American Author visits Ballarat in 1891

In 1891 Mark Twain stepped onto the platform of Ballarat's grand 

railway station where he penned

his timeless prose about Ballarat

and its newfound wealth. 

"Forty-five years ago the site now occupied by the

City of Ballarat was a sylvan solitude as quiet as

Eden and as lovely.  Nobody had ever heard of it.

On the 25th of August, 1851, the first great gold-

strike made in Australia was made here.  The

wandering prospectors who made it scraped up two pounds and a half of gold the first day - worth £600.  A few days later the place was a hive-a town.  The news of the strike spread everywhere in a sort of instantaneous way - spread like a flash to the very ends of the earth.  A celebrity so prompt and so universal has hardly been paralleled in history, perhaps.  It was as if the name BALLARAT had suddenly been written on the sky, where all the world could read it at once."

From 'Following the Equator'

by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

The fact that, during the 19th century, one of the world's most influential writers and one of its best-known singers, Dame Nellie Melba, were both drawn to Ballarat, is testament to the town's cultural heritage.

Dame Nellie Melba

With its wide boulevard planted with elm trees and lines with grand statues, you'll see evidence everywhere of Ballarat's spectacular rise from humble mining settlement to wealthy city.

Explore Ballarat today and you'll discover that history isn't confined to dusty old books and stuffy museums.  In Ballarat, there is a living and breathing history.  A history immersed in stories of romance and mystery.  A history steeped in legendary tales of tragedy and triumph. A history you can be part of every day.

Ballarat's Avenue of Honour

I'll be like a kid in a lolly shop when we move to Ballarat!

Source: BALLARAT, Victoria's Goldfields, Official Visitor Guide

P.S.  "Ballarat" came from "Balla" and "Arat", derived from Aboriginal words meaning elbow or reclining on the elbow (resting or camping) and place.

Mayday

Calamity Jane

Just a bit of trivia.  I really enjoyed reading about Calamity Jane; had no idea what she was all about, so that was my lesson for the day!

Born on this day:

• 1852 - Calamity Jane, American Wild West legend (d.1903)
• 1907 - Kate Smith, American singer (d.1986)
• 1916 -  Glenn Ford, Canadian actor (d.2006)
• 1945 - Rita Coolidge, American singer

Events:

• 1759 - Josiah Wedgwood founds the Wedgwood pottery company in Great Britain
• 1786 - Opening night of the opera The Marriage of Figaro by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in Vienna, Austria
• 1834 - The British colonies abolish slavery
• 1869 - The Folies Bergère opens in Paris
• 1931 -  The Empire State Building is dedicated in New York City
• 1956 - The polio vaccine developed by Jonas Salk is made available to the public
• 2003 - In what becomes known as the "Mission Accomplished" speech, on board the USS Abraham Lincoln (off the coast of California), U.S. President George W. Bush declares that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended".

Source: Wikipedia

ANZAC REQUIEM

Today, Anzac Day, Australians and New Zealanders come together to remember and honour our soldiers who lost their lives at Gallipoli in defense of their families, their country, their ideals. The Anzac Requiem, written by Dr. Charles E W Bean, says what we all feel today.

The Anzac Requiem

On this day above all days we recall those who served in war and who did not return to receive the grateful thanks of the nation.

We remember those who still sleep where they were left - amid the holly scrub in the valleys and on the ridges of Gallipoli - on the rocky and terraced hills of Palestine - and in the lovely cemeteries of France.

We remember those who lie asleep in ground beneath the shimmering haze of the Libyan desert - at Bardia, Dema, Tobruk - and amid the mountain passes and olive groves of Greece and Crete, and the rugged, snow-capped hills of Lebanon and Syria.

We remember those who lie buried in the rank jungle of Malaya and Burma - in New Guinea - and in the distant isles of the Pacific.

We remember those who lie buried amid loving friends in our Motherland and in our own far North.

We remember those who lie in unknown resting places in almost every land, and those gallant men whose grave is the unending sea.

Especially do we remember those who died as prisoners of war remote from their homeland, and from the comforting presence of their kith and kin.

We think of those of our women's services who gave their lives in our own and foreign lands and at sea, and of those who proved to be, in much more than name, the sisters of our fighting men.

We recall, too, the staunch friends who fought beside our men on the first ANZAC Day - men of New Zealand who helped create the name of ANZAC.

We recall all those who gave their lives in the Royal Navy, the British Army, the Royal Air Force, the Merchant Service and in British Commonwealth and Allied Forces, and we think of those British men and women who fell, when, for the second time in history, their nation and its kindred stood alone against the overwhelming might of an oppressor; we think of every man and woman who in those crucial hours died so that the lights of freedom and humanity might continue to shine.

