Stokesay

September 15, 2026September 15, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

‘I praise god and ever shall / It is the sheep hath paid for all.’ (Wool merchant memorial)

Stokesay is rightly acknowledged to be one of the finest surviving fortified manor houses in England, and we were keen to savour a return visit on this holiday. The castle was built between 1285 – 91 for Lawrence of Ludlow, one of the wealthiest merchants of 13^th Century England. This enterprising figure was named for his birthplace in the neighbouring market town of Ludlow, the magnificent fortress capital of the Welsh Marches. His father Nicholas was a wool merchant who had laid the foundations of a family business which his son would extend into a complex pan European network.

Lawrence travelled extensively to negotiate with cloth producers in the great centres of the trade at Bruges and Ghent as well as attending the most important fairs, like the one at Champagne. The biggest driver of the national economy, huge revenues generated through the wool industry built many grand churches and houses in town and country. It facilitated Lawrence’s social progression from urban businessman to country gentleman, making Stokesay, as a physical manifestation of wealth and power, so special and informative.

At his new abode possessions could be stored safely. The surrounding 120 acre manor of woods, watermills and farms would supply most everyday household needs. As on our previous visit swallows were diving in and out of the shafts of sunlight coming through the large open windows of the great hall. It’s easy to imagine Lawrence, his wife Agnes or any of their five sons entertaining guests at a feast. VIPs like the Bishop of Hereford and the Abbot of Haughmond Abbey are recorded attending. Lawrence had his local office in Shrewsbury and another in London near the royal court.

English Heritage reconstructive view of Great Hall as it may have looked.

One of the country’s richest men, Lawrence became a money lender to courtiers and King Edward I himself. The warrior monarch, in order to fund imperial ambitions in Wales, Scotland and France introduced export taxes on the actual producers of wool – the great monasteries and wealthier landowners. Lawrence, head of a consortium of leading wool merchants, was seen as the instigator of this move, making him unpopular with many.

Travel in the medieval period was a business fraught with risks at the best of times and In November 1294 Lawrence and his brother perished in a shipwreck off the coast of Suffolk, en route to the low countries. it was recorded in one monastery that ‘…because he sinned against the wool mongers he was drowned in a ship laden with wool.’

Thanks to the actions of the redoubtable Agnes and her eldest son the Stokesay legacy was secured, and his descendants continued to live relatively peaceably at their country estate until 1498. The picturesque half-timbered gatehouse was added in the 17^th Century and the two great towers from Laurence’s day were made more comfortable as private and guest living quarters with the addition of wood panelling, remodelled fireplaces and decorative carvings.

It was a delight to wonder through them before going down to the cellars or ascending the narrow age worn steps to the highest rooms.

There have been interpretive improvements by English Heritage since we last came a decade ago. Most of our fellow visitors opted for headset audio guides, which I personally find a rather alienating experience. Digital technology has also been used to give screen visualisation in principal rooms, showing how they might have looked at different periods in the building’s long history, and that I did like.

Another nice touch is the children’s discovery trail that leads curious young minds through the different spaces with various clues, ending on the castellated roof of the south tower. The end of their exploring adventure promises a revelation of the giant’s key to the castle. Spoiler alert – looking down onto the courtyard garden below the outline of a large key made up of different flora can be clearly seen.

Northbound train at Craven Arms: Image Creative Commons via Geograph

From this high point I could also clock, across the intervening meadow, Welsh Marches line trains speeding by on the double track linking Crewe to Newport Gwent. Frequency of services and modernity of carriages compares well with the older Heart of Wales line rolling stock we’d travelled on along single track to Knighton and back.

On leaving we slipped into the adjacent church of St John the Baptist. Originally the castle’s chapel it was rebuilt in 1654, in the wake of the civil war ( when the castle walls were demolished, rendering it indefensible). The handsome solid exterior gives way to a severe protestant interior with admonishing biblical texts on the whitewashed walls and a mass of high sided dark oak box pews which put me in mind of an early 19^th century penitentiary.

The original west gallery, where once the parish band would have played before being usurped by the church organ helped lighten the initial impression, evoking the ghost of Thomas Hardy’s Mellstock Quire in Under the Greenwood Tree. In another life I’d attended a packed candlelight Christingle family service here, with a jolly female vicar officiating and lots of small children engrossed in the seasonal proceedings. A memory quite at odds with today’s encounter. How curious and contradictory our unreliable recollections can be.

More on Stokesay here: https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stokesay-castle/

Border Lines

September 9, 2026September 12, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ 1 Comment

Bucknell Village: The long shed by the rail line is a steel fabrication plant

A packed five days away on the Welsh Border where Shropshire, Radnorshire and Herefordshire intertwine. Our base a lovely B&B in a Georgian house in the village of Bucknell. One of the location’s attractions to me is its location on the Heart of Wales line. https://www.heart-of-wales.co.uk/

HoW line, Knucklas Viaduct & Castle: Image Tom Martin / Wales News Service

This 120 mile much loved rural railway, dating from the 1850’s & 60’s, links Shrewsbury and Swansea and apart from its enduring value serving remote communities in both England and Wales the main draw today is for hikers and cyclists, giving extraordinary access as it does to some of the most remote and challenging of upland landscapes.

Bucknell Station is a handsome well preserved building (now a holiday home) from where we took an old two carriage diesel to the next stop of Knighton, a 10 minute trip below conifer forest and above the River Teme in its valley of several oxbow lakes marking the stream’s former meandering course.

Knighton Train Station Credit: Visit Wales / Tom Martin WALES NEWS SERVICE

Curiously the station at Knighton, dated 1860, is in England while the town itself is in Wales. The once proud brick built station building presents as a sorry sight today, with windows blocked and falling roof tiles, desperately in need of a suitable owner or tenant to bring it back to life in some form or another.

