Wollaton Hall Research Articles

21st Century Rex: maximising access to a privately owned Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton in the digital age

A ~60-70% complete Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton known as Stan recently sold for 31.8 million US dollars to an unknown buyer (announced in March 2022 as the Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi), pushing up the price of all such skeletons way beyond the budget of most museums. Wealthy private individuals who purchase expensive fossil specimens sometimes put them on public display but leave them in an intellectual limbo, unable to be studied and published. However, a partial T. rex skeleton known as Titus was excavated in Montana in 2018, shipped to the UK in 2020, and had casts of Stan's bones added to complete the skeleton during mounting. It was loaned to the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall, as the centrepiece to a temporary exhibition called Titus: T. rex is King. This was the first time a mounted T. rex skeleton containing fossil bones had been on display in England for many decades. Importantly, before the mounting process began, all the real bones were 3D scanned in detail using photogrammetry. The resulting digital 3D models were sent to palaeontologists in America who studied them and produced a paper describing the palaeopathology before the mounting process was even complete. Replicas of all the identifiable bones were 3D printed for display in the exhibition and were accessioned into the museum collections, along with the 3D digital models and all associated data. This ensured that physical as well as digital replicas of the bones would remain accessible, and in theory publishable, forevermore.

The benefits of regional collection-based undergraduate projects: an example from Nottingham

Hands-on access to natural history museum collections is often limited for undergraduates. An ongoing collaboration between staff at the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall, and staff and students at the School of Science and Technology, Nottingham Trent University, was established in 2013 to allow final year undergraduate students to undertake collections-based research projects. A successful pilot project conducted on dinosaur fossils in 2013-14 led to subsequent projects based on the geological collections. The projects provide mutual benefits to students, university staff, and museum curators and their collections. In particular, students benefit from hands-on practical learning engagement with collections, university staff benefit from using the collection as a teaching resource, and the museum collections benefit from increased usage and identification or reidentification of specimens. Overall, the only notable cost is the time commitment required to develop and facilitate projects, however, this investment is richly rewarded by numerous positive outcomes.

Prehistoric human material in the Nottingham Natural History Museum, and the Cresswell Crags Museum and Heritage Centre

The Creswell Crags Museum and Heritage Centre (CCMHC) and the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall (NOTNH) both curate collections of prehistoric human material that have undergone limited documentation. The condition of current records demanded revision, which this study will perform. Reported here are nine cranial, and five postcranial Neolithic and late Iron Age human bone specimens, as well as two teeth, collected at the CCMHC from the late 19th century excavation of the caves of the gorge and nearby area. Three crania, and three post cranial human bone fragments dating to the late Pleistocene are present among the NOTNH collection; these originate from various locations in the East Midlands. This paper offers a revised account of the material, providing detailed osteological descriptions, and biological profiling of sex, age, pathology and taphonomy; where possible historical backgrounds, and radiocarbon dating information are included in this report. Overall the specimens were found to be in fair condition, while the collections' records of the material required minor corrections.

A critical review of the application of paleo-art in paleontological exhibition – a case study of the Dinosaurs of China exhibition in Wollaton Hall and Lakeside Arts, Nottingham

ABSTRACTPaleo-art has become an important element in paleontological exhibitions after a long development. Since 1996, new discoveries of feathered dinosaurs offer paleo-art an unprecedented freedom of creation, which provide both opportunities and challenges for curators. The Dinosaurs of China exhibition hosted in Nottingham in 2017 was a platform to test the best ways of showing contemporary paleo-art along with fossils on display. The experience gained from this exhibition confirmed that paleo-art could not only help visitors understanding but could also be misleading. Additionally, the key concerns revealed by the exhibition can also be found in other areas of science. Therefore not only should the selection and application of paleo-art be carefully evaluated by curator, but also the experience of using paleo-art should be shared as widely as possible with colleagues in other scientific disciplines.

