Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Author: admin

  • Streets of Norwich – Hindes Yard

    Streets of Norwich – Hindes Yard

    Part of my Streets of Norwich project….

    Hindes Yard is located off of St. Augustine’s Street, just above where it says ‘free trade tavern’ on the above map from the 1880s.

    It’s one of many yards along this street, many of which have survived in some form, although some of them are closed off. The name of the yard likely comes from the early part of the nineteenth century, after the local Hinde family who ran a nearby manufacturing business.

    Back in 1939, there were three households in the yard, with six people living across the properties.

  • Streets of Norwich – Bakers Road

    Streets of Norwich – Bakers Road

    Part of my Streets of Norwich project….

    Baker’s Road, also known as Baker Road, connects Oak Street and St. Augustine Street, and it’s one that has changed substantially over the last century.

    This is Baker’s Road from the St. Augustine’s Street end, looking very different to 50 years ago as all of the terraced houses on the left hand-side were pulled down in July 1973.

    The pulling down of the houses meant that previously hidden sections of the city wall were uncovered, which were previously in the backyards of the properties along here (and visible in the above map).

    Looking back towards St. Augustine Street.

    Not much remains of this section down towards Oak Street, but the council are looking at the potential of making clear that the wall used to be wider than this suggests.

    The house painted white is number 31, which in 1939 was lived in by 6 people, all from the Hardy family. There was Amos Hardy, a pedlar, and his wife, along with five children, including Benjamin, Joyce, Eric and Douglas. Benjamin’s job was marked as “of national importance”, working as a coil spring operator.

    A green area where the houses stood, with the street being named after the number of bakeries that were once here.

  • Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day Forty-Eight

    Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day Forty-Eight

    The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue was first published at the end of the eighteenth century, and given that the Coronavirus crisis is giving too much time to read books, I thought I’d pick a daily word from it until I got bored…..

    Budget

    The dictionary defines this as a “wallet”, and also “a term used to signify the notification of taxes required by the Minister for the expenses of the ensuing year”. At the end of the eighteenth century, the phrase “open the budget” with reference to the Chancellor’s monetary decisions had started to come into use, but it wasn’t a widespread word for financial figures and that only came at the end of the nineteenth century when the “open the” fell off the phrase.

    Back to the word wallet, it came into the English language in the fifteenth century from the French word for a leather bag or purse, which was bougette, which in turn had derived from Latin. Shakespeare used the word in reference to meaning a purse and it was used frequently in written and verbal communications.

  • London – British Museum (Great Yarmouth Fisher Girl by John Sell Cotman)

    London – British Museum (Great Yarmouth Fisher Girl by John Sell Cotman)

    I usually visit the British Museum three or four times a year, something which is a little difficult to do with the current virus situation, primarily because it’s shut. However, they’ve placed hundreds of thousands of images on their web-site, so this will have to do me for the moment. The images can be used non-commercially, as long as the British Museum is credited. So, this is their credit.

    A watercolour of a fishwife in Great Yarmouth by John Sell Cotman (1782-1842) which was acquired by the British Museum in 1902 from James Reeve. They don’t know when it was painted, but Cotman lived in Great Yarmouth between 1812 and 1823, so it was probably then. There’s something quite intriguing about this one-eyed lady, standing in front of a lottery sign, with her key at her waist and her fish on her head. I’m not sure that I can think of another painting which is more evocative of Great Yarmouth at that time. I’m equally unsure what that says about Great Yarmouth or me, but there we go….

  • Words – Housen

    Words – Housen

    Further to my post about Recorder Road, I liked the use of the word “housen”.

    The above chart (I’ve embedded it, so if there’s nothing there, blame Google) shows how the word usage has fallen back over the twentieth century, although it was very much a late nineteenth century word. The word ‘housen’ is simply the plural of house, which is a more beautiful word than ‘houses’ and although it was never that common it has become pretty much entirely archaic now.

    There aren’t many words now which shove an “n” at the end to make a plural, but there used to be. The plural of tree was sometimes ‘treen’, knee was ‘kneen’, shoe was ‘shoon’ and even Shakespeare used the word ‘eyen’ as the plural for eye. And, of course, in German the practice of adding the ‘n’ is still common for many words.

  • Streets of Norwich – Recorder Road

    Streets of Norwich – Recorder Road

    Part of my Streets of Norwich project….

    Recorder Road is a relatively new street in Norwich, winding its way through what was until the early twentieth century a distillery and vinegar works. It is L-shaped and connects Horsefair to Prince of Wales Road.

    As the road is relatively new, there’s not a great of historic interest along here, with this being the road from the Prince of Wales Road end.

    The Greek Orthodox Church, which was built for the Christian Scientists in 1934 and was designed by Herbert G Ibberson to seat 300 people. I’ve never thought it was particularly exciting architecturally, but it is a listed building as it’s apparently notable for its Arts and Crafts style of design

    There’s a walkway which connects through to the River Wensum riverside footpath.

    This is where it gets more exciting, when we approach Horsefair, and it’s Stuart Court. These are almshouses which were constructed in 1914 and are listed buildings noted for their Dutch-style design.

