‘Hands of Time’

There is now only a handful of watchmakers in the UK which means that it has been in the Critically Endangered category in the Heritage Crafts Red List of Endangered Crafts since the first research was published. Hurray, then, for Craig and Rebecca Struthers who run their company, Struthers Watches, in the Jewellery Quarter in Birmingham. The fact that this is such a rare craft means that Rebecca’s book ‘Hands of Time’ is even more important.

However, do not think that this is yet another book on craft, who does it and how to do it, of which there seem to be quite a few at the moment. This is a fascinating, delightful and well-written book about all aspects of time and the development of measuring time, as the title suggests, No wonder it was chosen to be ‘Book of the Week’ on BBC’s Radio 4 in what seemed like only seconds after it was published! Rebecca is the only person in the UK to have a PhD in horology and her research and depth of knowledge stands her in good stead for this book.

All the drawings in the book (here and as above) were done by Rebecca’s husband, Craig, and the care, precision, delight, and execution add immensely to the book. They also show the need for the supreme accuracy that is required for those who work with objects that are often less than a mm in size.

What is particularly interesting about the book is the way in which Rebecca weaves her own story and experiences into the means by which counting and recording time has developed. In the first chapter, for example, it is meeting with friend Jim, whose wife is a shepherdess, who explains the effects of nature and the seasons on the times when ewes get pregnant and then giving birth; this emphasises the way in which the yearly cycle has on all of us, even though it is often not always obvious to city dwellers. This also relates to the 44,000 years old Lebombo bone (see image) which has scratched markings on it that are thought to reflect and represent the days of the lunar month and the monthly cycle – perhaps a degree of sophistication at that time which many hadn’t fully appreciated.

Rebecca considers both the development of watches and a number of special watches such as this lion watch which some believe to have been owned by Mary, Queen of Scots, and was presented to her by her first husband, Francis II, King of France. This watch was then given to Mary Seton, one of the ‘four Marys’ who accompanied the Queen to France and then back to Scotland. It was said to have been given to Mary Seton on the Queen’s execution, but was this actually the case?

Should watchmakers and repairers leave any sign of their work on watches? This is similar to calligraphy which is rarely signed. Decades later it is often difficult to work out who was responsible for great works of art. Rebecca was told never to leave a trace, but this person inadvertently left a finger print here on the back of an enamelled watch. (Can you see it, just under the word ‘Wilson’?) Wouldn’t it be interesting to know who this person was and at what stage they were involved in making the watch?

One of my favourites, photographed by Andy Pilsbury, as indeed all the photographs are in the book, is this watch which is part of a chatelaine, worn by a housekeeper or someone in charge of a large house. What a lucky housekeeper to have such a wonderful instrument as part of her daily duties to refer to every day.

I have had such pleasure reading this book, and enjoyed every moment as stories both of Rebecca’s own experiences, and the history of watchmaking are revealed, and the art and craft of watchmaking are interleaved with the history and development of watches. I cannot recommend this book highly enough – buy one for yourself and one or two more for those who you may think would also be fascinated, and those really difficult people (uncles, aunts, cousins, brothers) who are difficult to buy for – you won’t regret it!

‘The Lindisfarne Gospels: Art, History and Inspiration’

This new book by Eleanor Jackson, Curator of Illuminated Manuscripts at the British Library, on the Lindisfarne Gospels offers a fascinating insight into this magnificent manuscript. The fact that the Gospels are thought to have been created by one man, Eadfrid, Birshop of Lindisfarne, before 720 is quite remarkable. It is also glossed, an Old English translation of every word, not necessarily making complete sense, by Aldred, who describes himself as ‘a miserable priest’ in the colophon (‘peak’ or ‘finishing touch’ from the Greek) which he added at the end of the book, and is the earliest surviving translation of the gospels into English.

The new book has magnificent images, many of them enlarged so that the innovative and inspirational design and mastery of skill of pen and brush are clearly shown. This is the incipit, the beginning, of Luke, and it shows the innovative design, the intricacies, and the precision of execution. La Tène ornament (the whirls and swirls) contrast with the entwined bodies of birds lower left, and the multitude of red dots, so characteristic of insular manuscripts.

