The 2021-22 season

 A new season of lectures and visits beckons the members and supporters of the Historical Association's Bath branch. We must all hope that it is able to proceed without let or hindrance after the Covid-related disruptions towards the end of the 2019-20 season and throughout 2020-21.

The branch committee was grateful for the enthusiastic support given by so many members to the two limited-audience lectures and four presented online using Zoom that did take place between September 2020 and May 2021.And what a joy it was for the 24 of us who were able to visit Old Bowlish House one afternoon in June under conditions that were almost normal.

As I write we do not yet know whether our occupancy of Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution will be affected by ongoing restrictions, but there are reasons to be optimistic. Any limit on numbers is likely to be much higher than was the case last autumn, and there may be no special limit at all. The branch itself may need to decide its own policy about the wearing of face coverings. This website will carry any relevant information, and members will be informed by email.

The new season incorporates seven lectures, one of which will be given using Zoom. A twice-postponed visit to the Merchant's House, Marlborough, is again planned for May. The branch committee hopes to be able to organise a special pre-Christmas event in December. There is likely to be another visit in June and a guided walk on the Lansdown battlefield. Other special events, including one in London, are being considered.

For now, it is a pleasure to be able to list for you the seven lectures for 2021-22 and one of the visits. Let us hope that they will take us forward to an even better 'normal'.

Thursday 23 September 2021

Building a Righteous Nation: Religion in the political construction and disintegration of the United States 1787-1861

Professor Richard Carwardine (Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford)

Thursday 21 October 2021

Medieval Queens: Ruling Women in a Man's World

Dr Ellie Woodacre (University of Winchester)

Thursday 18 November 2021

Maggie's Gospel: the Sermon on the Mound

Dr Clifford Williamson (Bath Spa University)

Thursday 20 January 2022

Illuminating conversion: manuscripts from the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms

Professor Joanna Story (University of Leicester)

This lecture will be given using Zoom. It will not take place at Bath Royal.

Thursday 24 February 2022

Louis XVI and the French Revolution

Professor William Doyle (University of Bristol)

Thursday 24 March 2022

'That Epidemical Madness': Women and elections in eighteenth-century England

Professor Elaine Chalus (University of Liverpool)

Thursday 28 April 2022

Royal Attitudes to the Atlantic Slave Trade and Abolition in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries

Professor Suzanne Schwarz (University of Worcester)

Thursday 19 May 2022

Members' Visit to the Merchant's House, Marlborough

All lectures will begin at 7.30 pm at Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution, 16-18 Queen Square. I will introduce each lecture in this diary.

Finally, a note about BRLSI. Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution - known variously as 'Brizzly' or 'Brilsi' - has decided to rebrand as 'Bath Royal'. The Historical Association wishes it well and looks forward to continuing to enjoy its facilities.

Mike Short 

Europe's Great Witch Hunt (Thursday 22 October)

Belief in supernatural powers and in the existence of individuals who are able to communicate with and manipulate them pervades all human history. Such powers and such individuals may be regarded as benign and beneficent, but some may be thought malign and harmful. From the Middle Ages until the eighteenth century many people who professed skills in the use of spells and potions or who challenged religious and intellectual orthodoxy or who were in some way 'odd' were liable to be accused of practising witchcraft and being witches.

In Europe from about 1200 to 1500 various individuals and groups who challenged aspects of Roman Catholic doctrine were likely to be accused of collaboration with the devil or devils. The development of printing from the 1430s aided the spread of 'heresy'. The Dominicans were prominent among those who hunted and prosecuted 'witches'.

During the religious turmoil of the sixteenth century both Catholics and Protestants persecuted witches. The peak period for prosecutions for witchcraft was from about 1580 to about 1630. Mass witch trials accompanied by hundreds of executions took place in Catholic southern Germany, in Trier (1581-1593), Fulda (1603-1606), Wurzberg (1626-1631) and Bamberg (also 1626-1631). There were witch trials in the Basque Country (1609-1611). Witches were pursued with intensity in Protestant Scotland. In the 1590s King James VI set up royal commissions to hunt down witches and in 1597 published Daemonologie, describing the menace witches posed to society.

