Andrew Ayton
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andrewayton.bsky.social
Andrew Ayton
@andrewayton.bsky.social
5.5K followers 2K following 920 posts
Historian (ret’d Univ of Hull, UK) working on late medieval military, maritime, soc & economic; & Napoleonic. MSS, prosopography, networks. Classical music, wildlife, cinema, coins, postal history, Dorset, France, Hungary. 🦋& #Shugborough Staffs pictures.
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andrewayton.bsky.social
You know how your ‘phone throws up photos randomly. This from August 2020. I can’t recall now why I was reading Isaiah Berlin, but the Red Admiral butterfly on my slightly sweaty blue linen shirt is the real reason for recalling the occasion.
Chap on blue shirt, showing a copy of Isaiah Berlin, ‘Russian Thinkers’ to the photographer, while a butterfly perches on his shirt. Green foliage in the background.
November 23, 2025 at 12:28 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Psychiatric Educator of the Year award for my brilliant wife @agnesayton.bsky.social. So pleased to trumpet this achievement to a broader constituency than would normally hear about such things.
4th photo: Agnes & two colleagues (see ALT text) who contributed to this work.
Agnes standing at the lectern at the RCPsych awards ceremony last Thursday, giving her acceptance speech. The citation for Agnes's award which emphasises her 'contributions at national level. Her most impressive contributions have been her leading on the rollout of UK's first Credential in Eating Disorders and Treating Patients Well - the first national guidance to formally recognise eating disorders as a required area of learning for all medical professionals are significant pieces of work which impact on training, leadership and patient safety.' The award - a transparent column, with an inscribed details - standing on a table. Agnes at the awards ceremony, flanked by Dr Ali Ibrahim (left), with whom she has published a number of important papers that contributed to the work leading to this award; and (right) Dr Ashish Kumar, with whom she has shared the leadership of the Eating Disorders Faculty of RCPsych for about ten years.
November 10, 2025 at 7:37 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
My rather clever wife punted this on to me; after all the kerfuffle of recent days, it’s rather good.
Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone dancing in ‘La La Land’ (D. Chazelle, 2016), their arms describing an X shape that might be compared with the image in photo 51.
November 10, 2025 at 12:10 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Definitely one my books of the year - a tremendous achievement.
Cover of paperback edition of Herald of a Restless World, including a picture of Bergson, looking straight at the viewer, in the bottom right corner.
October 24, 2025 at 11:18 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
This bit of Michael Wood’s review of David Woodman’s new book on Athelstan (in @thetls.bsky.social) raised a chuckle. Suitably robust in responding to implausible battlefield revisionism. It’s good to see, via the reviewer bio, that MW’s biography of Athelstan is due next year.
On the battle of Brunanburh, 937, the photographed paragraph of Michael Wood’s review reads: But its site has never been identified. The controversy has spawned countless theories, but in the past few decades the view has become entrenched that Brunan-burh was in the Wirral. The theory rests on a single twelfth-century placename, however, and still lacks even a plausible, let alone a convincing, narrative. One would have liked to see Woodman take a fresh look at the whole story.
October 23, 2025 at 4:05 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
The chestnuts become Gesztenye purée. Hungarian dessert.
Two tall glasses with layers of whipped cream and cooked, grated chestnuts.
October 14, 2025 at 9:56 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
The sheer bounty of sweet chestnuts at #Shugborough this year
Accumulation of shiny sweet chestnuts in a Portmeirion bowl.
October 14, 2025 at 3:30 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Our medlars are coming on quite well this year.
Single medlar fruit surrounded by green foliage.
October 11, 2025 at 10:59 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
A nice summary by James Meek in his ‘On the search for Artificial General Intelligence’ in the current @lrb.co.uk #AI
Text in photo: Leaving aside the known problems of LLMs and other forms of generative AI - their massive energy use, their ability in malign human hands to create convincing fake versions of people and events, their exploitation without compensation of human creative work, their baffling promise to investors that they will make money by taking the jobs of the very people who are expected to subscribe to them, their acquired biases, their difficulty in telling the difference between finding things out and making things up, their de-intellectualising of learning by doing students' assignments for them, and their emerging tendency to reinforce whatever delusions or anxieties their mentally fragile human users already carry - leaving aside all this, the deep limitations of generative Al make it hard to see it as anything but a dead end if AGI is the goal.
October 11, 2025 at 10:35 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
A misty, dew drenched morning: 8.45 @Shugborough.
Middle distance: Hadrian’s arch (right) and a tree (left) stand out, but beyond is shrouded in mist. Sunny, dewy-grassed foreground. Blue sky. Still.
September 29, 2025 at 9:32 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
The Caerleon Roman fortress is very impressive: ampitheatre, baths and barracks. Family outing.
The grassy area of the excavated amphitheatre at Caerleon on a sunny day. The swimming bath in the the excavated baths; now enclosed and roofed. The excavated foundations of the barracks of II legion fortress at Caerleon. Pretty unique apparently. Me and family ambling; wife took photo.
September 28, 2025 at 10:33 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
A day late for #PostboxSaturday - but couldn’t walk past this VR in Caerleon without taking a snap.
Red VR pillar box, with nicely decorated top, sited on the pavement in front of a low brick wall with iron railings.