We think of those gallant men who died in Korea, Malaya, Borneo, Vietnam and in peacekeeping and peace enforcing commitments assisting to defend the Commonwealth, and other countries of the Free World, against a common enemy.

May these all rest proudly in the knowledge of their achievement, and may we and our successors in that heritage prove worthy of their sacrifice.

Ha-ha! Did you know?

Castle Ashby Ha-ha, Northamptonshire

with the Orangery in the background

Photo: R. Neil Marshman 

I didn't.  I was reading about Kedleston Hall in Derbyshire and the article said the grounds had a ha-ha.  A what?  So, I clicked on the big W and read all about it.  The above pic shows the ha-ha looking towards the house, while the photo below shows the uninterrupted view from the house.  It is so-named because of the reaction of most people when happening upon one.  One wouldn't be walking at night-time without a torch!

This from Wikipedia:  "The Ha-ha is an expression in garden design that refers to a trench, the inner side of which is vertical and faced with stone,, with the outer face sloped and turfed, making the trench, in effect, a sunken fence or retaining wall.  The ha-ha is designed not to interrupt the view from a garden, pleasure-ground, or park, and to be invisible until seen from close by."

Castle Ashby - looking over the Ha-ha
Photo: R Neil Marshman

The ha-ha is designed to keep animals from entering the property around a building and can also be used to deter people from getting out; as in the following pics of two lunatic asylums (yep, that's what they were called once) that existed in Melbourne in the 19th and 20th century.  The ha-ha enabled the patients to see the outside world.

Ha-ha at Yarra Bend Asylum

       Melbourne Victoria, c.1900

1848-1925

Ha-ha at the former Kew Lunatic Asylum

What would have been a ladies' courtyard

1871-1988

The main building and surrounding grounds of the Kew Asylum (later known as Willsmere) were sold by the government in the 1980s and it is now the site of the exclusive Willsmere Apartments.  Many of the ha-ha walls have been repaired and remain intact on the property.

So, there you have it - ha-ha!

"All the World's a Stage"

Photo: Geoffrey Wallace

Copyright State Library of Victoria

This stained-glass window of Shakespeare at the State Library of Victoria, is one of the earliest stained-glass windows made in Melbourne. More than three metres high, it displays the words, "All the World's a Stage". The production of colonial workmen, it was originally installed in the facade of Coppin's Apollo Music Hall in 1862 on the first floor of the Haymarket Theatre in Bourke Street Melbourne.

Haymarket Theatre 1863
showing the shape of the
stained-glass window in the centre window.

Copyright SLV

It remained there until 1870, when it was removed to George Selph Coppin's (1819-1906) private homes in Richmond and Sorrento and actor-manager Bland Holt's home in Kew until it was left to the trustees of the Melbourne Public Library by Coppin's daughter, Lucy.

George Selph Coppin, C. 1864

Copyright SLV

From the 1960s to 1990s it was displayed against a wall in a stairwell of the Museum. After a major refurbishment of the State Library, the window was placed in storage and in 2005 extensively restored by stained-glass artist Geoffrey Wallace and installed in the La Trobe Domed Reading Room.

Photo: Geoffrey Wallace

Copyright SLV

Domed Reading Room

The Spring 2006 edition of the La Trobe Journal (published by the State Library of Victoria Foundation twice yearly in Autumn and Spring), has an interesting piece by Mimi Colligan entitled, 'That window has a history' (page 94) and Geoffrey Wallace's 'Conservation of the Shakespeare Window' (page 104), walks through stage by stage restoration of this beautiful window.

Detail of window before intervention

showing earlier, poor quality glass replacement.

Detail of window after intervention,
showing newly painted glass replacements
in sympathy with the original window.
Copyright SLV

State Library of Victoria
Melbourne Australia

Photo: Anthony Agius

La Trobe Journal link.

Cassone - Italian Renaissance Marriage Chest

Ebony Cassone - Hercules Room

Sala di Ercole, Palazzo Vecchio, Florence

The cassone (or cassoni), an Italian Marriage Chest, or a Glory Box, as I've always known it. They were highly decorated with fine metals, rich velvets and an artist, or artists, would be commissioned to paint arabesques, love stories, Roman poetry, Tuscan verse and tell fascinating tales of ancient Greece, Rome and Palestine. It would have contained the bride's dowry and was carried from her Father's house to that of her groom. Later they were used to store fine linens, clothes and textiles. A marriage in 15th century Florence was more about dynastic alliance between powerful families, rather than for love or religion.

