Tea at Trianon: Britain's Pompeii

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

Thursday, July 11, 2019

Britain's Pompeii

From Ancient Origins:

He also discussed the “uncontaminated simplicity of the settlement record – built, occupied, burnt down” and how that has helped the researchers reconstruct what life was like circa 850 BC. As Knight mentions, there are numerous finds that have been made at Must Farm since the first discoveries of a rapier and sword there in 1969. Ancient Origins has also reported on previous finds such as vitrified food found in jars , household and personal items such as textiles and jewelry , and a wooden wheel .

Combined with other discoveries, the archaeologists at Must Farm have an almost unrivalled peek into what Knight calls “daily practice, architecture and the consumption of material culture” when people lived in the stilted roundhouse dwellings elevated over a river so long ago. (Read more.)