History Carnival time!

Hello! It’s my turn to host the early modern History Carnivalesque here at Madame Guillotine and I’m really looking forward to introducing some excellent posts from the amazingly diverse world of history blogging. Forget whatever the latest over hyped blogging craze happens to be – if you want a really stonking good read, history blogging is always where you’ll find it.

We history bloggers are a fortunate lot really – we have so much material to choose from, so much fabulous art, incredible personalities and tremendous dramas that it actually becomes more than a little overwhelming at times.

I got some amazing submissions for this carnival, which I’m looking forward to sharing with you and have also picked some plum posts from a few of my favourite history bloggers.

Onwards!

First of all, we have Early Modern Whale’s recounting of the tale of Richard Dugdale, the Surey Demoniac. A ‘demoniac’ being someone who has been possessed by demons, so you can imagine what a thrill his antics gave to the good people of seventeenth century Lancashire.

Next, we have another seventeenth century post as Tom Sykes of In Pursuit of History ponders diarist, tumbler of maidservants and bon vivant, Samuel Pepys’ uncanny ability to be in the right place at the right time. There’s more seventeenth century history with this fascinating post from Mercurius Politicus about the preacher and writer, Henry Walker.

We now have two posts from jliedl.com, where some truly horrible wicked stepmothers and the vile sewers of the seventeenth century are looked at in revolting detail. Would Carlisle Cullen from Twilight have looked quite so swoonsome after dashing about the foul smelling underbelly of Stuart London? I think not…

We take a step back into sixteenth century England for our next post by historical fiction writer, Susan Higginbotham, in which she discusses the other Lady Jane Seymour. If scandalous ladies are your bag, then I’d definitely recommend a visit to Elizabeth Mahon’s marvellous blog, where I always learn something new about the infamous women of the past – this month’s pick is the weird case of an alleged Medieval witch, Dame Alice Kyteler.

Ah, now as regular readers of my blog will know, I’m more than a little bit keen on Paris and its history, so here’s a lovely post from Culture & Stuff about the Pont Neuf.

If you’re new to my blog and London is where your heart is, then you might like to read my recent post about a magical visit to Dennis Severs’ House in Spitalfields, where time has stood still for a wealthy Huguenot family. Lee Jackson of the amazingly vivid and interesting The Cat’s Meat Shop also has a post about a visit to the House of St Barnabas in Soho.

I was spoiled for choice when it came to posts from one of my favourite blogs, the always insightful and charming, Parisian Fields, but in the end decided upon a fascinating one about a view from the Butte Montmartre. I love posts like this one, which link the past and present so deftly.

As an art history graduate myself, I’m also pleased to present a very lovely post about Italian artist, Barbara Longhi. It’s a delight to me that the tide definitely seems to be turning where it comes to the study of female artists – they definitely seem to be taken much more seriously these days and rightly so. Following the same theme, here’s a post by the always charming Man About Town, The Cogitations of READ about a forgotten Victorian artist, Jose Weiss.

Finally, no day is complete for me without a visit to the wonderful Spitalfields Life blog, and this month’s pick is a fascinating post about the annual swan census carried out on the Thames by members of the Worshipful Company of Vintners.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this selection of blog posts – it’s just perfect for a rainy Saturday afternoon, I think! Many thanks to Sharon Howard for letting me host this History Carnivalesque!