Posts by Geri Walton

Jane Austen and Bath have long been associated with one another partly because it was her home from 1801 to 1806. It was also about 116 miles west of London, and unrivalled as the head of English water places. At the time the Austen family moved there it was a thriving and vibrant spa town…

On Wednesday, 7 August 1799 Jane Austen’s maternal Aunt, Jane Leigh-Perrot, described as a pale, thin, fine-featured lady with a melancholy expression, went to a haberdashery and milliner’s shop at Bath and Stall Streets. It was being managed by Elizabeth Gregory, sister-in-law to a man named Smith, who had owned the shop. He had separated…

Wardian cases were an early type of terrarium that were sealed protective containers for plants. They were created by Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward, an English doctor, after he noticed the effects of hermetically sealed glass containers in 1829. Of his discovery he wrote:

The Elgin Marbles, also known as the Parthenon Marbles, are a collection of Classical Greek marble sculptures made by Greek sculptor, painter, and architect Phidias in 400 BC. They were originally part of the Parthenon and other buildings erected on the Acropolis of Athens. However, between 1801 and 1812, Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin…

Jane Austen was born on 16 December 1775 at the Steventon rectory to the Reverend George Austen and his wife Cassandra Leigh. Her life would be short for she was just 41 years old when she died in Winchester on 18 July 1817. However, her accomplishments would be long remembered.