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| Inside the DMU Heritage Centre |
A week in the life of Leicester!
Last week I made an unusual
detour and visited the new Heritage Centre at De Montfort University in
Leicester, and this week, I have again ventured out to Leicester, in a week
that has been one of the most exciting in all its history.
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| The souvenir programme |
My week did, however, start in Loughborough when on Saturday evening I went along to the Charnwood Orchestra Banks of the Green Willow concert at the Church of All Saints with Holy Trinity (aka Loughborough Parish Church). This concert, which was in memory of the fallen of WW1, and to mark the re-positioning of the Great War memorials in the Parish Church, was composed almost entirely of English music, ranging from Butterworth, through Howells, to Vaughan Williams, and including songs by the French composer, Duparc.
The real story of the week, however, began on Sunday, which
saw me watching as much of the live procession through the county of the body
of Richard III, as I could find on television, my pc and BBC Radio Leicester.
Even through a television screen, this was a hugely emotional event, but was
really just the start of what turned out to be a very exciting week.
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| Queues snaking along Loseby Lane |
On Monday lunchtime I went into Leicester city centre,
thinking I might just pop into the cathedral and have a quick look at the
coffin of Richard III. Nothing prepared me for the queues that had already
built up, and I went away resigned to not having time to go into the cathedral.
On Tuesday evening I was lucky enough to go along to a
lecture at De Montfort University, given by Professor Kevin Schurer, of
Leicester University, Pro-Vice Chancellor (Research and Enterprise) and DMU’s
Dr Douglas Cawthorne and Steffan Davies, one of his PhD students. The first lecture discussed and
explained the difference between mitochondrial and Y chromosone DNA, and how this was used to confirm the descendants of Richard III. The second
lecture described how DMU’s Digital Building Heritage Team built up a picture
of what the original Grey Friars, and created a fly-through, which is now in
the Richard iii Visitor Centre.
Here’s the full version of Dr Turi King and Professor Schurer’s original
paper.
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| View from the queue! |
By Wednesday morning I had become desperate to queue up and
visit the coffin of Richard III in Leicester Cathedral, so at 8am I joined the
queue. It was worth the 45-minute wait: The atmosphere inside was charged, and
the embroidered cloth covering the coffin was stunning. The British Legion
volunteers were excellent, standing tall and erect, silently guarding the
coffin.
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| The coffin in the cathedral |
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| Band marching along High Street |
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| Watching the big screen in Jubilee Square |
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| The procession |
On Friday evening, after a long day at work, my hubby and I
went into town to see some of the “glow”! There were clay pots filled with deep
candles around the whole of the cathedral square, in Jubilee Square, and along
Peacock Lane. The smoke and the smell from these was astonishing!! We were too
tired to stay for the firework display, but if the rest of the week’s events
were anything to go by, I’m sure these would have been spectacular!
The big question now, of course, is what next? For
Leicester? For Richard III? For lynneaboutloughborough?
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