{"id":14034,"date":"2023-09-06T21:34:15","date_gmt":"2023-09-06T20:34:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/?p=14034"},"modified":"2023-09-07T08:39:34","modified_gmt":"2023-09-07T07:39:34","slug":"the-eighth-and-hopefully-the-last-lost-blog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/the-eighth-and-hopefully-the-last-lost-blog\/","title":{"rendered":"The eighth and hopefully the last lost blog: Eastbridge Hospital and much more"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Just as an alert to regular blog readers, this is the last CKHH blog until it restarts early in September<\/strong>. Not that this means we aren\u2019t doing anything over August. For example, Dr Diane Heath <\/strong>and her \u2018Medieval Animals Heritage\u2019<\/strong> team have a series of events (see below), but we need the space to do other things too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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Lion from the Rochester Bestiary<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

For today, therefore, I\u2019ll start with Diane\u2019s exciting summer holiday programme for SEND families, and then mention an opportunity for \u2018young historians\u2019 linked to the CKHH temporary exhibition at Dover<\/strong>. This will go up this evening and then tomorrow evening I\u2019ll add a report on the Eastbridge<\/strong> talk scheduled for tomorrow afternoon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So to Diane<\/strong>, Martin Crowther<\/strong> and Dr Pip Gregory<\/strong>, firstly, there was a highly successful Medieval Mermaids<\/strong> event on Ramsgate<\/strong> beach last Sunday<\/strong> (23 July) where SEND families produced a series of sandcastle mermaids and mermen which they decorated with beachcombing finds. The event finished with a picnic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keeping with the seaside, the next event will be back on Ramsgate<\/strong> Main Sands beach for more \u2018Medieval Mermaids sandcastle-building<\/strong>\u2019 for SEND families on Wednesday 2<\/strong> August<\/strong> between 10am and noon. Again, booking is essential and can be found at: Medieval Mermaids sandcastle-building – for SEND families Tickets, Wed 2 Aug 2023 at 10:00 | Eventbrite<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now for lovers of fossils, the team\u2019s next event will be on the evening of Thursday 3 August<\/strong> (6pm to 9pm). The Prehistoric Sharks Teeth Hunt<\/strong> \u2013 for SEND families will involve hunting for 50-million-year-old fossil sharks\u2019 teeth on Beltinge<\/strong> beach. At the same time, SEND families will discover some fabulous medieval stories about fossils. For further details and to book, please see: Prehistoric Sharks Teeth Hunt – for SEND families Tickets, Thu 3 Aug 2023 at 18:00 | Eventbrite<\/a> Another treat for fossil <\/strong>lovers scheduled by the Medieval Animals Heritage team will take place on Tuesday 8 August<\/strong> between 10am and 1pm. This time the location is the beach at Folkestone Warren<\/strong>, a great place to find fossils. Join Diane, Martin and Pip to see if you can find amazing ammonites. These incredible creatures lived in the semi-tropical seas that covered Kent over 65 million years ago. There are medieval stories about these creatures, including the tale that St Hilda turned these serpents to stone. For more details and booking, please check out: Folkestone Fossil Foray – for SEND families Tickets, Tue, Aug 8, 2023 at 10:00 AM | Eventbrite<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For something a bit different, there will be a spectacular free Dover Dinosaur Day<\/strong> on Wednesday 9 August<\/strong> between 10am and 3pm in Pencester Gardens. As Martin says, as well as a giant T-Rex and Stegosaurus dinosaur walkabout and \u2018How to train your dinosaur\u2019 shows, the Medieval Animals Heritage<\/strong> team will be joining those from the Maison Dieu<\/strong> project to create dragon and gargoyle grotesques inspired by the Dover Maison Dieu\u2019s fabulous carved creature. For details and booking: https:\/\/www.dover.gov.uk\/Community\/Events\/Dover-Dinosaur-Day\/Dover-Dinosaur-Day-9-August-2023.aspx#:~:text=Two%20huge%20dinosaurs%20are%20visiting,other%20dino%20friends%20with%20them<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Dragons as close ‘relatives’<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Furthermore, the MAH team are finalising details for the end of project events in late August which will involve a visit to Rochester Cathedral to see the Rochester Bestiary<\/strong> and its fabulous animal images. Then the end of project party at Dover Castle<\/strong> will be on Thursday 24 August <\/strong>\u2013 St Bartholomew\u2019s feast day \u2013 also celebrated at St Bartholomew\u2019s Hospital at Sandwich \u2013 does anyone know why? If not, and to find out why the Sandwich celebration did not take place in 1532, check out my \u2018Discord in the Public Arena\u2019 article in Negotiating the Political in Northern European Urban Society, c.1400\u2013c.1600 <\/em>(2013).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, going back to Dover, those who have seen last week\u2019s blog will know that the \u2018From Cradle to the Grave: Living, Working and Dying in Late Medieval Dover\u2019<\/strong> temporary exhibition will be staying throughout August <\/strong>at St Mary\u2019s church,<\/strong> located next to Pencester Gardens and not far from Dover Museum. To avoid disappointment, it is probably sensible to check the church\u2019s opening hours because they do vary. Nevertheless, to celebrate this extension and to offer an opportunity for budding \u2018Young Historians\u2019<\/strong> we would like you (those of school age) to produce between a half and a full page of A4 as a creative written response to an aspect of the exhibition at the church that has inspired you. Please use size 12, Arial font, double spaced. Just give your initials and age and ask a parent or carer to email to: sheila.sweetinburgh@canterbury.ac.uk<\/a> and the two entries the judges like best will go in the CKHH\u2019s blog in early September. We at CKHH will look forward to reading your work. Please note, if any entries are perceived to indicate a danger to life or other serious matter, they will be passed to the appropriate authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Canterbury pilgrims – from the Becket Miracle Windows<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Then finally for this first section, I\u2019m delighted to report that Dr Daniella Gonzalez<\/strong> provided a morning of training on how to get the best out of social media for volunteers linked to the Medieval Animals Network project \u2013 so many thanks Dani!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally to Eastbridge,<\/strong> and this afternoon after starting in the hospital\u2019s Juxon Room, the almost sixty-strong audience decamped to the upper chapel because not everyone had been able to get in. This lovely airy room was fine and meant I could point out the splendid misericords, which came from Holy Cross church (now the city\u2019s Guildhall), that seemingly have a representation of the Westgate and the archbishop\u2019s Westgate mill. This, I think is a totally appropriate home for them, not least because Archbishop Hubert Walter gave the tithes of this same mill to St Thomas\u2019s hospital (pre-1205).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For today\u2019s talk, I offered a brief assessment of the hospital\u2019s foundation and early history in the context of the explosive nature of Becket\u2019s cult in the late 12th<\/sup> and early 13th<\/sup> centuries. So as well as its place within the landscape of pilgrim hospitals in Kent pre and post-1170, I wanted to explore why people in the High Middle Ages saw fit to support such hospitals, and specifically St Thomas\u2019 using the donations of one of, if not its premier, benefactor, Hamo de Crevequer, and those whom he influenced \u2013 his mother, brother and son, his friends and peers, his tenants and those of his son. Moreover, as well as what might be seen as more worldly reasons, we also investigated his likely spiritual ideas by thinking about the Seven Corporal Works of Mercy, purgatory and the Last Judgment, and matters relating to Christ the pilgrim, a Christian\u2019s duty to God, to one\u2019s neighbour and to oneself, and the mutual spiritual interdependency between rich and poor.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Chantry chapel at Eastbridge<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

