Indians spend a lot on ‘tamashas’: A British female traveller offers a glimpse into colonial life

 Jemima Kindersley’s letters depicted life in an uncertain mid-18th century, when things were chaotic and complex.

“Weaving is the employment of the greatest number of the people throughout India; but the greatest manufactory for fine muslins, calicoes, dimities, & c. is at a place called Daca, in Bengal, and formerly the capital of that province. The exquisite fineness of some of the muslins is inconceivable; for those which are made for the Mogul and his zanannah are ten times the price of any allowed to be made for Europeans or any other merchants.

Embroidery and needlework of all sorts, is likewise brought to the greatest perfection at Daca. The needlework is all performed by men. Their slowness is intolerable, but their patience is without end.”

Illustration by Anirudh A Ashar.

This extract from a letter by Jemima Kindersley in October 1767 provides an insight into the “patience and neatness” that the writer observed in the “inhabitants of India”, which led to “such perfection” in “some of their manufactories...that Europe can boast of nothing to equal them”.

Kindersley was among the several female travellers from England who had – from the 1740s onwards – documented their experiences in India. They were usually written as letters, a medium popular at the time.

Kindersley, who journeyed in the mid-1760s, occupied an ambivalent position among these writers. Historians, who placed travel accounts within a contextual framework based on approach and style, found it hard to classify Kindersley. She came several decades before the well-known and better-anthologised writers such as Maria Graham (later Maria Callcott) and Eliza Fay. Her style, in places, mirrored that of travellers such as Niccolo de Conti (of the early 15th century), and Ralph Fitch and Jean-Baptiste Tavernier in the 17th century, who are known for their curiosity and detailed observations. Kindersley’s letters show the same meticulous care, but she was clearly opinionated on several other aspects: for example, her reasoning for why sati was “so prevalent”. She stood midway between travellers of a century or so ago and the ones who came decades after her and clearly believed in the civilising mission of the colonising countries.

The 68 letters that make up Kindersley’s account were published as Letters from the Island of Teneriffe, Brazil, the Cape of Good Hope, and the East Indies, in 1777 by John Nourse, a well-known publisher of scientific and philosophical works. They are now available online, thanks to the digitisation efforts of the Fansey-Kindersley family history project. A review of the book in Critical Review Volume 43, which says the letters make for easy and agreeable reading, places the number of letters at 85.

Journey east

One of the earliest female travellers was Jane Smart, who lived in Madras, around two decades before Kindersley came to India. Her letters to her son – covering a total of eight pages – were all written in 1743. They describe how the Nawab of Arcot – with a fine procession of palanquins – visited the British governor at Madras. They are available in volume II of Henry Davison Love’s Vestiges of Old Madras.

The nawab’s begum, Smart observed, was “thin, genteel and middle sized” and her “complexion...tawny”. Her eyes were painted black, while her lips, nails and the spaces between her fingers and toes were coloured red. Smart’s view of the begum was in contrast to how Kindersley would, a few decades later, write about “Mohammedan women in the seraglio”, though both writers showed a certain empathy and curiosity.

Kindersley was born in 1741. When she was in her early twenties, she married Colonel Nathaniel Kindersley in Norfolk, East England. In 1765, three years after her wedding, she set out for India, where her husband served in the East India Company’s Bengal Artillery. Earlier that year, the Treaty of Allahabad had been signed between the Mughal Emperor Shah Alam, Shuja-ud-Daula of Avadh, and Robert Clive of the East India Company. The treaty recognised the Company’s now changed status in India – from traders, they were revenue collectors and administrators. As per its terms, the Mughal emperor also granted the Company the diwani of Bengal and Bihar. The Company also maintained troops at Allahabad, ostensibly for the emperor’s protection, but primarily as an assertion of their own power.

t took Kindersley a year to make the sea journey to India – from England to Tenerife (off the coast of northwest Africa), Brazil, South Africa and then South India. During her time, the big sailing ships called the Indiamen were yet to become popular. Instead, she travelled in gun-ships, which were equipped with 34 or 64 guns around the deck to guard against pirates. It took her three weeks to reach Tenerife, which had been conquered by the Spaniards a couple of centuries earlier.

