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Andrew Ayton

@andrewayton.bsky.social

Historian (ret’d Univ of Hull, UK) working on late medieval military, maritime, soc & economic; & Napoleonic. MSS, prosopography, networks. Classical music, wildlife, cinema, coins, postal history, Dorset, France, Hungary. 🦋& #Shugborough Staffs pictures.

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Andrew Ayton@andrewayton.bsky.social · 2w ago

This paragraph rather leapt out from David Runciman’s review of Samuel Moyn’s Gerontocracy in America (current @lrb.co.uk). Context: ‘the remorseless greying’ of some areas of US academia; but these are also my thoughts precisely.

A paragraph from David Runciman’s review of S. Moyn, Gerontocracy in America - from current London Review of Books ‘To deprive older academics of the privileges they have been hoarding is not to cut them off from the benefits of the community to which they belong. They can still write books and give papers and go to seminars and hang out in libraries - in fact, liberated from the administrative burdens of a professional existence they can do more of these things, only without being able to control how their younger colleagues manage it. As someone who quit professional academia aged 57 but still lives in a university town and maintains a connection with the institution for which I worked, I can testify to the truth of this. I enjoy going to seminars more than I used to. I enjoy reading academic papers more than I used to. I don't have to sit in meetings that take all day and go nowhere. I don't have to worry about how to mark a piece of work that has almost certainly been written by a machine. The price of this emancipation is having no say in the way the university goes about its business and a less well-padded income than I had in the past. It feels like a good bargain.’
Mike Pitts@pittsmike.bsky.social · 4w ago

Is Alfred under a car park? Almost certainly no. Anything's possible, but if he is we'd likely never know. "The academics did the same with the Richard III bones. They don't like anyone other than themselves proving these theories correct" Well... 🧵 www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/king-al...

Researchers 'snubbed' in quest to find King Alfred's bones in Hampshire city

Researchers on a quest to uncover the bones of King Alfred the Great in Hampshire have run up agains

portsmouth.co.uk

Xander's Skyscape@wellmanneredxs.bsky.social · 4w ago

Reconnecting landscapes and joining up RSPB reserve land for the first time in 60 years - new opportunities for Celtic Rainforest species, wildflower-rich meadows, tempting in Hen Harriers to breed, and working with local farmers on sustainable and regenerative farming. Very #GoodGreenNews here!

Mark Avery@markavery.bsky.social · 4w ago

RSPB acquires land in mid-Wales to help Atlantic oakwood species like Pied Flycatcher (pictured) and Wood Warbler and to protect blanket bogs. bit.ly/44hDARp

Cara Ellison@caraellison.bsky.social · last mo.

Maybe this hasn’t sunk in for anyone who should care but the NHS was birthed when the UK *literally had negative money*. The USA had razed us of every penny to pay for weapons to defend ourselves against Germany, Germany had bombed all our industrial sites. We still did it in 6 months. 6.

Amnesty International UK@amnestyuk.bsky.social · last mo.

The NHS was founded 78 years ago today. It was built after the devastation of the Second World War when the country was bankrupt - but when the people demanded a society built on fairness and dignity for all. Today, we must defend the right to healthcare and rebuild our social security system.

Photo of Nya Bevan with a quote saying: "Illness is neither an indulgence for which people have to pay, nor an offence for which they should be penalised, but a misfortune the cost of which should be shared by the community."
Yorkist History Trust@yorkisthistory.bsky.social · last mo.

📣📣 New book announcement! 📚📚 In 2027, the YHT will publish "Dynasty, Politics and Ceremonial in Late Medieval England and Europe: Essays in Honour of Livia Visser-Fuchs", eds Rowena E. Archer and Margaret M. Condon. More info here: yorkisthistorytrust.org/2026/07/01/d... #MedievalSky #Skystorians

Dynasty, Politics and Ceremonial in Late Medieval England and Europe: Essays in Honour of Livia Visser-Fuchs

The Trust On…Dynasty, Politics and Ceremonial in Late Medieval England and Europe: Essays in Honour of Livia Visser-Fuchs Dr Livia Visser-Fuchs with the volume’s table of contents The Y…

yorkisthistorytrust.org

The Parker Library@parkerlibcccc.bsky.social · last mo.

It is with sadness that we note the passing of Professor John Hatcher (1942-2026), Life Fellow of our College and such an important figure for the successful delivery of Parker Library On the Web Just recently we had a chance to hear him remember the early days: www.corpus.cam.ac.uk/articles/amb...

Ambition and Achievement

Professor John Hatcher thinks back to the obstacles that the large-scale manuscript digitisation project at the Parker Library encountered in the early years

corpus.cam.ac.uk

Helen Day@lbflyawayhome.bsky.social · last mo.

I recently purchased at auction one of SR Badmin’s sketchbooks. I had to have it because I’d spotted that one of the pages contained a study for an illustration in the Ladybird book ‘Trees’. As close as I’ll probably ever come to owning original Nature series artwork 😊

A small open sketchpad containing a study of trees and the final illustration from the ladybird book, published in 1963, of the page Ilex and Wild Cherry
Andrew Ayton@andrewayton.bsky.social · last mo.

A footnote to this excellent thread: it's worth remembering Robert C. Palmer, who was responsible for the AALT site - a vast repository of digital photos that has transformed how we research late medieval England. historyofparliament.com/2023/03/23/a...

A Tribute to Professor Robert Palmer - The History of Parliament

In today's blog we pay tribute to Professor Robert C. Palmer who's work has had a large impact on the History of Parliament. Dr Hannes Kleineke, editor

historyofparliament.com

Sonja Drimmer@sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · last mo.

Did you know that we have a nearly unbroken span of legal records from the 13C in England that have not been calendared, much less edited & published? Only in the last 20 years have these records been digitized & that has been the dogged project of a dude at a university in Texas. 4/n

Esther Liberman Cuenca@estherlcuenca.bsky.social · last mo.

I co-edit a book series for Boydell & Brewer on "The Urban World in the Middle Ages." Open to *BOOK* proposals c. 800–1600, covering urban life, societies, or cultures in Europe, Mediterranean, or Islamic world. For more info, email me, CuencaE@tamuv.edu. Happy to hear from 1st-time book authors.

Margot Finn@eicathomefinn.bsky.social · last mo.

'Ginzburg’s death...means that one of the last living links with a remarkable postwar generation of historians has gone....As the rise of 21st-century authoritarianism creates new generations of scapegoats and misfits, the approach of one of Italy’s greatest scholars speaks directly to our times.'

The Guardian view on the death of Carlo Ginzburg: a historian who taught us to think about outsiders | Editorial

Editorial: The work of one of Italy’s greatest scholars focused on ordinary lives oppressed by power and prejudice. That approach resonates today

theguardian.com