September 28, 2025 at 1:46 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Revisited ‘The Voyage of Charles Darwin’, a magnificent 400 min series from the late ‘70s. It wouldn’t be made or shown now; prompted to rewatch by the recent BBC ‘Human’ series, about which the less said the better. (Perhaps an unpopular view, but I’m old school when it comes to documentaries.)
DVD case showing an elderly Charles Darwin (brilliantly played by Malcom Stoddard) walking in the grounds of Down House, Kent. 7 episodes on 3 DVDs. A classic. One of those things that you rewatch every few years.
September 25, 2025 at 11:29 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Actually, not so recent: 2019. We address a number of pretty important issues with Sumption’s interpretation, but he sees fit to simply repeat his previous argument. Sadly, this book has received little publicity.
Initial page of Andrew Ayton & Craig Lambert, ‘Navies and Maritime Warfare’ in Anne Curry, ed., The Hundred Years War Revisited. Cover page of Anne Curry, ed., The Hundred Years War Revisited (2019)
September 24, 2025 at 11:17 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Here’s one in Dorset - Thorncombe Wood, near Hardy’s Cottage.
View along white gravel road surface, with trees & scrub each side. Clear sky in evening sunshine. OS map showing course of the Roman road to the east of Dorchester, Dorset
September 20, 2025 at 6:10 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Reminded that it’s #MosaicMonday (or was), so here’s one in the Roman Town House at Dorchester, Dorset - the room is thought to be the owner’s office/study…
Photo of mosaic at the Roman Town House, Dorchester. View of the site at the Roman Town House, Dorchester, the foundations and mosaics etc now protected by roofing. Plan of the Roman Town House, Dorchester.
September 15, 2025 at 11:36 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Unexpected sighting by our door at #Shugborough on 13 Sept. A Clifden Nonpareil, described in ‘ Moths of West Midlands’ as: ‘Formerly a rare migrant but recently irruptive into West Midlands (2020) and probably becoming resident’. It’s huge: the white band is 1 inch wide.
@bc-westmids.bsky.social
Large, roughly triangular-shaped moth: only forewings visible - shades of grey patterning, with a distinctive paler blotch on each wing. Settled on some netting.
September 15, 2025 at 8:03 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Stumbled over this #pillbox last week at Woodsford castle, Dorset. Set into a low stone wall. Well described on the Pillbox Study Group website.
There has clearly been further deterioration of the brickwork since 2012.
www.pillbox-study-group.org.uk/dorset-squar...
Front opening of pillbox, with brickwork in need of attention. View of pillbox from SE. It is set into the low stone wall that marks the roadside boundary of Woodsford castle. Rear door opening of pillbox
September 7, 2025 at 12:27 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Apples from a wild tree by the A 513 #Shugborough Years ago, someone tossed an apple core out of the window of their car. We’re harvesting the benefits. They’re pretty tasty. This is a phenomenon in the UK: apple trees by major arterial roads.
A rather splendid pile of red/pale green apples. Plump and ready to eat.
September 6, 2025 at 11:56 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Our local posting point for #postboxsaturday I say ‘local’; it’s actually about half an hour’s walk away. Great Haywood, Staffs. The PO used to be a single small room on the left, just inside the door. Charming place; sad day when it relocated to the village store.
Red GR postbox, set in white-painted roughly-rendered wall White-painted three-bay house with sash windows in the four corners of the facade; pedimented doorway, with Doric columns each side of door. Hanging baskets with colourful cascades of flowers each side of doorway. Red GR postbox set into the wall to the bottom left of the ground floor, leftmost window. Built in 1806, in Trent Lane leading to Essex Bridge, #Shugborough, designed by Samuel Wyatt, who also had a hand in designing the building that we call home.
September 6, 2025 at 10:52 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Today, the anniversary of the battle of Crécy (first day), I remember my friend and academic collaborator, Philip Preston (d. 2021), here snapped in a favourite lunch venue in Saint-Saëns. Anglo-French relations have had few better champions.
Bespectacled gentleman, napkin tucked in to protect his shirt-front; the moustache (I always thought) giving him a resemblance to Pierre Monteux. The picture, taken by my wife, catches a moment of humour that I shared with him.
August 26, 2025 at 11:28 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Not for the first time in recent days, I thank an informed reviewer for reading/watching something so that I don’t need to. I’m sure that @medievalrevolt.bsky.social is right to suggest that such books find ‘an enthusiastic readership’, though I do wonder whether that really means ‘listenership’.
Photo of half page of this week’s issue of the TLS - the summer ‘bumper issue’, so well worth the cover price - with Justine Firnhaber-Baker’s review of Helen Carr’s ‘Sceptured Isle: A new history of the fourteenth century’.
August 23, 2025 at 12:34 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Today on the buddleia: the late summer butterflies in our Staffs garden. @savebutterflies.bsky.social @bc-westmids.bsky.social
A Comma butterfly on a buddleia flower. The late summer batch of Commas has just emerged. A Painted Lady butterfly - there have been more of these wanderers in this garden than for years. A Red Admiral butterfly - one of the usual late summer batch.
August 22, 2025 at 11:20 PM
andrewayton.bsky.social
Pears in abundance this year. Quite small, but I think they’ll be good. That said, my wife likes them crunchy, I like them soft…
Pears, newly picked, arranged in a circle against a black background.
August 21, 2025 at 12:03 AM
andrewayton.bsky.social
These are perfect.
Four freshly-picked figs in bowl.
August 15, 2025 at 4:42 PM