Nixon's Coup: Establishing the NATO Committee on the Challenges of Modern Society, 1969–70

In early 1969 the new US President, Richard Nixon, suggested the expansion of allied political consultation, as well as the setting up of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) committee which would deal with environmental problems. The Americans stressed that their proposal did not involve merely the technical aspects of environmental protection, but also the need for modern governance to evolve in order to safeguard the ‘quality of life’, a prime aspect affecting the legitimisation of the political and social systems. The US proposal was not received enthusiastically by the allies, who had little desire for radical changes, and did not regard this as a proper subject for the alliance; some even feared that a NATO role in environmental questions might mask a US disengagement from European security, especially during an era of détente. However, after making sure that the new committee would be fully under the control of the Council (in accordance with NATO's inter-governmental character), the allies finally agreed to its creation. The NATO discussions on the Committee on the Challenges of Modern Society (CCMS) point to the emergence of a new, more complex international agenda, and raise interesting questions regarding transatlantic relations during an era of wider transitions.     

Spinning Yarns: The Archaeological Evidence for Hand Spinning and its Social Implications,c ad 1200–1500

THIS PAPER EXAMINES the archaeological evidence for hand spinning in medieval Britain from c 1200 to c 1500. Ceramic, stone and baked clay spindle whorls have dominated the excavated finds, but a new corpus of lead-alloy spindle whorls, recorded through the Portable Antiquities Scheme and Scottish Treasure Trove, is presented here. Analysis of the metal whorls’ distribution, manufacture, dating and decoration is provided, illuminating the wide social and economic contexts in which they were used. From memento mori of pious spinners to sexually potent objects representative of lubricious gossips, the ubiquitous spindle whorl was a universal tool that had a powerful agency. The artefacts are small finds embodying daily life but also tie into the wider national economy of the High and Late Middle Ages.     

The archaeology of industry; people and places

The development of industrial archaeology over the last 50 years can be traced through articles published in PMA. The early stages of recording the standing remains of industrial activity were augmented by detailed studies of groups of structures which revealed the organization of the manufacturing process. From the late 1980s, developer-funded excavations became important following extensive remediation work on brownfield sites. Greater attention was paid to the social context of past industrial activity including workers’ housing and institutional buildings, and this has continued with studies of oral history. New challenges considered include studies of modern technologies, de-industrialization and the digital revolution.     

Down at the old Ship and Ball — taverns,trade and daily life in the London Borough of Southwark

SUMMARY: Archaeological excavations in Southwark over the past 50 years have proved to be a very prolific source of evidence for the material culture of people living in this part of London from the 16th century onwards. This lecture, the fourth held by SPMA in honour of the late Geoff Egan, focuses on a remarkably rich and varied assemblage of 17th- and 18th-century artefacts excavated on a site in Tanner Street in 2012. Covering a wide spectrum of activities, occupations and levels of society, these include ceramics, glass, clay tobacco pipes, pewter, copper-alloy, wood, leather, bone and ivory, with objects as diverse as cloth seals, spoons, book mounts, wine bottles and glasses, bird feeders and a mallet for playing pall mall, and sources ranging from the English Midlands to the Far East.     

A Mean and Random Past: The Implications of Variance for History

Abstract

Historians seeking to identify the Irish have overwhelmingly relied upon nominal record linkage, thus limiting studies to periods and contexts in which corroborating records exist. Surname analysis provides an alternative: a subset of 283 Irish surnames was able to correctly isolate 40 percent of known Irish individuals across thousands of entries, which is sufficient for sampling the Irish in demographic studies. This conclusion was based on an analysis of 278,949 names from the London area in the 1841 census, and was tested and refined against 42,248 historical records pertaining to the poor in London between 1777 and 1820.     

Europe and the American mind∗†

Wells's The New Machiavelli (1911) offers an excellent case study of the use of anti-Machiavellian Machiavellism as both a philosophical and a rhetorical strategy. In Remington, Wells creates a protagonist who follows Machiavellian rules of behaviour and denounces those who do likewise. The novel is structured to show Remington's progress from an idealist refutation of Machiavellism, through a recognition of its necessity, to the formulation of a private and political method for the necessary pursuit of Machiavellian principles under the disguise of anti-Machiavellism, including trenchant criticisms of Fabians as anti-Machiavellian Machiavellians. These stages, culminating in complete personal and public failure, are reflected in Remington's party allegiances, and broadened by Wells into an account of British party ideologies around the turn of the twentieth century. Wells's rhetorical design for mapping and assessing anti-Machiavellian Machiavellism is paralleled by an exploration of that technique in himself, attested by the predominance of autobiographical elements in The New Machiavelli, and by similarities between Remington's and Wells's own deception of others and themselves. Far from incidental, anti-Machiavellian Machiavellism is the motif that unites the shifting party allegiances, political conceits and moral hypocrisies, and private and public failures of Wells, Remington, and of the period of British politics that they intend to encapsulate.     

The Soul of the Luba: W.F.P. Burton,Missionary Ethnography and Belgian Colonial Science

This article examines the motivations, institutions and processes involved in colonial knowledge formation through a study of the missionary William Burton. It considers Burton’s work on the Luba of Katanga in relation to the practices of Belgian colonial science and Anglo‐Saxon social anthropology. The essay discusses why missionaries engaged in ethnographic research when they were so intent on changing the customs and beliefs they described and why Burton in particular did not get the recognition he deserved as an authority on his subject. The article charts Burton’s shifting attitude toward the Luba, showing how he moved from an aggressive intrusive mode of research to a position of greater sympathy as he came to consider their cultural riches through study of language, proverb and folklore. Consideration of the second phase of Burton’s research opens up discussion of the missionary origins of the disciplines of African theology and African religious studies.     

British School Atlases, 1880–1930: Questions of Relevance,Credibility and Authorship in the Production of Geographical Knowledge

Abstract

The focus in this article is on school atlases produced in Britain in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries and on what is revealed, both in their pages and in the processes behind their compilation, about the people who were producing and using such map books. The Bartholomew Archive, in Edinburgh, has proved to be an exceptionally rich source of hitherto unexamined data on the business and personal activities of one of the leading producers of school atlases, the local firm of John Bartholomew and Son, which was active in map making and publishing between 1880 and 1987. The sociology and pattern of communication of publishing, explored by book historians and historians of science, geography and cartography in other contexts, are here considered in relation to the atlases that were produced in Britain for schools in the United Kingdom and in other parts of the Empire in the period 1880–1930. Particular attention is paid to the efforts of mapmakers, publishers, geographers and other professionals to ensure the relevance of the maps selected in school atlases for specific audiences, to guarantee the credibility of the information communicated through these atlases, and to negotiate questions of authorship.     

Constant Desjardins,Peripatetic Cartographer

ABSTRACT

The French-born, nineteenth-century commercial cartographer, Constant Desjardins (1787?1876) remains a rather obscure figure, despite a productive career of more than four decades and his creation of a precociously designed atlas of Europe. Desjardins was a typical mapmaker of his age in his interest in thematic mapping, his use of the new technology of lithography, and his publication of materials primarily for the growing educational systems of Europe. Yet he was unusual in the increasingly nationalistic era of nineteenth-century Europe in that he produced multilingual as well as monolingual maps. He also crossed many state borders, working in France, Bavaria, Austria, Hungary and Serbia. Indeed, this cosmopolitanism may explain his relative obscurity.