A few months later, when she reached Brazil, she noticed how suspicious the Portuguese were about the arrivals from England, for they were always shadowed and trailed. At the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa, then under Dutch control, Kindersley wrote of the slaves from the Malay region. Some of her accounts, though, were based on hearsay and factually incorrect.

Kindersley’s travels coincided with that of Mirza Sheikh I’tesamuddin, who travelled to London as the Mughal emperor Shah Alam’s emissary. In his book The Wonders of Vilayet, I’tesamuddin wrote of his journey to the West, including a stoppage at the Cape. In contrast to Kindersley, I’tesamuddin detailed how the people of Bengal and Eastern India had been taken there as slaves and had, in time, forgotten their native languages.

Kindersley then sailed to Nagapattinam in South India, where there was controversy brewing over the Dutch governor Van Teylingen’s escape to Madras. Teylingen had been charged by his own company of corruption. From Pondicherry, Kindersley travelled to Madras, and then to Calcutta via the Bay of Bengal. It was during this time that she wrote about the dangers of the sand banks along the river Hooghly, which had led to many shipwrecks in these parts.

Kindersley’s accounts of how people travelled, how messages were passed on and how ordinary people lived gave a vivid sense of the times. Many of her river journeys – Calcutta to Patna, and to Allahabad – were on budgerows, a long, spacious boat that was common on the Ganges, especially after the monsoons. The budgerow would be accompanied by another boat, which carried helpers and provisions. In summer, Kindersley observed, people would travel in palkis or palanquins. A set of bearers would go on ahead with tents and pitch them when the journey ended every evening.

People lived simple lives, says Kindersley, though they spent vast sums “on tamashes”, such as their children’s marriages and religious festivals. The cow was the most venerated animal, she notes. The Rajputs and Mahrattas were the “fighting castes”, while “the banias”, with their passable knowledge of English, served as “intermediaries and interlocutors”.

Kindersley returned to England in 1769. Eleven years later, she translated Antoine Leonard Thomas’ Essay on the Character, Manners, and Understanding of Women in Different Ages (originally written in French in 1774). This book looked at women, largely of the upper class and in supposedly civilised cultures – ancient Greece and Rome, and the Renaissance period in Italy and France – and described them as both “adored and exploited”. She also added two essays of her own. In one of them, on the “Muhammedan women in the seraglio”, Kindersley wrote about how the women lived a life of pleasure and constraint, and used their wiles to control men.

Kindersley died in 1809, and in the decades following her death, there appeared more accounts, again written in the epistolary style, by women writers. Reading these – from Eliza Hamilton’s fictitious novel on a Hindu raja to Fay’s Letters and Callcott’s accounts – one can sense a gradual change in how the East was shaped and viewed.

Kindersley’s letters, precursors to those that followed, depicted life in an uncertain mid-18th century, when things were chaotic and complex across the Gangetic plains, when there was no clear ruler despite the recent battles that had been waged, and the many changes – such as those wrought by trains – had yet to leave their mark on this region.

(Source: Scroll)

Homeschooling has revealed the absurdity of England’s national curriculum

 My eight-year-old daughter is being called to spot expanded noun phrases. My 11-year-old son fills in checklists of "success criteria." Are we raising children or robots?

In normal times, my cheery “So, how was school?” rarely receives more than a grunted “OK.” But homeschooling is revealing what my children actually do all day. And the discovery has come as a shock.

My 11-year-old son and eight-year-old daughter go to a perfectly decent state primary, which has valiantly provided worksheets week by week throughout our successive lockdowns. But I read them with incredulity, hilarity—and horror.