By the mid seventeenth century the phenomenon of witch trials was in decline, though major trials of alleged witches still took place in Austria (Salzburg, 1675-1690), Sweden (Torsaker, 1675) and Salem, Massachusetts (1692-1693).

The last witch trials in Britain were staged in the early eighteenth century. In 1735 the Witchcraft Act ensured that witchcraft was no longer a legal offence.

Tens of thousands of 'witches' were executed, most of them women, but by 1800 witch trials had ceased.

To guide us through Europe's Great Witch Hunt we are delighted to welcome back to Bath Professor Ronald Hutton of the University of Bristol. Ronald's two most recent lectures to the HA Bath branch concerned Charles II and Elizabeth I. As well as being a leading historian of sixteenth and seventeenth century British history, Ronald is an expert on British folklore, pre-Christian religion and contemporary paganism. He has published at least fourteen books and has broadcast frequently on television and radio. He is one of the eleven trustees of English Heritage and chairs its Blue Plaques Panel.

Mike Short   

      

Spoils of War: The treasures, trophies and trivia of the British Empire (Thursday 24 September)

One way to introduce our first speaker of the new season is to refer you to his website, www,christopherjoll.com. Christopher Joll lives in Bath. Educated at the University of Oxford and RMA Sandhurst, his varied careers have included a commission in the Life Guards, executive and director roles in a range of high-profile businesses, devising, writing and directing national events for charities, and writing. Christopher's busy programme of lectures, both in person and online, reflects his role as the regimental historian of the Household Cavalry and his wide-ranging interest in the history of the British Army.

Spoils of War is the lecture title and the title of Christopher's book published this year. Its 33 chapters begin with the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453) and end with the Falklands War (1982). The book describes the treasures and trophies - and the trivia too - collected by assorted men and women engaged in military action during the rise and fall of the British Empire. There are stories of courage and cowardice, ingenuity and farce, and sometimes elements of mystery. Christopher will dip into them and illustrate their variety when he gives the branch's first lecture since February.

As I write this preview we expect to have to limit the number of members attending Christopher Joll's lecture to 30. On Monday 7 September I will contact members by email to invite them to reserve places at the lecture on 24 September,

Mike Short       

The 2020-21 season

The national lockdown that followed the arrival of Covid-19 in England brought an early end to the Bath branch's 2019-20 season of lectures, delayed the Annual General Meeting, and caused the postponement until 2021 of members' visits planned for May, June and July.

The branch committee has organised a full programme of lectures and visits, including a special pre-Christmas event, to run from September 2020 to July 2021. As I write, we cannot know how much of this will actually take place. Everything will depend on the national and local situation and the rules that apply at the time for gatherings in public places.

The programme should begin on 24 September. Christopher Joll, regimental historian of the Household Cavalry, will speak on Spoils of War: The trophies, treasure and trivia of the British Empire. It is likely that the audience for Christopher's lecture will have to be limited to 45 people. If so, a booking system will operate during the preceding 14 days.

Christopher Joll will be followed in October by Professor Ronald Hutton of the University of Bristol, a long-term friend of the HA Bath branch and a celebrated interpreter of the past on television and radio as well as in the lecture room. On this occasion Ronald, whose most recent lectures for the Bath branch have focused on Elizabeth I and Charles II, will speak about the European witch trials of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

All being well, on US Thanksgiving Day in November, Dr Ellie Woodacre of the University of Winchester, who is American, will talk to us about medieval queens, some who ruled in their own right and some who exercised power behind the throne.

Number 1 Royal Crescent has been booked for our members' Christmas visit and buffet, though currently we do not know whether it will be possible to hold the event there. I will circulate more information when the situation becomes clearer. The Bath branch committee has made a contingency plan to hold an alternative event, possibly early in the New Year.

I will send regular updates to members. For now, this is the programme planned for the 2020-21 season ...