The enlargements emphasise also the accuracy of Eadfrid’s designs and the different colours used and can be studied in great close-up. At the top here is ‘Eusebius’ (note Aldred’s script just above), having a diamond for the middle crossbar of the letter ‘E’, and with its entwined birds, a dog, interlace, and a multitude of red dots; this is the opening to the prefatory text. Below is ‘Generationum’, the beginning of the chapter lists for the Gospel of Matthew, with restrained decoration but again many many red dots. Note the capitals written in Half-Uncial in red at the top ‘Incipit capitula lectio sec mattheum’ indicating what is to follow. The colour red used is beginning to deteriorate at the beginning to a darker red.

The book is notable for its cross carpet pages. These are designs that incorporate crosses (in the Lindisfarne Gospels many on one page), and look like the intricate designs in a Middle Eastern carpet. Research by Professor Michelle Brown suggests that carpets were used for prayer on special occasions at the time the book was produced in a similar way to Islamic traditions. Here the cross carpet page for Matthew is a riot of intricate birds and dog-like creatures. But for me, it is those white circles which really catch the eye. Were they left to be illuminated with gold or another colour? With such an eye for effect, it is really interesting that Eadfrid left them blank like this.

The author images are particularly striking, taking up a whole pages and showing the ages of man, writing in books and on scrolls, and three-quarters and full face. This of Luke, with his name and representative animal of a calf, is shown with him sitting on a cushion and bench, his feet on a stool, and writing on his lap. His name is written in Greek but in an angular script that is similar to Runes.

The angle of the face of his calf is very similar to that inscribed in wood on the coffin of St Cuthbert made probably at Lindisfarne at the end of the seventh century. The calf is shown also holding a book between its front legs.

The colophon of Aldred is particularly important naming as it does Eadfrid as the scribe, Æthelwold as the person who bound it, and Billfrith who adorned the covers. It must have been truly magnificent and a great asset to the cult of St Cuthbert who was regarded as the greatest saint in England until Thomas Becket at Canterbury.

This new book by Eleanor Jackson brings together the knowledge that we have of this great book and looks anew at the manuscript. It, like the book, is a true treasure trove and anyone who is interested in Lindisfarne the Gospels, St Cuthbert and the history of this area, and wants their eyes to be delighted and their souls to be enriched by the artistry of this amazing manuscript needs this book!

Fear no More the Heat of the Sun

‘Fear no more the heat of the sun’ is a poem from William Shakespeare’s ‘Cymbeline’. It is a poem of reassurance at death – nothing can touch the deceased now, not sun, cold, thunderstorms, whims of monarchs or tyrants, or even ghosts or witches.

I had been wanting to write this out for for time and thought it would be appropriate for my new book ‘The Art of the Scribe’, to be published by the British Library in 2024. It just wasn’t right though and so I went a different route in the end.

The first rough is here and the script I tried was Caroline Minuscule. This is one of the seven scripts featured in the new book. I had the idea of the sun colours changing from red to yellow through a couple of oranges for each verse, but it really didn’t work. The piece was far to large and it just didn’t hang together in these varied colours. The initial letters for each verse were emphasised here and I left space to write a gold initial for the first verse.

This lay on one side of my work bench for some time, mulling over the design and thinking of ways to improve it, I was spurred on by realising that it was the colours, size and script that were all wrong – not much right then! Quite a change was required. So I mixed one colour – a good orange (see here for colour mixing) using Schmincke Calligraphy Gouache, I cut a small nib on a swan’s quill, about the size of a Mitchell nib size 6, and wrote it out in rough.

I had the idea of a setting sun at the bottom of the piece. This is depicted in some mediæval manuscripts with alternate straight rays and wavy rays which I rather like – good to have that difference. Not being that good at sums, it took me a little while to work out the appropriate angles so that the rays were even, but once this was done and half-circles inscribed with compasses, it was not too difficult to draw and paint them in Schmincke Goldpearl.