My daughter is told to improve her writing using “PUGS (Punctuation, Up-levelling, Grammar and Spelling).” (“Up-levelling,” I gather, means “improving.”) Meanwhile, she is left finding comprehension incomprehensible: “Use evidence from the text to justify your thinking!”—the exclamation mark failing to animate the task, which involves describing the appearance and personality of protagonists; or spotting expanded noun phrases. (I kid you not.)

Suspicious, I took out their old exercise books, which I’d shamefully only ever briefly glanced at in the holidays. At the top of each page is an “LI,” which, they informed me after some racking of brains, stands for “learning intention.” 

(Other schools use “learning objectives” or “WALT”—We Are Learning To…). When she was six and seven, my daughter was in the habit of writing her name followed by a row of hearts and kisses. Yet under that charming heading, she’d been made to scrawl such heart-sinking formulas as “LI: to practise inference skills”; “LI: to interpret a pictogram”; “LI: to work systematically to solve a problem”; and “LI: to identify features of a non-chronological report.”

Underneath the “LI” they have to paste in a checklist of “success criteria”: “I can add extra information to my sentence using a subordinate conjunction”; “I can use time adverbials”; “I can include technical vocabulary.” It was as if I’d booked a babysitter but a marketing manager had turned up instead.

The maths worksheets seemed more cogent, but the language was just as weirdly abstract—all tell, no show. “LI: to add using expanded column method”; “LI: to use inverse relationships to solve problems”; “Challenge: how many different division facts will you be able to write for the following statements? Explain your answer.” The wording reminded me of a poorly translated instruction manual.

When Michael Gove instituted a new national curriculum in 2014, the highly technical grammar foisted on primary pupils attracted some consternation (the secondary grammar curriculum is tiny by comparison). Six- and seven-year-olds are now expected to know prepositions, conjunctions and subordinate clauses; eight- and nine-year-olds, noun phrases expanded by the addition of modifying adjectives, preposition phrases, fronted adverbials and determiners; nine- and 10-year-olds, modal verbs and relative pronoun cohesion. I don’t even know what some of these terms mean, and I’ve got a PhD in English.

But there is a bigger problem with our education system, and it is manifest not just in the grammar, but in its entire lexicon. The dismal ingredients listed in the national curriculum are ending up, raw and unprocessed, on my children’s plates. The teachers—who are expected to serve up this extraordinarily detailed menu—have no time to properly prepare it. When an outsider like me suddenly sees what is going on, the obvious question is: why are they spending precious learning time deciphering abstruse terminology that is clearly age-inappropriate, joyless and fundamentally pointless?

Photo: © Rex Shutterstock

The first national curriculum for England and Wales was legislated for by Margaret Thatcher’s education secretary Kenneth Baker in 1988. It began being phased in the following year. Designed to standardise local variation, it was initially stuffed with knowledge but slimmed down by Ron Dearing’s 1994 review. In 2008, after New Labour’s early fixation on the three Rs, Gordon Brown’s government eventually attempted to shift the emphasis towards “life skills,” but this was reversed when the Coalition initiated its own reforms in 2010.

I am something of an educational conservative, and found myself in agreement with Gove’s belief, shaped by his own education at an Aberdeen private school, that children should acquire a rigorous grounding in “literary canons, mathematical proofs, scientific laws, musical exercises and artistic traditions.” In a 2013 speech, Gove surprised many by quoting the Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci and his defence of traditional education against Mussolini’s knowledge-stripping reforms: “Previously pupils at least acquired a certain baggage of concrete facts,” Gramsci wrote. “Now there will no longer be any baggage to put in order.”

Gove also cited the American academic ED Hirsch, who argues that educational conservatism is in reality progressive, as it is “the only means whereby children from disadvantaged homes can secure the knowledge and skills that will enable them to improve their condition.” These children must “master the traditional culture in order to command its rhetoric,” and thereby advance in life. In my view, Gove correctly argued that dethroning the teacher as an authority figure and placing the child alongside them “on the same footing as co-creators of learning” actually ends up reinforcing broader social hierarchies—although his subsequent disparagement of experts means he gets 0 out of 10 for consistency.