Florentine Cassone in gilded pastiglia (layers of gesso, embossed)

Cassone degli Adimari (detail)

Galleria dell'Accademia, Florence

Probably painted by 'Lo Scheggia, meaning 'splinter' (Giovanni Cassai),

brother of 'Masaccio', meaning 'fat' Tommaso Cassai

Nerli Chest

The above chest (Nerli Chest) and spalliera (a wall panel that hangs on the wall above) was one of a pair made to commemorate the marriage of Lorenzo di Matteo de Morelli and Vagia di Tania de Francesco de Nerli and was painted in 1472 by Jacopo del Sellaio and Biagio d'antonio. It is on display at the Courtauld Gallery, London.

The other Nerli Chest

Walnut, domed lid

The above 16th century cassoni (found on an auction site) is of solid, carved walnut with dome top and intarsia-inlaid, string banding. The centre panel is inlaid with family crest (the panel usually has the crest of both families). It was for sale with the original iron key! Intarsia is a form of wood inlaying similar to marquetry.

Scenes from Boccaccio's Decameron

Cassone were generally displayed in a man's camera (chamber) one of the most important rooms in a house.

My Mother's Glory Box,

dating back to The Great Depression era of the 1930s (I should

have added a touch of folk-art to the front panels).

The top lifts up to reveal a cavity about 6 inches deep and behind the doors are about four drawers. Many of the chests, as this one, were made of cedar, a fragrant timber which has a natural repellent to moths. It still has that unique, fresh perfume I remember as a girl.

It is now housed in my daughter Nicole's home. Hopefully, there will be a great-grand-daughter to pass it on to.

NEW YORK CITY'S NARROWEST HOUSE

I've been doing a bit of searching around for our forthcoming trip and found a great site with stories of some of the oldest buildings in New York. The above building is the narrowest in New York city at only 9ft 6inches wide. Built in 1873 on what was a former carriage entrance way between two buildings. Read below a snippet of Bonnie Rosenstock's descriptive history of the house and the many luminaries who once lived there or visited.

'According to the plaque on the front of the building, Edna St. Vincent Millay lived there from 1923-1924 and wrote "The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver", for which she won the Pulitzer Prize. No so, says Elizabeth Barnett, literary executor of the Millay Society. Via e-mail, Barnett stated that Millay did not write this poem there. "Millay worked on that poem while living in Europe and finished it before returning to the USA. Millay and her husband lived at Steepletop, Austerlitz, NY, beginning in 1925. She lived there until her death in 1950, her husband until his death in 1949." However, writer Ann McGovern (who lived at the building sometime in the late 1980s) asserted in a newspaper interview that Millay wrote part of "The King's Henchmen" there.'

Further reading can be found here.

'THIS FRAIL BARK'

Penelope Boothby 1785-1791
The above monument, by Thomas Banks was shown at the Royal Academy in 1793 before being installed in St. Oswald's Parish Church, Ashbourne, Derbyshire (the link to Ashbourne is extremely interesting with snippets from the parish records dating back to 1539).

The white Carrara marble effigy commemorates the short life of Penelope Susanah Boothby, daughter of Sir Brooke Boothby, who died on 20th March 1791, a month short of her sixth birthday. The inscription reads, 'She was in form and intellect most exquisite. The unfortunate parents ventured their all on this frail bark and the wreck was total.' She is said to have been able to speak a little of the four languages inscribed on her tomb.

She used to play in the studio of Sir Joshua Reynolds and at age 4, was the subject of his painting "The Little Girl in the Mob-cap". Henry Fuseli, an acquaintance of Sir Joshua, also painted "The Apotheosis of Penelope Boothby" in 1792.

Her distraught parents parted after her funeral, each blaming the other for her death. Sir Brooke Boothby never got over his only child's death and wrote several Sonnets about his loss; an excerpt from Sonnet X111 follows:

Her faded form now glides before my view;

her plaintiff voice now floats upon the gale.

The hope how vain, that time should bring relief!

Time does but deeper root a real grief.

MISERICORD

Gloucester Cathedral

A Misericord (mercy seat) is a small wooden carved shelf, of
mostly grotesque design, underneath folding seats in churches.

St. David's Cathedral, Pembrokeshire

With the seat lifted the Misericord provides a ledge that
supports the user, standing for long periods of prayer.










Holy Trinity Church, Vendome France

They were installed in English churches from the
13th Century up to the 21st but in the 1600s anything
that followed were considered 'modern copies'!


St. Mary's Church, Buckinghamshire

Many were destroyed in the Reformation of the 1600s.
Happily there are many hundreds left.

Montbenoit, Franche-Comte, Eastern France

Here is a very comprehensive website
with a lot more about the Misericord -
Misericords.co.uk

LISTENING TO THE QIN

I've recently discovered the ancient Chinese musical instrument, the Guqin and a lovely talented lady, Wang Fei. Wang Fei expertly plays and teaches the 'qin' and is founder and director of the North American Guqin Association (NAGA) and council member of the China Guqin Committee. She is a published writer and an international award winning digital artist.

