Viking age stone grave markers go on display
They are a legacy of both Christian faith and Viking settlement on the island, with carvings ranging from simple crosses to complex depictions of Christian and Scandinavian themes.The two stones were taken to the Manx Museum for recording and safe-keeping until they could be securely displayed.The stones were carved as memorials at the site of an early chapel or keeill, and in 1700 some of the large crosses from the keeill were broken up and used for the construction of the old parish church.When the old church was demolished in the early 1800s, the stones were reused for the wall of St Patrick's Church, which was where they were found in 2022.
The Friends of Jurby Church, which works to refurbish the 200-year-old building, received an £8,000 grant from the Ann Harrison Trust for the construction of a cabinet to house the larger 34kg stone, as well as to install both crosses into the Church.A new path has been completed to the church, which the charity said has made the building more accessible.
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BBC News
10 hours ago
- BBC News
How a whale left an island fascinated for 100 years
A century ago, the appearance of a stranded sei whale on the shore at Langness caused shock and fascination among people on the Isle of efforts were needed to move the 48ft (14.6m) carcass in a mission that involved ropes, chains, trailers, steam traction engines and even a skeleton remains the largest single artefact held in the Manx Museum's National Collections, and events were held this week to mark the milestone since its the whale's arrival on Manx shores marked only the start of a final journey that would last a decade, and capture the imagination of children and adults alike. When did the whale appear? The female Sei Whale became stranded in a gully at Langness on the southern coast of the island in the summer of was the spectacle that crowds of people, including families with children, streamed down to the shore to see the creature and even pose with the largest mammal ever to be stranded on the Manx coast, it also drew the attention of the custodians of the island's history at the time. As curator of natural history for Manx National Heritage Laura McCoy explained, it was at a time when natural history and antiquarian societies were very prominent."Things like whale skeletons were seen as a very a prestigious thing to have," she said."And so when this opportunity came about, the museum was like 'we want that skeleton'."But taking it into the collections of the newly opened Manx Museum was not as simple as just staking a claim on it, as all cetaceans are the property of the British permission was secured for the whale to be taken locally, something had to be done to move the rotting carcass, which was by now becoming a public nuisance. How was the whale retrieved? Without the powerful portable machinery of the modern age, a series of manoeuvres was needed to move the involved wrapping it in chains to drag it back out to sea where it was refloated and pulled around the coast to Derbyhaven by a there, it was hauled ashore onto large trailers using ropes and chains to allow it to be transported to an abattoir in Douglas to be was the putrid smell of decay that it is said police at the head of the cavalcade warned people along the route to shut their windows as it passed by. After the bulk of the flesh was removed from the carcass at the abattoir, the bones were buried for four years to finish the McCoy said that allowed the skeleton to be cleaned "organically", which was a technique still used when dealing with the marine mammals."A common way to prepare whale skeletons, even to this day, is to bury them," she said."That allows all the little creatures and things to get into the bones and deflesh them.""Then you dig out your nice skeleton that is hopefully very dry and clean and not smelly." Why did it take another decade before it was put on display? With that process taking about four years, the task remained of finding somewhere appropriate in the Manx Museum to house the huge a fundraising effort, the Langness whale found a home in the newly created Edward Forbes Gallery, named in honour a notable Manx company chosen to mount the skeleton was the same London-based firm responsible for the original hanging of Hope the blue whale in the Natural History Museum in McCoy said while the skeletonised whale would have been "a little" lighter once the flesh had been removed, it would still have been "incredibly heavy" with the skull alone weighing more than a enormity of the task of mounting the creature meant it was a "fairly prolonged project", which the records had shown had involved "barrels of papier-mache" and steel rebar, she said. Once in situ the skeleton remained in position for the next seven was until a revamp of part of the museum saw the opening of a new Natural History Gallery in 2005, leading to another epic task of moving the bones, this time with the help of modern techniques. What is a sei whale? Taken from the Norwegian word for pollock, "seje", sei whales (scientific name balaenoptera borealis) are the third largest whale species after blue whales and fin in colour with a white underbelly, they have long, sleek bodies that can grown up to 64ft (19.5m) long, allowing them to travel at speeds of up to 34mph (54km/h).Usually found alone or in small groups, they are baleen whales which consume about 2,000lb (907kg) of plankton each day, diving for up to 20 minutes at a time to distribution around the world is wide with the species found in subtropical, temperate, and subpolar as endangered, the marine mammals are usually seen in deeper waters, away from the coast, and have been noted for their unpredictable seasonal movements. Why is it still an important feature of the museum today? The largest object in the museum, and Langness whale has fascinated generations of children on the Ms McCoy explained, as well as celebrating the history of the artefact, it allows for a broader conservation about the natural world and its conservation."What museums do best is use an object that illustrates multiple lines of inquiry," she said."You've got the history, you've got the science, you've even got art."The whale skeleton is like an entryway into a bigger story if you want to go down that route."That's why we love these kinds of objects and specimens because they allow us to talk about all sorts of different things and reach people in different ways."We want to bring kids into the museum, have a lovely day, see something really cool, and learn something interesting."And then they can talk about it and maybe it'll inspire some of them to take it further when they get a little bit older... that's always the dream."The Langness whale is on display in the Natural History Gallery of the Manx Museum. Read more stories from the Isle of Man on the BBC, watch BBC North West Tonight on BBC iPlayer and follow BBC Isle of Man on Facebook and X.