24 September 2020

Spoils of War: The trophies, treasure and trivia of the British Empire

Christopher Joll (Regimental historian, Household Cavalry)

22 October 2020

Europe's Great Witch Hunt

Professor Ronald Hutton (University of Bristol)

26 November 2020

Medieval Queens: Ruling Women in a Man's World

Dr Ellie Woodacre (University of Winchester)

10 December 2020

Members' Christmas Visit and Buffet at Number 1 Royal Crescent

21 January 2021

'That Epidemical Madness': Women and elections in eighteenth-century England

Professor Elaine Chalus (University of Liverpool)

18 February 2021

The Execution of Earl Waltheof, 1076: Rebellion and its consequences in eleventh-century England

Professor Ryan Lavelle (University of Winchester)

25 March 2021

The Triumph of Music: how it became the master-art of the modern world

Professor Tim Blanning (Sidney Sussex College, University of Cambridge)

22 April 2021

The Crisis of the Meritocracy: How popular demand made Britain into a mass education society

Professor Peter Mandler (Gonville and Caius College, University of Cambridge)

President of the Historical Association

All lectures will take place on Thursday evenings at 7.30 at Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution, 16-18 Queen Square. I will introduce each lecture in this diary.

Mike Short 

The search for women in the Viking Age (Thursday 26 March)

Vikings! Bewhiskered helmeted warriors brandishing swords. Fearsome energetic invaders arriving in magnificent longships. Men of the other side, our opponents. ... Few of us will not have been introduced as children to the Vikings. For many of us they entered our history as glamorous exciting figures: dangerous, effective, brave. And now we know more, how easy is it to throw off the mythology of those early encounters as archaeological and historical research reveal a more nuanced account of the lives and deeds of those men and women of the early Middle Ages?

From the late eighth century to the late eleventh people from Scandinavia travelled, raided and traded across much of Europe. Trade and military conquest established Vikings in increasing numbers in the British Isles, France, the Baltic, Kievan Rus (parts of present-day Russia, Ukraine and Belarus) and Sicily. They traded throughout much of the Mediterranean including North Africa and the Levant. Their seafaring took them to Iceland, Greenland and Vinland. They knew how to build sleek slender longships capable of travelling great distances at high speed. They possessed pre-eminent navigational and seafaring skills.

Viking men were clearly expected to be men of action. But what of Viking women? Historical research has shown that women could have property rights and the status of head of family. They were allowed authority in matters of religion. There were women poets and runecarvers. Women could be merchants and dispensers of medicine. In Scandinavian folklore and mythology there were shield-maidens - female warriors - but the historical evidence has been heavily debated.

In the tenth century a large ceremonial burial took place at Birka, near Stockholm. It was excavated in the 1970s and found to contain a human skeleton, a large number of weapons and the bones of two horses. Study of the human bones and recent DNA analysis (2017) confirmed that this was the grave of a woman. But what could be the conclusion? Was she necessarily a warrior? Some other Viking women were also buried with weapons. What does this tell us?

The great Viking era and the Viking empire ended almost a thousand years ago. Scholars who seek to understand and interpret the history of the Vikings face a unique set of challenges, Viking artefacts reflect a restless mobile people who spread widely and were accustomed to adapting to local circumstances. In their leisure time they appear to have been great tellers of stories. The stories add to the fictions that may distort later understanding of reality.

In our next lecture Dr Chris Callow of the University of Birmingham will endeavour to illuminate the lives of women in Viking society, sharing with us some of the challenges posed by the evidence and its interpretation.

Mike Short      

   

Who is the tramp? Vagrancy in Victorian and Edwardian Britain (Thursday 27 February)

Throughout history vagrants or vagabonds or tramps or drifters - homeless people without regular employment or income - have been considered troublesome outsiders by people living in settled, ordered communities. They might be thought worthy of scorn or mistrust, or they could be the recipients of charity.

The first major vagrancy law in England and Wales was the Ordinance of Labourers (1349). At a time when the population had been depleted by the Black Death it made unemployment an offence. A person who was judged able to work but declined to do so would be branded or whipped. Four Vagabonds Acts in the sixteenth century included as legal punishments flogging, disfigurement, enslavement, transportation and execution.

In 1821 a parliamentary review recommended the consolidation and simplification of earlier vagrancy laws, the removal of the abuses and fraud that had developed in their operation, and, for certain types of vagrants, longer prison sentences with hard labour. The outcome was An Act for the Punishment of Idle and Disorderly Persons and Rogues and Vagabonds (1824).

