“A DIFFERENT WAY OF DOING IT”

As you can see, this website began as an outreach service for Essex schools, filling a gap in museum provision. Now it is being reused as a vehicle for - 1. My Books 2. My Craftwork 3. Contact Details So, whichever is your interest welcome!

MY BOOKS

August 2009 - “Hoax! The Domesday Hide” published by Matador

ASK THE AUTHOR

Hi there, I hope I can tell you a little about this book in the form of questions you might want to ask, so here goes.

“Ok, what was this hoax?”

Well, having spent some years recording buildings, reading muniments, talking to people, researching and mounting exhibitions and with four buildings to run, I became fascinated (in the mid-1970s) by the incredible detail of Domesday Book. Lots of people experience this ‘discovery’ and we then realise that the ‘experts’ can’t actually tell us what it all means! In effect they tell us that this unique achievement (one we can’t even replicate today – it has been tried) was a waste of time and effort because it actually meant nothing.

I am sorry, for this is not only nonsense it is stupid, for a start the resources committed to this survey mean that it had to be justified. No, no, said the clever people, the arithmetic just won’t add up and we have an indemonstrable hypothesis to prove this (if you are intelligent enough to understand it). Well I wasn’t, so I sat down to solve the puzzle and I discovered that 19th century scholars had actually managed to encapsulate the problem: succinctly they asked ‘what was the area of the hide’, because if you know that the rest actually falls into place. In less than 2 years I had an answer in the form of a demonstrable hypothesis validated by arithmetic. So the hoax is the indemonstrable hypothesis which says that there never was a hide (unit) with a fixed value.

“Give me some examples”

• Economics is based on what we believe was the position a long time ago, so that we can chart the evolution of economic theories and politics up to today. Economists start from a foundation of assumptions and say, ‘this is how it all happened and how everything works’, only it doesn’t. In fact it didn’t happen as we have always assumed, but it is only now, when we can read what Domesday Book says, that we can put some facts to this foundation document of Medieval economics.
• Sociology is also based on a starting point of historic assumptions concerning politics, power, ethnicities, hierarchies, human needs and perceptions, the distribution of essentials and wealth and concepts such as liberty, loyalty and consensus. Well, the 1086 picture of all these things is now very different from anything we have been led to believe.
• Demography is often presented in simplistic terms of population growth and its relationship to economics. Well, both the economics and the old estimates of population growth seem to be badly wrong, so where was the factual foundation on which to build?
• Agriculture relies on assumptions made about ‘primitive’ (usually sustainable) practises back at some foundation level. The trouble is that, up to now, we have had no facts and figures by which to calibrate what clever people told us about the need to treat our environment in particular ways, so how do they know that there isn’t an alternative to modern agriculture if we are to feed our nation? In 1086 they don’t appear to have been destroying eco-systems but they certainly were producing a lot of food.
• Governance essentially depends on what a population will accept, so how did we end up with our present bureaucracy and taxation and how do governments keep most of us under control? By what processes did our modern states and present politics evolve? Domesday Book even tells us of the inevitably of the Reformation (five centuries later!) and look what a difference that made to the evolution of Europe, even of the world.



So I hope these things will make you think about the importance of this one archive (muniment) in the evolution of our modern world. There really is nothing else quite like Domesday Book and that is why we need to know what is recorded.




“What impresses you most about Domesday Book”




For centuries the English civil service was the envy of the world and its model and Domesday tells us of the forces which created and shaped this curious and secretive right arm of government.




As I say in my book, years ago I wrote a monologue about Domesday Book for fun, just because Stanley Holloway never did. In this I proposed that Domesday Book was the origin of the civil service: well, now I have persuaded myself that these were ‘true words though spoken in jest’. On the other hand, Domesday Book did not (as in the monologue) limit their activities, instead it gave birth to our intrusive, information technology surveillance state. And what is more amazing still they did all this without algorism! (oh, bother, I’ve answered twice, not once, never mind.)




So, if you want to try out your Holloway voice, here is my ‘Origins of the Civil Service’ recitative, I hope you enjoy it. Please forgive the fact that the history is a bit ‘loose’ but that, after all, is no different from most of our current historical factoids is it?