I had done quite a bit of research for the new books into scripts of the Renaissance and decided on a style of Arrighi Italic. I used a lovely piece of prepared vellum (see here, and here). With a left aligned margin and a small quill I wrote out the text in orange gouache, painted the sun at the bottom, with the rays carefully measured out and was able to give the piece to friends. I was sorry in a way to see it go as I rather liked what I had done with it in the end, but pleased, too, that they would be able to enjoy it.

‘Craft Britain – Why Making Matters’

It is not always the case that a new non-fiction book is a page turner, but ‘Craft Britain – Why Making Matters’ by Helen Chislett and David Linley is certainly one such. Page after page of beautiful photographs are surrounded by an informative, fascinating and interesting text. To be fair, craft usually photographs well, but these images are exquisite!

In my view, the book starts not on page one, but with the gloriously marbled blue endpapers by Lucy McGrath, acknowledged in the text – reflecting books in the nineteenth century when most would have had endpapers like this. It gives the book the quality that continues on the following pages.

Lucy McGrath is marbling paper here by flicking – in a controlled way – colour on to a thickened water base. A piece of suitably sized paper is then floated on the top and when lifted off the marbling has been transferred on to the sheet of paper. The beautifully patterned paper is used not simply for endpapers but for books, book marks, Christmas baubles and much else.

From the wonderfully colourful to the monotone, but equally exquisite work of Geoffery Preston MBE. He works in stucco/plaster, moulding by hand the flowers, foliage and flourishes that he designs. This is an overmantel that he’s produced and if you want to see more of his work, save up and go to the bar at the Goring Hotel in London where you’ll be amazed at the sea creatures and his designs that are on the wall leading out to the garden. This craft links to pargetting which is included in the book.

Although all craft is beautiful in my eyes, particularly heritage craft (!), it is often, and perhaps usually, useful as well, and none more so than most objects to do with the making of shoes. Steven Lowe owns and runs Crispians which produces lasts for bespoke shoes; lasts are the wooden former, the shape of a person’s foot, around which shoes are made. He also runs Lastmaker House which trains those who wish to learn the craft. When Steven presented at the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Craft a few years ago he explained that the vast majority of those who come on his courses are from abroad; it is a sad situation when this endangered craft cannot recruit those in the UK who could make it viable.

Another craft carried out by only a few people is wheelwrighting. Mike Rowland and Son are featured in the book. The skills are being passed on in that they have trained one apprentice already and now have Sam Phillips, shown here, working in the workshop. Self-employed makers and micro businesses like these find the costs of training almost prohibitive. If just one day a week is set aside for passing on the skills, and it is usually much more, then production goes down by 20% and that’s a craftsperson’s profit, so they can afford to live, not enouigh to pay for an apprentice. Government provision for support for apprenticeships in the UK works well for bankers and hairdressers, but is virtually non-existent for these endangered crafts. This is rather ironic because the crafts are where the whole apprenticeship, journeyman and master system was established!

Many do not realise the craft skills that are involved in scientific glass instrument blowing, but they are definitely right at the centre! A lot of scientific and medical experiments and processes could not take place if they did not have the correct glass equipment to do so. This elegant tower of glass could sit under a spotlight on a shelf in an expensive penthouse suite as an ornament, but it is actually a water jacketed oxygenator made by Terri Adams as part of cardiovascular research. Terri is the University of Oxford’s only scientific glassblower, and this is an endangered craft with fewer than fifty of these craftspeople in the UK.

Nowadays we are used to wallpaper being produced by machine, but this wasn’t always the case. In the past wallpaper was printed from carved wooden blocks, often cherry wood; here Hugh Dunford Wood is carving a pattern in lino bespoke to clients who can choose not only the design but also the colours for the ground and print.

The book is divided into twelve chapters after a foreword by Stephen Bayley and an Introduction. Each chapter is a cornucopia of crafts, with details and photographs of each one. It really is an absolute delight and very highly recommended.