Section of Offa’s Dyke from the air: Credit ODA

Knighton or Tref-y-Clawdd (town on the dyke), lies on the long earthwork known as Offa’s Dyke, named after the 8^th Century King of Anglo-Saxon Mercia who had the structure built. Whether as a prestige project or to restrain or tax through customs his Celtic Welsh neighbours remains unclear but his monument would define the first proper border between the two countries.

Offa’s Dyke map showing extent of the earthwork

Offa’s Dyke stretches for 82 discontinuous miles. Much has been lost or erased through the ravages of time, weather, burrowing, landslides and modern developments. A 2018 survey found that only 8% of the monument was in a favourable condition. What remains is officially protected as a ‘Scheduled Monument’ and enhanced by the tireless volunteer action of the Offa’s Dyke Association, formed in 1969. (www.offasdyke.org.uk) Offa’s Dyke, and its northern extension Wat’s Dyke, are part of a 177 mile long National Trail linking Chepstow on the south coast of Wales with Prestatyn on the north, a magnet for ramblers from all over the UK and abroad.

The very short section we followed took us through woods and back across the rails, over the river. We watched a dipper below the metal rail bridge searching for caddis fly and other insects to eat in the shallow water.

Later downstream brought us back over the meandering border, from Shropshire (England) into Radnorshire ( Powys), pausing for photos at the boundary marker. The riverside stretch into Knighton was a pleasant walk and I liked the sign on the electric fence here on the meadow’s edge.

Finally, in ambling over another isolated section of the Dyke, we arrived at the OD visitor centre and café, dating from 1999, that sits rather elegantly alongside the monument.

Knighton is a small rural town of many architectural styles with few national chains but many local businesses.

Had our lunch in the little café below the central clocktower, homely cheerful chintz, with lovely warm hearted laughing ladies serving. The rest of the venerable low ceilinged building that is ‘Prince & Pugh’ revealed itself when threading one’s way up to the toilets on the top floor past an array of store rooms.

This outlet is a rare old fashioned country store, stocking everything one needs when living out by. Sadly, by way of contrast, the one-time grand Victorian hotel at the bottom of the hill was standing empty and forlorn, as was an even older pub nearby that had only recently served its last pint.

A market town since 1230, Knighton services a widespread agricultural community so we were delighted to discover that a sheep sale was on in the livestock market. The local Clun and Welsh Mountain were the main breeds being loaded and unloaded from trailers pulled by farmers’ 4x4s, plus the odd hauliers stock waggon. The two young women rattling through the auctioneer’s patter while perched on the pen rails were doing a cracking job of keeping the trade brisk and the laughter and chat flowing.

Bremenium

August 22, 2026August 22, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

Thought I’d celebrate being 75 last week by taking a walk at a place often driven past while heading over the border via Carter Bar. We started at ‘The Last Café in England’, something of a local institution, on the A68 in Rochester village. Coffees with a bacon butty, made deli style with focaccia bread, set us up nicely for the afternoon ahead. The café’s handsome resident hens are a law unto themselves as they weave in and out of customers, but I liked their casual audacity of their panhandling approach.

I’d called in here for the first time earlier this year returning from a social trip north and on that occasion discovered the neighbouring interpretation centre, a contemporary structure of wood and stone. (exterior, above) It gives an overview of the early history of Upper Redesdale, centred around the Roman fort, or rather series of forts, situated on the slopes above from 80 AD to AD 340 when it was abandoned.

LIDAR image of Bremenium at the interpretation centre

Bremenium fort stood guard over their cross border highway, known since the middle ages as Dere Street, and roughly aligned with the A68 today, which linked the Roman towns of Corbridge (Corstopitum) to the south and Melrose (Trimontium) to the north. That first fort, founded by the great Roman general Agricola, preceded the building of Hadrian’s wall by some 50 years. It was a vital logistical base and stopping off point on the supply route that spearheaded their invasion of what is now Scotland. When the legions later withdrew Bremenium’s importance only grew as the most northerly permanent outpost of the empire. At its peak up to 1,000 men were stationed here; infantry, auxiliaries, scouts, cavalry as well as all those who supplied their needs in the civilian vicus and beyond.

We ambled along the lane that leads up to High Rochester, and the hamlet within what was Bremenium. Like Hadrian’s wall and other Roman sites it would be robbed of its vast resource of dressed stone in the centuries that followed the legions departure from Britannia in AD 410.

By the C16th our region would became notorious for cross border cattle raids by marauding native clans known as the Border Reivers. In 1581 a particularly bad incursion from Scotland laid waste to High Rochester. We could see that at least one of the existing buildings on the old fort site was originally a bastle, (above) a fortified stone house where animals and people were barricaded in during Reiver raids.

Later, after the union of the Crowns in 1603, what passed for peace and and the re-establishment of the rule of law slowly returned to these borderlands. That speeded up the fabric recycling process and most of what stone was left of the fort vanished from view only to reappear in the form of the houses, farms, cottages and barns scattered across this wild rugged landscape. The most impressive remains (above) are of the stout western walls and gateway, accessed by footpath from the lane.

A hot day, with a gentle breeze to cool us as we left the site for even higher ground. In the neighbouring field a stone waller was plying his ancient craft, under the shade of a small gazebo. Our metalled road became a gritted track then a grass path through rough pasture, leading to a farmhouse entrance with a cautionary sign for passing dog walkers…

Here on the edge of conifer forest we emerged on to extra wide gritted trackways. On one side of us lay the 93 acres of the Otterburn live firing ranges (a quarter of the national park) which have played a key role in training the military since 1911. On the other side is the 250 square miles of Kielder forest, the country’s biggest commercial softwood resource. Military vehicles and timber trucks both require this standard of roadway to get about. We had our mid walk snacks where an impressive metal cantilever bridge crossed the Sills burn, the little river in its steep sided valley, and the ‘place of the rushing waters’ that gave Bremenium its name.

