A beautiful place! Well worth a visit.

This breaks my heart: ‘If I think about what this means, I want to cry’: what happens when a city loses its university? www.theguardian.com/environment/...

The Healthcare and Disability in the Ancient World unit is welcoming papers in the following categories for this year's #SBL Annual Meeting: tinyurl.com/29ene8n6

MMU deleted the page celebrating Mandelson’s appointment as Chancellor in 2016. 🤷‍♂️

'A Roman ship with its entire cargo of garum amphorae intact found off the coast of the Gulf of Taranto in the Ionian Sea' www.labrujulaverde.com/en/2026/02/a...

Save curiosity. Save learninge. Save lore. Save science. Save researche. All arounde the worlde ther ys an attack on higher educacioun. Banning bookes ys nothinge compared to sneaky defunding that doth destroye knowledge at the root. Protect higher ed. www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-n...

Our expense system at work is now so complicated that it took me an hour to file 5 receipts. Is this the best use of my time? but that's what "efficiency" looks like in the modern university. First World problems. But it takes as much energy as writing good useful words, or a student supervision.

“We must address the demoralising effect of loss of autonomy by getting people to stop being nostalgic for the days when they had more autonomy.”

'The 450,000 objects, which are being held in a secret warehouse, include a possible Roman gladiator's tag, a hand axe that may be more than 40,000 years old and 19th Century gold dentures.'

Hannah Arendt did not mince words, did she? 'Totalitarianism replaces all first-rate talents with crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty.' From "The Origins of Totalitarianism" (1951)

Today I feel like I have succeeded as a mum. My son said of the freshly changed sheets: I love when they are all fresh and crinkly. Turned my refusal to iron anything into a positive!

After being held in two of them as a boy, I fought for decades urging America to never again build concentration camps and put human beings in them. It breaks my heart to watch this happen twice now in my own lifetime.

Villa Farnesina Cubiculum B fresco depicting the Nymphs of Mount Nysa caring for the infant Dionysus. The baby is shown being nursed or tended to by female figures in a lush setting. It is painted in a "Neo-Attic" or "lekythos" style, which mimics the look of 5th-c. BCE Greek pottery. #FrescoFriday

This is such an interesting explainer video

A moving thread. What is happening at Edinburgh is replicated in many institutions.

What I love about these ‘universities need to set up programmes abroad’ stories is that no one who does work abroad is ever actually consulted. Ever.

Dr. Gladys West, the pioneering mathematician whose work laid the foundation for modern GPS technology, has died. She was 95.

Spent some time with this beauty today. 1650s King's Bench Plea Roll. TNA KB 27/1777

I'm not Starmer's biggest fan on internal affairs, but imho his address to the nation this morning was excellent.

the European mission to Greenland was fourth in the BBC news running order this morning, which feels a bit like doing a light "and finally..." item about the archduke's motorcade taking a wrong turn in Sarajevo

Fire-damaged fragment of the Talmud tractate Yevamot, remnant of the Talmud burning of 1553 decreed by the Roman Inquisition [Archivio di Stato di Roma (ASR), MS. Pergamene, Appendice B, Documenti ebraici, n. 264]

Missed the news of this Amur tigress who been spotted with five cubs! A glimmer of good news in a TL full of horrors. news.mongabay.com/short-articl...

We were deeply saddened to learn that our former colleague Robert Maltby died last week. Having taught at Leeds since 1989, Robert was Professor of Latin Philology by the time he took early retirement in 2013 and though he moved away from Leeds, he stayed in touch.

🧁 How’s this for a fabulous 1930s Art Deco shop frontage? The Grade II listed Bennett’s Bakers, 117 High Street in Poole, Dorset. Sadly, the third-generation, family-run bakers closed in July 2025 after 72 years of trading. As far as we’re aware it remains vacant and in need of a new custodian.

