Members of Chetwynd Medieval Heritage Society enjoyed a full house for its inaugural meeting last Tuesday.
More than 40 people turned up to the nostalgic event at Sambrook Village Hall.
The night included an array of talks from a number of speakers including historian Julian Meason who focussed on archaeological field searches.
He presented items he had found in the Chetwynd area including specimens of roman coins, medieval pottery, hat pins and Neolithic flints from around 6,000 BC.
Society member and co-orgainser Robin Spencer said the event had been a great success.
He said: “Not only did numbers exceed our expectations, but we were pleasantly encouraged by the number of visitors that wish to become members and attend future events.
“The meeting certainly achieved what we were hoping for – arousing local interest in the history of where people live.
“The society plans to work closely with Julian in the coming months to look at the Chetwynd archaeological finds and start to fill on some of the gaps in the timeline.
“His talk added another 3,500 years to the time line that I had presented earlier in the evening.”
Joanna Spencer gave a talk on clothing styles in the late medieval period, showing medieval peasant clothing was far from dull with vibrant colours she had obtained by dying her own brushed sheep wool.
At the break, Liz Middleton gave a talk on the Domesday survey with members given copies of the original questions.
A modern ‘Domesday survey’ was also taken and adapted to modern lifestyles.
Robin added: “What was most rewarding was the heavy buzz of conversations at the interval, as society members, visitors and presenters discussed the points presented during the evening.
“There were also many displays around the village hall including extracts from the 1841 census for the Chetwynd parish.
“Musical entertainment was provided at the interval by John Royale who played various melodies on his medieval bagpipes.
“And the evening ended with a very lively account of medieval surgery by Kevin Goodman, showing how natural anaesthetics and anti-septic preparations were used by surgeons.
“In case people are still trying to figure out the connection about Lady Godiva mentioned in the last article, she owned Chetwynd Manor, which was forfeited to the crown on her death in 1067.”
The next event planned is a Medieval Evening Meal, to be held at Wellbank Farm, provisionally planned for Friday, August 20.
By Sam Pinnington