Image: Great North Museum / Carole Raddato

One of the highlights of the Great North Museum in Newcastle is a deep relief stone frieze of Venus and attendant water nymphs which was found fronting a water tank in the commander’s quarters in 1855. Its mix of Roman and Celtic styles makes it particularly engaging…Hard to imagine the goddess and her attendants taking a dip here today though.

A little further on we crossed the line of Dere Street. To our right, heading arrow straight into the firing ranges and Scotland beyond, was a well-kept road for farm, forestry and military access. But to our left a trace of pathway and the odd paved stone protruding from rush covered grazing were the only signs that the old Roman road had ever ran through there. The path’s dislodged weather beaten interpretive sign seemed to say it all.

Another sign we had to take notice of though was this one. Someone must have been out recently to set the dial at extreme risk of fire. Earlier when walking downhill through the forest we’d seen beaters lined up by the roadside, ready to be enlisted in putting out any nascent flames. Mindful of images of recent devastating wild fires elsewhere in the UK and on the continent, the sign was a suitably sobering reminder of seasonal danger.

At this point in our ramble opinions differed as to the return leg of our route. Our Northumberland National Park guidebook (published 1996) had got us into trouble before. A walk above Falstone last year promised a fine view over Kielder water from its highest point, but when we got there the subsequent conifer growth had completely blocked any vista. Similarly, this walk advised returning to Rochester by following the marked OS footpath between forest and stream. I was all for following the green dots, even though no sign of any path existed, while Kim favoured either going back the way we’d come or carrying on along the track to gain the A68 north of Rochester and loop back the long way.

She was reluctantly persuaded to opt for my route. Setting off we quickly found ourselves in the roughest of rough grazing before clambering through a bank of forest fringe, ducking under low sweeping branches. A relief to come across a style in the fence and some footprints. Traversing the steep sloping field ahead, full of chest high bracken, wasn’t the most encouraging of prospects. Making instead for gaps where they existed, we zigzagged on open ground, heading for the eminence of Bremenium ahead, with a visible path curling up to it, over the humps and bumps that are the remains of defensive ditches. Eventually then we got there, much to my relief. Kim said nothing, clearly not best impressed with my boys’ own spirit in pursuing the lost footpath that the guide book had directed us along.

Today a corner of Bremenium, bounded on this west side by the remnants of its thick wall foundations, is home to the annual Upper Redesdale Show Society who put on the Rochester Show on the last Saturday in September. The 2026 event will be their 135^th gathering.

A rural community celebration and a far cry from the blood and guts history of the area. I pulled in at the Redesdale Arms for a refreshing pint in the garden overlooking the dale at its tranquil summer best. We relaxed in the late sun and had a laugh about that last leg scramble of a ramble. Once home the old guide book was duly consigned to the recycling bin. From now on, when walking in this neck of the woods, we’ll be using the up to date guides supplied by the Revitalising Redesdale Community Partnership. https://www.revitalisingredesdale.org.uk/

Monumental Tales

June 7, 2026June 7, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

Our medieval themed treats for the week away in Suffolk included visits to two Grade I listed buildings with interlinked family ties. The first was the parish church of St Nicholas in the neighbouring parish of Denston, regarded as one of the finest late perpendicular village churches in England. (https://shct.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Denston-Suffolk.pdf)

We had a chat with three local parishioners who were doing housekeeping on the late afternoon of our visit. Learned that by the 1980’s the church roof was in imminent danger of collapse and that the parish (pop.100) raised, with outside help from individuals and church restoration charities £90,000 to completely re-roof the building and undertake other essential repairs.

The east end window is a C19th addition, consisting of an eye catching medley of original medieval glass fragments manufactured in Norwich.

Because it was never significantly altered after the reformation a host of lively original wood carvings of animals on bench ends and roof timbers remain. The mellow stone and timber are displayed at their best in a space lifted with light, thanks to the wide aisle and high clerestory windows. A wonderfully calm and ethereal space which I felt would lend itself well to concerts and talks.

Sir John Denston portrayed at Long Melford Church

One of the landowners involved in the textile trade that so enriched this part of the world was Sir John Denston of Denston Hall (1420-1463) He married Katherine Clopton whose family were among the richest and most powerful of Suffolk’s wool merchants, based at Kentwell Hall not far away, near Long Melford.

Long Melford Holy Trinity; Image Church Website

Set imposingly along a ridge at the north end of Long Melford, Holy Trinity is St Nicolas writ large, Hailed as one of England’s grandest parish churches its elegant mass is complete with adjoining Lady Chapel. Its grace is further enhanced with attractive churchyard flower planting between buttresses.

Almost cathedral like in its structure and internal aura, the church miraculously retains eight bays of late medieval glass. Being likenesses of mostly secular figures, members of powerful local families, they were spared destruction after the Reformation and during the civil wars of the C17th.

One of those grandees immortalised in glass is Elizabeth Talbot, an heiress married to the region’s rising Yorkist magnate Sir John Howard (Later Duke of Norfolk, killed at Bosworth fighting for Richard III) We’re invited to look closely and decide whether or not she was the model for the Duchess of Hearts in Sir John Tenniel’s illustrations for Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The artist is known to have visited and admired these windows.

Tenniel illustration for *Alice*: Image credit British Museum

Sir John Denston, as befits his status and family connections, has a bay all to himself. Various grand monuments to the Clopton dynasty are here too. Sir John Clopton had a vicarious existence balancing loyalties in the Wars of the Roses. Perhaps it was in gratitude for his survival after battle and subsequent imprisonment that he funded the church’s restoration in its present form between 1462 –1497.

