Oakham Castle reopens after major restoration project

I went over to Oakham today for the official reopening of its castle after a £2m restoration project.

The castle grounds and town centre were en fête with more or less Norman attractions.

There is a report on BBC News:

Oakham Castle, in Rutland, has been closed since September to allow for the restoration of the Great Hall and cleaning of the 230 commemorative horseshoes inside. 

The ancient defensive walls have also been revealed for the first time in 150 years. 

It is one of the oldest surviving secular buildings in the country. 

Oakham Castle, which dates back to 1180, was built as a manor house and was later heavily fortified with walls, a moat and a drawbridge but by the 16th Century most of the castle was a ruin.

If you want to know more about the archaeology of the site, there is a helpful episode of Time Team.

To an  occasional visitor like me, the revelation of the walls around the site is striking.

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Leicester Oral History Trail 8: Highcross

The latest interview in this series deals with the archaeological dig that took place after the site had been cleared for the construction of the shopping centre Highcross Leicester.

It found the medieval church of St Peter and a thousand skeletons in its churchyard. Today that churchyard lies under the city's John Lewis store.

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Richard Reburied Revisited

A year ago today, on a similarly sunny day, I paid my respects to the remains of a King of England.

That was Richard III, whose coffin lay in Leicester Cathedral for three days before its burial.

To mark the anniversary the city council is staging a series of events under the title Richard Reburied Revisited.

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When the Jorvik Centre was a hole in the ground

This evening York Mix posted 12 vintage films of the city.

One caught my eye straight away, because it comes from August 1979 and so falls during my time as a student in the city.

Watching it today does confirm one memory of mine - and I don't mean the gruesomely distorted sound, which reminds me of film shows at primary school.

No, that memory is of a time before the Jorvik Centre opened. In my student days there was a large archaeological dig on the site. You can see it on the film from 2:27.

As I recall, there was no charge for going round and you were given a Viking oyster shell when you left.

The latest news from the Jorvik Centre is rather grim. It was badly affected by the recent floods and the government has rejected a plea for extra funds to allow a swift reopening.

A report in the Yorkshire Post quotes the former North Yorkshire councillor and Liberal Democrat peer Angie Harris:

"When I visited the Jorvik Viking Centre in York last week it was a scene of utter devastation. 

"It's a world renowned tourist attraction and educational centre, provided by the excellent York Archaeological Trust, of which I am a member, and which depends largely on its funding from the viking centre. The Trust could be destroyed by this enormous loss of revenue."

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Six of the Best 556

Mark Park shows how Stop the War airbrushed a conspiracy theory from its website.

"The long term trend of the decline of membership and support for political parties has, if anything, accelerated, and long standing loyalties to right or left have given way to a far more complicated political reality in which populist or even anti democratic voices are now being increasingly heard." Cicero's Songs on the crisis of conventional political parties.

"What to do with a broken ship full of explosives? That question has been debated off and on for the past seven decades, and the consensus has been to leave it alone, safer right where it is. So there the ship sits at the bottom of the estuary, the area around it cordoned off by buoys." Robkam on the wreck of the SS Richard Montgomery, which lies in the Thames Estuary.

California's third-largest city is a desert ghost town - Laura Bliss explains.

Martyn Barber and Edward Carpenter present some striking aerial photographs that reveal previously unsuspected archaeological sites.

Tiffany Imogen celebrates gifts from the hedgerow.

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