monumentoffame.org For Women’s History Month: how Elizabeth & William Beauvoir navigated the social and financial consequences of her not knowing who her mother was, told through 100s of 18thc.letters @lampallib.bsky.social @royalsociety.org donor Godfrey Copley left her money and Hans Sloane helped

On Thursday I will be chairing our online session on writing history aimed at a wider audience with guests Elliot Prior and Sabhbh Curran from Curtis Brown Literary Agency. All welcome - sign up here: www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

Good to be @somervillecollege.bsky.social today to hear fitting tributes to Barbara Harvey (1928-2025). Her major work on the history of @westminsterabbey.bsky.social will long be remembered. A photo of her in Somerville Library is a reminder of a great historian, a great teacher and a great friend.

A suitably beautiful Lambeth Palace last night for Lenten Music sung by the superbly blended St Martin’s Voices. My own favourite of many lovely pieces was Eleanor Daley’s setting of Seal upon thy heart. Hopefully the first of many concerts in the Great Hall following the accessibility renovations.

It is lovely that the Art Gallery of Ontario can now name the Black woman in the gorgeous #18thc portrait they acquired 6 yrs ago & also date the painting. It's from 1775. She is Eleonora Susette, enslaved by the Dutch governor of Guyana, accompanying his widow on her return to the Netherlands.

Music for Lent this Thursday 19 March in Lambeth Palace Great Hall. Hildegard of Bingen and Lucy Walker as well as Allegri Misere. Super programme, super singers and super venue. www.stmartinsvoices.com/event-detail...

The 2026 Holberg Prize is awarded to Australian-British scholar Lyndal Roper of the University of Oxford for her ground-breaking research into early modern European history. holbergprize.org/laureates/ho...

Are you a mid-career historian researching 17th & 18th-century British Protestant dissenting traditions? 🏛️ Apply for the Dr Williams's Trust Library Bursaries at the IHR! Three awards of £3,500 are available to support your research in London libraries and archives www.history.ac.uk/fellowships-...

Another excellent report from the House of Lords Digital & Communications Committee. Lords committees have been assessing the likely impact of AI on a range of fields over the past decade.

New exhibition @senatehouselib.bsky.social!

Happy St Philippa’s day to all who celebrate! She died otd 1236. This later fresco shows her with a large book, perhaps representing her Bible reading or her records of her friend Santa Chiara, also influenced by St Francis. A happy coincidence that reformer Philip Melanchthon was born otd 1497.

Thank you so much for sharing. Absolute news to me and the De La Motte dynasty is fascinating. Of interest to @huguenotsociety.bsky.social

It is a mystery why or when composer and conductor Imogen Holst wrote 14 quotations in this vellum-covered book, but still delightful. From the lovely Church House collection accessioned at Britten Pears Archives in 2025. HOL/8/15/2/52

Archives are a treasure trove of expressions of love. Here is William Beauvoir, chaplain to the British Ambassador in Paris, writing to his wife in England in 1716. “Hand-drawn heart, but without pretence, for absence doesn’t lessen the ardour of love at all”. @lampallib.bsky.social MS 1556 f.109.

Well this is a very touching local news story.

Super blog by @huguenotsociety.bsky.social about the drainage of the fens, an enduring feature of the Cambridgeshire landscape, by a Protestant immigrant workforce. “The French” are still remembered at Thorney Abbey, where they later worshipped.

Even in this rainy weather the mimosa tree in Archbishop’s Park, next to the wonderful @lampallib.bsky.social, is spectacular. The photo can’t capture its scent, but it must surely be the largest mimosa in London.

Born #otd in Boston, Massachusetts, 320 years ago, Benjamin Franklin, polymath, printer, scientist, diplomat, writer & US Founding Father. For those in central London wanting to celebrate, a visit to @benfranklinhouse.bsky.social, where he lived, wrote and experimented for years, is inspirational.

Delighted to announce the launch of a new seminar - Race and the Early Modern - in collaboration with @folger.edu. A monthly, transatlantic, online seminar for research on race, racialisation, and racemaking across #earlymodern Studies. Sign up to attend! kingsearlymodern.co.uk/race-and-the...

@ihr.bsky.social events may sound too good to be true but there really isn’t a catch. They are just excellent.

This is such good news from @nationaltrust.org.uk. When visiting historic houses I always try to spend as much time as possible looking at book spines, particularly for the periods in which I’m most interested. Being able to read them would be a big step forward for book lovers of all ages.

@historytoday.com’s 1st co-editor Alan Hodge died in 1979, when his family founded a travelling fellowship in his memory @somervillecollege.bsky.social, where his wife Jane had studied. I was the beneficiary in 1979, visiting France for the first time aged 21 to research 16th-18thc MSS. So grateful

Looking forward to this. A reminder that online @huguenotsociety.bsky.social lectures are free to all. Membership of the society is also open to all (some Huguenot societies elsewhere require members to be of Huguenot descent). I couldn’t imagine my research without access to their member resources.

2nd exhibition visit of 2026 to « Henry VIII’s Lost Dagger » @strawberryhill.bsky.social. Horace Walpoles attempt to outTudor the Tudors didn’t quite work (his now-lost bejewelled dagger was Ottoman) but the daggers on display are spectacular, as is his house. Ends 15 Feb. Train station nearby.