A wonderful Edward Johnston book

Sometimes the most chance encounters bring rich rewards! At a recent Christopher de Hamel lecture at the British Library, I overheard the words ‘Edward Johnston’, and my ears pricked up. It turned out that a church on the south coast had an illuminated book of the Communion Service written by the great calligrapher in 1902. The photos I was shown looked amazing and I arranged to go and see the book as soon as I could. It truly was wonderful and such a thrill to see page after page of Edward Johnston’s writing and illumination.

The note at the back (see below) explained the production of the book and that the hands and faces in this crucifixion scene were painted by ‘my friend E G Treglown of Birmingham’. Note the border decoration of a waving pattern of vine stems and leaves with bunches of grapes, reflecting John 15 ‘I am the vine: you are the branches’. The gold here is shell gold – gold powder in gum Arabic base – with raised gold leaf grapes.

A paragraph in Priscilla Johnston’s book about her father notes that ‘ G B Gabb, a surgeon … accordingly commissioned Johnston to write out the Communion Service. The terms of the agreement were that he was to ‘make the most gorgeous book within his power’ and ask for money whenever he wanted it’. What a commission! The lavish use of gold leaf here and above, (where shell gold as well has been used in the border,) are certainly testament to the gorgeous nature of the book! Johnston used ‘Reeve’s raising agent’ as gesso. I haven’t been able to find out anything about this raising agent and would be grateful if anyone reading this can shed any light on it. It is a much deeper red than the pink colour made by the addition of Armenian bole to gesso today.

The decorated initials are particularly fine as can be seen here. A raised gold leaf initial A with first a background of ultramarine and shell gold applied in straight lines with a ruler, with circles along the lines on the left, and then a similarly raised gold A with an ultramarine background and a swirling foliage pattern in green and red with the addition of white dots.

As would be expected of Johnston the initial letters are particularly fine as here, although the red gold cross behind the raised gold letter A may not be a complete success, but all is forgiven by the surety of the strokes in the versals!

This glorious page of raised gold letters absolutely shone in the light and would lift anyone’s heart and spirit. It really is a tour-de-force.

The book also contains music for the service as here with an impressive decorated border of raised gold leaves and blue cranesbill. The main wavy line going through the image is drawn with a firmness of the master. I think Johnston would particularly have enjoyed creating the squiggly fine black lines of decoration.

That same firmness of line is shown here in this red vermilion decorated chalice; many would envy that sureness of stroke. Interestingly, it looks in places that Johnston may have used a broad edge calligraphy nib for some of the strokes. Note how the furthest left curved line to the base gradually changes from a thicker line to thinner, and also the thin and thicks on the two circles in the oval shape halfway up.

The lettering, as Johnston explains in the note at the back, is based on tenth-century manuscripts. We know that he was introduced to these by Sir Sydney Cockerell, particularly the Ramsey Psalter (BL Harley 2904) which Johnston studied and then developed into his Foundational Hand. The tail of the letter g extending to the right is very much one found in the Psalter. The tenth-century Benedictional of St Æthelwold, written at about the same time and probably at the same location, has a similar style of writing, but here the tail of this letter is dealt with more successfully. Now, dare I say this, pace calligraphers, but Johnston does need to work more on his letters s where almost invariably the top bowl is larger than the bottom (it should be the other way round to prevent the letter looking top heavy).

And traditional to the period of study, Johnston used a blind point to rule the lines, where the furrow on one side of the page created a raised line on the other. On the left-hand image there is a faint black baseline where some of the ink on the opposite page has rubbed off on the raised skin.

The gold tooled cover is just magnificent – produced by Douglas Cockerell, probably the most famous bookbinder of his time, and brother of Sydney.

In each corner is a little raised carved ‘button’, not as large as a penny coin, with the symbols of the four evangelists. These are exquisite and the design fits so well in to the circular shape.

Matthew – the winged man,

Mark – the lion,

Luke – the bull,

And John – the eagle.

