Heritage Photography Spring 2010

Patron: Her Majesty The Queen.

Incorporated by Royal Charter

HERITAGE PHOTOGRAPHY

JOURNAL of the ARCHAEOLOGY & HERITAGE GROUP

Bradley Manor, Devon: the 15th-century chapel

The Great Hall at lghtham Mote, Kent R. Keith Evans FRPS

Se'e The Early English Manor House, pages 3-4 SPRING 2010

Archaeology & Heritage Group Chairman R. Keith Evans FRPS 7 Grassy Lane Sevenoaks Kent TN13 1PN Tel 01732 743943 Secretary Jim Tonks ARPS Earlton 174 Chairborough Road High Wycombe Bucks HP12 3HW Treasurer Ernie Gates 4 Pine Dean Great Bookham Leatherhead Surrey KT23 4BT Webmaster Dr Mike Sasse Publications Committee R. Keith Evans Eric Houlder LRPS (Archaeology Editor) Garry Bisshopp LRPS Gwil Owen ARPS Dr Mike Sasse

PERSPECTIVE First I must record a sad moment for the Group - in mid-January we learned of the death of our committee member and former chairman John Adams ARPS .

A tribute to John appeared in the April issue of the RPS Journal, and I was pleased to see how many group members attended a moving service in his memory at Leatherhead , where he had lived and worked for much of his life .

John had been a devoted member of the RPS , and of the A & H Group, for 34 years, and leaves us some fine examples of his photographic work.

It is now early April, and I am gratified by the success of this year's Group events - apart from the annual Print Day which, in view of the unusually heavy snow in southern England during January, we decided to postpone: it will now take place on 8 May, following our Annual General Meeting.

In March we were welcomed to Chichester cathedral, where we undertook a morning 's photography to the melodic accompaniment, for part of the time , of the boys of the cathedral 's Choir School. Several members enjoyed lunch in the refectory, followed by further picture-making in the cathedral or at other sites nearby. This month, April, we had a successful day at the part-Norman church of St Cross and its mediaeval almshouses, with participants from other Groups and from four different RPS Regions.

On such visits I am always interested to see the photographic equipment our members use . Just a few years ago, the wood or metal 5x4 inch field camera was the norm; some members used 6x6cm Rolleis or Hasselblads, but anything smaller was almost unknown . Today, however , I notice a much wider range of equipment in use , from 10x8 inch cameras taking plates or sheet film - often the originals for 'alternative processes ' of print-making - through the traditional 5x4 and medium-format cameras taking film or digital backs , to a variety of highly-specified digital SLRs. It is, of course, the resulting final image that matters , not the mean s of its taking , and in looking over the entrie s for this year's Group Exhibition (opening first at Smethwick on 18 May) , I was impressed by the very high technical and pictorial qualit y of the prints, no matter their origination.

The next few months see an inviting programme of events , including visits to the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum, Win ston Churchill 's home at Chartwell in Kent, and a number of Romney Marsh churches; and a weekend in N011hamptonshire where we plan to photograph an active archaeological site at Piddington, and some of the artefacts found there . First , though , comes the AGM and Print Day; if attending the former, which I hope you will, please bring along a selection of your prints to display - but remember that the AGM is primarily your opportunity to vote for a new Committee , and to help influence the topics of our events and the running of the Group in general.

R. Keith Evans, Chairman.

Published by the Archaeology & Heritage Group of The Royal Photographic Society, April 2010 Copyright in all text and photographs is held by the credited authors, or as otherwise stated.

No part of this publication may be reproduced , transmitted or stored in any form without prior written permission of the Publisher.

ISSN No. 0-904495-00-0

The Norman church and almshouses of St Cross, near Winchester, photographed during the Group's visit in Jtpril 2010.

The early English manor house A major economic facet of the feudal system, the manor house and its estate developed under the Normans and later the Tudors to become a residence for the country gentleman.

Text and pictures by Dr Mike Sasse.

Lytes Cary Manor in Somerset is a 14th-century house with later additions.

The English manor house has its roots in the Saxon timber aisled hall, which had a central hearth and was used communally for eating and sleeping. With the development of feudal society under the Normans, timbered halls continued to serve a communal function. However, the new Norman lords of the manor constructed for themselves separate rectangular houses, first of timber and later of stone.

