Tea at Trianon: Anglo-Saxon Timber Architecture

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Anglo-Saxon Timber Architecture

Scientist and acclaimed historical novelist Carla Nayland has an article about Anglo-Saxon architecture, which appears to have been more elaborate than once thought.

“What is the house of Eorl but a thatched barn where brigands drink in the reek, and their brats roll on the floor among the dogs?”
--JRR Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings; The Two Towers (Book III, Chapter 10).

Thus spoke Saruman the wizard, after King Theoden had seen through his lies and told him to take a running jump, neatly articulating some of the more snobbish views of early English (‘Anglo-Saxon’)* culture in general and architecture in particular. Does timber architecture deserve this image?

Julygirl said...: In this country the advanced culture of the North Coast Indians of British Columbia and Washington State built huge structures of Cedar which were still around over 100 years later.....
Cedar being a wood impervious to insect attack and moisture. Also, One can still visit ornate Russian Orthodox churches in Alaska built of wood. Wooden structures withstand earthquake damage better than stone.; September 19, 2009 at 8:56:00 AM EDT