At the back Johnston explains about the book, where his sources for the text come from, and also about the materials used. The skin is ‘Roman vellum’, or lambskin, manufactured at Brentford, no doubt by Bands (since closed), and could explain the difficulty in achieving really fine strokes as this skin is renowned for its greasiness. The blue is ultramarine ash, which I know only as a much paler colour than ultramarine, but here it’s about as strong.

This truly is a remarkable book and it is a privilege to show photographs of it here.

‘Words Made Stone’

‘Words Made Stone’ records a ‘conversation’ between Lida Lopes Cardozo Kindersley MBE, one of the country’s leading letter cutters, and Marcus Waithe, lecturer in English at Magdalene College in Cambridge. The value of this style of gaining information was brought home to me when I interviewed a number of lettering luminaries for Heritage Crafts series of ‘In Conversation With …’. The one with Lida is here, and there are others worth watching on the Heritage Crafts website as well.

This book provides a fascinating insight into how a modern letter cutting workshop with masters, journeymen and apprentices actually works, and works very successfully indeed. This workshop format allows for exchanges of ideas, creativity, and for skills and techniques to be passed on collaboratively at the same time. Here four people at the workshop are each working on different projects.

Do view the ‘In Conversation With …’ Lida to see the actual workshop. First of all I couldn’t believe how clean and tidy it was when I was there – and was assured that it wasn’t like this especially for the filming! Tidyness and order matter when in a workshop, whether with one person or several. Time is wasted looking for items of equipment, and putting things away after use is part of good craft practice – a place for everything, and everything in its place.

More collaboration is needed when cutting letters in situ, and not all of them are ideally placed. Each letter cutter here adopts a different position from kneeling, sitting and crouching over, lying prone and lying sideways (Lida at the back – how did that work?).

But in addition to that, the book explores how each commission is approached, every one being different. From very first ideas, sketches sometimes being made at or soon after the initial approach, to working out those ideas with more precision, and finally, as here, Lida completing a precise drawing to scale.

Sometimes ideas pop up at rather inopportune moments. You will need to buy and read the book to find out exactly when Lida and her assistant Fiona came up with the ideas for the fourteen stations of the cross and how coincidental and even dangerous it was! The brief was to incorporate square tiles in the designs. Note the successful nesting of letters to accommodate different lengths of text.

So is this ‘just’ a conversation about workshops and processes? Certainly, not! The book is so much more. There is so much philosophy to the way of working, thinking about each commission, and a sense of, as Lida says, learning by doing, but also perfecting by doing. As she writes ‘We get on with the job, do the best we can and in the process we learn and improve. This is not achieved by sitting in front of a drawing board or easel dreaming of the perfect capital. It is only earned by getting on with it, through craftsmanship’.

There is so much to love in this book – the fascinating and interesting text, of course, beautiful photography, the images of white pencils sharpened to point beyond belief is so intriguing, but the whole design and production is really carefully done. Such thought has been given to the selection of the images illustrating the points being made, and even to the quality and feel of the paper – perhaps regarded as trivial by some, but how wonderful to enjoy the actual touch of fingers on the pages as they are turned. This is a book for anyone and everyone – buy it, enjoy it, read, learn and dream of being able to commission your own cut lettering from this wonderful workshop.

St Peter’s Church, Monkwearmouth

In the seventh century it must have been amazing for the people at the time living near Monkwearmouth in Northumberland to see this building going up! The craft skills of building in stone were lost when the Romans left Britain at the beginning of the fifth century, and, according to an Anglo-Saxon poem called ‘The Ruin’ it was thought that such buildings were created not by mere mortals but by giants. However, on his five journeys to Rome, Benedict Biscop (c. 628–690) saw magnificent large and sturdy stone buildings and brought back masonsfrom Gaul, as well as glassworkers to create stained glass windows, and, under his direction, they built this church in 674–5 and its sister church of St Paul’s in Jarrow.

Only the tower and west wall remain of Benedict’s church now but they are supreme examples of the stone mason’s skills. It is thought that many of the actual stones and some of the masonry came from Roman buildings nearby, and this arch certainly has a Roman feel to it with its carefully dressed stone. Even so, if it was created by the Romans, dismantling and recreating it on this site needed knowledge and techniques.

