http://www.buildinghistory.org/ News and site updates from Researching Historic Buildings in the British Isles en-gb Mon, 30 Jan 2012 09:40:00 GMT http://www.rssboard.org/rss-specification http://www.buildinghistory.org/index.shtml#HarmondsworthGood news. The largest, best preserved medieval timber barn still standing in England has been bought by English Heritage. The barn is a masterpiece of carpentry,built in 1426 by Winchester College as part of its manor farm at Harmondsworth, now absorbed into Greater London. The primary aim is to preserve this Grade I listed structure from decay. The bonus for the public is that the barn will be open for free two Sundays a month between April and October 2012, with plans to open it every Sunday from next year. http://www.buildinghistory.org/index.shtml#WallpaintingsThe Churches Conservation Trust cares for 341 English churches.Over 80 of them have wallpaintings of some kind, making the Trust one of the country's most significant keepers of nationally important wallpaintings. So the Trust was inspired to create a beautiful online guide: Discover wallpaintings. The range of date and type is extraordinary - from the 12th to the 19th centuries, from simple monograms to visually rich Victoriana. It takes us through the history, development and meaning of wallpaintings, as wellas conservation techniques. The Trust is looking for funding for phase two of the project. http://www.buildinghistory.org/index.shtml#DorsetFollowing a four year project run by volunteers at the Dorset History Centre and supported by The National Archives, the Dorset section of the Manorial Documents Register (MDR) has joined those already online courtesy of the National Archives: The Manorial Documents Register. http://www.buildinghistory.org/index.shtml#PewsThis month the Ecclesiological Society published the first book to focus on church seating. It promises to tackle head-on today’s debate about pew removal, as well as covering the history of the topic. Trevor Cooper and Sarah Brown, (eds.), Pews, Benches and Chairs: church seating in English parish churches from the fourteenth century to the present. http://www.buildinghistory.org/index.shtml#EarlyMy attention has been drawn by Janelle Jenstad, its creator, to an ambitious project from the University of Victoria, Canada. The aim is to turn the large woodcut map of London attributed to Ralph Agas into an interactive resource, linking to encyclopedia-style articles, scholarly work, student work, editions, and literary texts to the places mentioned therein. (The map itself was already available online via British History Online: The 'Woodcut' map of London c. 1550.) I have listed The Map of Early Modern London beside Mapping Medieval Chester in my ever-lengthening towns bibliography. http://www.buildinghistory.org/index.shtml#BLGoogleThis morning an arrangement is announced between the British Library and Google for the digitisation of out-of-copyright works. Google will pay for the digitation of 250,000 works from between 1700 and 1870, giving the library one copy and keeping another to make available online. Google has similar arrangements with more than 40 other libraries, which make it possible already to search and read the full text of countless out-of-copyright books. However the British Library has a massive collection, since it is a library of legal deposit, which by law has received a copy of every book published in the United Kingdom and Ireland since 1757, but also holds the Royal Library, which was a library of legal deposit from 1662. The project will take some years to complete. http://www.buildinghistory.org/index.shtml#NHLEThe new National Heritage List for England is a combined catalogue for all designated English heritage. You can search listed buildings, scheduled monuments, registered parks and gardens, World Heritage Sites, Certificates of Immunity and Building Preservations Notices all in one fell swoop.