Historianka

Tag: Scandinavia

  • Lovers and ‘Paupers’: the ‘Gap Year’ in the 1830s

    This post takes a look at another young gentleman on a series of ‘gap year’ tours – William Hartigan Barrington, son of Sir Matthew, who built Glenstal Castle, Co. Limerick. Barrington was interested in new experiences, meeting young women, and finding out about poverty. Has the ‘gap year’ changed all that much? Between 1833 and…

  • Scandinavian Artefacts in John Lee’s Private Museum

    John Lee’s private museum at Hartwell House was said to contain some 4,000 items. The main room’s sixteen large glass cases and several smaller cabinets formed a ‘miscellaneous collection of articles culled from the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms; as well as antiquarian relics, and works of industrial art.’ The museum had sections devoted to the arts…

  • ‘Balloonacy’ in the Arctic, 1799

    The first air balloon launch in the Arctic took place at Enontekiö, Finland, in July 1799. It came about with the meeting of two travelling Englishmen and a local pastor. Edward Daniel Clarke, later first professor of mineralogy at Cambridge University, was then employed as tutor to a young travelling gentleman, John Marten Cripps. The…