The massive corner stones give great strength to the building, some of them being about three feet (1 metre) in length as can be seen here. Even the strong Northumberland wind and sometimes inclement weather wouldn’t shift this structure!

Even now, the mason’s skill can be seen. There are horizontal striations on the two short pillars supporting the arch in the front of the porch.

The barrel vaulting creating the rounded arched roof is truly magnificent, the stones being selected very carefully to be well matched in size and shape. What an entrance to a church!

Either side of the arch are two similar smaller arches, with carefully cut stones to create the top curve. Although the wall may look rather higgledy-piggledy, a little like a dry stone wall, the stones are actually carefully selected and neatly placed.

There is even some pattern in the seemingly random stones creating here a zig-zag texture.

The porch was extended upwards by the end of the seventh century when a second floor was added, and this can be seen from inside the church here in a line in the masonry just below the narrow single window above the arched doorway.

In the porch are two stone slabs and on one there are incised depictions of a sword, a decorated cross and what could be a bishop’s crook (?).

The tower was extended upwards by the tenth century with other floors added, but the Romanesque style of half-moon arches was still being used in buildings.

St Peter’s in Monkwearmouth is just outside Sunderland* and is well worth a visit. I am so very grateful to the vicar and those at the church who kindly stayed on after the Sunday morning service and opened up the porch door so that I could take the photographs used in this post.

Benedict Biscop was given the land to build this church. He was also given land close by – the ‘sunder’ land, hence ‘Sunderland’.

HUGE Choir books

Producing books before printing was an expensive exercise. The text was written by hand and often detailed and precise illuminations were added. Whereas nowadays each member of a choir would usually have their own copy of the music and words, this was prohibitive in times past because of cost. So how could a choir sing together without having to learn everything by heart? For rich and prestigious religious foundations and churches, large choir books were produced. However, in Granada cathedral in Spain, behind the altar, not just large books but HUGE choir books are on display! (Apologies for the photographs. Avoiding the reflections on glass was impossible on an iphone!)

Now when HUGE is mentioned, the actual size may not be truly appreciated. These books are actually over three feet high and two feet wide – they really are massive and would need at least two people to carry them! This ‘miniature’ of the Christ with Virgin Mary and St Anne with John the Baptist is at least 1 foot or 30 cms in size, and would have been glorious for the members of the choir to look at while they were singing.

Of course, the lettering had to be pretty large too! The x-height for these was over an inch, 3 cms, high, and written so very precisely, as can be seen here. It is likely that some form of balsa wood pen would have been used to create strokes this wide, but the purity of form, and the sharpness of outline, with dense black ink, are truly inspiring and commendable. The style of writing is called Gothic Rotunda by calligraphers, and was the Italian and Spanish equivalent to the dense Gothic Textura, or Gothic Black Letter, of northern Europe.

Each page shown was an absolute masterpiece and it was truly a privilege to see page after page of these books – and displayed at a height and in a way that they could be seen easily – not always the case with manuscripts!

Although there is no musical time indicated, and the notes didn’t appear to have a value in terms of length such as a crotchet or minim, it is likely that the positions next to one another indicated how long each note should be held for, and, of course, their position on the stave indicated the pitch.

The clarity of the script is shown well here.

The coat of arms in one of the books is certainly for a cardinal, indicated by the hat and number of tassels (although they should be red, but depicted here in grey against the red background), but I have not been able to find out which cardinal this represents.

Many of the pages have elaborate decorated and illuminated borders. This shows wonderful Renaissance decoration of urns, butterflies, and foliage with a scattering of gold dots – the ‘dots’ being at least a quarter of an inch, 5 mm in diameter!

A fully clothed Christ, without his two companions at Calvary, is shown in this image of the crucifixion, with the most glorious surrounding border. It must have been difficult to focus on the singing with this feast for the eyes within sight!

The carved and elaborate stand on which the choir books are displayed is placed just behind the magnificent altar. There is space for one on each of the four sides, but only two were on show this time, allowing for the gilded and decorated back panel to be seen.

