This was ‘real tennis’, played with a net that sags in the middle, on a funky inside court to a complicated but intriguing set of rules more akin to a game of ‘quidditch’ than that played on the lawns of Wimbledon. And although today I am heading to the one surviving court in the city, it seems the game is still alive and kicking.
Every so often while out walking I will come across something or somebody that takes me by surprise. Stops me in my tracks. And so it is on my regular route to the University Parks when I encounter Dan Arnold and Trigger.
I am delighted to present for your amusement some engravings by George Glover from William Stokes’s book ‘The vaulting master or the art of vaulting’ in the hope that they will amaze and entertain you as much as they have me.
I’m standing in front of the huge window at the east end of Balliol College dining hall. There in prime position, right at the top is a burning wheel. It…
I cannot count the number of times I have been inside the Oxford University Natural History Museum. A short walk from my home, I come to marvel at its glorious…
Exactly this time last year my neighbour and go-to flora and fauna guru Beatrice Groves took me to the Lye Valley in search of the elusive flower, the Grass of…
The date is 30 June 1860. The location is the new University Museum (now the Oxford University Museum of Natural History). Upwards of 500 people have squashed into the first…
Today I take advantage of a break in the cloud and incessant rain to snap a few pictures of Oxford’s marvellous magnolias. The blooms arrive suddenly in March, full blown…
When I was researching Oxford tokens for a previous ‘Sausage’ post, I came across a coin that had been struck in the mid 17th century with the sign of a…
Last December I became a little obsessed with taking photographs of angels within walking distance of where I live in central Oxford. I am not a religious person, but there…