Living quarters were on the first floor, with a solar (withdrawing room) for the lord at one end. The ground floor was reserved for storage , and the separate hall would have stood nearby. Boothby Pagnell in Lincolnshire (ca.1200) is a rare surviving example of such a stone house , with an external staircase providing first-floor access.

Later, the hall and the house came together as a single building, so manor houses might have a timber hall with a two-storey stone house attached, containing a parlour below and the solar above. The hall often retained a central hearth , and the lord generally took his meals there on a dais adjacent to his private quarters . Old Soar Manor in Kent, with its undercroft, solar and even a private chapel, is externally a rare example of such a house: it dates from 1290, but as is usual the timber hall has not survived . Later buildings might be entirely of stone ._or in Eastern England of brick.

The privately owned Little Wenham Hall (ca.1270) is a fine brick-built example from Suffolk. Other houses with private

HERITAGE PHOTOGRAPHY

chapels include Ightham Mote in Kent, Littlecote House and Bradley Manor, pictured on our cover.

From defensive walls and moat ...

In an age of conflict, the lord's residence needed to be defended - indeed, some had been built as tower keeps, such as Castle Hedingham in Essex. In time, the manor house emerged as a residence designed more for comfort and convenience than for defence. The ruined fortified manor house known as Acton Burnell Castle in Shropshire represents an early stage (1284) , built four-square like a castle but pierced by Gothic windows. One of the finest examples of a moated manor house is Ightham Mote, dating from around 1320. The Great Hall dates from this early period, and later additions have been built around a central court overlooking the moat, a very picturesque aspect.

Another atmospheric survival from the age of the manor house is Stokesay Castle in Shropshire . The hall and solar date from 1285-1305 and have been little altered since .

Features like moats and gatehouses remained, perhaps as status symbols, long after they played any defensive role.

... to mediaeval grandeur The rise of sheep farming generated wealth for the lords of the manor . Tenant farmers rented land from them, so the

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lords became less directly involved in farming. Wealthy country gentlemen, as they were becoming, were rebuilding manor houses of greater complexity and beauty. Stone halls with lofty trussed roofs replaced the successors to the Saxon hall, the lord could eat in his private quarters , and the Great Hall became a place to entertain rather than a communal area for family, servants and retainers. Glass replaced shuttered windows, and the inclusion of a kitchen and an upper chamber created the 'H' plan manor, with central hall flanked on either side by two-storey wings. The hall was elaborated with porches and bay windows, and the lord's chamber with oriel windows.

Great Chalfield Manor in Wiltshire is an excellent example of a 15th-century manor house, with projecting wings, oriel windows and a tiny parish church within the grounds , bounded by an outer moat. Despite some Tudor additions , Haddon Hall in Derbyshire is essentially one of the most complete mediaeval manor houses in the country, built around a courtyard, and preserving chapel, kitchens and Great Hall.

The yeoman farmer also aspired to a more elaborate residence, and the elements of hall and wings under a single roof, but executed in timber , culminated in the fine yeoman's houses still to be seen in the south-east of England. These, though, are not true manor houses, nor are the many increasingly grand homes that followed in the Elizabethan period and afterwards. However, like Penshurst Place in Kent, with its Great Hall dating from around 1340, a number of great houses that were much enlarged in later periods retain at their heart a mediaeval manor house.

Above: the New Chapel at Ightham Mote was built about 1470-80, though not consecrated until 1633.

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Below: Old Soar Manor, Kent: a stone house dating from around 1290.

Colour infrared aerial photography - the early days The forthcoming centenary of the discovery of the Woods Effect, essentially infrared, encouraged Eric Houlder LRPS to recall his early experiences in using colour infrared film in his archaeological work.

My mind was transported back to a sunny July day in 1967, when I first saw a U.S. Air Force Huskie helicopter circling the archaeological site at Sutton Hoo on which I was working at the time. The Huskie itself was unusual; a twin-rotor machine in which the rotors were angled, side-by -side and intermeshed, but what intrigued me just as much was the fact that someone wearing a large white helmet was leaning out shooting pictures. At that time I was an archaeologist with pretensions to being an archaeological photographer. In addition, I had long had an interest in aircraft and flying, inherited no doubt from a father who had served in both the RAF and the Fleet Air Arm .