Intangible Cultural Heritage and the UNESCO Convention

What links traditional craft skills with the Notting Hill Carnival, the Cornish language, the Norfolk rotation, Arbroath Smokies, sea shanties, and Plough Monday? They, and many, many more, are all part of the rich fabric of Intangible Cultural Heritage, or our living heritage, which make individual villages, towns, regions and counties distinctive and different and what they are. In many cases these are customs and traditions that have been carried on for centuries by ordinary people rather than any organisation or national society.

Cremona’s current oldest luthier, Hungary’s Stefano Conia, 74, and his son Stefano Jr, 47, are pictured with a violin at their workshop in Cremona. — AFP

These are recognised throughout the world as part of our Intangible Cultural Heritage (our living heritage), as distinct from our tangible cultural heritage. For the latter, they are essentially our buildings such as stately homes and castles, our landscapes, and our historical artefacts in museums and libraries – things that can be seen. For our living heritage, the craft skills and the traditions cannot actually be ‘seen’ in themselves, which is why they are ‘intangible’. Most countries are able to identify traditional crafts, such as violin making in Cremona, Italy, flamenco dancing in Spain, samurai sword making in Japan, and list them in a similar way to World Heritage Sites. They are significant to the individual communities and need to be supported.

Sadly, the UK is not able to do that. This country is one of only 12 out of 193 signed up to UNESCO that has not ratified the 2003 Convention on Intangible Cultural Heritage. The UK was one of the world leaders in our tangible cultural heritage with the National Trust, Historic England and the listings of important and significant buildings in Grade I, II and so on. The British Museum and other museums and libraries have been in existence for centuries to ensure that our heritage objects are displayed, conserved and looked after for future generations. But what of our intangible cultural heritage, surely this is just as important? Sadly on that we are really far, far behind almost every other country in the world.

The UNESCO Convention identifies five different domains as part of our intangible cultural heritage:

Oral traditions and expressions, including language as a vehicle of the intangible cultural heritage;
Performing arts;
Social practices, rituals and festive events;
Knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe;
Traditional craftsmanship

And it is the latter particularly, and my interest in heritage crafts that mean that this post is being written.

And the lack of ratification is, simply, a lack of government will. The cost is $150,000 a year to sign up to the Convention, which would then give the UK a seat at the table, representing this country with such a rich living heritage; that seat is so badly needed post-Brexit. This is really nothing in terms of government spending, although, to be fair, there would be costs on top of that to ensure that the five domains were surveyed and plans in place for support. However Heritage Crafts surveying the sector with its regular issuing of the Red List of Endangered Crafts are already on the case, and their Endangered Crafts Fund and The President’s Award support the passing on of craft skills. This shows that it won’t cost a fortune to be done!

It would also mean, as said by Professor Tim Ingold of Aberdeen University: this is really about revitalising skills and practices that have the potential to be transformative for future generations. This is much bigger than Arbroath smokies and Stilton cheese. It is about placing values of care and custodianship, as well as respect for difference, at the heart of the ways we live.’

It would mean that, similar to the ways in which for the UK City of Culture, people get together to define what makes their city special, what they can do to produce a programme of cultural events that have a lasting legacy, each village, rural area, town, city, county and region could, as Professor Ingold states, place values of care and custodianship and a respect for difference on what they feel is important. In this fractured society, it could bring people together to identify and share their cultural heritage.

With seven different Secretaries of State at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport over the last five years Intangible Cultural Heritage has clearly not been a priority, but it would be fantastic if it was! Ratification would not be a panacea to everything but it would mean that it has a place in the department and our wonderful traditions would be surveyed and not simply regarded as not worth anything.