The final resting place of John and Katherine Denston though is back at St Nicholas. And what a monument. Startling to encounter when unprepared, as we were. It’s believed to be the only remaining double cadaver church tomb anywhere in the country. The couple’s stone effigies lie undercover, in process of decay, exposed in shrouds of wool tied over their heads. Sir John’s likeness is strikingly macabre in its exposed state. Memento Mori indeed. Son-in-law John Broughton and Sir John Howard were charged under Denston’s will to set up St Nicholas as a Collegiate Church in 1475. A resident warden and priests were paid to pray in perpetuity for the deceased’s soul. That eternity only lasted awhile as the final stage of dissolution during Edward VI’s reign in 1548 bought the practice to an end.

Another curious ecclesiastical monument, once common but now rare, is the display of arms of a local landowning family within their parish church. Here in the south chapel – safely out of thieves reach – are helm, tabard and sword of the Robinson family, later occupants of Denston Hall.

Medieval Wool Trade: Credit Look & Learn Magazine

All in all some interesting connections and an immersive experience in Church of England buildings which retain a strong sense of former Catholic orthodoxy and vernacular artistic exuberance. Much is owed hereabouts to a wealth creating home spun industry built on the backs of sheep.

Lodes, Rodes and Sedge

June 2, 2026June 4, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

There’s some quiet magic at work when you enter the world of Wicken Fen. Coming from the England of stone walls, fast streams, lush valleys and high moors I’ve nursed a lifelong need to sample the exact opposite. Finally I got the chance to do just that, in this corner of Cambridgeshire, where horizontal and vertical combine to define new perspectives and land and waterways interact on different levels under a carapace of yawning skies.

Wicken is a complex interrelated wetland that is England’s most species rich nature reserve, as well as being its most studied. This National Trust site welcomes some 70,000 visitors annually; not that it felt at all crowded on a midweek day in May. Quite the opposite!

Over 2,000 years Romans, Normans, Medieval monks, Stuart Merchant Adventurers, Victorian improvers, modern governments and agribusinesses have played their part in draining, containing and cultivating the great rural swathe of eastern England known as the Fens. The bulk of England’s grain, vegetable and fruit harvests are produced in the region as a result. The changes to the landscape have been profound and widespread. Less than 1% of that original wetland ecosystem remains, and nearly all of it is at Wickham.

Planting Little Gem Lettuce in a Fenland Field: Credit NFU Online

So how come it’s still here? Partly because in 1637 an armed uprising by locals fearful of losing their livelihoods fishing, water fowling and sedge harvesting prevented the Anglo-Dutch drainage projects of the area’s aristocratic landowners from going ahead here, like they had elsewhere. By the end of the 19^th century, naturalists, academics and enlightened landowners who prized this traditionally managed oasis for for its rare bird, moth and butterfly populations took action to preserve and extend it. In 1899 the newly formed National Trust bought two acres of Wicken Fen – the charity’s first ever nature reserve. Now acknowledged as’ the birth place of ecology’ it has grown to be a 629 nature acre (254 hectare) reserve of international importance featuring wet grassland, scrub woodland, reedbeds and sedge fen. More than 9,300 species have been recorded.

The reserve is connected by a network of boardwalks, paths, bridges and droves (grass roads) alongside ditches, dykes, meres, banks and lodes (canalised waterways). These waterways form part of the River Cam navigation and drainage catchment.

There’s only so much you can take in on one day at such a place. We set off from the Visitor Centre, with its chalk boards listing an array of daily bird sightings, to circumnavigate adjacent Sedge Fen. It proved a gentle introduction and easy perambulation, mainly on boardwalks fashioned from black recycled plastic.

Passed the remains of old clay pits, now deep ponds with coots scuttling, used when this area was a brickworks. Passed through islands of willow and alder buckthorn carr (wet scrub) alive with reed warbler and other bird song. The neighbouring seasonally wet grasslands (above) were cordoned off, for conservation reasons they’re not open for visitors until the summer. Saw Chinese Water Deer, an invasive species, nibbling the turf.

Vertical features have increased pull on the eye in such a landscape. The black wooden wind pump with its white sails is one such iconic marker. A relic of another former Fenland industry, peat digging.

Pushing a barrow of peat turves across a Fenland waterway c.1900

Before steam and diesel, wind power did the draining of the turf pits (peat diggings) so these small mills were once a common sight.

The modern structure seen here is a new wind pump, funded by the Environment Agency in 2011 to draw alkaline ground water to Sedge Fen from nearby Monk’s Lode in the winter months, helping keep the peat soil from drying out, a very real threat as the climate changes.

At this point, where Monk’s Lode meets Wicken Lode, is where we came across narrow boats moored. The name of one of them ‘Coo…ee Too’ a pun on a somewhat larger ocean going vessel!

After a picnic lunch we followed paths that led in turn to the straight lines of droves dividing East and West Meres from Baker’s and Adventure’s Fens. And what a contrast. Here we looked down on to swathes of land drained for farming centuries back. An unforeseen consequence was the drying out and sinking of the land, leaving vast acreages below remaining water level. Reflooded by the Trust post WW2 the new bogland and pools in the peat created as a result now attract masses of wildfowl, especially in winter.

We lingered at one of the hides, hearing more birds than we saw. Later, some brave folk passed us on tandem bikes, hired at the visitor centre, bumping furiously along the deceptively uneven drove surface, laughing in mixed measures of anxiety and delight.