    The plaque reads “these housen were built in the year 1915 in memory of James Stuart, Privy Councillor born at Balgonie, Scotland, 1843. Sometime a citizen of Norwich died at Carrow Abbey 1913”. I’m going to post about that word ‘housen’ in another post, it should be used more…..

    A media report at the time noted that “these cottages are two-storied and designed on the flat principle, since owing to the preciousness of land it is impossible to build this class of dwelling economically on any other plan. Each storey, therefore, forms a complete and entirely private home, planned on thoroughly hygienic lines and fitted up in a way which is too rarely met with houses designed for persons of such small means. A wash-house is provided, for instance, containing a tip-up bath, a copper with a patent steam extractor, and many other useful features; while every building is supplied with gas pipes, and in each wash-house space has been left for a gas cooker, tenants being allowed to install a slot meter or not as they wish”.

    Once again, I’ve managed to pay no attention to this despite walking by it hundreds of times.

    This plaque is inside the entranceway to the gardens constructed in 1922, with the gardens also being named after James Stuart. This is the third listed building on Recorder Road, impressive since everything on it is twentieth century (or this century I suppose). The gardens and the gateway were designed by Edward Boardman, who died in 1910, showing how long this took to be finished.

    Some rather nice gardens, very peaceful.

    One mystery I haven’t been able to answer, I don’t know why it’s called Recorder Road. I’m sure it’s obvious, but it’s gone over my head.

  • Norwich – M&S Easter Eggs

    Norwich – M&S Easter Eggs

    Well, this is very lovely. 20p each…..

    Very restrained of me I thought.

  • London – British Museum (1787 Print of Norwich Cathedral by John Sanders)

    London – British Museum (1787 Print of Norwich Cathedral by John Sanders)

    I usually visit the British Museum three or four times a year, something which is a little difficult to do with the current virus situation, primarily because it’s shut. However, they’ve placed hundreds of thousands of images on their web-site, so this will have to do me for the moment. The images can be used non-commercially, as long as the British Museum is credited. So, this is their credit.

    This plate is from 1787 and has the beautiful Norwich Cathedral at the rear, whilst a donkey chucks a boy off its back, kicks a dog and then gets whipped by its owner. Eventful to say the least…. The plate isn’t on display and was acquired by the British Museum in 1873 from George Mason, who was a bookseller.

    I’m puzzled what that wall to the right is, there’s no obvious building on any overhead map from the period. It is though the site of whether Norwich Cathedral’s bell tower once stood, but this was torn down in the late sixteenth century and the bells flogged off. The building on the left is Norwich School’s chapel, the chantry chapel and college of St John the Evangelist which was built in 1316.

    And a photo from around the same spot today. Unfortunately, no donkeys were visible to liven proceedings up.

  • Streets of Norwich – Plumbers Arms Alley

    Streets of Norwich – Plumbers Arms Alley

    Part of my Streets of Norwich project….

    Located off of Princes Street, this small alley connects to Waggon and Horses Lane, taking its name from the Plumbers Arms pub which traded between the early nineteenth century and 1881.

    The pub building still stands and is now trading as a restaurant, which doesn’t seem to make much of the structure’s heritage in their communications. But, the building is of importance, it has two undercrofts with one from the fifteenth and the other from the sixteenth century and it was originally constructed (albeit much changed since) in the fifteenth century as a residential property.

    Norfolk Museums Service have this drawing in their collection which was created by Percy Stimpson, looking back towards Princes Street.

  • London – British Museum (Cicely Ormes)

    London – British Museum (Cicely Ormes)

    I usually visit the British Museum three or four times a year, something which is a little difficult to do with the current virus situation, primarily because it’s shut. However, they’ve placed hundreds of thousands of images on their web-site, so this will have to do me for the moment. The images can be used non-commercially, as long as the British Museum is credited. So, this is their credit.

    This print was made by Thomas Bowles II in the mid-eighteenth century and it was donated to the British Museum in 1901 by Sir Sidney Colvin. The image tells the story of Cicely Ormes, a brave woman from Norwich who was burned at the stake on 23 September 1557.

    Ormes, who was born in East Dereham, lived in the St. Lawrence parish of the city and when she was aged 21, she was pressured by a Catholic magistrate to denounce her Protestant faith. She did, but she regretted this, and so she recanted. Ormes, the wife of a worsted weaver, was then arrested a few months later and ordered to shut up about her refusal to accept the Catholic faith. She said no, so the magistrate ordered that she be burned to death.

    At the stake she stood firm and said:

    “Welcome thou cross of Christ” and “my soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit rejoiceth in God my Saviour”.

    It was common for people to change their religion at this time, indeed, it was pretty essential as the Monarchs kept faffing about with their decision on what the national religion should be. But, they were allowed to just change their minds to suit the situation, which most people did for a quiet life. Cicely Ormes was clearly braver than that, she didn’t want to sacrifice her beliefs and so she died at the age of 22. She was reported to feel no pain as she died, and she was clearly very courageous, and I’m not sure that Norwich has really recognised that bravery.