A Sucker for Norman Architecture
Today I am travelling out of London, heading down to a little town on the coast that flows out from the magnificent South Downs. This will be the first time in several months I have spent the weekend outside my fair capital. I cannot wait.
My trip promises to be a grown-up affair. There is to be a birthday meal in a posh seafood restaurant (at which I will not be allowed to wear a Green Lantern t-shirt); cooking lessons (I am hoping to be taught how to make a killer tortilla and mean artichoke pizza) and possibly even an excursion to investigate wattle trees.
There is also a fabulous 903-year old church I quite fancy a chance explore. As a Hadleigh boy, I have always been a sucker for Norman architecture. Aside from its amazing arches, I would love to get inside and look at the church’s highly interesting incised marks. These on have some notoriety in Masonic research circles and how could I not want to see something carved circa 1185 that coincidentally duplicates a veve for Carrefour? English Hoodoo carved in pillars of stone.
It is probably too late in the year to enjoy it, but the church also has a Mary Garden and Hospitallers’ herb garden with everything from Alecost to Yarrow. The archetypal England of Hollywood and collective national mythology is more than a dream in places such as this.
My trip promises to be a grown-up affair. There is to be a birthday meal in a posh seafood restaurant (at which I will not be allowed to wear a Green Lantern t-shirt); cooking lessons (I am hoping to be taught how to make a killer tortilla and mean artichoke pizza) and possibly even an excursion to investigate wattle trees.
There is also a fabulous 903-year old church I quite fancy a chance explore. As a Hadleigh boy, I have always been a sucker for Norman architecture. Aside from its amazing arches, I would love to get inside and look at the church’s highly interesting incised marks. These on have some notoriety in Masonic research circles and how could I not want to see something carved circa 1185 that coincidentally duplicates a veve for Carrefour? English Hoodoo carved in pillars of stone.
It is probably too late in the year to enjoy it, but the church also has a Mary Garden and Hospitallers’ herb garden with everything from Alecost to Yarrow. The archetypal England of Hollywood and collective national mythology is more than a dream in places such as this.
4 Comments:
Excellent. Please let us know how it goes.
Some of my favorite times spent when i lived in england was exploring architecture, the older the better. Here, if a house is 100 years old it's an historical landmark. I'm so sorry i lost my UK residency.
This will be an amazing and interesting trip. The oldest architecture here, as you know, is just over 200 years old, we practically sparkle. When we went to Prague my husband couldn't drag me away from the streets, my mind just can't sort out the sheer manhours it took to do the carvings on the buildings.
David, hope your weekend is wonderful. I vote for wearing your Green Lantern t-shirt ANYWAY. xo
I love walking through gardens, but I must say, my ability to name what I see is very, pathetically, limited. Just dropping by to say hi and I hope the death threats have died down, at least a little, but that life's still interesting.
I hope your vaction is going (went?) well. I also love visiting old churches. The architecture usually is extraordinary and the feeling of being in an ancient institution that has remained close to God never ceases to bring me peace.
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