Image of Konik ponies at Wicken Fen: National Trust

We glimpsed a distant group of Konik ponies at pasture. Together with a herd of handsome highland cattle, these introduced conservation grazers free range the reserve. The animals contrasting complimentary grazing styles play a key role in managing wet grasslands, doing the job people once did, keeping the ever encroaching scrub at bay. They also distribute wild flower seed in their droppings! Sedge today is cut by machine where once the fenmen cut, stacked, stored and transported the material for a wide range of uses in the textile and building trades.

Opposite the visitor centre, off the narrow approach lane, is the pretty C18th Fenman’s Cottage, restored in 1990 and furnished as it might have been in the 1930’s. A must see that gives a fascinating insight into an age old relationship between people, buildings and place.

The cottage is vernacular architecture defined by the use of locally sourced material; from dried peat bricks to floor tiles and daub plaster of gault clay, thatching with reeds and sedge.

Here, for many centuries, local families made a fiercely independent living from a raft of interrelated successional labours. Sedge, reed or willow harvesting, fishing, eel or mole catching, wildfowling, digging peat and clay, cutting litter (marsh hay) or transporting a wide range of goods in and out by water….all dictated by the seasons.

Under ambitious plans set out in the ‘Wicken Fen Vision’ the reserve is set to expand downstream, right to the outskirts of Cambridge. It’s the NT’s commitment to tackling climate change by re-establishing a lost landscape at scale, including nature friendly farm holdings on its edges acting as a buffer zone for the core fenland.

I wish them well in their mission. The Trust is protecting a treasure horde of vulnerable species and preserving precious peatlands, while still enabling access for all to enjoy this magnificent if fragile ecosystem. Balancing the need to increase self-sufficiency and security of food production while including nature as a key to managing a healthy and sustainable countryside remains one of the most pressing challenges of our times.

Star of the East

May 24, 2026May 24, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

Country dwellers like us could take a shine to any city that presents like East Anglia’s regional centre. The centre of Norwich feels more like a town than a metropolis, retaining ancient street patterns while much new building complements the old. Following the trend of breaking identity down into quarters also suits it well. We stayed two nights at the Maids Head, a venerable independent family hotel, right in the centre. The inhouse hire offer of Bentleys and bicycles must be unique.

From this base on Tombland (Old Norse for ‘open ground’) we took an evening stroll along the quayside that skirts the encircling River Wensum, from Fye bridge to Pull’s ferry. Thanks to the demolition of the former city gas works in recent times that stretch of riverside path is now continuous.

Curiosities here included seeing the remains of a sluice gate and swan pit. With their wings clipped the birds were once culled for feasts at the neighbouring Great Hospital. Formerly part of a monastery and still linked to the cathedral, it continues its caring role as a sheltered housing complex – minus the swan diet.

We watched a male bird waddling along the path while his mate sat on a nearby nest in the reedy corner of a fenced off pond.

Cow Tower (c.1398) is an early example of an elevated gun battery set on a bend in the river. Originally part of the medieval city wall, it looms up as a flinty floorless finger against the tranquil watery scene below.

Later, in the castle, we’d see the work of Romantic era artists from East Anglia like John Sell Cotman and John Crome. Here’s Crome’s bucolic summer view of the riverside hereabouts in 1819.

Bishops Bridge is a striking original structure of stone and brick, dating from 1340. The oldest span over the Wensum and once a major portal in the settlement’s walled defences. Terraced housing and small houseboats moored on the opposite bank give a peaceful counterpoint to passing traffic. A reminder of navigation that brought boats back and forth to the city’s teeming quays, helping Norwich develop as a major population centre of medieval England. Home to a thriving nexus of craftsmen, artisans and merchants.

The stone used to build Norwich cathedral was imported all the way from Caen in Normandy. To accommodate that final leg a short canal was dug here in the 1090’s, linking waterway to building site. Now long filled in we passed under the overarching ferryman’s house heading along the cut’s former course, now Ferry Lane, to the Cathedral close.

Next day found us digging further the city’s rich Norman legacy. From the newly refurbished castle to that imposing cathedral. The medieval splendour of the roof bosses in the cathedral is something to behold (preferably with binoculars!) Deeply impressed with the degree of visual narrative power so cleverly compressed in those vivid stone roundels.

The bosses were incorporated into the new stone roof of the late C15th. Yet for most of their existence they have been hidden from view, whitewashed over from the Reformation until late Victorian times. In 1932 they got repainted in their original bright colours.

An extraordinary achievement, 255 in total, looking down from on high above nave and choir, depicting biblical scenes and characters, from the Creation to the Last Judgement. I wondered if the much loved mystery plays performed by trades guilds through the streets of Norwich and other big towns had inspired the stonemasons in their turn.

One of the best meals of our holiday was had in this gracious medieval building, the Britons Arms. In the early C15th this was a ‘Beguinage’, a community of lay single women who devoted themselves to a life of prayer and charitable work. Today its secular tenants create some great dishes cooked with care and skill in the most relaxed and ambient of settings.

Taking a break from matters medieval, we stumbled upon a hidden gem, the Plantation Garden, situated just outside the centre. It’s a redundant chalk pit lovingly fashioned in the second half of the C19th into a charming green oasis by local businessman Henry Trevor, often re-using redundant building material in the process. The villa he had built as his family home overlooks the tree bordered steep sided three acre spread.

And finally…the steps of the C20th Art Deco City Hall not only give a fine view over the permanent market to the castle keep beyond but also yield overlooked sights of their own.

18 large round plaques grace the great bronze doors of the hall, chronicling Norwich’s history and its diverse businesses… I particularly liked this one of the former soda works.

We only saw a fraction of what Norwich has to offer and would gladly return to experience more. With a medieval church round every city centre corner, a maze of lanes and alleys, a wealth of business large and small, independents and chains, with its universities, museums and the wider cultural offer its civic star is rising. May its light continue to shine.

