Words we associate with falls

wordcloud of most frequently used words

We’ve invited course participants on Ageing Well: Falls to tell us the three words they associate with falls.  It’s made fascinating reading, thank you to everyone who has contributed so far.

You can see the most frequently used words in the word cloud above and we’ll be updating this during the course – so it’s not too late to have your say.

Even more online resources

English Heritage have just published a large number of their archaeological monographs online as e-books and available for free as PDF files. Rather brilliantly, these include Tony Wilmott’s Birdoswald: Excavations of a Roman fort on Hadrian’s Wall and its successor settlements, 1987-1992 as discussed in step 6.3!

All of the available monographs, including Tony’s, can be found at  http://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/archives/view/eh_monographs_2014/

Have fun exploring and thanks to Pat Oddy for pointing out the link on platform.

Known Unknowns

Thank you for your great questions on our “Known Unknowns” step on in this, the last week of our Hadrian’s Wall journey.  Dr Rob Collins chaired our panel which took place this afternoon at around 3.45-4.15pm, when he posed the questions you had asked to:

  • Lindsay Allason-Jones OBE, Visiting Fellow, Newcastle University
  • Mike Collins, Inspector of Ancient Monuments: Hadrian’s Wall, English Heritage
  • Professor Ian Haynes, Newcastle University
  • Frances McIntosh, Curator of Roman Collections, English Heritage

NB: Lindsay recommends a book during the video – it’s Murus ille famosus (That Famous Wall): Depictions and Descriptions of Hadrian’s Wall Before Camden by William D Shannon.

If you prefer you can read the transcript for this discussion.

Balancing act: filming for falls at Circus Central

The digital media team captured some wonderful images at Circus Central for our upcoming course Ageing Well: Falls which starts on the 24th November. You can sign up through the FutureLearn pages.

Vladamir web

The footage shows Vladamir walking a wire and standing on a barrel. This will become part of a video illustrating how amazing the body is at balancing. We hope that exploring the science of balance and walking upright, will help course participants understand how to manage the risk of falling and possible preventative measures covered in the course.

Vladamir (pictured on the wire) has 45 years experience as a performer, including tours with the Moscow State Circus. He is now settled in Gateshead, and teaches classes at Circus Central  (based in the Christ Church Building on Shieldfield Green in Newcastle). Circus Central’s mission is ‘to provide access to fun, high quality circus experiences for everyone’. They have a growing range of workshops for all ages and levels and can provide circus workshops, parties and trainings for groups. Find out more about Circus Central at http://www.circuscentral.co.uk/.

 

Andy Bates master leatherworker on Roman shoes

Shoes by Andy Bates
Shoes by Andy Bates

Master leatherworker Andy Bates visited the School of History, Classics and Archaeology at Newcastle University recently during our first year undergraduate archaeology induction week.  He talked about the process and demonstrated how he makes replica Roman shoes, which some of our students filmed on their mobile phones (with Andy’s permission!). We’ve edited some of their footage together, and whilst student mobile phones didn’t give the best sound in the echoey room, we thought you’d be interested to get a glimpse into what an induction session is like. Andy provided shoes for our week five videos filmed in the Commanding Officer’s House at Arbeia in South Shields for Hadrian’s Wall: Life on the Roman Frontier.