Minoo Dinshaw

Portrait of Mary Dudley, Lady Sidney (d.1586) by Levina Teerlinc, done c. 1575. (V&A)

Teerlinc was Flemish, & she was one of those who worked for Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I, & Elizabeth I

In a woodcut released today the Guild of Thieves and Cutpurses declared that enforcement of regulations against Thieving and Pursecutting would ‘devastate a growth industry’ and damage the economy.

Can’t study English these days because of anti-woke.

Edgar Allan Poe died on this day in 1849.

Doom.
Plague.
Despair.
Madness.
Creeping existential horror.

He would have loved 2025.

I know this is uncomfortable to admit, but there is a small area in England's second city where people are just not integrated with the rest of society. Many of them hold views that arguably go against British values.

Yes, we need to talk about the Tory conference in Manchester.

Maria of Burgundy (1457-1482)

undated by Hans Maler, 1480/88 – 1526/29

Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien

Brooch depicting lovers 1430-1450, made for the Burgundian Court.

(Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien)

May Mercury, patron of scholars thieves and lawyers, protect you…

Re Labour’s proposed “hard rain” and adverse reaction to it - why are penurious academics so peculiarly devoted to the interests of their haughtily bloviated administrative tenants in chief, long responsible for starving and slighting them?

Yes. Also non famous freelance writers always have hotmail accounts

Manning a fortalice in disturbed border country

What strikes me about the new coronation portrait of Charles III is how it seems to reference portraits of James I and VI (400th anniversary this year) - the first monarch to be depicted, I think, with the crown on the table next to him, and also painted with a window behind him

The difference is everyone has heard of Farage and barely anyone of Davey. As rather extraordinary life full of loss and care, and popular, clear, patriotic stance on Trump sink in, Sir ED will go up, overexposed Putin pawn will go down

"Looked on as a young man, because he had always been known as a young man, and had never done anything to compromise his position in that respect"

Reticent does not mean reluctant

Tom Tugendhat, MP for Tonbridge in Kent, said: "The White Horse has been the symbol of Kent for almost two thousand years. The first king of Kent, Hengest, is said to have used the flag as he and his brother, Horsa, conquered their new kingdom. Denying our flag is denying our history" (GB News)

Also taken aback as a sometime constituent. Whole thing perhaps a harvesting robot?

Preserving, by destroying, international security

Which approach do you think the government broadly believe is the right thing to do? And why (eg in the national interest, or generally morally correct)? Or are they simply not considering such questions? (My instinct is they think approach 1 is more expedient and haven’t cogitated beyond that)

Three young women sit on bench against the back wall with open books. One at the left looks away, distracted by Mary's arrival (not shown in this detail) at the Temple. In the foreground, one young woman dressed in green sits on the floor. She has an open book with visible script and she looks towards a young girl at the right who holds a sheet with the alphabet. To the right, a bearded teacher with a blue robe and hat stands with an open book. The room has richly patterned paneling on the wall and on the pavement.

Detail of the young women in the Temple school, from Ottaviano Nelli's scene of the Presentation of Mary in the chapel of the Palazzo Trinci, Foligno (1424). Four hold open books, but the youngest girl at the lower left is just beginning with a sheet with the alphabet.
#ArtHistory #Education

The Conservative Party’s problems are deep. They are not caused by the leader. On the contrary, she shows signs of understanding the seriousness of the party’s situation and of trying to do some of the right things to fix it.

Does...she? www.independent.co.uk/voices/edito...

Just writing about Matilda of Boulogne, queen of King Stephen, and I notice that today is the anniversary of her death in 1152. Matilda is of course not to be confused with her aunt, Matilda, queen of Scots, or Stephen's rival for power, the Empress Matilda, or the Empress's mother, Queen Matilda...

Brit centre right was surgically removed from Commons by Mr Cummings in 2019

Kemi Badenoch can’t rubbish net zero—unless she has a better plan to save the world The days when people could get away with outright climate change denial are mostly behind us. But using net zero as the latest front in the culture wa...

I am trying to imagine Kemi Badenoch in June 1940. “We shall not yet fight on the beaches,” she might have said. “We are not going to set a random target for fighting in the hills.. we have to consider whether it would mean a drop in our living standards.” www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/con...

Yes and why are the colonials suddenly so eager and efficient at personally decapitating the rw pretenders to power?!

Absolutely; I insistently add the disguised ww2 trilogies of Steven Runciman and TH White (and indeed LotR) ; I don’t think though that Sword of Honour or Balkan & Levant Trilogies yet get their due

Frances Wilson Literary Review pulpit on the concept and composition of The Mad Book, as always, indispensable

It was even madder at first. Hyde then Halifax, covering whole crisis of 1629-88 between them. I realised that the links between them were too slender (ie, I admire them both) and the timeline too unwieldy. Then I discovered in BW a genuinely intimate contemporary to replace Halifax…

So interesting that Pico was a latecomer to the book! (Whitelocke was a slightly unexpected arrival in mine)