Castle Acre

May 20, 2026May 20, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

Bare ruin’d choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. ( Shakespeare: Sonnet 73)

On the road to Norwich to start our East Anglian holiday we stopped off in north Norfolk to explore Castle Acre. It’s a quiet spot embedded into a rolling landscape of arable chalklands, woods and shallow valleys. But today the air was riven by the passing sorties of fighter planes. A reminder that American jets stationed at nearby RAF bases are actively involved in that country’s current conflict with Iran.

It was military conquest following the battle of Hastings that brought a veteran of that regime changing conflict, William de Warenne, to these parts in the 1080’s. He and his successors planned and built a whole new settlement consisting of priory, village, parish church and castle. Their main seat though remained at Lewes in Sussex.

Artist’s impression of Castle Acre priory as was

Today the impressive remains of priory (dissolved at the reformation in the 1530’s) and castle (abandoned by the 14^th century) stand either side of a well to do pretty village complete with pub, teashop and convenience store.

Castle Acre castle site: Source – Wikipedia

Arriving in this region you notice just how much flint is in evidence as building material, alongside other local stone and timber frame. The historic remains are in the care of English Heritage while the estate lands that surround it remain with the Coke family, earls of Leicester, landowners since the mid 17^th Century. We noticed they were following the national trend in rewilding parts of the land, especially around waterways and hedgerows.

The priory was a wonder to discover as the ruins are so extensive and allow you to build a coherent picture of it as the grand self-contained community it once was. On entering the grounds you’re immediately struck by the C.12^th west front facade of the church and tower. The adjacent west range was the guest house for important secular visitors. We then ascended stone stairs to the Prior’s chambers, which includes a well-lit hall and private chapel.

These sections of the priory were always roofed, unlike the religious buildings which were ruthlessly stripped following dissolution for their valuable construction material. It became a farmhouse and stores with the former priory ruins and meadows grazed by stock or otherwise farmed. In the C.18th and C.19th growing appreciation of the picturesque and further interpretation and recording by antiquarians and artists allowed the Castle Acre complex to be seen in a new light and by 1929 the government Ministry of Works were allowing visitors regular public access to both priory and castle.

Of the ruined complex, largely stripped of dressed facing stone, the most evocative are the parts that betray human interaction, like the well-worn stairs that led up to the monks dormitory, where the brothers slept in their robes of black and white. The reredorter (literally, ‘at the back of the dormitory’) is a narrow two story building which was used on an industrial scale as a latrine block. Underneath is a watercourse designed to carry the waste away.

The castle footprint is huge, with steep embankments, ditches and motte. The De Warenne’s first buildings however were a relatively modest affair set within the outer defences.

It was only later, in the C13th civil wars that raged between nobles supporting the rival claims of Matilda and Stephen to the English throne that it was rapidly transformed from fortified house to full scale fortress, with barbican and inner bailey additions.

That protection stretched to an outer town wall and a bailey gate entrance, through whose narrow archway we carefully drove on entering and departing.

In Norwich we were impressed with the multi-million pound makeover of the great Norman castle (or rather the remaining keep) which has been five years in the making and feel it would make for a worthy winner of this year’s ‘Museum of the Year’ award. The great hall would have been similar to the De Warenne’s eventual fortress creation at Castle Acre.

Two exhibits displayed in the revamped medieval treasures display pertain to Castle Acre. This C15th parchment chant book, made and used by the Castle Acre monks, is of vellum (calfskin) oak and leather and small enough to be held in the hand. It’s complete with instructions (in red) for use in services as the brethren processed through the priory on different feast days throughout the year. The Cluniac order, founded in the French town of Cluny in the 6^th century, strictly followed the rules set down by St Benedict, but was also renowned for a love of art and decoration, which would have resulted in the walls of their establishments being brightly coloured and expressive.

There’s a timeless quality to this simple board game of Nine Men’s Morris made of chalk with horse motif, found at the castle in Castle Acre. Two players try to place three of their counters in a row, allowing them to remove one of their opponent’s pieces. Whoever removes enough of their opponent’s counters to prevent them from moving is the winner.

Castle Acre is a fantastic place to get an idea of how the temporal and spiritual life of a rural medieval planned settlement would have appeared. Well worth a visit, especially at mid-week when we were only two of a handful of visitors at the priory. More at https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/castle-acre-castle-acre-priory/

Light Over Jutland

February 13, 2026February 14, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ 1 Comment

The Old Window (detail) Oil painting by Anna Ancher

Maybe it’s from watching too much Danish television and cinema, but the northern region of Jutland lodges in my imagination as a cold windswept archipelago breeding outlaws, from Viking raiders to Scandi noir murderers. How refreshing then to set the record straight with a welcome immersion in the luminous world created by one of that country’s most celebrated artists, Anna Ancher.

Last week, on a rain soaked Tuesday morning, we slipped into the serene interior of the UK’s oldest public art collection, the Dulwich Picture Gallery in south London. We’ve previously caught some fine shows here but this one was different in that the artist was hitherto unknown to us.

Women artists of Anna’s day – she lived from 1859 to1935 – faced huge barriers in pursuing their careers. Her family, the Brondum’s, ran the only hotel in the remote town of Skagen (pronounced Skay-en) where she was born and spent most of her life. It became a lively centre of artistic activity from the 1870’s and still trades today in what has become an upmarket seasonal resort town of uniform bright walls and red tile roofs.

Emerging artists were drawn then to what was a near inaccessible spot at the very northern tip of Jutland, where the Skagerrak and the Kattegat seas meet. An exposed lone finger of land defined by sand dunes and continual beaches under vast open skies. One of those dynamic young incomers, Michael Ancher, became Anna’s husband and collaborator.

Anna, central, and her circle at the Brondum’s Hotel / Art Museums of Skagen, historic photo collection.

