Uncovering the story of Roman London’s mysterious Mithraeum

December 3, 2017February 5, 2019 Caroline4 Comments

In November 2017 one of London’s most famous Roman sites reopened to the public after spending several years hidden away in storage. The Mithraeum, a subterranean temple dedicated to the god Mithras, has had an eventful afterlife since its celebrated rediscovery in 1954. Moved from its original site to make way for a new office development, it was reconstructed at a new location nearby before the great wheel of redevelopment turned again and offered the chance for the Mithraeum to be reinstated at its original location on the banks of the now-underground river Walbrook. The Mithraeum offers modern Londoners a glimpse into one of the Roman period’s more unusual elements: the secretive cult of Mithras, and the work to restore its ruins to the banks of the Walbrook also gave archaeologists an incredible opportunity to discover more about Roman-era Londinium.

The new entrance to the Mithraeum at 12 Walbrook

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19th Century · 20th Century · Crystal Palace

A Victorian marvel beneath the streets: Crystal Palace subway

June 25, 2017February 5, 2019 Caroline9 Comments

Part of the A212 road runs along one side of Crystal Palace Park, carrying traffic between the suburbs of south east London. However, beneath a section of the road – unbeknownst to those passing above – is a quite astonishing structure, usually hidden from the public. This is a subway, but not of the concrete, graffiti-ed, dubious-smelling variety more commonly seen beneath Britain’s roads: it is something else altogether.

The entrance to the Crystal Palace subway, usually sealed off

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11th Century · 13th Century · 20th Century · Dunwich

The last ruins of Dunwich, Suffolk’s lost medieval town

June 12, 2016February 5, 2019 Caroline10 Comments

The tiny village of Dunwich clings to the edge of the Suffolk coast and is in many ways a pretty but unremarkable place, a sleepy settlement a long way from any large towns. There’s a beach, a place to buy ice cream, a little museum, a pleasant old pub that draws visitors from miles around. But in the grounds of its Victorian church, and in a field on the edge of the villages, are ruins that suggest a more propserous past. Two impressive archways welcome the motorist into Dunwich, a sign between them proclaiming that they are a part of Greyfriars, Dunwich’s medieval friary. The ruins of this Franciscan friary are some of the final remaining relics of what was once a thriving and significant port – an ancient settlement that today is sometimes dubbed “Britain’s Atlantis” due to most of its medieval fabric now lying beneath the North Sea.

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10th Century · 8th Century · Heysham

The ancient rock-cut tombs by the Lancashire coast

April 30, 2016February 5, 2019 Caroline5 Comments

Regular readers of this blog will know that I’m especially interested in particularly old and unusual graves, and the subject of today’s post definitely falls into that category. On the windswept Lancashire coast, six graves carved into solid rock have survived for over 1,000 years, remarkable survivors at an ancient site where it is thought that pilgrims came to venerate St Patrick in the Anglo-Saxon period. These are the rock-cut tombs of Heysham, some of the finest relics of early Christianity to be found in the north west of England.

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19th Century · 20th Century · 21st Century · Battersea

Battersea Arts Centre: a Victorian gem rising from the ashes

October 24, 2015February 5, 2019 Caroline4 Comments

When stepping into the grand entrance hall of Battersea Arts Centre, it’s not obvious that only a few months ago a terrible disaster struck the building. On a Saturday afternoon in October, the place is bustling. Families have gathered in one of the rooms for a child’s birthday party; half a dozen buggies are parked on one side of the marble staircase. Other people sip coffee and tuck into snacks at the centre’s cafe bar. It all seems like a normal day – business as usual – except for the group of people donning high-visibility jackets and hard hats. They have come to the centre to see for themselves the devastation left by a fire in the centre’s Grand Hall in March 2015, and to hear about the plans to rebuild the venue that has been at the heart of social and cultural life in Battersea for over a century.

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Bronze Age · Lochbuie · Neolithic period

The mysterious and majestic stone circle at Lochbuie

October 3, 2015April 14, 2021 Caroline15 Comments

When visiting the Isle of Mull, off the coast of western Scotland, you quickly get used to single-track roads, to landscapes where there are more buzzards than humans, and to strange old places popping up wherever you visit – graveyards, chapels, long-abandoned villages, and even the occasional prehistoric monument. The subject of today’s post falls into that last category. It’s the oldest place yet featured on Flickering Lamps, and probably the most mysterious – a beautiful stone circle in a remote part of Mull.

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17th Century · 19th Century · 20th Century · Chilworth

Chilworth Gunpowder Mills: three centuries of industry in the Surrey Hills

June 28, 2015February 5, 2019 Caroline5 Comments

The Surrey Hills – an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty – isn’t the first place that you’d associate with heavy industry. Today, thousands of people are drawn to the picturesque hills and the lush green countryside. However, hidden away in the valley close to the village of Chilworth, near Guildford, are the ruins of an industry that dominated the area for almost 300 years – the manufacturing of gunpowder.

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14th Century · 16th Century · 20th Century · City of London

The ruins of Christ Church Greyfriars and the grave of a “she-wolf”

March 6, 2015February 4, 2019 Caroline13 Comments

I remember the first time I saw Christ Church Greyfriars – I was on my way to a job interview near the Old Bailey, and as I was walking up Newgate Street from the tube station by St Paul’s I saw the ruins of a church. Intrigued, I went over to the ruin to read the sign explaining what the site was. I’ve always been fascinated by ruins – not just the reasons why a building became a ruin, but also why the ruin itself was preserved. When one considers how valuable every square foot of space is in the City of London, it’s quite something to come across a ruin that’s stood there for over seventy years.

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13th Century · Pennygown

Pennygown: the ruined chapel and medieval effigies of a Hebridean burial ground

December 5, 2014April 14, 2021 Caroline23 Comments

I first came across the ruined chapel whilst on a wildlife trek – we had stopped near the little town of Salen to watch harbour porpoises in the Sound of Mull. Intrigued as I was by the ruined chapel and its surrounding burial ground, there wasn’t time to stop and explore and I had to return a few days later to get a good look around the site. My stay on the beautiful Scottish island of Mull had been blessed with warm sunshine, but on the final day of my trip – when I finally had time to visit the chapel and the burial ground surrounding it – the clouds had arrived.

This is Pennygown burial ground, and it is still used by the people of the Mull today.

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19th Century · 20th Century · Stoke Newington

Autumn comes to Abney Park

November 21, 2014February 4, 2019 Caroline13 Comments

What better thing to do on a chilly Sunday afternoon than explore a beautiful old cemetery? Abney Park in Stoke Newington is one of London’s gems – as well as being one of the city’s “Magnificent Seven” Victorian cemeteries, it’s a peaceful space that members of the local community have worked hard to make into a welcoming place for visitors. It was founded in 1840 as the first completely non-denominational burial ground in England and is the final resting place of many well-known nonconformists. Bunhill Fields, which for nearly two centuries had been the main site for nonconformist burials in London, closed in 1854, and Abney Park took over as the most prominent burial place of nonconformists. Probably the most famous people to be buried at Abney Park are William and Catherine Booth, founders of the Salvation Army.

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