Even then Sutton Hoo was a legendary site in British archaeology, following the discovery in 1939 of the complete and unrobbed grave of a seventh -century king, almost certainly Raedwald who died around 625 AD. The Second World War effectively put an end to the work at Sutton Hoo, and our presence there was actually the final stage, long postponed, of the original dig. During the war the USAF had acquired several air bases in East Anglia, and each day we were treated to the sight of their Super Sabres overhead on their way to patrol the North Atlantic.

Unknown to us, the pilots had seen us and some of them then paid us a visit in the base helicopter. Unfortunately, archaeology and low-flying helicopters do not happily mix, and our displeasure at the flying dust and sand must have been obvious, so the pilots came by car on their next visit.

They were welcomed and shown around, and responded by asking if they could help in any way. Our director, Paul Ashbee , suggested some aerial photographs, and the resulting 8443 Infrared Ektachromes were the first false-colour pictures that any of us had seen.

A typical Iron Agel Romano-British enclosure in Nottinghamshire, recorded above on Agfachrome SOS Professional film (C41 process), and below on Ektachrome 8443 infrared film.

The Sutton Hoo dig finished in the early 1970s. I went on to other sites, but remembered those weirdly-coloured images and mentioned them to a friend, Michael Leach , who had a private pilot's licence. He immediately offered to take me up in the Chipmunk in which he owned a share . The opportunity was too good to miss, and I asked my friendly local photo dealer to obtain the relevant film. It took a long time arriving, and when it did the instructions were daunting. It required total darkness for loading, and a Wratten 12 filter (3x yellow). A speed of 100 ASA was recommended in sunlight.

Our first efforts were quite encouraging , using my Minolta SRI v and a gelatine filter. However, the filter was quite

dense, and being soft it tended to distort in the slipstream when we moved on to other aircraft (the Chipmunk had perspex windows which could not be opened) . We initially

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The Victorian gardens at Clumber Park, hardly visible to the eye, show up well in infrared colour.

Mysterious black markings in Clumber Park are the sites of World War II petrol and ammunition dumps; after the war the petrol was poured into nearby ditches and ignited.

tried to discover 'new', hitherto invisible sites, but wasted a lot of film cin unproductive land. In time we realised that it was best utilised on cropmark sites that were visible to the eye, where it vastly increased the visible data. The two pictures on the preceding page well illustrate the effect.

Enhancing the monochrome image Parallel to my use of the false-colour infrared , I had been working on improving results on ordinary monochrome film.

Techniques of aerial photography had been developed during and after the Great War, when O.G.S. Crawford had invented and published the procedures. Crawford was first and foremost an archaeo logist who took pictures, and I felt that a photographer would have an advantage in making these vestigial traces more visible.

Building on the work of our Group member Vic Hepplethwaite ARPS, I tried under-exposure, coupled with an orange filter and extended development interspersed with water-baths to prevent too great a contrast build-up. The aim was to achieve a film speed of 100 ASA so that colour (Agfa SOSProfessional, uprated one stop), monochrome (Plus X or FP4) and infra-red (Ektachrome 8443) could be used simultaneously with a sing~ meter reading . The development times and temperatures were published in Archaeolog , the then-current Group newsletter , and today are of only historic

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Eric Boulder's one-time student Simon Thorp drew the original of this cartoon in 1979; Eric clearly treasures his Russian Zorki more than the Hasselblad !

interest. At that time, however , being primarily concerned with colour, my heart was always with the two transparency processes, though I did shoot some professional negative film on one sortie along side the other three emulsions.

By the two drought summers of 1975 and 1976, I had attended and addressed a number of aerial photography conferences. I was privileged to project for Dr St Joseph , and had met various members of the RPS Aerial Photography Group. Ideas on development times and other matters were bounced around within both the Aerial and Archaeology Groups, and here I must record my thanks to all the members who helped me to formulate ideas and put them into practice.

Also, Derrick Riley, one of our leading aerial archaeologists , had asked me to fly with him as photographer. Derrick was a Bomber Command veteran, and one of those early pioneers who had known Crawford and helped develop the techniques .

With him I was able to put some of the new ideas into practice, as he made a point of regularly re-visiting sites during the cropmark season .