At that time most of the indigenous inhabitants led a hard existence as farmers and fisherfolk and many, like Anna’s mother Ane, were devout protestants. Surprisingly perhaps, Ane supported her daughter by paying for private art lessons in Copenhagen. (Women were banned from the official schools) Later both Anna and Michael studied in France where the liberating influence of impressionism was key to further development.

Anna was not just confined to the traditional female realms of home and family for subject matter and she demonstrated her compositional skills in large scale works like this one from 1903. The Skagen mission church congregation her mother belonged to, seated in the dunes ,listening to a sermon given by their local preacher.

Particularly liked this little picture of mothers bringing children to be vaccinated against smallpox. The practice had been compulsory in Denmark since 1810 but then, as now, it was a cause of controversy. With Michael modelling as the doctor, alongside local women and children, clearly shows which side of the argument the Anchers favoured.

Another eye catching small study in oils shows the Ancher’s daughter Helga, with Anna’s cousin Ane Torup, dressed in green, at home on the bench in a summer garden (c.1892).

Farmland had been painstakingly reclaimed from sandy heath and this vibrant close study of harvesters in the corn from 1905 both focuses and intensifies the colouration of the scene, where the sturdy workers set out to reap the rewards of their year’s labour.

One of the major oil paintings on display is a wonderful portrait from 1886 of a maid in the kitchen which demonstrates Ancher’s particular genius. A fascinating composition imbued with intimacy and stillness. Entrancing in its luminosity, with echoes for me of Vermeer.

Before the Hunt, Michael Ancher painted by Anna

Thank you Dulwich for bringing us this cultural gift from rural Denmark. I for one will – literally – see that land in a rather different light from now on. The exhibition continues to 8^th March. https://www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk/whats-on/anna-ancher-painting-light/

Grenen nature reserve, beyond Skagen. Image: Christian Faber

On Turner and Constable

February 9, 2026February 9, 2026 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

John Constable: View of Dedham Vale 1809 Oil paint, paper on canvas

When you live in the country but you’d like to know how others see the country then you need to head for the city. That’s what we did last week to indulge in a double dose of artistic genius served up for our consumption at Tate Britain.

Arrived at Millbank by boat on one of the catamaran Uber river taxies that ply their trade on the Thames. Pricey, but worth it for the vistas afforded. Powerful engines allow for nimble sideways docking and a surprising turn of speed on the fast flowing floodwaters. Graceful bridges backed by sky blocking glass walled monoliths at Vauxhall with remnants of more graceful human scale buildings elsewhere on the river banks.

JMW Turner and John Constable. The two mighty creative engines that powered and defined the art of landscape painting in early C19th England. The Tate exhibition bills the two men as ‘Rivals and Originals’ and an intriguing combo they proved to be when viewed here in tandem.

Weaving in and out of the mass of fellow visitors we were skilfully drawn into their overlapping visions of a land and people in flux, complimenting and contradictory by turns.

Both men were out touring in summer and working up drawings and sketches to a finished state back in their respective London studios throughout the winter, for display at the Royal Academy show, where they’d eventually secure top billing as leading members; feted, criticized and praised in equal measure by critics, patrons and public alike.

We were introduced to two very different personalities from contrasting social backgrounds. Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) was the son of a Devon born barber and wigmaker who had set up shop in Covent Garden. The proud father displayed his precocious 15 year old son’s drawings in the shop window to attract custom.

By contrast Constable’s father was a prosperous miller and coal merchant in rural Suffolk who disapproved of his son’s artistic ambitions. John Constable (1776-1837) comes across as an introspective, conservative and conscientious countryman while Turner was quite at home in the capital; an eccentric showman and gallery owner, secure in his own genius.

Constable: detail from oil painting of Hampstead Heath 1835

Against both their families initial opposition Constable married Maria Bicknell, a neighbour and childhood sweetheart, and subsequently supported a large family of seven children. For a while they lived out of London, in Hampstead village and Brighton, for the sake of Maria’s fragile health. Success came much later to him than it did Turner. Scaling up to work on larger canvasses his ‘Six footers’ helped secure artistic and economic success on being accepted as a member of the R.A. in 1829. Turner never married, though it’s believed he fathered two illegitimate daughters who he looked after. He also had Sandycombe lodge built in Twickenham for his widowed father. A fascinating miniature Italianate villa, still standing, recently restored and well worth a visit.

The exhibition displays a combined 170 works by the two artists. Constable’s masterpieces with the greatest appeal show us the working people of his native Suffolk going about their business in a quintessentially English pastoral setting. It seems idyllic on the surface but was often the opposite due to the huge changes wrought by the agricultural revolution then in full swing. A situation chronicled by contemporaries like William Cobbett in his ‘Rural Rides’ series of newspaper reports across the southern English counties.

I like this Constable picture of a muck heap, painted as a childhood friend’s wedding gift. Not the most obvious subject for a conjugal gift…Or is it? Composted fertility, spread on the land to increase yields, has a more obvious meaning. Like his most famous painting ‘The Haywain’ collie and patches of red feature as signatures to this otherwise everyday rural scene.

In Turner’s thrilling immersion we’re pitched into the dynamics of mechanised invention engaged with great elemental forces . ‘Snow storm – Steamboat off a Harbour’s Mouth’ (1842) is an outstanding example of the artist’s innovative style. Turner claimed he was lashed to a mast so he could safely observe the scene. I mused to think how much more disorientating this kind of artistic vision would have been when first viewed by the public.

By way of contrast Constable reveres the age old crafts – boat building in a dry dock off the River Stour. Barges like this floated his father’s stores of grain to Flatford mill and beyond. They were the foundations of the family’s fortunes and are lovingly captured in this oil painting of 1815. Constable must have revisited his childhood self in such scenes. A warm memory, in his own words, of a ‘careless boyhood…which made me a painter.’

