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Personalised historical Maps are available from 1805 to the 1940’s.
Whether you are tracing the history of your family or just interested in the local history of the area where you live, reliable conclusions are based on quality sources and Cassini historical maps have an important part to play in discovering where and how your ancestors lived.
Cassini Maps also make diverting, decorative and practical presents for anyone with any interest in the past. For weddings, anniversaries, birthdays or Christmas; for your friends, your relatives – or even for yourself. Ideal as business gifts centred on your company location.
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Map Date: 1887
Greyfriars was a Franciscan monastic community (called Grey Friars from the colour of their garments), established on the west side of Leicester from about 1255, and demolished at its dissolution in the late 1530s. Although a small monastery, its Church acquired national significance when Richard III was buried there following his death at Bosworth Field.
Richard III (2 October 1452 – 22 August 1485) was King of England for two years, from 1483 until his death in 1485 in the Battle of Bosworth Field. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty. His defeat at Bosworth Field, the decisive battle of the Wars of the Roses, is sometimes regarded as the end of the Middle Ages in England.
In August 1485, a rebellion led by Henry Tudor landed in Pembrokeshire, with a small contingent of French troops, and marched through Wales recruiting foot soldiers and skilled archers on his way towards London.
Richard mustered his troops and intercepted Henry’s army south of Market Bosworth. The King divided his army, which outnumbered Henry’s, into three groups. One was assigned to the Duke of Norfolk and another to the Earl of Northumberland. Henry kept most of his force together under the command of the experienced Earl of Oxford. Richard’s vanguard, commanded by Norfolk, attacked but struggled against Oxford’s men. Northumberland took no action when signalled to assist his king, so Richard gambled everything on a charge across the battlefield to kill Henry and end the fight. Seeing the king’s knights separated from his army, Lord Stanley, and Sir William Stanley, who had brought a force to the battlefield, but held back while they decided which side it would be more advantageous to support, led their men to Henry’s aid, surrounding and killing Richard. Richard was the last English king to die in battle.
Following his death at Bosworth Field, Richard III’s body was thrown across a horse and carried to Leicester where, after a period of public display, it was buried inside Greyfriars Church. Ten years later, Henry VII paid for a tomb to be built. The tomb was presumed to have been demolished along with the Church following its dissolution after 1536.
Sir Robert Catlyn acquired the site following its dissolution by Henry VIII and sold it to Robert Herrick, who built a mansion with extensive gardens over the east end of the Friary grounds. These gardens were visited by Christopher Wren Sr. in 1611, who recorded being shown a handsome stone pillar with an inscription, “Here lies the body of Richard III, some time King of England”. Any remains of such a pillar having long since disappeared with the subsequent redevelopment of the land.
However, the Archaeology service of the University of Leicester, along with the Richard III Society and Leicester City Council, initiated an archaeological study resulting in three trenches being dug across the parking area behind the buildings on Greyfriars. These excavations revealed walls of the cloisters and the Church, enabling a possible layout for the monastic buildings to be drawn. Also found was the complete skeleton of a male showing severe scoliosis and major head wounds. On 4 February 2013 it was confirmed that the DNA matched, that the radiocarbon agreed, and that the characteristics of the bones and the nature of the head wounds were all entirely consistent with it being the remains of Richard III.
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Map: Valentines Farm, Hertfordshire 1870-1894
The History of St. Valentine’s Day
St. Valentine’s Day began as a religious celebration of one or more early Christian saints named Valentinus. Nothing is known reliably of St. Valentine except his name and that he died on the Via Flaminia north of Rome on February 14 sometime around the year 270.
The ‘Roman Martyrology‘, the Catholic Church’s official list of recognized saints, for February 14 gives only one Saint Valentine. It records that he was imprisoned for performing weddings for soldiers who were forbidden to marry and for ministering to Christians, who were persecuted under the Roman Emperor Claudius II. Claudius is said to have taken a liking to his prisoner – until Valentinus tried to convert the Emperor – whereupon the priest was condemned to death.
The feast of St. Valentine of February 14 was first established in 496 by Pope Gelasius I, but many of the current legends that characterise Saint Valentine were invented in the fourteenth century in England, notably by Geoffrey Chaucer and his contemporaries when the feast day of February 14 first became associated with romantic love.
The earliest surviving valentines in English appear in the Paston Letters, written in 1477 by Margery Brewes to her future husband John Paston “my right well-beloved valentine, I recommend me unto you full heartedly”.
Love it or hate it, Valentines Day is getting ever nearer so why not buy your loved one a personal gift to remember that romantic place and time in your life?
Order now for delivery before the 14th February
It all began in 1898. Mr. Reginald Bray, a clerk from Forest Hill in South London, bought a copy of the Royal Mail guide that proudly proclaimed they would deliver anything as ‘small as a bumblebee and as large as an elephant’. Bray viewed these rules as a challenge and spent the next 40 years of his life experimenting with the limits of the British postal system.
(map shown: Forest Hill, London – OS County Series 1:2,500 – 1895)
Not satisfied with that, he had himself delivered, not once but three times, including being sent, along with his bicycle, by registered mail. An official form acknowledges ‘Delivery of an Inland Registered Person Cyclist’ to Bray’s home address for a charge of 3d a mile.
Cassini Maps have just launched a series of rare and beautiful historical maps carefully selected from the British Library Map Collection and now available as high quality framed prints from the Cassini Maps website.
Some of these maps, such as Rose’s Octopus Map of Europe, have been featured extensively in BBC Four’s recent TV programme, The Beauty of Maps.
The British Library’s Map Collection is a remarkable treasure trove brimming unique examples of some of the finest maps ever made.
The Collection includes Saxton and Speed British county maps from the late 16th and early 17th centuries as well as many historical British, European and world maps made by the finest cartographers of the day.
The maps are fascinating and important historical documents in their own right but really come into their own when framed and presented as highly decorative works of art.
Cassini is proud to bring you the chance of owning your own selected map print. The map will be printed, framed and sent to any address in the UK. Classic works of art delivered to your door.
To learn more visit http://www.cassinimaps.co.uk
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