History news
From visiting palaces to reading racy poems, historians have been reflecting on the experiences that sparked their passion for the past. ANNA WHITELOCK clocked these formative moments
Etched into a desert hillside in southern Peru, this huge image of a cat – measuring approximately 37 metres in length – may not seem inconspicuous, but it has remained hidden until now thanks to the angle at which it was drawn and the effects of erosion. It’s the most recent of a series of drawings to have been discovered dotting the Peruvian desert, and is thought to date from between 500 BC and AD 200.
Known as the Nazca Lines, these designs, or geoglyphs, resemble animals and geometric patterns. They were created by making depressions and incisions in the ground, and by removing rocks and pebbles to expose the coloured earth beneath.
This feline figure is near to other designs – it was first spotted during work to create a new path to an observation platform – but has its origins in the late Paracas era, which actually pre-dates Nazca culture. “We know this from comparing iconographies,” said Johny Isla, Peru’s chief archaeologist for the Nazca Lines. “Paracas textiles, for example, show birds, cats and people that are easily comparable to these geoglyphs. They are [also] smaller in size [than the Nazca examples]”.
As lovers of history, it’s always interesting to reflect on when and how the passion grabbed us. Janina Ramirez (@DrJaninaRamirez) asked Twitter: “When did you realise that the present and future only made sense alongside the past?” For Janina, it was “aged seven, in Hampton Court Palace”. As she describes vividly: “I walked over a threshold passed by thousands before me & felt time slip before me.”
For Jonathan Foyle (@JonathanFoyle), it was “finding coins in the soil of a field: one of Diocletian c300, one William and Mary c1690. Such similar copper discs, over a millennium – but only three yards apart.” Phillipa Vincent-Connolly (@PhillipaJC) tweeted: “My grandparents taking me to National Trust properties within an hour’s drive of Wimborne [in Dorset]. Wondering why I wasn’t born into nobility when staring at palatial paintings of ladies in glorious Georgian gowns, watching Saturday afternoon historical dramas wanting to know what really happened.” Rebecca Rideal (@RebeccaRideal) cited a “brilliant Australian high-school teacher called Mrs Jamieson. She taught the history of 20th-century China with so much passion. Really brought the subject alive. I was then drawn to the
17th century after reading the Earl of Rochester’s dirty poetry.” It takes all sorts!
Hallie Rubenhold (@HallieRubenhold), meanwhile, recalled being “taken to Bodie, an old gold mining ghost town at the foot of the Californian Sierras. The wind whistled through the empty buildings. It was like stepping into a parallel universe. The ‘wild west’ suddenly became real and I became obsessed with understanding it.” For Penny Ewles-Bergeron (@ABroadBrush) “it was reading Rosemary Sutcliff and Henry Treece aged about 10 – that sense that one could remove a veil and the past would be there with the human story and the wider cultural story too”. The Rt Hon Leggy Mountbatten, Esq (@Zardoz67) took me back by tweeting a picture of The Hamlyn Children’s History of the World, which they received “for Christmas 1977 from my nan”. They went on to do a degree in medieval and modern history at Liverpool University. Brendan O’Connor (@BrendanOConno20) caught the bug playing “the computer game Crusader Kings, which simulated 10th to 15th-century Europe”. Not only did Brendan learn a lot but, as he explained: “If you want, you can create a religion that’s into cannibalism, which means it’s possible to eat the pope…” Gosh.
As for me, it was, like Janina Ramirez, at Hampton Court. The ability to breathe in the past, and to walk the corridors as others have for centuries, was thrilling. It’s a feeling that has never left me. One can only hope that sites such as Hampton Court are protected through the pandemic and survive to stir the soul and senses for centuries to come.
I walked over a threshold passed by thousands before me and felt time slip before me