Month: November 2023

a german enigma machine

Most secret: the story of the Bletchley Park codebreakers (video of online talk)

30/11/2023 donbrown 0

Discover the secrets of Bletchley Park’s codebreakers & the cracking of Enigma in this online talk. All ticket money goes to The Brain Tumour Charity […]

A History of London – free talk recording

27/11/2023 donbrown 0

Last week I did a Zoom talk for 40 or so people as a fundraiser for Prostate Cancer UK. Called “a history of London in […]

vine street london roman wall

Londinium: a new place to see the capital’s Roman wall

14/11/2023 donbrown 0

Typical, you wait ages for a post about Roman London, then three come along at once. After the Mithraeum and the Billingsgate bath house, here’s […]

billingsgate roman bth house - caldarium hypocaust

Londinium: the Billingsgate Roman Bath House

14/11/2023 donbrown 0

Dig a hole in the City of London and a few metres down you will hit Londinium, the original city, because before the Romans there […]

british museum colossal scarab

All Hail the Sacred Dung Beetle!

12/11/2023 donbrown 0

When Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, sold his collection of antiquities to the British Museum in 1816, the museum acquired not only his once […]

star carr red dear headdress in the british museum

Contemplating the Infinite in the British Museum

09/11/2023 donbrown 0

In Douglas Adams’s Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy, the Total Perspective Vortex gives “one momentary glimpse of the size of the entire infinity of creation […]

leake street sign

Leake Street – London’s Street Art Tunnel

09/11/2023 donbrown 0

I feel almost embarrassed to admit that I’m not a huge fan of ‘street art’. One can admire the draughtsmanship, say, or the use of […]