On 27 February we will welcome as our speaker Nick Crowson, Professor of Contemporary British History at the University of Birmingham. Nick has a particular interest in homelessness from the 1880s to the present. In his lecture for the Historical Association Bath branch he will use records of court cases, censuses and personal documents to demonstrate how genealogical research can be used to recreate the hidden life stories of the vagrant and the tramp in late Victorian and Edwardian Britain.

Nick Crowson's findings challenge the frequently-made assumption that tramps adopted their way of life because they were personally inadequate. Through exploring their life stories it becomes apparent that there were varied pathways into, through and out of homelessness.

Mike Short

'This war without an enemy': Civil conflict in Somerset and Wiltshire in 1643 (Thursday 23 January)

The lecture originally planned for Thursday 23 January, on international diplomacy between the two world wars, has had to be cancelled. In its place the Bath branch of the Historical Association is pleased to welcome Julian Humphrys of the Battlefields Trust to speak on 'This war without an enemy': Civil conflict in Somerset and Wiltshire in 1643.

Sir William Waller (1597-1668) and Lord Ralph Hopton (1596-1652) were close personal friends. During the English Civil War Waller became a leading general on the side of the Parliamentarians while Hopton led soldiers loyal to King Charles I. Their friendship endured. Even as they prepared to face each other as rival commanders at what became the Battle of Lansdown (5 July 1643) and the subsequent Battle of Roundway Hill (13 July 1643) they wrote letters to each other as friends. In a letter to Hopton Waller wrote ...

That great God who is the searcher of my heart knows with what a sad sense I go upon this service, and with what a perfect hatred I detest this war without an enemy ... We are both upon the stage and must act such parts as are assigned to us in this tragedy, let us do it in a way of honour and without personal animosities.

The English Civil War was fought in three phases, which some scholars regard as three individual wars: 1642-1646 and 1648-1649 when the forces of Parliament faced those of King Charles I, and 1649-1651 when the combatants were Parliament or 'the Commonwealth' and supporters of 'King Charles II'.

Charles I's refusal to call a Parliament between 1629 and 1640, his imposition of taxes without Parliament's consent, his ill-judged support for favourites, his Catholic wife, his encouragement of moves towards 'High Anglicanism' in the church, and his belief in the Divine Right of Kings were bound to cause unease and opposition among Members of Parliament and their supporters.

Charles's attempt to introduce a High Anglican version of the Book of Common Prayer in Scotland, his other kingdom, led to armed conflict. Needing money for an army Charles finally summoned Parliament. Parliament would grant no taxes until the grievances of its members were addressed. Charles attempted to arrest five leading members of the House of Commons.

In January 1642, with tensions high and rising, Charles left London with his family. On 22 August 1642 Charles raised the royal standard at Nottingham and started to gather support. Parliament began to recruit an army of volunteers and appointed Robert Devereux, the Earl of Essex, as its commander.

The first major skirmish took place near Worcester on 23 September. Exactly a month later the first pitched battle of the Civil War was fought, inconclusively, at Edgehill in Warwickshire.

Royalists and Parliamentarians each took control of extensive areas of English and Wales. By May 1643 Lord Hopton's Royalist army had captured most of the South West of England. Sir William Waller's Parliamentary forces held Bath and the route to London.

As the Royalists closed on Bath Waller withdrew to a strong position on Lansdown Hill. On 5 July Hopton attacked and the Battle of Lansdown ensued. The Royalists were repulsed and retreated to Devizes. The Parliamentarians followed them and by 8 July occupied the high ground to the north of Devizes, Roundway Down. Waller's soldiers surrounded the town and demanded its surrender, but on 13 July a Royalist relief force appeared near Roundway Down. With Royalist soldiers now in front of and behind his own troops Waller was unable to take advantage of his higher position. The Royalists attacked. The Parliamentarians were defeated. Roundway Down came to be regarded as the greatest cavalry victory of the English Civil War.

To lead us through these tumultuous events we are fortunate to have as our guest speaker the historian, writer, lecturer, broadcaster and tour guide Julian Humphrys. Julian is the Development Officer of the Battlefields Trust and chairs the trust's Wessex region.

We hope to follow this lecture with a guided walk around the Lansdown battlefield during the summer of 2020.

Mike Short