A comparison of Plurality Voting Sheets and Idea Rating Sheets in judgement-making: a participatory architectural design in the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall

ABSTRACTThe public's engagement in museum projects is widely encouraged. However, public participation may also passively impact the relationship of museum and their publics if any existing conflicts cannot be identified and resolved. This paper organised a group of public participants to use Plurality Voting Sheets (PVSs) and Idea Rating Sheets (IRSs) in a museum design project, in order to find out: (1) Which method can generate more in-depth judgements? and (2) Which method can reveal more potential conflicts? The proposed project was the curation of a dinosaur exhibition at the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall. The results prove that, firstly, IRSs can generate a higher quantity of in-depth judgement than PVSs, and secondly, IRSs can disclose more conflicts than PVSs do. Generally, it is arguable that the performance of IRSs in the judgement-making stage is better than that of PVSs. However, IRSs still require more testing in public participation situations.

Creswell Crags fossil material in the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall, UK

The Creswell Crags gorge on the Nottinghamshire-Derbyshire border contains a series of caves in which Holocene and Late Pleistocene deposits accumulated. Fossils from these deposits were acquired by the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall (NOTNH), during the late 19th century and early 20th century. This study provides the first published review of the entire NOTNH Creswell Crags collection. Overall, there are 274 fossil specimens from Creswell Crags consisting of 466 individual elements. However, only 11.7% of specimens can be attributed to specific caves and none retain any detailed stratigraphic data. This compromises the scientific value of the collection. The collection contains a total of 160 attached labels (on 146 individual elements) comprising ten different types. An assessment of the faunal abundances was conducted to compare with historical excavations. 61% of the NOTNH elements have been identified to genus level and the collection consists of 17 genera from six orders: Carnivora, Artiodactyla, Perissodactyla, Proboscidea, Lagomorpha and Primates. The NOTNH collection contains proportionately more woolly rhinoceros (Coelodonta) elements than the 1870s excavations but fewer hyaena (Crocuta), reindeer (Rangifer), and woolly mammoth (Mammuthus). We attribute these discrepancies to a possible 'donation bias'.

Clinging to the past: medievalism in the English ‘Renaissance’ garden

When studying the Tudor period, garden historians often over-emphasize what is deemed new, concentrating on anything that might be linked to continental, particularly Italianate, influences. If some of the greatest architectural triumphs of the period were a quirky combination of ‘antiquarian medieval’ motifs (Wollaton Hall's traceried windows and soaring tourelles, for example) with sophisticated continental features (Wollaton's Italianate plan), it seems likely that the same eclecticism would have been employed in gardens. What needs to be examined is what Tudor builders knew about earlier gardens in Britain (or elsewhere). Because the period is so often treated as a ‘beginning’ (of the early modern period), what remained of important royal and aristocratic medieval gardens, both materially and in the collective memory, has not been adequately determined. Once we have a proper understanding of what survived to be admired by the Tudors, we might be able to assess how gardens reflected both indigenous and Renaissance ideas. Perhaps the best way to differentiate between medieval and classical inspiration is to look carefully at the evolution of individual garden features – fountains, garden buildings, earthworks, planting and basic principles of design – to determine at what point classical ideas began to dominate and when medieval features were revived and to what purpose.

Wollaton Hall: Prospect Room Floor

Wollaton Hall is one of the most important houses of its period, and the Prospect Room, which rises above it, is unique. The floor construction to the Prospect Room is especially significant because it is formed as a ‘Chinese lattice’ structure, with no main beams clear spanning across the width; instead each are tenoned into adjoining beams running at right angles, which themselves are then tenoned into further beams, thus reducing the lengths of the timbers.This paper looks briefly at the history of the building and the floor, and then at the context for the repairs and the design development, which took place between November 2003 and May 2005, and the construction process which brought the floor back into full use for the first time since the 1950s.

The Workers' Reward at Middleton Hall 1567

The evidence for the ‘feast’ explored in this article is found in the house­hold, personal and estate accounts of the Willoughby family, whose main residences in the sixteenth century were Wollaton Hall, near Nottingham and Middleton Hall in Warwickshire. This paper looks at what workers performing "boon work" (not paid for except by a meal) would have been fed by the gentry who received their assistance on a particular occasion in May 1567.

