Archaeology of the Ear
One of the things that got me through the post-Christmas lockdown was recording a series of excerpts from mediaeval texts for Chris Cundy's Archaeology of the Ear series, currently being broadcast on Resonance FM.
The most recent episode, broadcast on November 9th on Resonance and now up on Mixcloud, features the text that I found most compelling to read - a series of excerpts from Guillaume de Machaut's The Judgement of the King of Navarre, which is an extraordinary first-hand account of the Black Death from around 1350.
It was, to say the least, fascinating reading this. There were so many echoes, politically, in de Machaut's text with the current state of responses to the Covid pandemic. Frustratingly, the only version of the text I can seem to find online is a painfully expensive Routledge edition - I'd love to read more of it, but not at that price.
If you'd like to hear the show, I have embedded it below. As well as me reading the excerpts from de Machaut, the show features Chris speaking with with pioneering composer and sound artist Annea Lockwood about her innovative work with glass during the 1960’s, and he also visits Gloucester Cathedral to look at a breathtaking example of medieval painted glass work. He speaks to stained glass expert Leonie Seliger at her studio in Canterbury, and to late medieval historian Dr Helen Lacey about how the Gloucester window conceals a clue about one of the most tumultuous events in English history. It's a fascinating show, and the other episodes are well worth a listen too - you can find them here.
