The Tudor Fair Blog
History Reading Room: Witches and Richard II
In Halloween history news, the ghost of Jennette Device has been apparently seen roaming around a church in Pendle recently. She was the 9 year old girl who testified against her own mother and sister in the famous Pendle Witch Trials which saw ten people convicted and killed for witchcraft (8…
Witchcraft in Tudor England
I’m working this week on two podcast episodes with the History, Bitches podcast (which is great) that we’re putting out jointly, on Halloween themes, including witches and ghosts. Today we recorded ghosts, so different places where Tudor ghosts are meant to be haunting, and tomorrow is witches. As such, I’ve…
The Execution of Lady Jane Grey
When I was 24 I moved to London because I was in love with the English choral tradition, and wanted to immerse myself in music and history. I also happened to have a crazy crush on an Unavailable Man who lived there, but even though the man and I didn’t…
Stile Antico rescued my Music Drought
About 7 years ago I went through a Music Drought. Have you ever been in one of those? Months, or even years go by, and you realize that you haven’t listened to anything new, or even anything that you love and makes your spine tingle in ages? Yeah, well, that…
The Atheist’s Favorite Service: The Wonder of Choral Evensong
Here’s a niche audience waiting for a need to be met: If you’re in the UK, AND you want to hear choral evensong services near you, there’s a new site called choralevensong.org. It’s a searchable directory of evensong services throughout England. If you’re into choral music, there’s no better place to…
Cambridge, and the draining of the Fens
It’s October, which means that I’m in my head planning for another year spending November in a NaNoWriMo haze in addition to the tryptophan-induced sleep coma of Thanksgiving. In case you don’t know, NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month, wherein participants pledge to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days.…
John Dee: Brilliant Scientist and Occult Philosopher
I’ve just recently uploaded a new episode of my Renaissance English History Podcast, which focused on trade and exploration in Elizabethan England. While researching it, I came upon several interesting men who had major roles in the creation of the Age of Discovery. One was Sebastian Cabot, the son of…
Bess of Hardwick: An Elizabethan Woman Who Created Her Own Smart Luck
History can often seem intimidating because it seems like only the stories of dead white men. And there’s a reason for that. The white men were the ones who kept most of the records, being the ones who were educated and literate, and so they are the ones about whom…
5 Reasons Cirencester is a Hidden Magical Gem (aka History Travel Tuesday)
There are a handful of cities in Europe that were once major epicenters of the universe, but are now snoozy little hamlets who betray nothing of their illustrious pasts. Cordoba comes to mind. The place was once pretty much the center of the universe, and the most populous city in…
Medieval Monks and Nuns weren’t as Promiscuous as We All Think They Were
I recently came across a post on medievalists.net about a thesis by Christian D. Knudsen concerning sexual misconduct in convents and monastic houses. The idea that the monasteries were corrupt, and in “decline” just before the Dissolution is a narrative that has been largely unchallenged for 500 years, and in…
Richard Hakluyt: England’s first Travel Writer
I’m working on a new Renaissance English History Podcast about trade and exploration (because of course the two were linked – without the possibility of new trading markets, there could be no exploration of new lands). It’s impossible to read much about any of the early English explorations without stumbling…
Staying relevant in pop culture after 500 years: Tallis and Spem in Alium
A few months ago I went to pull up a recording of Thomas Tallis’ Spem in Alium, his famous 40 part motet written for 8 5-part choirs. I hadn’t listened to it in a while, and it was the kind of day that called for some later Tallis. The recording that came…