In the garden today: the last of this year’s giant poppies is ‘Beauty of Livermere’, named after the Suffolk village where it was first cultivated. Great Livermere Rectory was also home to the medievalist and ghost story maestro M.R.James, who set several of his most celebrated tales in the area.
A heartwarming response to my post of today on Instagram, I just had to screenshot and share.
It's not complicated: just give nature a break. 🌏
Radio X feels like home. Thanks everyone 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
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The beauty makes me feel giddy with joy! The smell, the sight, it's just so beautiful. Thank you for your posts.
Portrait of a woman, 1435. Don't know what I love more: the eyes, the subtlety of the purple robe, the incredible headscarf (the layers! the folds!) or the pins. The pins! Robert Campin, you did well.
My photo shows a pair of fibre ‘flip-flop’ style sandals with toe-thong and strap made of split papyrus. They were excavated from the near-intact tomb of Yuya and Tjuya (great-grandparents of Tutankhamun), in the Valley of the Kings at the Thebes. The sandals are made of grass and reeds, with the toe and side straps made of split papyrus.
Some designs stand the test of time! 🩴
Ancient Egyptian flip-flop-style fibre sandals, still looking remarkably wearable, and as good as the day they were made some 3,400 years ago!
From the Tomb of Yuya and Tjuya. Dynasty 18, reign of Amenhotep III. Egyptian Museum, Cairo 📷 by me
#Archaeology
A very large Exmoor Horn sheep.
Seven years today since we first introduced you to this absolute unit.
I'm not going in to the history of Fountains Abbey. Just admiring the stonework in this image by Allan Harris
I'm not going into the history of Fountains Abbey. Just admiring the stonework in this image by Allan Harris CC BY-ND 2.0
there's a lot we can learn from animals. such as: wearing sunscreen, sunbathing in compost, and generally being a pig
Photo of a rocky grey stone cliff in the sunshine, on the ledges gorse is in flower, creating vibrant yellows splashes of colour across the sirface of the rocks.
the gorse is absolutely spectacular right now
Or just 'No eating'. Too triggering.
Calm blue seas and a blue sky with the sun just rising over the horizon
No we're not on holiday in the Maldives, this is the view from the ferry this morning as #BookyMcBookface sails north to spend the day on the beautiful #Orkney island of Sanday. ❤️
The ridiculously fine C15 coffered barrel vault of Shepton Mallet church.
An ancient manuscript. Along the left margin is a drawn-on octopus whose tentacles point out important sentences on the page.
In the 14th century, someone who didn't have a highlighter handy thought to use octopus tentacles to mark the most important parts. I love it so much
(Manuscript from the Bankcroft library, UC Berkeley)
We are looking at a picture of a timber room with a large timber framed roof. Cartoon clothes are hung from different levels and include jeans, jackets, socks, dresses, t-shirts and socks. Two baskets of clothes are sat on the floor.
Did you know that in the Tudor period the Great Hall roof was used to dry clothes?
The roof space was so large it provided enough room for everyone in York to use it and it was free!
Ladders were provided for the highest levels which were reserved for pants. 🩲
French artist Jean-Pierre Laurens’ quietly-restrained depiction of his sister-in-law Alice with her young son, mourning the loss of her husband Raymond who died in the last weeks of WW1 (The Mourning Wife, 1922)
As we start a new week, it’s a timely reminder that we should make time to pause, return to our breathing and be in the present moment. It doesn’t mean sitting in silence in nature. It means bringing our awareness back to ourself and knowing everything else is external. Our calm comes from within. 😊
A WHSmith paper bag from the 1970s or 1980s.
As I have written elsewhere, along with our two local libraries and Jackanory, WHSmith in Croydon's Whitgift Centre was the formative influence on my reading life. To me, it was the best bookshop in the world. Notwithstanding the long, slow decline of the WHS brand, I am still sad to see it go.
An oak tree hanging on to last year’s leaves whilst this years tree buds grow next to them
The old and the new
✨The 12th-century Romanesque nave at Ely Cathedral rarely steals the spotlight (thanks to that lantern tower), but it’s absolutely jaw-dropping – so I put my tilt-shift lens to work... 📸 #throwbackthursday
Yesterday, and in broad daylight, I walked straight into a badger digging in our bluebell fields. Bluebell bulbs were flying. He didn’t notice me, as humans are scarce around here, and because he was facing away from me. So I playfully kicked him up the bum 🤭
The balls of Orkney Library & Archive in the sunshine. The sky is blue.
Today is the first day of spring and it's good to have the sun on our balls again. 🌞
during social distancing times, MERL had a life-size cardboard standee of this dude by the entrance with the slogan "please stand one absolute unit apart" 😀
A painting of a very chunky cow
we saw this unit and thought of you
Crikey that’s a unit too 😳
A very large Exmoor Horn ram, with a small yet noticeable smile.
look at this absolute unit
School of Fish in blue! Love this colour 💙 😊
Love this website - anything that illustrates amazing things so beautifully is inspirational.
