We are standing on London Bridge and I am waving my arms about describing a Saxon-Viking battle that took place there about 60 years before the Norman Conquest. As we talk, there is a slowly emerging sense of convergence – of times and places, of “then” and “now”, the continuity of things. London’s place names, streets, rivers and churches all begin to make sense once you see it as a long, messy, river-bound and continuing story.
Leading Catholic history walks involves meeting many different groups: American visitors, schoolchildren, Catholics from parishes and other organisations and non-Catholic groups of family historians.
The venture began in 2010 as a way of celebrating our faith and our heritage. It has flourished from the days when I stood outside Westminster Cathedral handing out leaflets to today, when we have a smart website and wide contacts at home and abroad.
When you say “Catholic history” to most English Catholics, they will respond: “Oh yes… Thomas More”. They want to talk about their sense of connection with the English martyrs.
Naturally our history walks include this. We have a Thomas More Chelsea walk and the great annual Newgate-Tyburn martyrs walk. But there is so much more. The story of the Catholic Church in Britain is the story of Britain itself. We are not a group that emerged in the 1530s with Henry VIII’s marital troubles.
The Catholic Faith arrived when we were part of the Roman Empire – the same Empire into which Christ was born and through which the Christian faith spread.
When the pagan Saxons arrived, as the Empire crumbled, they referred to the Romano-British as “Welsh”, or “strangers”. Hence names like Wallington, Walworth and Wallingford. The Saxons were converted in their turn and a Saxon king built a minster to the West of London, which gave its name to the district and later to the Parliament established there.
It’s frustrating that history is so poorly taught in schools today. Students need an understanding of the timeline: Romans, Saxons invasions, Vikings, Normans, Medieval era, Reformation, Tudors and Stuarts and so on. Today, they tend to get themes – women’s history or black history – or “let’s have fun” stuff along the lines of “Imagine what it would have been like living in a Norman castle”, instead of discovering who the Normans were and why they built castles in strategic places.
The Church is the key: explore London place names from Marylebone to Upminster to hear the Marian and monastic echoes, discover St Olave and that Viking battle, ponder the Neo-Gothic splendour of our Barry/Pugin Parliament, and reflect on links with the Tractarian movement and thus John Henry Newman.
Come and join a Catholic history walk next time you are in London. Discover the rivers, including the River Fleet, which belied its name to become a sluggish ditch and exists no more, the Tyburn with its associations with the martyrs, the deep crossing at Deptford and the one for the cattle at Catford. The Saxons liked calling a place “ham” – heim, home. Hence Tottenham, Twickenham, Sydenham. Our country is our home: celebrate its story.
Joanna Bogle is an author, broadcaster and historian. For more on Catholic history walks, including the latest dates and times, visit catholichistorywalks.com
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