Chester Food & Drink Festival 2013

The Easter Chester Food & Drink Festival is once more under way. The photo below was taken on Good Friday, when everything was ready and waiting for the (ravening? salivating?) hordes that flock to it. Notice all the caravans in the background, poised for their occupants to nip in early.

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Canal Swing Bridge

At the entrance to the rediscovered basin is a nice new swing bridge, put there to allow narrowboats to get in and out. It is a very tight turn into this basin, and the entrance seems very narrow to me, and I'm really not sure that all the boats on the canal could get in, longer ones might well struggle.

I have only ever seen it used once, shortly after the re-opening, and never again. The bridge replaces the four planks of wood that we used to walk across, and we have also lost the hordes of frogs that used to spawn here.

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Cathedral Brass Memorials

Dotted all around the Cathedral are brass memorials, which are cleaned and polished to a high shine. When the sun is shining through the stained glass windows they look very beautiful. My congratulations to whoever looks after them.

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Holt Roman Pottery

Just outside Chester, at Holt, there was a Roman pottery, supplying earthenware to the fortress. The pots below were unearthed locally, and are on display in the Grosvenor Museum. The potters at Holt specialised in a number of different styles and shapes of pottery, some of which show a remarkable degree of technological sophistication. I especially love the whole pot shown below - you can almost see the fingers of the potter shaping the neck of the vessel.

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Rediscovered Canal Basin

When I first moved to Chester back in 1982, down on the canal basin near Telford's Warehouse there were a few wooden planks across a small inlet (or outlet) off the canal. The inlet (or outlet) went nowhere. Later investigations by, I think, Chester Civic Trust, showed that there had originally been extra mooring off the canal basin, and that part of the original quay wall was still there. This has now been opened up and restored, and you can see part of the result below. The section of original wall is furthest away in the photo.

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Cross Keys II

Another music session took place in the Cross Keys last night. with a group of local musicians hosting a group visiting from all over the country. Eleven of them arrived on a narrowboat, instruments were ferried to the pub, and a good time was had by all, with addresses being exchanged and return trips being planned. Thanks to the Cross Keys for being such willing hosts, and to the pub regulars for being interested listeners.

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Roman Military Diploma

In the Grosvenor Museum is a copy of a Roman Military Diploma. The original was found in Malpas, just outside Chester, and is now in the British Museum. Only 13 such diplomas have been discovered in Britain, and this the most complete.

Military diplomas are certificates of discharge inscribed on bronze tablets. They were issued to all auxiliary soldiers when they had served 25 years. The diplomas granted citizenship to soldiers and their children, and made marriages legal (in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD Roman soldiers were forbidden to marry).

This diploma was issued by the Roman emperor Trajan (AD 98-117) to Reburrus, a Spanish junior officer in the 1st Pannonian cavalry regiment. The original declaration would have been displayed in the Forum in Rome and a version copied onto bronze tablets as a portable proof of Roman citizenship.

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