Indeed, the whole Govian “reform” project was deeply contradictory: he undermined his own curriculum by allowing academies and free schools to depart from it. Even where it has been stuck to, the “knowledge-based” curriculum has failed on its own terms—why else do my kids stare blankly at an atlas? They are asked to write about topical issues like plastic pollution without understanding the composition of either plastic or the ocean—or even what a fish is.

Part of the problem is that “knowledge” has been incorrectly defined as “grammatical concepts.” Children’s author Frank Cottrell-Boyce tells me he has done readings in primary schools where the teacher says afterwards: “Now class, let’s identify the wow words, connectives and metaphors that Frank is using here.” This is not the fault of teachers: “I see amazing work all the time,” he says, “but it’s in the teeth of what they’re asked to do—they’re having to gouge moments out of the day and twist the curriculum to be able to do it.”

Cottrell-Boyce believes the value of listening to stories is being missed. “It’s a strange thing for a writer to say,” he tells me, “but I think we really overvalue writing. A lot of the writing that’s done in the classroom is to create some physical entity that can be assessed. It has no intrinsic value apart from the testing—and kids know that.”

Testing leads to everything being “gamed,” he tells me. “Kids are being urged to expand their sentences and add adjectives that their story doesn’t need because they gain points for it; so at some level, the whole process is becoming transactional. And the kids know there’s bad faith in that,” because it’s not really about them. Schools are ranked by SATs performance: “So at the core, we’re teaching cynicism over pleasure. Pleasure is regarded as suspect, to do with fun and distraction—but I think of pleasure as a really profound form of concentration. You will only do something well if you are taking pleasure in it.”

Formal grammar teaching is defended as a remedy for those who do not grow up around books. But Cottrell-Boyce points instead to the “huge inequality” between “kids who experience a book on their mum’s knee or being read to in bed, and kids whose first encounter with a book is decoding this terrifying puzzle on a desk. It’s very hard to get over that hurdle.”

“Why are our children spending time deciphering abstruse terminology that is clearly age-inappropriate, joyless and fundamentally pointless?”

All four academics who advised on the literacy curriculum have since criticised the process as chaotic and rushed. One was Debra Myhill, director of the Centre for Research in Writing at the University of Exeter. “The curriculum as it stands doesn’t necessarily reflect what we recommended,” she tells me. “Our advice was made to fit Conservative ideology”—though she adds that other parties would also interfere, a reason why most countries keep politicians out of it.

Myhill questions the degree to which knowing grammar improves writing. “Some naming of parts gives you a vocabulary to use between you and the teacher, but if that is actually confusing you and getting in the way of your learning, then actually it’s not serving any good purpose.”

There is technical language in all subjects, but it is not the case that grammar is to writing what the periodic table is to chemistry. As linguists Noam Chomsky and Steven Pinker have shown, children deploy grammar instinctively; they don’t use it as building blocks to construct sentences. They can write “I went to the park and played with my friend” without knowing they’re using a conjunction. Earlier this month, the writer and teacher Kate Clanchy tweeted reassurance to homeschooling parents struggling with fronted adverbials: “Grammar is not ‘the basics’ of language,” she wrote: “it’s the description of how it works.” Even if there could be some application for it as part of language learning or literary criticism somewhere down the road, it is surely consuming disproportionate amounts of time in the primary school classroom.

Clanchy was writing in tribute to her late mother, Joan Clanchy, herself a headteacher and an adviser on the curriculum, until she resigned in 2011 in protest at emerging literacy plans. “It’s as though the driving test just involved doing a three-point turn without taking the driver out in traffic,” Joan commented at the time. “The interest, enjoyment and excitement will go.” Michael Rosen, another prominent critic of grammar teaching divorced from context and function, argues that writing is best learned through “imitation, parody and invention.”

