scholarly journals Cambridge University Natural Radiocarbon Measurements XV

Radiocarbon ◽  
1981 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 81-93 ◽  
Author(s):  
V R Switsur

The dates presented in this paper are concerned with studies of the vegetational history of Western Scotland and are research projects in collaboration with members of staff and research students of the Sub-department of Quaternary Research, Cambridge University. The measurements of radioactivity were carried out between 1975 and 1977 at the University Radiocarbon Research Laboratory at Station Road, Cambridge, using highly purified carbon dioxide as filling gas in proportional counters. The dates are conventional radiocarbon dates calculated using the Libby half-life for the 14C isotope of 5568 years and ad 1950 as the reference year. The associated uncertainties represent one standard deviation and are calculated from a combination of the counting statistics of the samples, standards, and backgrounds together with estimates of population variation, variation of the background rate with changes of barometric pressure, and estimates of other laboratory measurement uncertainties. Thus, the stated uncertainty is considered a fairly reliable estimate of the laboratory uncertainty of the dates. The background samples are prepared from Welsh anthracite and the contemporary standard from NBS oxalic acid. A subsidiary standard is also used which is prepared from the ad 1845 to ad 1855 growth rings of an oak tree which grew near Cambridge, and the activity of this is compared frequently with the NBS standard.

2008 ◽  
Vol 59 (4) ◽  
pp. 697-713 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. C. LUBENOW

The question in 1898 of the recognition by Cambridge University of St Edmund's House, a Roman Catholic foundation, might initially seem to involve questions irrelevant in the modern university. It can, however, be seen to raise issues concerning modernity, the place of religion in the university and the role of the university itself. This article therefore sets this incident in university history in wider terms and examines the ways in which the recognition of St Edmund's House was a chapter in the history of liberalism, in the history of Roman Catholicism, in the history of education and in the history of secularism.


2012 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-2
Author(s):  
Sanjoy Bhattacharya

Medical History is embarking on an exciting new journey. Thanks to the Wellcome Trust, the ownership of this journal has passed to Cambridge University Press. The Press is committed to running the publication as its flagship journal in the history of medicine, related sciences and health, and is keen to offer authors full flexibility when it comes to publishing and archiving their articles. Medical History's editorial office has moved to the Centre for Global Health Histories at the University of York, which is housed within its Department of History; the Centre and Department are honoured to be associated to this world-leading journal.


1998 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 486-493 ◽  
Author(s):  
RICHARD REX

It was long a commonplace of Reformation history that John Bale, the Catholic friar turned Protestant firebrand, was during his time at Cambridge University a member of Jesus College. This received wisdom was enshrined in the pages of such standard reference works as Cooper and Venn, and was regularly repeated, where appropriate, in histories of the university and of the English Reformation. This was not questioned until J. Crompton observed over thirty years ago that there was no foundation for this tradition. Crompton's lead was followed some years later by L. P. Fairfield, who reiterated in his study of Bale that there was ‘no evidence whatever that Bale ever became a member of Jesus College’. However, despite these categorical conclusions, the editor of Bale's surviving plays, Peter Happé, now the leading authority on Bale's life and works, has recently maintained that after all he ‘probably entered Jesus College’. In making this claim, Happé argues partly from a passage in Bale's own writings relating to his connection with two early Fellows of Jesus College, Geoffrey Downes and Thomas Cranmer, and partly from a later tradition of Bale's membership attested in a seventeenth-century manuscript history of the college. A close analysis of the evidence, however, corroborates the contention of Crompton and Fairfield, and indicates that the later tradition arose from a misinterpretation by the Stuart antiquary Thomas Fuller of Bale's own recollections.


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