King Bill were a bright young feller, But knockin’ on sixty I fear, Wi’ a wife an’ three sons to look after, 1 And a kingdom to govern all year. His lads, athletic and handsome, Would ‘ave thought their old dad a dear, If he’d coughed-up some brass for their hobbies, (Like huntin’ an’ wenchin’ an beer) But Bill were a strict non-conformist, 2 We’d call him a killjoy today, Who spent ‘alf ‘is life in th’ chapel An’ worked ‘ard the rest of th’ day. If Bill had a fault (among many), I have to admit it were cash: He’d bled all the peasants for pennies And badgered ‘is barons for brass. His arm an’ ‘is temper were strong, And no-one dared stand in ‘is way, Lest ‘e should cry ‘tempus apertum’ And double their impost that day. Now Bill had a brother called Odious, (An’ we’ll call him Odo’ for short) As graspin’ and mean as King Billy But not unsympathetic to ‘sport’. Alas, he was not in the same mould, As a Bishop he was a dis-grace, He lusted for lassies at matins And lasted for lucre at tierce. Being tired of his brother’s philanderin’s (A wicked example to th’ lads) Bill picked-up picaroon by phylactery And clapped him in chains and in rags. The auditors set about counting, The loot Odo’d ‘ad stashed away While the peasants complained like the billy-o About t’ frauds he had done in ‘is day. 3 “By gum”, quoth King Bill when he read this, “I wonder if other upstarts have Purloined me gew-gaws and kickshaws, Me nick-nacks, me forfeits and harts? 4 “You can’t trust the young generation, Th’ owd ‘un is what you’d expect, I must call me Witan together 5 And ask ‘em some questions direct.” In snowstorms he separately called them, From valley, from meadow, from moor; The Witan he stood by the fireside while The witless he stood at the door. “Come tell me my Witan and witless, What sort of country I’ve got, What men, money, cattles and chattels, What sac and what soc and what -not?” The counsellors squirméd and squiggléd, They wriggled and grimaced on ‘t spot, “We don’t rightly know what you ‘ave got But, by ‘eck you ‘ave got a lot!”

“I’ll give you a year and no longer, Go forth and don’t darken me door, ‘til you can say just what I ‘ave got AND how I can make it some more!” 6 By villeins and socmen and bordars, In arpents, in leagues and in poles, With carucates, acres and swinewoods, They set about delving like moles. Every hide in its place they recorded, Every village they entered it’s name: They hadn’t a clue what it all meant 7 But they still set it down all the same. Through shivering rains, mists and agues, Through heat, through flies and through dust, They rounded up radmen and rudemen And examined half cows when they must. 8 An army of clerks was appointed 9 To sharpen the quills and to score, While a precisian sage (using both hands) Parsed and précised and wrote a lot more. It was done in a year (by a wonder), And sorted in folios for ease; Six clerks bore them into King Billy All humble-like down on their knees. He thumbed the top pages in horror And said “I can’t read this reet-away, Being writ in both short ‘and an’ Latin It’ll tak me a year an’ a day!” “Up to now I ‘ave found it a blessin’, Being unable to read or to write 10 But if you read t’ ruddy thing to me 11 We’d be ‘ere ‘til next year sen-night!” “Some idiot suggested this to me: Perhaps thow’t got nowt else to do? Well, I’m off to France to fight Philip An’ I leave th’ whole cock-up to you!” 12 Most important to us is the sequel, For he called as he rode on his way, “Just reduce it down to two pages – AND I don’t care if it takes ‘til DOMESDAY!!”

NOTES

These are, probably, only necessary for scholars as everyone else either understands or couldn’t care less about Domesday!




1 Poetic license: Matilda was dead by this date.




2 I.E. (not Inquisitio Eliensis!) He did not conform to the standards of his day.




3 One explanation of Odo’s fall from power though not everyone agrees with this. If they did at least one gravy train would cease to run for luminaries.




4 He ‘loved the tall stags as if he were their father’ (A.S.Chron.): possibly the origin of the jingle about hearts (sic.), tarts and knaves who steal things from kings (which changed to queens lacks euphony if not euphuism).




