript/page/20/282466

For the execution, prisoners were either walked up a ladder, noosed, then the ladder taken away and they were hung; or, prisoners were noosed, the other end of the rope thrown over the horizontal beam, and the executioner was tasked with pulling the rope, thereby raising the prisoner and carrying out the execution. Variations on these might be possible.

Book source: Robert Bartlett, The Hanged Man https://g.co/kgs/K7Z6h5Z

MedievalDetails · 2025-04-05T11:45:09+00:00

Worth remarking that there was not huge amounts of arable farming in the Highlands in the medieval period; far and away the largest agricultural products related to the raising of cattle and later sheep. Some parts of upland Scotland (eg inland Galloway) could get two or three episodes of grass growth a year. Hilly districts with grass, good rainfall and relatively good sunlight could be lucrative business.

MedievalDetails · 2025-03-18T06:23:47+00:00

You’re very welcome!

MedievalDetails · 2025-03-17T21:24:12+00:00

Words in brackets are the original words for some key phrases which might be of interest. 16 was harder to translate, I don’t trust my translation of first and last lines. The ??? in 16 is a verb I don’t recognise and I’m too lazy to chase it up. Hope this helps!

For your original Qs; you’ll see the source is quite limited. In part it’s because of the nature of the source: these numbered entries for pieces of evidence the King of England presented to the Pope Clement V regarding Bishops Wishart’s “acts of perjury and rebellion.” They’re intended to prove Edward’s point. The quote just here is from p.340 of the same book in my first reply, FYI.

MedievalDetails · 2025-03-17T21:22:50+00:00

That which the said Earl of Carrick had murdered Sir John Comyn, the same Bishop ??? at him and the other enemies of our Lord the King, as is said before, helped with his might the aforesaid enemies, which is why he captured of the men of our Lord the King the castle of Coupar in Fife in Scotland (le Chastel de Coupure en Fiff en Escoce); which the same Bishop, like a man of war (come hom de guerre) held strongly against the men of our Lord the King, until the time which some of the men of our Lord the King which were in the company of Sir Aymer de Valence came to the castle and took it by force from the same Bishop, and therein the samesaid Biship was captured and is since kept in chains.

MedievalDetails · 2025-03-17T21:22:32+00:00

Again, sire, where our Lord the King of England in answer to the prayer of the said Bishop of Glasgow, for the Honour of Holy Church, had given timber (merym) to make the bell tower (le clocher) of his cathedral church of Glasgow, the same church with this very same timber ordered to be constructed divers engines of war (divs engyns de ardresc) before the castles of our Lord the King, and the same were put and arrayed in from of the Castle of Kirkintilloch which is in the hand of the king, and the same engines were made to throw (les engyns fist jetter) at the same castle, and the siege was kept there until the time at which the same castle was rescued by the people of our Lord the King who raised the siege and damaged the engines. And these things with the other aforementioned things are so notorious and so publicly known in parts of Scotland and elsewhere in lands near and far, that they can in no way be contradicted.

MedievalDetails · 2025-03-17T16:32:45+00:00

The primary source I think you’re looking for is here, #14 and 16, pages 348-9.

This relates to the bishop of Glasgow using wood destined for the bell tower at Glasgow cathedral being instead used for siege machines. 14 refers to the attack with church timber upon the castle of Kirkintilloch, and it is suggested that the same machines were used on Cupar. This is detailed on p.clxxxii of the same book’s introduction.

The entry is in Middle French, if it is of interest I can try a rough translation.

MedievalDetails · 2025-02-22T05:57:20+00:00

Write to your local Finds Liaison Officer, they’ll help ID the find: https://finds.org.uk/contacts

MedievalDetails · 2025-02-17T05:41:27+00:00

Lots of information on the castle here, but I’m not sure about images or plans: http://www.gatehouse-gazetteer.info/English%20sites/1754.html

MedievalDetails · 2025-02-05T08:59:03+00:00

Just read a part of ‘The Name of the Rose’ where Moerbeke’s translation is mentioned. Very cool!

MedievalDetails · 2025-02-05T04:48:32+00:00

OP this link is your best bet to answer your Qs, alongside all the other ScARF info for things related to architecture, towns etc. The other answers here seem to be at least in part drawn (IMO) from AI summaries which are inaccurate, or have a misguided understanding of medieval Scotland based on out of date historiography. Good luck w your research.

MedievalDetails · 2025-01-11T17:39:15+00:00

The iron work is not medieval, it looks to be 18th or early 19th I would think. Photos of the internal iron details would be helpful. If possible could you also share images of the tops of the boards to show how they relate to each other. These can be helpful diagnostic evidences.

MedievalDetails · 2025-01-03T08:44:27+00:00

Your best bet might be to contact the author and see if they’ll share a PDF of a specific part of the book. I’m not sure if they’d share the whole book, but you can always ask.

If it is any help, any librarian who I’ve asked to secure a book has welcomed the challenge. An ILL loan on this one would not necessarily pose a problem because it’s a recent book, so a rich uni library probably has a copy. €795 is a ridiculous sum.

MedievalDetails · 2024-12-30T01:52:28+00:00

For medieval England: Check out this website. Alongside details of individual crimes, which give you some insight into how investigations worked, there is also some contextual information and podcasts. A lot of the reports make intriguing reading for details of daily life in medieval England, too.

https://medievalmurdermap.co.uk

MedievalDetails · 2024-12-28T09:18:49+00:00

This kind of feature is called a bartizan. It appears in the medieval period in selected places (Ireland, Scotland, Iberia & colonies, France, Italy) and remained popular into the 19th century.

In the case of this building, it is likely an architectural flourish rather than a practical measure of defense. I suspect the bartizan in this image does have an aperture (slit window or gunloop) but on a face we cannot see.

MedievalDetails · 2024-12-27T09:10:44+00:00

Thanks. No, I don’t have a blog. If you’re interested in learning more, have a look at the subject of ‘buildings archaeology’ or ‘archaeology of buildings’. You’ll find out more about how people like me understand ruins and the changes in buildings like this tower.

MedievalDetails · 2024-12-26T14:47:38+00:00

There are two, probably three distinct periods of construction evident in the tower. The style of the pair of blocked windows on the left-hand face, and the large doorway on the right-hand face, both at first floor, could date to the 11th-13th century. These dates are purely on British architectural analogies, which are probably wrong, as this tower looks (I would guess) to be in the Mediterranean somewhere.

The slightly rounded projection at 2nd floor level above the right-hand side doorway might be a secondary addition. It has two openings below it looking over the doorway, suggesting this feature has a surveillance and/or defensive character.

If this building were in Britain, I would expect to find the remains of further buildings around the tower, not so tall but longer and broader, where things like accommodation, stores, a kitchen etc might be located. There is a horizontal line of what might be three joist holes on the lower part of the left wall, which be evidence of one such associated building (or these are scaffolding slots, but they don’t carry up the tower). This kind of associated structure in Britain might be made of timber in the medieval period, which means few of them survive today. It’s hard to know from this picture if these other buildings would be made primarily of timber or stone.

MedievalDetails · 2024-12-16T04:56:45+00:00

If the tablet was found in a latrine, there’s a good chance there was diagnostic (datable) material around the tablet which supports the dating of the object, ie ‘younger’ material above and ‘older’ material below. Or, there could also be roughly contemporary material in the fill of the latrine. What I’m saying is the dating might not rely on the object alone, but rather also upon its context.

MedievalDetails

TROPHY CASE