The 2011 curriculum review was led by Tim Oates, an expert in assessment policy and long-term government adviser on curriculums and qualifications. He acknowledges it was done “at speed,” but insists it is “really well grounded in solid international evidence on high-performing education systems.” The results, he says, speak for themselves. According to PISA, the Programme for International Student Assessment (itself controversial for its reliance on quantitative testing), “standards have improved in mathematics, and we’ve held steady in reading literacy,” Oates tells me; not exactly a ringing endorsement for all the grammar, but he points out that other countries’ performance has deteriorated.

One of those countries is Finland, often hailed as a paragon of holistic, child-centred education. “There’s a lot of nonsense talked about Finland,” Oates says: its impressive results should be seen in the context of historically high literacy levels in the culture at large, which are now in decline.

Is the narrow focus on grammar and perhaps maths at the expense of basic science, geography and history—let alone music and the arts? Oates acknowledges that “we’ve remained somewhat moribund in science,” for example, but thinks that keeping the initial focus on numeracy and literacy is “sensible. Resources are limited, and we don’t want to burden schools with innovations everywhere.”

One of the curriculum’s guiding principles, Oates says, is making sure children understand each aspect before they progress to the next. So what about the impenetrable vocab? “If you’re talking about ‘language about language’ being acquired mechanistically and superficially without understanding,” he says, “I know that’s occurring in reading and writing, and I don’t support it”—damning words from the man behind the original blueprint.

“There is a lot of content in those Year 5 and Year 6 annexes to English” (for nine- to 11-year-olds), he admits, but adds that “the testing has been, as it were, toned down a bit after the first two years’ experience.” Oates thinks it would be “prudent” to review those annexes. But he is not in favour of revamping the entire curriculum; instead, he’d like to see it implemented better through teacher training and support.

For teachers, however, the issue is not just the curriculum but the entire regime of tests and inspections. “Testing drives teaching,” Myhill tells me. “It is possible to abide completely by what the curriculum is asking while teaching it in a meaningful way, but that takes confidence.” Similarly, while LIs, LOs and WALT originate in the pedagogical principle of conscious learning, “they’ve become redundant, fossilised, formulaic procedures”—in part because they plug so neatly into the evidential framework. “There are a million more appropriate and imaginative ways,” she says.

According to the curriculum’s statement of aims, the “language about language” is “not intended to constrain or restrict teachers’ creativity, but simply to provide the structure on which they can construct exciting lessons.” But over-stretched teachers inevitably stick to the script to avoid leaving boxes unticked.

Carrie Derrick is a Year 5 teacher in Bristol. “They can say all they like about parts of the curriculum being non-statutory, but they may as well be,” she tells me. “Understandably, management wants the best for its school, so if Ofsted asks about whether an aspect of the curriculum is being taught, you teach it.”

Derrick works at an inner-city school with a challenging intake. “Year 6 are essentially cheating,” she says, “getting children to copy pretty much what the teachers write throughout the year for ‘evidence for writing’ [an externally moderated teacher assessment]; and actually every school is doing it that I’ve ever worked in, because everyone is so scared of the bad inspection that will follow a bad SATs result—the fear that you could go into special measures, or be [forcibly] ‘academised.’”

Testing—SATs, but also GCSEs—also explains why so few academies and free schools (or independents for that matter) grab the chance to jettison the jargon. In fact, academy chains are replete with dispiriting acronyms: from DEAR (drop everything and read) to SLANT (Sit up straight, Lean your body towards the speaker, Ask and answer questions, Nod your head “yes” and “no,” Track the speaker with your eyes).

The need for schools, teachers and pupils to make it through the gauntlet of tests means the terminology travels largely undigested through the system: the Year 6 spelling, punctuation and grammar test—referred to by the unlovely term SPaG—has its 11-year-old victims identify “modal verbs,” “determiners” and “co-ordinating conjunctions.”