With this as our bedrock, we were then in a position to examine pilgrimage as a phenomenon in Canterbury in the context of the later Middle Ages once we had looked at the socioeconomic climate of the early 14th<\/sup> century \u2013 generally not a good time for St Thomas\u2019 hospital, and the post-Black Death world of frequent plague outbreaks, famine, war and thus death \u2013 the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Yet such crises apparently drew pilgrims in large numbers to Canterbury (which probably in turn exacerbated the plague outbreaks and food shortages).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet this also gave us the chance to investigate the actions of the city, citizens, hospital and cathedral to bring in more pilgrims by enhancing the \u2018pilgrim experience\u2019 \u2013 spiritually and materially. I began with the city\u2019s (civic) response and here I\u2019ll just point out one factor. Having a well-ordered city was vital and while this could be seen as the provision of a range of markets, equally important was the wholesomeness of their running, such as the civic employment of scavengers to keep the marketplace and butchery clean, but as part of this was in Canterbury\u2019s case the provision of a public latrine at the Kingsmill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moving on to the responses of the citizens, again I\u2019ll just pick one which is that albeit very few citizens, at least through their wills, sought to enhance the well-being of pilgrims and pilgrimage at St Thomas\u2019 hospital, there are some interesting exceptions. One of these was Thomas Halywell clerk, who in his will of 1513 left a pair of sheets to be made into altar cloths for the high altar in the hospital\u2019s chapel, with 2 mattresses, 2 pairs of his blankets and 2 old coverlets to the beds of poor male pilgrims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keeping with St Thomas\u2019 hospital, one of the factors I discussed was differences in provision for the care of poor, sick pilgrims and those seen as able-bodied. For if these same sick pilgrims died at the hospital, under the archiepiscopal provisions they would be buried in the cathedral\u2019s lay cemetery, and their mortuary candle would come from Dover\u2019s great candle (brought to Canterbury every 3 years).<\/p>\n\n\n

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The undercroft<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Allied to this but part of the responses to enhance the pilgrimage experience by the cathedral community within the city was the building of new inns (as well as buying inns from others). Among these was the famous the Cheker, the (White) Bull and the Sun, with the Crown in Mercery Lane being among the second group. While for the cathedral\u2019s responses within its precincts, it is worth noting the enhance use of space and time, from the sheer physical splendour of the shrine to the timetable of feast days and their attendant celebrations, as well as the importance of Tuesdays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This brought me to my final section on what those involved with St Thomas\u2019 hospital sought to do to ensure its survival beyond its core purpose. These we saw as the provision of corrodies, the value place of confraternity, the desire to establish chantries and the hospital\u2019s parochial responsibilities. Thus, having discussed these points, I felt my audience deserved their refreshments, and in keeping with its charitable origins we moved down to the Juxon Room for tea and cake. As far as I could tell this had been a successful afternoon and perhaps those at Eastbridge will lay on other talks in the future. And with that, I hope all the blog\u2019s readers have a good and enjoyable August, see you in September.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just as an alert to regular blog readers, this is the last CKHH blog until it restarts early in September. Not that this means we aren\u2019t doing anything over August. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6665,"featured_media":7789,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[973,822,1001,818,5762,982,1162,986,1029,817],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academic","category-blog-posts","category-canterbury","category-events","category-heritage","category-kent","category-lecture","category-local-and-regional-history","category-middle-ages","category-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"authorName":"Sheila Sweetinburgh","featuredImage":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/445\/2020\/01\/DSC08508.jpg","postExcerpt":"Just as an alert to regular blog readers, this is the last CKHH blog until it restarts early in September. Not that this means we aren\u2019t doing anything over August. […]","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6665"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14034"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14034\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14102,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14034\/revisions\/14102"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.canterbury.ac.uk\/kenthistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}