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kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
@kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
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kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
A year since the first episode of the Mirror and the Light broadcast in the UK and the duke of Suffolk "marry a witch and your member will shrivel...and then you die" is still giving the PE teacher in Mean Girls vibes. #themirrorandthelight #meangirls
Two screenshots one above the other. The top is from the original Mean Girls film. The PE teacher is standing in front of a black board on which is written "Safe Sex" and he is pointing at the camera. The captions read "Don't have sex. Because you will get pregnant and die." The bottom screenshot is from the Mirror and the Light and shows Thomas Cromwell walking alongside the duke of Suffolk. The caption reads "Then you die."
November 10, 2025 at 3:14 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
I normally try to avoid sweeping stereotypes but the Canadians are not helping with the news story. Or the Scottish bloke in short sleeves despite the cold.
Screenshot of a BBC news story about a Canadian football match played in a blizzard during which delays were required to clear the pitch and a snowplough had to be used before extra time. One of the midfielders, originally from Scotland, played in short sleeves and celebrated with a knee slide in the snow before being pelted with snowballs.
November 10, 2025 at 2:17 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
The font and suspended font cover at Wantage SS Peter and Paul. The shaft is medieval but the other elements are later additions. The cover is oddly eccentric resembling the roo of a "Princess castle" tower #fontsonfriday
A stone font with octagonal bowl on a shaft of clustered columns. The whole raised on a tiled plinth. Suspended above is a fantastical wooden cover. It looks like the conical roof of a round tower like those seen on fairy tale princess castles. It has dormer windows around and the top. The two counterweights are shaped like mini round towers with conical roofs and have lancet windows painted around the sides.
November 7, 2025 at 7:36 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Today the sewing had to come to swimming lessons. First attempts at handsewn buttonholes are proving interesting.

#reenactment #sewing #handsewing #buttonholes #medievalclothing
November 6, 2025 at 7:18 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Is the door straight and the floor and frame wonky? Or the floor and frame wonky and the door straight?

The Mermaid Passage at Harvington Hall #adoorablethursday
View along a corridor towards a closed door. The floor is sloping from left to right and is higher than the bottom of the door on the left hand side. The door itself is not sitting straight in the door frame. Above the door is a wall painting - partially damaged - of a mermaid with two tails.
November 6, 2025 at 12:43 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
You might appreciate this one from St Peter Mancroft in Norwich. Not the best photo - it was very hard to fit it all in the image!
November 5, 2025 at 12:35 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Is it really the Royal Oak if the original tree got destroyed by tourists (the influencers of the 17th and 18th centuries I guess)? This tree is a "son" of the original having been grown from one of its acorns. #shipoftheseus
A gloomy day in the countryside with grey skies. A large oak tree stands inside a fence. It has straps around the trunk because it was hit by lightning twenty years ago. Next to it is a small oak tree.
November 5, 2025 at 12:27 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
When you have a re-enactment event on Sunday but the child has football practice. #handsewing #reenactment
November 4, 2025 at 6:59 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
No doors but a satisfyingly aligned pair of doorways at White Ladies Priory

#adoorablethursday
Two round headed doorways. The nearest with an attractive mixture of red and yellow stones.
October 30, 2025 at 5:45 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Was anyone else tortured by acrostic poetry at school?

Maud Parker Thomas (d. 1584) clearly liked them enough to have one inscribed in her memorial brass. Or maybe it was the choice of her son Michael (buried 1628) who allegedly lived to 110 years old - I have questions about this last fact!
A wall mounted brass tablet with a densely packed inscription in the form of an acrostic poem using the name Maud Parker Thomas as the starting letters. There were not enough letters in her name so the last four lines do not form part of the acrostic
October 27, 2025 at 2:34 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Is it even a museum in England if you aren't instructed to exit through the Gift Shop? #museums #giftshop
Purple sign with an arrow pointing to the left. Cream text reads "Exit. Through the Gift Shop"
October 26, 2025 at 12:27 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
The rather charming medieval font at Northleach St Peter and St Paul comes complete with devils being trampled underfoot and musical angels.

#fontsonfriday
October 24, 2025 at 7:33 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
#adayinthelifeof a heritage consultant...

Yesterday was a field walking day: looking at the historic landscape, settlement patterns, and land usage; and identifying heritage asset, and significant views.

