Europe

Yorkshire and York

As mentioned above we had a 'shopping call' to make in the Yorkshire Dales to buy birthday shoes.   This required us finding our way to Grassington North Yorkshire, not a fast, direct or easy drive.  Having abandoned, as geographically impossible, the already booked and paid for 'bed and breakfast' on the coast, and arriving rather late, we had to find something 'on spec'.   In compensation, Grassington House was a picturesque hotel that, fortuitously, had a room and was very comfortable. 

Grassington House

While Wendy shopped I toured the village;

Grassington Village

then took the car out into the Dales for a closer look at the miles of dry stone walls. 

The Dales

From Grassington we drove to York; stopping in Harrogate to visit the historic Pump Room where people once 'took the waters' and submitted themselves to incredible quackeries in an attempt to cure a range of chronic and/or psychosomatic medical conditions.  It now serves as a museum with some interesting old bikes; in addition to a wide range of medical equipment that would better be located in a torture chamber; but that I was not allowed to photograph.

Pump Room at Harrogate

York has a number of highlights that make it well worth a visit and would have been nicer if it wasn't cold and often raining.  In particular; York Minster is a spectacular Gothic Cathedral and the National Rail Museum is very impressive and informative.  The Shambles in the old town is quaint and picturesque with, thankfully, some good snug coffee shops; against the weather.

A City Gate - York

We booked a B&B that was a short walking distance to both the Minster and the Museum; fortuitous because it is virtually impossible to drive in York. Just a few blocks can take half an hour. 

The Rail museum has examples of almost every steam locomotive ever made in the UK as well as examples of diesel-electric locos and, more modern, very fast electric trains. 

An impressive steam loco in the Rail Museum

The collection includes several Royal trains. 

Royal Train - Honi soit qui mal y pence (shame be to him who thinks evil of it) seems appropriate

I particularly liked one Royal carriage with a bathroom, complete with a conventional bath oriented lengthways along the carriage.  I imagined the water swilling back and forth as the train slowed or speeded up or as they went up or down a grade.   I imagined that if there was a sudden stop 'the King would be thrown out with the bathwater'.   I smiled inwardly for the rest of the day. 

In Roman times York, Eboracum, was capital of the province of Britannia Secunda and home to a large military contingent commanded by Constantius, father of Constantine the Great. 

Before becoming Roman Emperor in 324 Constantine escaped his political enemies in Rome by joining his father in York from where they jointly engaged in a campaign against the Picts in the north (Scotland).  Constantius held the title of Caesar and died in York in 306.  His son was first acknowledged Caesar in his place then proclaimed 'Augustus' in the same year. 

Adjacent to the Cathedral there is a Roman column dating from this period and a Bronze statue of Constantine stands adjacent to where he was proclaimed 'Augustus'.

Bronze statue of Constantine I

As a young man Constantine had studied Christianity, along with other religions, and was fluent in Greek and several other languages.  He was probably aware that Christianity had already reached Britain because Saint Alban, the first British martyr, was executed around the time that he arrived.   

In the Edict of Milan, in 311, Constantine (and Licinius) agreed that the Empire would stop persecuting Christians if they agreed to stop behaving unlawfully. 

Presumably they complied because in 325 he convened the First (ecumenical) Council of Nicaea charged with achieving Christian consensus; and eliminating dissent within the religion.  This Council is particularly important to Christians as it was when Christianity became a unified religion; and when it was finally decided that Jesus was one with God and the Holy Ghost; the original formulation of The Trinity.  It is the origin of the first Nicene Creed that thereafter defined a Christian.

Constantine's support for this unified version of Christianity resulted in it later being adopted as the official religion of the Empire; and the rest is history.  

Constantine is also remembered for moving the imperial centre to Byzantium; that thus came to be renamed New Rome then Constantinople.  In due course Constantinople would become the capital of the Christian Byzantine Empire that dominated the Mediterranean for over a thousand years; until the Muslims came along. 

For these reasons events in York were as important as those in Rome to the initial success and longevity of Christianity. 

After the Romans left in 410, York returned to polytheism under the Angles and then the Danes, the 'Great Heathen Army' who built the the Viking city of Jorvík on the site in the late 9th century and first half of the 10th century; giving the City its present name.  But it remained partially Christian and by the time of the Norman Invasion in 1066 Christianity was still practiced.  After the Norman invasion Christianity was fully reinstated; and the older religious practices became associated with witchcraft.

Then on March 16^th 1190 the incident that is called 'the darkest chapter in York's history' occurred when angry Christians, fired up by the Crusades, massacred the city's entire Jewish community.

York Minster is now one of the largest Cathedrals in Europe but it has a long history.  After the Danes destroyed a church on the site in 1075 a new Minster was built in the Norman style, with additions and modifications, from 1080 until 1215.  

In 1215 a new Bishop was appointed and set about rebuilding substantial parts of the Minster in the Gothic style; to make it the equal of Canterbury.  After many trials and tribulations this work was eventually completed over two and a half centuries later in 1472.  

York Minster

During the English Civil War York was besieged; and fell to Cromwell in 1644.  Protestant iconoclasts had already done substantial damage to the building; and due to the enormous cost, and further damage, it was not restored to the present condition until 1858. 

York Minster Interior

Since that time it has become famous for its magnificent stained glass windows; that require ongoing restoration. 

Interior at the Transept