Denied the chance to operate as autonomous professionals, teachers become hopelessly reliant on an industry that has sprung up to deliver the diktats. Twinkl is the most common provider; its corporate logo adorns my kids’ worksheets. “Help your Year 2 students to understand that addition is commutative using our range of age-appropriate maths activities and worksheets that have been designed specifically to meet the 2014 national curriculum aim,” its website states. Derrick says she’d like to make her own materials that reflect her own character, “but there just isn’t the time.”

I did a double take when I read Ofsted’s chief inspector Amanda Spielman’s criticism of teaching to the test. “We all have to ask ourselves,” she wrote in a 2018 review, “how we have created a situation where second-guessing the test can trump the pursuit of real, deep knowledge and understanding.” If my kids’ tribulations are anything to go by, not much has changed.

If children are only “parroting” knowledge, Oates tells me, “then the constellation of drivers and incentives in the system have not been correctly aligned.” Oates struck me as sensible and humane, but I couldn’t help notice his own use of jargon.

He still believes in testing. In fact, “we need far more assessment, but of a different kind and for a different purpose”: tests that “don’t hold schools to account, but are used to gain insight into what’s going on,” and especially to “identify pupils who are in need of support”—something many teachers would argue is their rightful domain.

“It’s a very long time in this country since we have had real discussions about what we want children to learn and to what purpose,” former adviser Debra Myhill tells me. She would like to see a rethink across the board, not just in literacy. “It used to be a strong field of research in the sixties and seventies. Since 1988, we’ve had curriculum after curriculum, but the design has been shaped by political ideology rather than discussions about what we want education to be for. It is a choice: we as a country decide what we think is important.”

“If I had a magic wand I would reinvent the whole thing,” teacher Carrie Derrick tells me. “I’d give teachers room to be creative, and actually do things that children like doing, and be led more by them and their sheer love of learning, rather than the need to provide evidence. That is why I’m a teacher.” Pendulum swings in education policy sap energy. But we cannot in good faith persist with a system that converts children’s natural curiosity into bafflement, strategising just to “get through,” and ultimately disengagement.

Homeschool has been gruelling. Tactfully ignoring most of the worksheets, my kids and I have learned why limestone foams in vinegar and how a valley is formed, but also what happens to an alarm clock when it is thrown across a room. Explaining how to tell the time was harder than I’d expected.

But it has also revealed what is possible. I will send them back to the classroom with relief on 8th March—but also a heavy heart. School involves an accommodation with the state. It’s basically fine, you tell yourself as you wave them off, bags on backs. It could get even worse, however, if the pandemic produces a doubling down on standards and a rush to plug attainment gaps.

What, though, if things went the other way? If enough parents were to reject what teachers have bemoaned for years, now that they’ve seen it for themselves? If pressure built to the point where all the jargon had to be stripped out and meaningful knowledge added in; if all the futile documentation, testing, inspections and league tables were abandoned and teachers liberated to speak in their own words? That really would be a silver lining.

Eliane Glaser is the author of “Elitism: A Progressive Defence” (Biteback)

(Source: Prospect)

The tiny 'country' between England and Scotland

 For 300 years, the Debatable Lands flourished as an anarchic no-man's land; not independent, but too dangerous for either Scotland or England to be able – or want – to take control of.

Nowhere does a brooding winter sky quite like the west coast of Scotland. As I looked across the open estuary of the River Esk, pale yellow sunlight filtered through streaks of low-lying cloud, reflected in the mirror-like ribbons of water and ripples of sand exposed by the retreating tide. All around, fields dipped gently to flatten out along the shore of the channel, which snakes its way westwards to the Solway Firth. The lowland coastline, flanked by rolling hills, expands until the firth meets the Irish Sea, creating a natural break in the land between Dumfries and Galloway in Scotland and Cumbria in northern England.