Naturally, results were published, but at this distance in time my main memories are of the sheer enjoyment of being, even in a small way, at the cutting edge of photographic and archaeological research .

Away-day to ... ARRAS In this new series we look at cities, towns or regions providing unique opportunities for heritage photography during a one- or two-day visit. First port of call is the northern French city of Arras.

Text and pictures: R. Keith Evans.

No further from London than are, say, York or Exeter, the city of Arras and its surroundings offer a rewarding day 's visit for the architectural, record or heritage photographer .

Capital of the old province of Artois, Arras dates back to Roman times , as the settlement of Nemetacum . Its architectural heritage as we see it today goes back to the Middle Ages: the town developed around the Benedictine Abbey of St Vaast, its wealth built first on grain, then as a wool-making centre whose fame spread throughout Europe as a source of the finest woollen tapestries - the name arras itself entering the English language as meaning a tapestry wall-hanging.

Today the magnificent facades of the old city-centre squares - in particular Grand'Place and Place des Hero s - are a remarkable example of l 7th- and l 8th-century Flemish architecture. The buildings rest on columned galleries and arcades designed to shelter stallholders and their customers; several of their original carved shop signs can still be seen.

The oldest house in Arras is the 15th-century Hotel des Trois Luppars in Grand'Place, built above three gothic arches and topped by a fine crow-stepped gable.

Towering 250ft above Place des Heros is the flamboyant belfry of the Hotel de Ville; like many other buildings in Arras, it was destroyed by shelling in the 1914-18 War and subsequently rebuilt. Twice weekly, on Wednesdays and Saturdays, the squares are filled with the colourful stalls of the city-centre markets .

History below the ground ...

For much of the past ten centuries , paralleling the growth of the city, limestone was quarried from beneath its streets and buildings. The network of caverns and passages grew over time , some becoming cellars and warehouses; in October 1917, towards the end of the War, as many as 24,000 allied troops were quartered there in readiness for an assault on the nearby German lines . Today a guided tour lets visitors see some of the passages, and one large cavern in particular, Wellington Quarry, named after the New Zealand sappers who excavated it. ... and on Vimy Ridge Eight miles north of Arras, capping the highest point of the limestone escarpment of Vimy Ridge , is another historic site not to be mis sed.

Here is the impressive white stone Canadian War Memorial, completed in 1936 in memory of the 66,000 Canadian

250ft belfry <!/_theCity Hall, top right, towers over the Place des Heros. City-centre houses , right, clearly reveal their Flemish architectural origins.

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Galleried houses in Grand'Place: the red-brick building is the 15th-century Hotel des Trois Luppars, oldest house in Arras.

Few Arras tapestries remain in the city; this 15th-century example in the Mus ee des Beaux-Arts shows one of the legends associated with St Vaast, its first Bishop. soldiers who died in the First World War. The 10-mile ridge was a vital German strategic barrier, prote cting the coal mines and factories to the east; after a number of abortive attempts, it was finally captured in April 19 17 by four divisions of the Canadian Corps of the British 3rd Army.

The victory was hard-won - 3,600 men lost their lives - and the 260-acre memorial site is now officially Canad ian territory.

Designed by the Toronto architect Walter Seymour Allward, the towerin g twin columns of the memori al itself can be seen for many miles; it incorporates 20 massive statues carved from Adriatic limestone. Much of the surrounding area has been re-forested, but mine and shell craters are still visible everywhere, and the site includes a section of restored German tunnels and trench lines. British and Fre nch volunteers continue to explore new such remains.

GETTING THERE Arras is easily reached from Calais (70 miles) by way of the A26 autoroute, which passes within two miles of the city's ring road. Follow the N50 south as far as Boulevard Faidherbe, then a short side street on the right leads to Grand'Place and ample parking. There are numerous hotels and restaurants , and an excellent tourist information office is located in the Hotel de Ville (city hall) on Place des Heras.

Not to miss: St Vaast Abbey, Musee des Beaux-Arts, citycentre squares , underground passages and caves . Visit Vimy Ridge , Notre-Dame-de-Lorette and other First World War battlefield memorial sites.

IN THE NEXT ISSUE Off the tourist trail in Jordan Away-day to Saffron Walden Militaria 1: Recording our naval history

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To be published in October 2010