Message text written by "Cordasco, Anthony (NJ Data Services)" > ...wondering if anyone had any recommendations for "must see" ( UK ) sundials<
Sounds like you are in for a gruelling tourist trip! I am sure you'll have lots to see as well as dials. Sounds like you might be interested in things Roman too and it's interesting that you will be arriving near where the Romans first arrived in Britain (in Kent at Richborough where there are still remains worth seeing). There are over a hundred quality dials in Kent but (for example) only one known in Lincoln itself (near the cathedral) - though the city is certainly worth seeing! I therefore suggest that you take opportunities to look at dials where there are concentrations of good ones. I'd particularly recommend Cambridge and Oxford. In Oxford there's even the 'History of Science' museum that has hundreds of small and large dials on display and a rare example of a stained glass dial. Cambridge - which has 28 dials alone all in a short distance of one another and mainly in the Colleges - is the site of the famous Queen's College 'Newton' dial which is also a moon dial and that would be my nomination for a 'must see' dial. You can get a preview on http://www.quns.cam.ac.uk/Queens/Misc/Dial.html Oxford has 22 dials, again mainly in the colleges - most are well worth a visit - esp the one at Corpus Christi College. If you do get to Hadrian's Wall at one of the forts there - Housesteads I think - in the museum there is one of very few Roman dials in Britain on view; though sadly it is mounted upside down! In general, if you have time in a village (esp in Kent) take a look at the local parish church. Many of them have reasonably old (1700s) dials above the South porch or on the South wall of the tower. Most are Direct South dials - even to the point of being canted out from the wall to face true South - but quite a few are declining dials. If you are visiting any of the older manor houses maintained by the National Trust or English Heritage they will often have a nice horizontal dial in the garden which was used to correct the time of early clocks. If you are interested too you can take in one or two examples of dials which are (nearly!) unique to England - these are the Mass Dials or Scratch Dials that were often scored into the stone mullions of windows or jambs of doors to indicate times of Mass in early times. There are more than a thousand known and it is often fun to look for them when visiting an old church. Beware though they can be in odd places since sometimes the stone has been reused for building over the centuries!! Finally there are a few Saxon dials in England. These are thought to be somewhat more scientifically thought out than the ordinary mass dial. Perhaps the best known is the one at the rather hard to find St Gregory's Minster in Kirkdale, near Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire. It is now situated inside the porch (they built a porch on in later times!) but is easy to see once you do get there. If you want help to find this, or need any other information contact me directly. Hope you have a good trip and enjoy the 'air-conditioned' country of England. Remember we only have the weather we do because of the heat exported from America by the Gulf Stream! Otherwise at our latitude we'd be much colder. As a consequence weather can be a tad variable ( that's why we talk about it a lot :-) and we regularly get showers followed by sun at this time of year. Let us know what you did manage to see won't you? Patrick