A short vignette Employees to Employer: - We can't cope with our workloads because of cuts to staff combined with the major restructuring of the institution's teaching provision Employer to Employees: - We can help. Join this Action Learning Set Employees to the Void: 😱

For #MosaicMonday a lost mosaic masterpiece from Micklegate Bar #York Found in 1814, the floor was protected by a shed but destroyed by overeager visitors 😱 This engraving by William Fowler in 1815 is the only record we have The weird *swirly things* may have been dolphins (or the 4 seasons? 🤔

a volume meant to showcase vegetal paper (all based on common plants), in an entire rose-tinted volume (and yes, i chose this page because of the 'Madame de C***')

Inside this isolated rural church is a magnificent and potentially unique medieval treasure. This is St Peulan's, Llanbeulan on Anglesey, which was founded in the 7th century. 1/8

Fruit of the sea mosaic from Pompeii. Modelled by the god of that sort of thing. #MosaicMonday #PlaymobilInfestation

'In total, the 20 universities spent £8.3 million on remuneration for their vice-chancellors. The accounts also reveal they collectively let go almost 7,000 staff in the same year – costing £124.6 million in compensation for loss of office.'

Emergency Endpapers! Moldy edition? 🤨

JFC

Coptic spell to Acquire a Beautiful Voice, 6th–7th century CE, Egypt, ink on papyrus, 37.3 x 25.4 cm (Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven) archives.yale.edu/repositories...

Couldn't sleep last night because of the storm (which didn't affect us much, but still), so read about St Maria Goretti instead. Had never heard of her before, and still not sure why a storm was given a last name in her honour, but it was interesting.

It really shouldn’t need saying that brilliant students are found across the demographic spectrum. The capacity of parents to pay for a child’s education has very little bearing on whether or not their child will be hard-working, full of curiosity, passionate and quirky, all of which would be

If you've got 15min to spare you can listen to the comedy history show i co-wrote/co-produced/am in a little bit. It's kiddie friendly, available worldwide, there's 15 episodes, here's one about the brontes! www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

A nice record of 81 plants still in flower on 29 October 1800 around Winthorpe, Nottinghamshire by Revett Sheppard (1778-1830), then a student in his twenties at @caiuscollege.bsky.social, Cambridge. From his ‘Naturalist’s Calendar’, MS Add. 9839/22/1 @theul.bsky.social. @bsbibotany.bsky.social 1/2

An aryballos in the shape of Medusa's head. The vessel was used to hold perfumes oil. Medusa was a mythical creature whose sight turned everyone to stone. Her head was a popular motif and used to ward off any evil. From Vulci, 6th c. BC. On display at British Museum. 📷 me

Can someone explain to me why copyeditors replace 'since' with 'as'? All my English teachers would scream at this. I'm open to changing my mind, but 'since' is often much more elegant.

The issue with living in South Wales right by the sea is that snow is a very rare occurrence. My kids are with their Nain in North Wales where there is so much snow rn!

Went for a walk today. More photos when I get home and edit what’s on the property camera. Slightly dicy walk up but wonderful at the top of the Long Mynd: deep snow, wild ponies and silence.

Encountering some #OldGods on a wintry lunchtime walk today 🐴

'The ballots are being held in response to the threat of job losses and the possible use of compulsory redundancies at the universities.' Unspecified no. at Aberdeen; 76 at Strathclyde; 'at least 41' at Heriot-Watt (Scotland & Malaysia); unspecified no. at Stirling, after 175 "voluntary" exits.

My niece in Stonehaven, near Aberdeen, has made a snow dalek that's featured in the Aberdeen Press and Journal. #proudaunt

I say this with love, but I feel that the constant justifying themselves that the Humanities have done for years has been harmful to the Humanities. /1

'Despite persistent myths, employment rates for humanities graduates are comparable to those of STEM graduates, as Humanities Indicators data shows. Early earnings differ but the salary gap narrows significantly mid-career, particularly for graduates who pursue further study'. 1/2

JOB ALERT! 3-year postdoc at @girtoncollege.bsky.social - research anything you like in History, Archaeology or Anthropology in a wonderful, welcoming scholarly community. PLEASE SHARE! Closes 12 January www.girton.cam.ac.uk/job-vacancie...

Today is Sextidi the 16th of Nivôse in the year 234. Nivôse is the month of snow. Today we celebrate flint.#JacobinDay More information on flint

William Henry Goss, founder of many archaeologists’ favourite ceramics company, died #OTD in 1906. Here’s a Goss model of an Iron Age pot from Glastonbury lake village, with the family crest and motto.