Later this year, a Ravenser Odd exhibition will be shared at Cleethorpes and Grimsby, not far from where the ill-fated island was situated. Last year, I was delighted to chat with Emily, whose PhD has been instrumental in the research and promotion of Yorkshire's Atlantis, and we talked about how the island had inspired this story, adding to the cultural evolution of the legend of of Ravenser Odd. It's a long read, but I hope you enjoy it... Ravenser Odd I had lived all of my fifteen years in Ravenser Odd. In my earliest memories it had been a busy town, the docks lined with ships of all sizes, carrying garments and foods from the mystical continent beyond the mouth of the Humber. Then, aboard one of those ships, arrived the plague. Forced to anchor at the toll on the peninsula, the ship had paid a deadly tax upon Ravenser Odd, carrying away half its population on the riptide of the Black Death. When the low-lying land had flooded, forcing out many of the surviving inhabi...
This week, I've been delving back into Ancient Rome, so this song was October's logical choice for a Horrible Histories blog. I'm so excited about the release of Alternate Endings , a collection of eight short stories from different historical writers. Each one (as the title suggests!) picked an event to change in history. Mine was the sparing of Vercingetorix's life. So Julius Caesar has been at the forefront of my mind! But Crassus was already dead by the time my story was set. In fact, his death triggered the collapse of that First Triumvirate. Unlike the later triumvirates, theirs was established solely to further their own ends individually. As the centuries turned, a certain hierarchy was established within each set of three, the geography reflecting this, but Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey were all as close to equal as they could be. Despite the appearance in the video, however, they all equally disliked one another. There was a circle of mistrust amongst them and...