People

  • Unwillingly to school …

    Today few young children walk to primary school alone, for a variety of reasons including parental perceptions of danger. In fact, the image of mum in a large Range Rover driving her offspring to the school gates has become a cliche. Yet 150 years ago children who were lucky enough to go to school often…

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  • Mr Burdett, map maker and …

    Peter and Hannah Peter Perez Burdett (c.1734-1793) is a fascinating example of an eighteenth-century artist, surveyor, amateur scientist and … serial debtor! His map of Derbyshire (1767) is the first accurate survey of the county, at the scale of an inch to a mile, and is invaluable to local historians. He was a friend of…

  • “A fine lady upon a white horse …”

    Woman riding side-saddle: No portrait of Celia appears to exist. Celia Fiennes (1662-1741) was a well-connected lady who toured much of England on horseback around the end of the seventeenth century. Her journal provides a rare insight into the Peak District at this time, before turnpikes but when ‘tourism’ was just beginning. Although independent female…

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  • The romance of the road

    Give to me the life I love, Let the lave go by me, Give the jolly heaven above And the byway nigh me. Bed in the bush with stars to see, Bread I dip in the river, That’s the life for a man like me, That’s the life for ever. Robert Louis Stevenson wrote his…

  • Wayside worship

    Altar to the Quadruviae in Germany For at least two thousand years European roads were marked by shrines and sanctuaries, giving travelers the chance to rest, make offerings and pray for a safe journey. The Romans dedicated some to well-known gods such as Hercules and Mars, but they also had divinities specific to travel: Biviae…

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