So Long, Michaelmas Term

It seems impossible, but the eight official weeks of Michaelmas have come and gone. My first term at Oxford is done! Already, the little town's dynamic has completely changed. The undergraduates have all packed up and vacated their rooms for the winter vacation, and the graduates' numbers are dwindling by the day. I will be attending the TAG conference in Bristol in about a week and a half, so I still have some time here in wintry England before I return home for the holidays. But, in honor of being one-third of the way through my master's program, I thought I'd take a look at all the new things I've learned in the past eight weeks. Staying as far away from academics as possible, of course.

The alternative title to this post: "A Smattering of Interesting Factoids Too Long for a Tweet, but Too Short for a Blog Post." Enjoy.

Hazy Broad Street

• How do you like your beans in the morning? In England, baked beans are a breakfast item. Yes, baked beans. The dish Americans reserve for barbecues Brits enjoy with their eggs, sausage, and toast in the morning. I admit that I felt a bit disturbed when I first noticed them in the breakfast buffet line, but I have since grown to enjoy this odd custom. They're cheap and filling, so I can't complain.
• Five go-old rings. On Saturday, the New College hall hosted a Christmas dinner for members of the MCR. The meal, which was absolutely amazing, was served family-style per every ten guests. It began with three starters: a potato leek soup, an English take on bruschetta, and some sort of salmon thing (which I ignored). The main course consisted of a whole chicken, sliced turkey, roasted potatoes, Brussels sprouts (which are a traditional Christmas dish, evidently), red cabbage, stuffing, and gravy. Before dessert, the dining staff served a palate-cleansing sorbet and a sort of mint biscotti. If you still had room in your stomach at this point, a round of desserts--including mince pies, Christmas pudding, fruit, and cheese--finished the meal. Why do I bring this all up? Well, I learned the next titillating bit of information while I ate my refreshing cup of sorbet. In the festivity of the evening, one table erupted into a splendid rendition of "The Twelve Days of Christmas." Much to my surprise, when the fifth day came, my true love gave to me five gold rings, rather than five golden rings. I had never heard it sung that way before, and stretching the word 'gold' to fit two syllables sounded absolutely ridiculous to me. But, according to Wikipedia, the 'gold' version is the original and is therefore 'correct.' It still sounds ridiculous, though, which is probably why it was changed in the first place.
• How grotesque. In October, I posted a few pictures of the charismatic creatures lining the tops of New College's buildings, and I mistakenly referred to them as 'gargoyles.' The vast majority of them are not gargoyles, they are grotesques. What's the difference? Gargoyles have water spouts, grotesques do not.

Peek-a-boo!

• The term 'omnivore' should not be taken literally. William Buckland, a fellow at the college of Corpus Christi in the 19th century, 'discovered' dinosaurs. He had come across the fossilized remains of a giant reptile, and he published his finds in 1824 in a report called Notice on the Megalosaurus or Great Fossil Lizard of Stonesfield. The term 'dinosaur' had not yet been coined, but it was the first published description of what eventually became the dinosaur. With this alone, Buckland could have left a lasting impression on history. But, instead, he has become well-known for his eccentricity: namely, his practice of zoophagy. Buckland was committed to eating every animal he could get his hands on. He ate crocodile, tiger, and even mole (which he found particularly distasteful). When he got wind of a rare animal's death, he would write to the zoo in which it had been kept and ask for a piece of the carcass to be sent to him. But the most disturbing example of Buckland's idiosyncratic behavior comes to us from contemporary Augustus Hare, who wrote:

“Talk of strange relics led to mention of the heart of a French King preserved at Nuneham in a silver casket. Dr. Buckland, whilst looking at it, exclaimed, ‘I have eaten many strange things, but have never eaten the heart of a king before,’ and, before anyone could hinder him, he had gobbled it up, and the precious relic was lost for ever.”

         That heart belonged to Louis XIV.

• THE STRATIGRAPHY IS A LIE! Archaeologists use stratigraphy as a method to provide relative dates for the material they excavate. Sites are formed in layers of deposition: new layers are deposited on top of older layers. So as the archaeologists digs into deeper and deeper layers, she encounters older and older material. The stratigraphy, or order of these layers, can give the archaeologist a basic idea of the order of events in history. Within stratigraphy, there are some methods for assigning more precise dates to a certain layer. One of these is called terminus post quem (TPQ), or 'limit after which.' This gives the earliest possible date for a layer. For example, if an archaeologist were to uncover a 1981 penny, she would know that the layer in question could not have been deposited earlier than 1981. You can't deposit a coin before it's made, right? Well, my friends, I have discovered this assumption to be utterly and completely false, because I have in my possession a 2011 coin! Archaeology is doomed. On a side note, the coin (a 50p piece) is part of a series commemorating the 2012 London Olympics. Mine has a shuttlecock on the back. Because when I think of the Olympics, I think 'badminton.' Behold:

TPQ = SOL. QED.

• Oh, get that, would you, Deirdre? This is less of an interesting fact, and more of an observation, but England--or, at least, Oxford--has the highest proportion of womanly-voiced men I have ever encountered! Think of Terry Jones' Catholic Mum in Monty Python's Meaning of Life. This is exactly what it sounds like. 
• Capitalism. During the English Civil War, Oxford briefly served as the Royalist capital of England when it housed the court of King Charles I after he was expelled from London in 1642. Its position up the River Thames made it a strategic place to relocate his administration. Yet, English monarchs were not the only ones to recognize Oxford's potential as a capital. It has been rumored that Hitler planned to make this medieval city the capital of his new kingdom. For that reason, Oxford was spared in Germany's attacks on Britain during WWII.

Well, if that isn't a random smattering of accumulated information, I don't know what is. In the next couple of weeks, I hope to take some trips around the country with my (limited) free time. When I do, I'll be sure to bring my camera and keep you all updated on my travels.

Jowett Walk

Until then, good night!
Alyce