Scotsman
3 days ago
- Scotsman
Last Words by Richard Holloway review: 'a warm and moving memoir'
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... A few years ago Richard Holloway, former Bishop of Edinburgh, published a book of reflections concerning old age entitled Waiting for the Last Bus. Happily the bus has not yet turned up - perhaps it has been rerouted - so now we have Last Words which, we hope, will not yet be the last. Richard Holloway | Colin Hattersley It is an affectionate and moving memoir of his early life and of a working-class youth in Alexandria (Dunbartonshire, not Egypt). The depiction of his parents is loving and moving; he doesn't shrink from their difficulties in what seems to have been an up-and-down marriage. Likewise, the depiction of conditions in Alexandria during the war and the next decade is both warm and critical; living conditions were deplorable yet loving families survived them. It is good to be reminded just what an important part was played by the cinema in these pre-television years. Programmes in Alexandria changed in the middle of the week, presumably because there were usually full houses. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Make sure you keep up to date with Arts and Culture news from across Scotland by signing up to our free newsletter here. It is well known that Holloway is a bishop who lost his faith, though on the evidence of this memoir he retains a deep loyalty to the Church. He has written before about his gradual loss of faith, a process which occurred even while he continued to serve his flock, many of whom, in the second half of the 20th century, must have had their own doubts and misgivings. What became impossible for him was the belief in personal immortality, life after death, and this belief has indeed withered in much of Christian Europe and America. Many still find comfort in the thought of being united with husband, wife, parents and friends after death, though, mischievously, Holloway recalls a woman who, hearing the minister promise that she would be united with her late husband again, muttered that this would give her no pleasure for she had "hated the old bugger" when he was alive. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Like so many who contemplate the decline of the Christian faith, Holloway quotes Matthew Arnold's lines in Dover Beach, about faith being on the ebb. Well, that was almost 200 years ago now, and, while the tide may be well out, the beach will welcome its return. Happily this little book isn't all about the loss of faith - it is also a warm and moving memoir. Now it seems that Holloway is content to live in uncertainty; yet his affection for the church remains. Reflecting on on the closure of a church where he worshipped as a boy, he seems to suggest that, while it served and strengthened so many, its relevance, or the need for it, has simply vanished. Yet though he doubts the existence of God and the afterlife, he doesn't deny the consolations of faith.
Spectator
4 days ago
- Spectator
Does Canopus have a connection with canopy?
I spent some time looking for the connection between the ancient city of Canopus and the English canopy. Nelson won the Battle of the Nile in Aboukir Bay. The bay was named after the city of Abu Qir, which was named after a Christian martyr, St Cyrus. Abu Qir stands on the site of the city of Canopus, to which ran the Canopic Way, from Alexandria. Canopus was said to have been founded by Menelaus, the King of Sparta who figures in the Iliad. Canopus, the pilot of his ship, was fatally bitten by a snake, and around the monument built by Menelaus grew the city. At Canopus, the Egyptian god Osiris was worshipped under the form of a jar with a human head. Modern antiquaries gave the name Canopic jars to other such jars with quite a different purpose: to hold the entrails of mummified bodies. The helmsman Canopus was also remembered in ancient times by a star in the constellation of Argo, itself named after Jason's ship, a beam of which killed him. Argo was among the 48 constellations named in the 2nd century ad by the astronomer Ptolemy in a book that we call the Almagest, from its Arabic name, deriving from Greek meaning 'the greatest'. The star Canopus is the second brightest in the sky, and it seems that the south-eastern wall of the square-built Kaaba in Mecca faces the rising point of Canopus, and the orientation of early mosques was taken from this. Mosques perhaps, but not mosquitoes. The Ancient Greek for mosquito was kōnōps, which does not come from konos ('cone') and ops ('face'), but perhaps from some pre-Greek word. Still, the Greek konopeion 'a couch with mosquito curtains' developed in two ways. One was into the French canapé 'sofa', hence a little bit of bread with something sitting on it: our party canapé. The other development, in the Middle Ages, was into canopy, a hanging, sometimes a hanging of honour. So Canopus has no connection with canopy, but I enjoyed finding that out.'