5 ‘Đa to þam mide wintre waes se cyng on Gleawe ceastre mid his witan…’ & ‘haefde… mycel ge þeaht & swiđe dé ópe spaece wiđ his witan….’ etc.




6 ‘and whether more could be got than now’ (Inquisitio Eliensis). This was an age of economy when a king was also premier, chancellor and economist, thus proving that the theory of economy in government does not accord with any progressive theory of history.




7 Received wisdom maintains that all this information was worthless (indemonstrable hypothesis) yet they set it all down in minute detail and in ignorance. The origin of the sound bureaucratic practise of detail for its own sake.




8 Vide Maitland (1897) on the Bedfordshire Domesday: land enough for half an ox to plough ‘terra est dimidio bovi et ibi est semibos’! (page 179)




9 Galbraith maintained that a single (senior) scribe engrossed the entire epitome into ‘flavours’ of ink, yet another proof of the primitive state of the civil service at this date, not only undermanned but also expecting its mandarins to work!




10 Conventional wisdom declares that all important medievals, especially kings, could neither read nor write (even when they did, e.g. John). This was because private education had not yet been invented and public schools could not exist. Owing to a circuit of classical education at this time the antonym had not yet become a synonym, which made real progress in education virtually impossible.




11 ‘Ruddy’: lest we be censored for an expletive we must explain that this comes from LIBER RUBRA (a later whist-book employed by barons temporarily confined to the torture chamber called the royal SCACHARIUM) or, alternatively, from LIBER RUDIS, a crude or ill formed thing (like this doggerel).




12 This expression ‘cock-up’ (is a venerable term in the printing trade derived from a simple transposition, viz. ‘cock’ = a pet, a term of endearment, to which has been added the O.E. ‘uþ’ = out, beyond, no longer; hence ‘uþ-cock’ = a thing which is no longer a pet or object of preoccupation. (c.f. ‘uþ-lagh’ = an outlaw.)




Now, in order to appreciate this poem you need to read my book. I apologise in advance for all the figures and arithmetic it contains but, in the end, this is how we prove and validate anything. For perhaps 200 years clever people tried to find a solution to this problem and all failed dismally. If I have made a mistake somewhere in all my figures (I’m not superhuman) please forgive me and accept that the overall result validates a few errors? I think I have succeeded where others failed, but if you can do as well or better, congratulations! What is important is that we understand what Domesday Book is trying to tell us, that need is bigger than anyone’s reputation or pride.




My friend Henry (Loyn) always believed the study of history to be chameleonic, ever changing, metamorphosing in time, whereas I argued that we had to find ‘truth’ or at least pragmatic ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ (Pilate was right about the truth you know) if history was ever to guide us into the future. But then ‘a fact is only a theory in which no-one has made a large hole for a long time’.




B) MY CRAFTWORK

For a number of years I have been a member of the Guild of Essex Craftsmen but I have worked with my hands (and my head) most of my life, whenever academic and domestic affairs permitted. And while academic approval depends on who you know and how obsequious you are, craftwork depends entirely on skill.



In the first place craftwork supplied domestic needs, like Leicester Griswold’s maxim, ‘let us improve our standard of living through better handicrafts’, except that he really meant crafts not handicrafts. As I expanded my skill-base and improved my skills, I began to supply replicas, models and illustrations for children and museum visitors to use, finally I created unique objects from the past, things which people said couldn’t be done today. This led me into producing a wide range of costume and accessories for living history so that I now work in wood, leather, animal products, textiles, ferrous and non-ferrous metals. I like a challenge.




No, I don’t make cheap gimmicks by the hundred, rather I design and realise special and unique artefacts to order. Below you will find a few examples of my work and, when I find the time, you might also see me at a craft fair.




Replica of the only Saxon plane ever found (at Saare in Kent in 1863), the original is in the British Museum. Made of stag horn and bronze with the wedge and ‘iron’ restored.

Shotgun restocked in black, American walnut (juglens nigra). The whole stock was shaped, fitted, chequered and finally oiled and polished

Medieval refectory table (‘board’) of oak and elm. The problem was to make a knockdown, car transportable object for living history use: it dismounts and folds flat in five pieces.