If you feel that this is important, and you have got to the end of this post, you can make a difference. Everyone living in the UK has an MP and, as their constituent, it is hoped that they would take on issues that concern you (they are after your vote in the end!). It is not difficult to write to them, you can do so here and it doesn’t need a proper letter sent by post, you can simply email them. Please use any of this post to make your point (I’m not worried at all about copyright here, just want to get that Convention ratified!), and ask them to contact the Secretary of State at DCMS to encourage her (Lucy Frazer as I write this, but who knows after a month or two??) to ratify the UNESCO Convention on Intangible Cultural Heritage. Stress that the UK is one of only 12 countries out of 193 not to have done so, and let’s see if together we can make things happen!

‘The Posthumous Papers of the Manuscripts Club’

Christopher de Hamel is a wonderful and inspiring writer, wearing his scholarship lightly and introducing his readers to manuscripts, libraries, manuscript makers, and authors with the lightest of touches such that they hardly realise that they are absorbing so much knowledge. This is evident in all his books, but particularly his previous best seller and award winner – ‘Meetings with Remarkable Manuscripts’. Could his newest book live up to that?

It certainly does!

In this latest one – ‘The Posthumous Papers of the Manuscripts Club’ – a play on the title of Dickens’ first novel, Christopher de Hamel takes as his theme not the makers of manuscripts (apart from Simon Bening), or the manuscripts, but those who collected and commissioned them, whether for themselves, other people or for religious foundations or libraries. It is an interesting conceit and one which could easily become rather dull and monotonous, but Christopher has such deftness of style, and introduces contemporary sources so well into the narrative, that it becomes such a good read and a difficult-to-put-down book. He starts with St Anselm as here, abbot of Bec Abbey, and then Archbishop of Canterbury. As with his previous book, Christopher takes us on a journey to Bec and describes what it must have been like at the time, bringing in Anselm’s correspondence and the ‘prickly’ script of Canterbury along the way.

The range of Christopher’s collectors include a monk (above), bookseller, illuminator, librarian, and, bringing us into the twentieth century, a curator. There are twelve chapters, all focusing on these different approaches of manuscript collection. The bookseller in chapter 3 is Vespasiano da Bisticci, the bookseller of Florence, and Christopher again sets out and visits the city to trace not only Vespasiano’s original shop but also the house where the bookseller retired; it is situated about five miles outside Florence. He left the city once the printing press signalled the decrease in demand for hand-written books, and Christopher quotes a letter from Vespiano to Pandolfini trying to persuade him to come and stay at; ‘…this pleasant and charming place, where the woods, fine hillsides, springs and clear streams and cascades invite you …’ – who could resist? Before his retirement, Vespasiano commissioned many manuscripts for his prestigious clients including this for the Duke of Urbino, illuminated by Francesco Roselli.

Constantine Simonides was a nineteenth-century forger, specialising in Greek manuscripts and particularly those of the early Christian era and ancient Greek authors. The photograph of him in the book (as here) certainly shows someone who lived up to that of an itinerant scribe and dealer, looking slightly dishevelled and about to pull out unknown manuscript treasures no doubt from a carpet bag! This is an intriguing chapter of deception and veracity, and brings in doubt about the authenticity of the Codex Siniaticus in the British Library (soon dispelled!).

Sir Sydney Cockerell will be familiar to calligraphers as the person who advised the great scribe Edward Johnston to study the manuscripts of the late tenth century so that he could improve his writing style, and from which Johnston devised his Foundational Hand. Cockerell had been William Morris’s secretary and together they bought the manuscript shown here, when, as this book describes they were in Beauvais together and at just after 7 in the morning Morris demanded that Cockerell ‘come out and buy a manuscript’! Despite his later advancement to be Director of the Fitzwilliam Museum, manuscripts were in Cockerell’s heart throughout his life, and the excitement with which such works could be bought for relatively small sums during the latter part of the nineteenth-century, and the delight of such collectors Cockerell advised and worked for such as John Ruskin, Henry Yates Thompson and Charles Perrins (of Lea and Perrins sauce fame) when they owned them is almost palpable in this book.

This is such a good book, a romping read through the ages of book collecting and dispersal that any thought of it being boring is dispelled in the first sentence. Should you buy it? YES, you should – it is very highly recommended!

Patricia Lovett MBE

Calligraphy | Illumination | Design