Philosophers,Naturalists, and Antipodean Encounters, 1748-1803

This article addresses a complex nexus of discourse and praxis: varying Enlightenment visions of Man; emergent ideas about human differences; and encounters between European scientific voyagers and Indigenous people in New Holland (Australia) and Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania) at the start of the nineteenth century. Discursively, I trace two strands of ‘anthropological’ thinking. One, philosophical and economic, is epitomized in French and Scottish stadial theory. The other is naturalist and culminated in Buffon's natural history of man. Both were appropriated from the late eighteenth century by a nascent science of race. With respect to praxis, I chart the reciprocal impact of metropolitan theory, antipodean experience and local agency by selective comparison of materials produced by the voyages of Matthew Flinders and Nicolas Baudin in Australian waters in 1801–1803.     

Town Houses in Taunton, 1500-1700

Abstract

In this article the author traces the evolution of the small to medium-sized town houses in Taunton in the period 1500–1700. He describes surviving examples of three, two and single cell houses, L-shaped, detached and semi-detached houses of the period, and after discussing building materials, compares them with developments elsewhere in the South West.     

Western society and alchemy from 1200-1500

In the middle ages someone professing to be an alchemist might not actually be one in the strict sense of the word. Many frauds and charlatans posed as alchemists to make the credulous public pay for the application of their supposed knowledge of the divine art.This article will trace the development of the medieval view of alchemy as it emerges from the most important contemporary sources and will attempt to answer the question why its abuses attracted more attention than its serious exercise.     

The Historical Snow Survey of Great Britain: Digitised Data for Scotland

Abstract

Mountain snowline is important as it is an easily observable measure of the phase state of water in the landscape. Changes in seasonal snowline elevation can indicate long-term trends in temperature or other climate variables. Snow-cover influences local flora and fauna, and knowledge of snowline can inform management of water and associated risks. Between 1945 and 2007 voluntary observers collected a subjective record of snow cover across Great Britain called the Snow Survey of Great Britain (SSGB). The original paper copy SSGB data is held by the Met Office. This article details the digitisation of the Scottish SSGB data, its spatial and temporal extents, and a brief example comparison of Met Office snow-lying gridded data. The digitised SSGB data are available from the Met Office authors.     

The Solidarity Revolution in Poland, 1980-1981

Abstract: This article, based upon in-depth interviews with anti-governmentleaders and activists, first explains the significance of theupheaval in Communist Poland in 1980–1981 and articulateshow the author became involved in this research and explainshis methodology. It then concentrates on the impact on the personallives of the participants and on social relations in Polandof the upheaval that produced an unprecedented-in-the-Soviet-blocindependent union with the right to strike. It shows how activistsdeveloped talents and cultivated abilities as they assumed responsibilitiesthat had previously been unavailable to them. It examines howworkers' lives changed as they grasped control of power: theirworking conditions improved; their status rose; they treatedone another better; they educated themselves. These changes,which contributed to the context in which the political struggleof that period took place, survived the suppression of the unionand ultimately contributed to bringing about the end of Communismin Poland.     

A Shield Loaded with History: Encounters,Objects and Exhibitions

This article discusses an Aboriginal shield in the British Museum which is widely believed to have been used in the first encounter between Lieutenant James Cook's expedition and the Gweagal people at Botany Bay in late April 1770. It traces the ways in which the shield became ‘Cook-related’, and increasingly represented and exhibited in that way. In the wake of its exhibition at the National Museum of Australia in late 2015 and early 2016, the shield gained further public prominence and has become enmeshed within a wider politics of reconciliation. A recent request from the La Perouse Local Aboriginal Land Council to the British Museum to review knowledge about the shield has contributed to a reappraisal of claims about its connection to Cook's 1770 expedition. Preliminary findings of this review are presented. In the process, the article addresses larger questions concerning the politics surrounding the interpretation of the shield as a historically ‘loaded’ object.