Interior of my toolbox. In the 18th century cabinet makers used to advertise their skills by fitting out and veneering the interiors of their large wooden chests. I have done the same.

Scabbard of red leather and silver made for a Wilkinson Sword Company’s presentation poniard.

Replicas of Roman jack and foreplanes made of holm oak and English oak (specimens are known from several contexts) with a replica of a bronze tri-square found at Canterbury. The maximum straight edge length of the tri-square was 6 inches PES DRUSIANUS

Renaissance dress dagger in various materials, early 16th century.

Roman table leg in oak, modelled from shale originals to demonstrate that hardwood could be used in the same way.

Replica costume circa 1565 made from patterns supplied by surviving clothes (from burials or museums). Hunting doublet circa 1565 worn by Nils Sturé (murdered 1567), now in Upsala Cathedral ‘A doublet of straw buckskin worked with black silk and with silver buttons, lined with Holland and Lockeran’ Venetians (britches) circa 1580 from a pair in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nüremberg. ‘Venetians of sad blue says (or Kersey) with tavelle of black and brazil, shot with purle’ Tall hat circa 1570 – examples survive in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum and in the Museum of London. ‘Capotain of sad blue says (or Kersey) with tavelle of black and brazil, shot with purle, lined with lady-blush sarcenet and with a neass leather band’. ‘A cotton (or fostat) shirt with crespines and parchment lace’ Riding boots of welted or randed turnshoe construction with low heels (or spurs) of light tan neats’ leather and half lined with cambric. Sword of mid-16th century south-German form and belts of red leather and silver, the weapon itself of brass, iron and steel. NOTE: I did not make the sword blade, the silver buttons or the ensigne (hat badge)

Sword belt and hanger for the south German sword made of red leather and silver. The buckles on the hanger are not cast but hand forged to make a set and the check-strap (hexagonal) buckle is engraved with a legend

Outfit circa 1560 for a girl of 12, a scaled down pattern of the dress in which Eleanora of Tolledo was buried in 1562. The sleeves are detachable and the fitting adjustable on laces at the back, either side. ‘A dress of roy or tawny mockardo trimmed with a galloon inkle of purle and goose-turd green’

Replica of a hunting crossbow circa 1500 showing the box-lock and ‘nut’ with various inlays, below which is the finial of the ‘key’ (trigger bar) in the form of a lion couchant grasping a shield. The blued steel key is damascened with copper and brass (like the box-lock) and the figure has been chiselled from solid steel, a technique quite common on high quality weapons of the period.

Replica of the earliest piece of European furniture, the stool found in a Bronze-Age grave at Goldhoj, Denmark. It was made of ash with bronze pivots and mortice and tenon joints, thus representing cabinet (not greenwood) work. My tools were of modern tool steel but the original may have been made with flint tools as bronze would not be adequate to work seasoned ash.

Scale model of an early Iron-Age roundhouse, made to illustrate archaeological remains. The opposite side was left open to show its construction and the 1/30th scale figures were specially made. Over the years I have made a number of models of houses, castles, forts and landscapes for museums and exhibitions.

Prehistoric lathe. We have lathe turned objects from at least the Bronze-Age but no fragments of lathes: the challenge was to make a pole-lathe with no metal parts. Using wedges, side-axe and adze I converted part of a 2 ton oak tree (using stag horn centres) on which I turned objects with modern tools. Then I mounted flint scrapers on sticks to demonstrate that lathes could have been used in the Stone Age! (greenwood technology)

CONTACT DETAILS



If you wish to order a copy of ‘Hoax! The Domesday Hide’ you can order it directly from me or from the publishers. If you wish to discuss some aspect of my book or ask questions about any works on this website, or if you wish to discuss a project you would like me to undertake, you can contact me in one of the following ways;




E-mail: mobilemuseum22@gmail.com




Phone: 01245 259614 (answerphone) Mobile: +44 (0)7939 186399




I will do my best to answer all bona-fide questions but obviously I cannot enter into lengthy arguments or undertake private research. My book will tell you everything you need to know in that respect!