The Sundial Garden and House-Plan Mount: Two Gardens at Wollaton Hall, Nottinghamshire, by Robert (c. 1535-1614) and John (-1634) Smythson

The Sundial Garden and House-Plan Mount: Two Gardens at Wollaton Hall, Nottinghamshire, by Robert (c. 1535-1614) and John (-1634) Smythson

A Catalogue of the Type, Figured and Cited Fossils in the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall, Nottingham, U.K.

Nottingham Corporation's first museum was established in 1867 at Exchange Buildings, Nottingham. The geology collections were transferred to the Nottingham University College Natural Sciences Museum, which opened in 1881, and placed under the care of the Professor of Natural History. Since 1926 the geology collections have been located at Wollaton Hall. Type, figured and cited specimens in the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall, are listed. Strengths lie in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire Pleistocene mammals. Lower Jurassic marine reptiles, Triassic footprints and Coal Measures plants and Wenlock Limestone invertebrates from the Dudley area, West Midlands.

House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family, by Alice T. Friedman.

"House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family, by Alice T. Friedman.." Canadian Journal of History, 26(1), pp. 98–99

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed in this article:Kenneth G. Holum, Theodosian Empresses: Women and Imperial Dominion in Late Antiquity.Edith Ennen, The Medieval Woman.Judith M. Bennett, Elizabeth A. Clark, Jean F. O'Barr, Anne B. Vilen and Sarah Westphal‐Wihl (eds), Sisters and Workers in the Middle Ages.Alice T. Friedman, House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family.Kate Mertes, The English Noble Household 1250–1600: Good Governance and Politic Rule.Patricia Grimshaw, Paths of Duty. American Missionary Wives in Nineteenth‐Century Hawaii.Margaret Jolly and Martha Macintyre (eds), Family and Gender in the Pacific. Domestic Contradictions and the Colonial Impact.Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (eds), Recasting Women. Essays in Colonial History.Ann Braude, Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women's Rights in Nineteenth‐Century America.Alex Owen, The Darkened Room: Women, Power, and Spiritualism in Late Nineteenth Century England.Catherine Lowman Wessinger, Annie Besant and Progressive Messianism (1847–1933).Carolyn Steedman, Childhood, Culture and Class in Britain: Margaret McMillan, 1860–1931.Joanna Hubbs, Mother Russia: The Feminine Myth in Russian Culture.Stephanie Urdang, And Still They Dance: Women, War and the Struggle for Change in Mozambique.

<sc>alice t. friedman</sc>. <italic>House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family</italic>. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1989. Pp. xvi, 227. $39.95

Journal Article alice t. friedman. House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1989. Pp. xvi, 227. $39.95 Get access Friedman Alice T.. House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1989. Pp. xvi, 227. $39.95. Stanford E. Lehmberg Stanford E. Lehmberg University of Minnesota Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The American Historical Review, Volume 95, Issue 5, December 1990, Page 1531, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/95.5.1531 Published: 01 December 1990

:House and Household in Elizabethan England, Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family

:<i>House and Household in Elizabethan England, Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family</i>

House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family.

House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family.

House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family Alice T. Friedman

House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family Alice T. Friedman

UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS IN ELIZABETHAN ENGLAND

House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family by Alice T. Friedman, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989, 227 pp., 8 colour plates, 1 map, 117 b. &amp; w. illus., £24.95

Alice T. Friedman. House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1989. Pp. xvi, 227. $39.95.

Alice T. Friedman. House and Household in Elizabethan England: Wollaton Hall and the Willoughby Family. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1989. Pp. xvi, 227. $39.95.

Patronage and the Production of Tombs in London and the Provinces: the Willoughby Monument of 1591

A presentation drawing and wall monument (1951) at Wollaton, Notts., erected in memory of Sir Henry Willoughby, can be associated with the Southwark stone-carving workshops on the basis of stylistic evidence. This casts new light on the patronage of Sir Francis Willoughby, builder of Wollaton Hall (1588), who commissioned the monument, and emphasizes the importance of London as a centre of high-quality works of art. Finally, the description of a group of contemporary tombs, linked by a distinctive motif, opens up the possibility of a specific attribution, perhaps to the workshop of Richard Stevens.