Also rain, mud, autumnal colours, and cows. It is the UK in October after all.
Selfie of a very wet woman in a field with a second person sticking their hand into shot to do a thumbs up An avenue of tree with green and yellow leaves, and orange leaves on the ground Cows in a field staring towards the camera A person dressed in khaki and carrying a bright red umbrella standing up to their ankles in an overflowing stream. They are pointing into the distance.
October 21, 2025 at 9:55 AM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Historic environment work meet autumn in the UK...
Selfie of a woman bundled up in a turquoise lined dry robe. All you can see is her face with grey eyes and squarish glasses. Her clothes are wet, she is standing in a wet field and the sky is full of grey clouds.
October 20, 2025 at 12:11 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
According to Google photo search I have lots of images of fonts. Unfortunately these were not the fonts I was looking for...

#fontsonfriday
Screenshot showing a grid of image thumbnails. All the thumbnails are either early modern documents or gravestones.
October 17, 2025 at 4:07 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
The Bodleian Libraries. Home to tens of thousands of academic books, journals and manuscripts. Also crochet patterns.

#bodleianlibrary #libraries #crochet #crochetpatterns
A thin book of crochet patterns lying on a shiny burnt orange table top. It is a copy of Pokémon Crochet by Sabrina Somers. On the front cover are pictures of crocheted Pichu, Pikachu and Eevee.
October 9, 2025 at 9:50 AM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Unexpected Wars of the Roses while out and about. This was once the location of the inn where Richard duke of Gloucester caught up with and took control of Edward V.

#warsoftheroses #edwardv #richardiii #stonystratford #yorkists #englishhistory #medievalhistory
The frontage of a high street building with a circular red plaque recording that this it was formerly an inn where Richard duke of Gloucester took charge of Edward V and took him to the Tower of London.
October 6, 2025 at 6:07 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
A rather lovely pattern of tiles surrounding the font at Stony Stratford St Mary & St Giles

#fontsonfriday
A stone font with deeply carved quatrefoils around the sides. Green and white tiles form a circular pattern of creating waves around the font.
October 3, 2025 at 3:00 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Say it louder for those at the back: #tradwives are a social media phenomenon (who are busy working at influencing women not to work). A rose tinted view of middle class, post-war suburbia is not representative of human history or the varying roles played by women over the centuries /rant
#history
Screenshot of someone's tweet saying that they are glad they married a tradwife not a boss babe. Attached to it is an AI generated image of a stereotypical 1950s style two parent, two child family with the woman baking while the children look at her adoringly. The caption to the image says "imagine how much propaganda it took to convince women that this is oppressive".
September 29, 2025 at 9:10 AM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
#skeletonsonsaturday anyone? This trio can be found in the chapel at Haddon Hall in Derbyshire.

#haddonhall #wallpainting
The remains of three skeletons painted on a white plastered wall. Two have skills and torsos. The rightmost is just a skull and shoulders, it looks like it has a spiky tendril of foliage in its mouth. To the right of the skeletons are branches and leaves.
September 27, 2025 at 4:16 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
The feats of engineering we are capable of blow my mind sometimes. Once this medieval tower might have been knocked down for development, now it's put on stilts and excavated around...

All Hallow's Staining. Photo credit: PA

#construction #conservation #medievalchurches
A medieval church tower is suspended on stilts in the midst of a construction site that has dug down around and beneath it. In the background, sky scrapers tower above it.
September 25, 2025 at 6:36 PM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Please send help. Urgently 😆
#crochet #yarn #fibrecrafts
A large tangle of yellow cotton yarn halfway wound into a ball
September 25, 2025 at 10:51 AM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
I don't talk about writing much but I did a thing. And the judges liked it enough to long list it for the Historical Writer's Association Dorothy Dunnett short story competition. And I am pretty excited about that. #writer
September 25, 2025 at 8:33 AM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
#adoorablethursday has made me realise just how many photos of doors I have... Anyway, here is one of the more elaborate doorways - Rochester Cathedral.
The elaborately carved west doorway to Rochester Cathedral. A round arch with five rows of carving above a carved figure of Christ in Majesty.
September 25, 2025 at 8:31 AM
kclaidenyardley.bsky.social
Starting my campaign for medieval scrabble. No standardised spelling. May require extra y, k, g, b and s tiles.
A Scrabble board with a number of words laid out all of them spelt in a "medieval" phonetic way rather than modern spelling.
September 23, 2025 at 5:32 PM