Category: London

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 drawing was made by John Thirtle, likely at the very end of the eighteenth century or the early part of the nineteenth century. The museum purchased the drawing from Andrew Wyld in 1977, a dealer in fine art. Like nearly everything I seem to look up, this artwork isn’t on public display and they don’t seem to have used it in any exhibitions or the like. It’s a pen and grey ink drawing with a grey wash, showing Bishopgate Bridge. Thirtle is buried in the Rosary Cemetery, a reminder to myself that I should go and have another investigation there as I haven’t visited in a while.

I think this photo was taken from around the same place as the above drawing was made, I was slightly hampered by three things. One were bushes, one was a big tree and the other was a blasted fence where I wanted to stand to take the photo. I didn’t fancy having any little incidents by climbing over that small fence and falling into the River Wensum, so this is the best that I could safely get.

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.

Clicking on the above image will bring up a larger version. It’s one of the better known plans of Norwich (or Nordovicum), issued at some point after 1581. It’s been in the British Museum collections for so long they don’t know when they got it, but it was before 1811.

Anyway, it’s gorgeous. At the top is Bishopgate Bridge, when it still had its gate, and Cow Tower is visible to the left of that. To the bottom, at number 14, is “Hell Gates”, which is more usually called Heigham Gate, but I prefer the version on this plan of the city. And near number 17, which is St. Stephen’s Gate, is near where the St. Stephen’s outlet of Greggs is now located.

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 is perhaps one of the more surprising items in the collections of the British Museum, a takeaway menu from Ephesus on Rose Lane in Norwich. It was given to the museum by St John Simpson, who is a curator specialising in items from the Middle East. Perhaps I’ll send the British Museum a nice JD Wetherspoon menu for their collection. Unsurprisingly, the museum hasn’t put this on display.

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.

The technical description for this is an “original envelope for banknote printing plate” which has the Norwich coat of arms on it. Banks in the nineteenth century seemed to be taken over as fast as sausage rolls sell in Greggs, so the whole ownership thing gets complex. I like what this represents, a period of banking revolution in the mid-nineteenth century, when banks were truly local. Although they also kept going bust which wasn’t ideal.

The East of England Bank had already taken over numerous banks, such as the Suffolk Banking Company and the Stable Bank, which I think is a very sensible name for a financial institution. The London & Westminster Bank mentioned on the note was founded in 1834 and later merged with the National Provincial and then that merged with the Westminster Bank, to become Natwest.

Barclays Bank (and I have no idea what involvement they have with all of this and why they hold some of the archives) note that:

“The East of England Bank was established in 1836 with paid up capital of £100,000 and note circulation of £25,000. The bank expanded rapidly, opening 33 branches across Norfolk and Suffolk, but got into difficulty and suspended payment on 20 July 1864. The six directors were a farmer, a retired draper, a clergyman, a surgeon, a retired commercial traveller and a Yarmouth wharfinger. The solicitor’s report said, ‘The Books and Accounts of the Bank are admirably kept and if the management had been as good as the book keeping the . . . state of affairs . . . would not have arrived.’ The company was reconstructed as the Provincial Banking Corporation, which bought the premises, other assets and accounts of the East of England for £11,625 9s. 6d.”

The note, or envelope or whatever it’s called, was issued between 1836 and 1864 and like nearly everything seems to be that I’ve seen, it’s not on display. It was on loan from the Chartered Institute of Bankers between 1987 and 2009, when the British Museum acquired it for themselves.

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.

When I was in Bucharest a few weeks ago I was quite impressed by the number of triumphal arches they had, which marked victory in some conflict or other. I wondered briefly, as to be honest I wonder about a lot of bloody rubbish, why no enterprising man or woman had bunged something up in Norwich. They were often only temporary structures, so a bit of wood, bit of decoration and there’s a lovely arch.

I digress. Again. So, this plate above is etched by Paul Fourdrinier, an engraver and etcher who lived between 1698 and 1758, who kept himself busy by doing the illustrations for books, as well as being a portrait painter. The British Museum noted that this scene is in Norwich and being naturally sceptical, I did wonder whether that was right. But, of course, the curators were right and I found a similar etching which does have Norwich written on it.

The arch was erected in honour of the Duke of Cumberland in 1746 and it had the phrase “to the deliverer of his country”. My rickety knowledge of history means this is the Battle of Culloden, where the Duke of Cumberland put down the Jacobite Rising. So, the next question is where on earth in Norwich was this arch put up? After reading through old newspapers, it seems there were triumphal arches placed in the city centre on a regular basis between around 1700 to 1850, usually at the marketplace. And then, I noted on Wikipedia, there’s a reference to the exact spot being by the Guildhall. I still can’t pin down exactly where the buildings in the above etching are, but I can now sleep at night with my new knowledge of triumphal arches in Norwich. I really need to get out more.

And you can’t see the etching at the British Museum, it’s not on display.

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.

The British Museum purchased this sketch by John Sell Cotman from the collector James Reeve (1833-1920) in 1902 although it’s not currently on display. Reeve had purchased it in 1862 when a collection of Cotman works were sold at the Bazaar Rooms in Norwich.

That’s a photo from pretty much the same spot today. The British Museum refer to this as a drawing of Norwich Castle, although I’m not convinced, that’s definitely Norwich Cathedral. Cotman lived near here for a while, on St. Martin’s Plain, which is at the end of Bishopgate. I like the idea that artists have been sitting in this spot by the river for centuries painting the Cathedral, and that the fields (now part of Norwich School) are still there.