The Guqin (pronounced ku-ch'in "ancient stringed instrument") is the modern name for a plucked seven-string Chinese musical instrument of the zither family. It has been played since ancient times and has traditionally been favoured by scholars and literati as an instrument of great subtlety and refinement, as highlighted by the quote "a gentleman does not part with his qin or se without good reason," as well as being associated with the ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius. It is sometimes referred to by the Chinese as "the father of Chinese music" or "the instrument of the sages".

There is much symbology surrounding the instrument. For example, it measures 3'6.5" (Chinese feet and inches), to symbolise the 365 days of the year; the upper surface is rounded, representing the sky, the bottom is flat and represents the earth.

Rock carving of a bodhisattva playing a guqin,

found in Shanxi, Northern Wei Dynasty (386-534)

Musee Guimet, Paris

Guqin music has been enlisted as a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2003.

Confucius was a master of this instrument. For thousands of years, Guqin has been regarded as a very important element for education, for the purpose of enriching the heart and elevating human spirit. However, being considered as a high-class art form it has never been very popular throughout history.

In Imperial China, a well educated scholar was expected to be skilled in four arts:

Qin (the guqin)

Qi (the game of Go)

Shu (calligraphy)

Hua (painting)

The U.S. spaceship "Voyager" was launched in 1977, a gold CD was placed on board to introduce the music of our planet to the rest of the universe. The guqin piece "Flowing Water" was included as one representative of the world's music.

TIMGAD

I have just watched again a "Lost Worlds" documentary on Timgad in North Africa, a Roman city founded by Trajan in 100AD. It was sometimes called the Pompeii of North Africa and also a 'mini-Rome'. The Roman Empire connected countries by 9000km of paved roads.


Timgad (called Thamugas or Thamugadi by the Romans) was destroyed by the Berbers in the 7th century and, thanks to 19th century archaeologists, the city began to be uncovered in 1881. Uncovered to reveal a fabulous Roman city, complete with a triumphal arch, public baths, fountains, a theatre, a library, a forum, more than 200 beautiful mosaics and sophisticated town planning; the engineers had thought of everything. An underground reservoir collected every drop of water for the bathhouses, pools and fountains and there was also a modern drainage and sewage system that many cities still don't have today.


They even had lavatories that could be heated in Winter - modern day luxuries in 100AD! Timgad was only one of the Roman cities in North Africa.

Old Sarum & Pillars of The Earth

This week we watched a fantastic episode of the English "Time Team" at Salisbury Cathedral. The Team was there in October 2008 and were digging right at the footings of the Cathedral.

'The Team opened a trench right next to the Cathedral to uncover the Beauchamp Chapel, built for one of Salisbury's most colourful Bishops, Richard Beauchamp but demolished hundreds of years ago. A trench was also opened up to explore the site north of the Cathedral where the original Bell Tower and spire once stood, also now long since disappeared.

Following their usual action-packed three day schedule the team digging the Beauchamp Chapel trench uncovered a mystery skeleton, as well as other finds which help shed light on the Cathedral in Beauchamp's time and the actions of subsequent generations. There was disappointment though as the Bishop's own tomb was discovered and found to be empty - robbed centuries ago with the Bishop's bones probably moved to the Cathedral's main Nave in 1789.' - Salisbury Cathedral.org.uk

Time Team at Salisbury Cathedral

About twenty years ago I borrowed a book, "Pillars of the Earth" by Ken Follett. I really became engrossed in this historical novel about Old Sarum, the site of the earliest settlement of Salisbury, the building of a cathedral, the beginning of Gothic architecture, the loves, the losses.

Ken Follett says: 'When I started writing, back in the early Seventies, I found I had no vocabulary for describing buildings. I read a couple of books on architecture and developed an interest in cathedrals. I became a bit of a train spotter on the subject. I would go to a town, like Lincoln or Winchester, check into a hotel and spend a couple of days looking around the cathedral and learning about it. Before too long, it occurred to me to channel this enthusiasm into a novel.'

In November 2007 The Pillars of the Earth was chosen by Oprah Winfrey as the 60th Oprah's Book Club selection and is #1 on the The New York Times trade paperback list and #8 on its mass market paperback list (9th December 2008).

The Pillars of the Earth is one of the '101 Books to Read Before You Die' chosen by patrons of Exclusive Books - it is 27th on the list and is one of the top 100 books chosen by British readers.

Salisbury Cathedral From the Meadows - John Constable, 1831

The landscape around Salisbury was captured by the artist John Constable in several paintings.

I now have my own copy of Pillars and look forward to reading it again.