My 1st exhibition visit of 2026 was to A Grand Chorus @foundlingmuseum.bsky.social. Recommend for (1) choir singers (2.8m of us in UK, apparently), (2) Handel’s Messiah lovers, (3) outstanding art lovers and (4) historians of illegitimacy in 18th century England. 1-4 all apply to me, I’ll revisit.

Free all day event for early career antiquaries on Friday 16 January @antiquaries.bsky.social. Details here: www.sal.org.uk/event/early-...

A new year’s gift for @deeplyclassical.bsky.social and all other Haydn fans who like to celebrate.

The University of London’s @senatehouselib.bsky.social is now closed for the Christmas break, so this photo was taken on Monday. Researching in its outstanding American studies section over the past three months has been sheer joy.

Be like the Victorians and read a biography or two during the holidays 📚🎄 cliosfootnotes.wordpress.com/2025/12/22/i...

I’m grateful to @britishlibrary.bsky.social staff for going above and beyond to help me access books and mss over the past 2 years. Most of its reading rooms are now often noisy spaces not used for quiet study. The BL will need to rediscover its unique place as the UK’s national library.

Looking for a New Year's resolution that is good for your mind and (relatively) easy to keep? Check out the Institute of Historical Research seminars for January 2026. Fourteen seminars in week 1 alone. Free, broad-ranging, open to the public and usually available both in person and online.

Sharing some of my own Michael Pacher favourites over the years when exploring the wonderful art of the Sud Tirol. Bruneck/Brunico, where he was born, has one small but lovely fragment, so this statue is from nearby San Lorenzen, 3 km away.

Is there a word for the irrational concern that over the holidays one will run out of reference books for writing December’s chapter (in my case about Herman Melville) and need to move on to January’s (Eleanor Roosevelt)? V grateful to @senatehouselib.bsky.social for helping me prepare just in case.

Happy Beethoven's birthday to all who celebrate.

Do you care about the sharp decline in children reading for pleasure in the UK? Here’s your chance to make a difference by responding to the call for evidence (3,000 words max) to the House of Commons Education Committee inquiry. Often the most compelling evidence is not from the « usual suspects »

It was such fun recording this with @dulwichchoral.bsky.social. I’ve bought 5 copies and am enjoying mine! The Mantegna was such a surprise after many years of listening to RVW.

Very much looking forward to this live broadcast of choral evensong this Wednesday, featuring the sacred music of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. The choir’s non-broadcast evensong in August, timed for SC-T’s anniversary, was superb.

St Cecilia at rest in her basilica in Trastevere, Rome. Posted for her day today, photo taken May 2019 at the end of the final stage of the Via Francigena.

Would you like to go on retreat, but are worried about the cost? Our Bursary Fund has helped dozens of people this year. Find out more, or donate to the Fund, on promotingretreats.org/bursary #retreat #bursary

Speaking about her appointment, Chloe said: "It is an absolute honour to have been appointed as the next Clerk of the Parliaments. I feel privileged to have been trusted to take forward this historic and important role that dates back over 700 years." 📄 Read more www.parliament.uk/business/new...

Chloe Mawson has been appointed the 66th Clerk of the Parliaments and is the first woman to take up the post. The Clerk of the Parliaments is head of the House of Lords Administration and Chief Procedural Adviser to the House.

Super post about science pioneer and namesake of @somervillecollege.bsky.social

A very #Tudor time at Liverpool’s Walker Art Gallery yesterday, with the unexpected treat of a volunteer playing period music on the lute. I otherwise had the early galleries mostly to myself, so was able to linger trying to count the Tudor roses on Elizabeth I’s very fine outfit.

Only one more week left to visit this excellent exhibition @lampallib.bsky.social. Like all their exhibitions it is small, thoughtfully curated, no need to book and free. Highly recommended to anyone interested in choral music.

Open until 31 January (Wed to Sat) the Museum of Croydon has an interesting one-room exhibition about Croydon-born composer and campaigner Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. Good selection of images, several of which were new to me. Well worth a 30 minute visit and a shortish walk from East Croydon station.

What does it mean to paint your way to freedom during the American Revolution? Prince Demah was an enslaved man, a portrait artist trained in London, and a patriot soldier. His story is nothing short of astonishing. 🔗 benfranklinsworld.com/423 #EarlyAmerica #Revolution250 #ArtHistory

Two weeks to go until History Day 2025! Take a look at some of the amazing organisations participating this year 🤩 Explore the different organisations and online collections on the History Day website: exhibitions.london.ac.uk/s/history-da... #HistDay25 @senatehouselib.bsky.social

Last night’s concert by @royalphilorchestra.bsky.social and chorus was indeed a Titan. The programme and performance were stellar and Mahler 1 and Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms a memorable pairing. Outstanding solo by @westminsterabbey.bsky.social choir treble in the latter. A triumph all round.

Really unusual heron pose. One for @everyheron.bsky.social. I’ve been observing herons since school days, enlisted with a friend by early wildlife broadcaster Phil Drabble to count nests in Staffordshire. I’ve never seen this.

Despite the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes #otd 1685 many Protestants in Paris attended services held on and off at the Residences of the Dutch or British Ambassadors. Revd William Beauvoir led Anglican services in English & French in Paris c.1716-1720. Records and letters @lampallib.bsky.social