Constable’s studies of Salisbury Cathedral in different weathers are famous works, reminding us of his deep Anglican faith and concern for the church in the face of social and religious reform. I loved the attention to detail in this painting, commissioned by the bishop, seen at the far left of the picture with his wife. Constable’s celebrated portrayal of clouds and loose handling of paint would prove a major influence on contemporary French artists, helping to lay the foundations of impressionism. That would not have impressed his patron though, who we are told, disliked the conflicted cumulous and wanted a more serene sky.

My eye was more drawn down earthwards, to the creatures in the foreground. Like the work of the C17th Dutch master Aelbert Cuyp, Constable clearly had a soft spot for cows, and they seem to represent the kind of rural contentment and prosperity he so valued. The beast on the left, having just drunk from the river, drools water while on the right a house martin hovers to catch flies over the stream.

Turner travelled extensively all over Britain and ,during breaks in the Napoleonic wars, across western Europe too. He worked rapid sketches in different mediums. I liked this small notebook sunset from a tour of 1796-7 executed in gouache, pencil & watercolour.

Constable too was no slouch on this outdoor tour mission. Six weeks spent touring the Lake District in 1806 sharpened his drawing skills as this fine pencil sketch of Borrowdale shows…I wondered if he ever met the Wordsworth’s on his perambulations then? What a conversation the Cumbrian poet and his sister may have had with artist from East Anglia.

Turner’s association with Northumberland is reflected in a handful of paintings on show. ‘Keelmen Heaving in Coals by Moonlight’ is one. It’s not specified which Tyne river port of Shields – North or South – is referred to. The image is typically dramatic yet also has a melancholic tone. The keelmen transferred vast amounts of regionally mined coal from their barges (keels) to sail boats bound for London and other rapidly expanding industrial towns and cities. But It’s 1835 and the rapid spread of railways is already making transport by these means redundant.

At the other end of the county Turner was drawn both as a young artist of 22 and as an old master to the ruins of Norham Castle on the English bank of the River Tweed, the boundary with Scotland. He clearly loved the place and his views at sunrise were recalibrated from the infused romance of 1823 (above) to light drenched abstraction in 1845 (below). The latter interpretation opened the door to modernism and, by acknowledgement, the major contemporary art prize awarded in his name.

All in all a great show which does both artists justice in refreshing our understanding, documenting and illuminating their roles in that revolutionary age. The exhibition continues to 12^th April. https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/turner-and-constable

On leaving we emerged into a street lined with mature plane trees, their bare branch stumps rounded like boxing gloves, punching the grey London sky. After hours infused in great art you can’t help but wonder at these natural forms tailored to urban life, like an outside extension to the gallery…Wonder what JMW and John would have made of them?

Cows on the Crags

October 2, 2025October 4, 2025 ~ stephentomlin ~ Leave a comment

What is this life if, full of care /We have no time to stand and stare? / No time to stand beneath the boughs / And stare as long as sheep or cows From ‘Leisure’ by W H Davies

The four acres of rough grazing in before our house – the crags – has had no stock on it since the spring when the Texel tups were taken off so vegetation has grown dense and high. A word with our farming neighbour at Southridge and we wake up last week to a small herd of cows in situ.

They’re beef shorthorn and white shorthorn cows with respective calves. These native bovine cousins are well suited to this environment being hardy foragers on poor grassland, easy calvers and good milk providers with a docile temperament for safer handling. They’re not only happy imbibers of our edible garden waste but their hearing is acute enough to catch the field gate opening, suddenly appearing over the crags as leafy foodstuffs arrive in my wheelbarrow.

The Durham Ox (1802) by John Boultbee: A national touring attraction weighing 171 stones

Delighted to discover that Shorthorns had their origin over 200 years ago here in the north-east of England through selective interbreeding of Teeswater and Durham cattle. The breeders herd book, dating from 1822, is the world’s oldest and the Shorthorn proved itself as adaptable to milk production as to meat when most farms were smaller mixed use holdings. On a larger scale, from Argentina to Australia and north America the breed rapidly established itself through C19th pioneering settlement and today some 40 breeds of cattle worldwide have their genes.

It’s the Shorthorn bred for beef that’s best known now, as agricultural history post 1945 has greatly increased specialisation and boosted yields, undermining the mixed farming model. The strains of Shorthorn originally bred for dairy have been vastly outnumbered nationwide by the larger black and white mega milk producers that are Friesian/Holsteins.

The Higher Stewardship Scheme incentivises hill farmers to return to stocking native breeds. White Shorthorn in particular benefit as it is officially registered ‘At Risk’ by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust. Their endurance is in part due to the cows being put to (black) Galloway bulls, producing the Blue Grey beef cattle often seen across the borderlands. Originally known in the 19^th Century as the ‘Cumberland White’ the breed has its heartlands very near us on the Northumberland/Cumberland border where the official society of breeders was founded at The Greenhead Hotel just off Hadrian’s Wall in 1962. Fitting then to have two of those distinctive white cows on our patch with their suckler calves sired in this case by a beef shorthorn bull.

In other news…A bumper year for apples so can hardly keep up at home juicing, pureeing or chip drying our orchard’s output. Recent moth trap reveals a fine example of seasonal camouflage with an Angle Shade demonstrating its October fallen leaf act. Volunteering in the garden at Cherryburn, I leave with some runner beans and a courgette from the take away table.

Enjoy a day trip to National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh for the wonderful Andy Goldsworthy retrospective. (showing to Nov 2nd). Here’s a detail from a recent ‘Sheep Painting’ of his created in mud and muck on dried canvas by action of flock in field round a mineral block, removed.