Standing firm against a determined breeze, I was surveying the scene from what marks the south-western end of the border between Scotland and England. Peacefully admiring nature at work, it was hard to believe that this seemingly tranquil, rural landscape was once at the edge of one of Britain's most lawless, and for a time, bloodiest, regions: the area known as the Debatable Lands.

For 300 years, the Debatable Lands was a dangerous, anarchic no-man's land on the English-Scottish border (Credit: Kirsten Henton)

Today, this once troublesome region is a laidback, quiet part of the border where hardy animal breeds are reared and a sense of community reverberates among the long-established towns and villages. This lesser-visited corner of the UK is also where you can get close to the story of those who called the Debatable Lands home: feuding clans known as the Border Reivers. It’s a place where local histories and scant ruins linger among wooded valleys, fast-flowing rivers and open moorland that lend themselves to letting your imagination fill in some of the blanks of its much under-told story.

And what a fascinating tale it is. The Debatable Lands is believed to have been the last great territorial division in Britain. Here, from the 13th to the 16th Centuries, the region's clans plundered land and livestock and endless blood was shed. Straddling the border, the Debatable Lands flourished as a sort of anarchic no-man's land, not independent but too dangerous and lawless for either Scotland or England to be able – or want – to take control of.

This was highlighted in a remarkable parliamentary decree issued by the governments of both countries in the mid-16th Century, some 300 years into the Debatable Lands’ story: “All Englishmen and Scottishmen are and shall be free to rob, burn, spoil, slay, murder and destroy, all and every such person and persons, their bodies, property, goods and livestock… without any redress to be made for same.”

While this decree was made into law, it was more of a legal “out” for England and Scotland. Neither side wanted the responsibility of dealing with the Debatable Lands; and as they could not agree on who owned it or how it was divided, neither could be held responsible for it, either. As Dr Anna Groundwater, principal curator, Renaissance and Early Modern History, National Museums Scotland, told me, “It was not a valuable piece of land, high ground and poor farming potential, so it was probably seen as not particularly worth fighting for or defending.”

The famous Gretna Green Blacksmith's Shop is used for eloping couples and weddings under Scottish licence on the border of Scotland (Credit: Tim Graham/Getty Images)

It was also a small area, something that struck me as I examined the map while waiting for a much-needed warming tea in the Cinebar Kitchen in the Scottish town of Gretna. The Debatable Lands ran just more than eight miles across at its widest, and roughly 13 miles from the elevated north down to the sandy-flats of the south with Gretna at its south-western tip and around one-third of the area extending into northern England. Gretna also proved perfectly placed as a launching pad for my foray, only a short detour from the A7, the artery that connects Edinburgh and Carlisle and cuts through the middle of what was the Debatable Lands.

It was probably seen as not particularly worth fighting for or defending

Gretna and its Green may be affectionately known as a safe haven for young lovers looking to elope, but the town also has an illustrious industrial heritage owing to the production of munitions for World War One, which drastically reshaped the community. The architecture reflects the early 20th Century well, such as the once-upon-a-time colonial revival-style cinema, whose adjoining cafe I was thawing out in.

The line between Scotland and England was established with the Treaty of York in 1237. As Graham Robb writes in his 2018 book, The Debatable Land: The Lost World Between Scotland and England, it is “probably the oldest national boundary in Europe”. But when it was finalised, it seems that it drew a line through lands that were essentially familial, dividing some held territory in two. Therefore, the border symbolised state-led authority and the Debatable Lands became the flashpoint of a rebellion of sorts, where powerful families plundered each other in both Scotland and England and neither government was committed to sorting it out.

Alexander Armstrong – aka Lang Sandy – was the last chief of the Scottish Armstrong clan in the Debatable Lands (Credit: Kirsten Henton)

The region became a no-go zone, a hazardous region frequented by the Border Reivers; “reiving” being a Scots word for plundering or raiding. Reivers busied themselves with a cat-and-mouse style game of stealing each other’s livestock. As Groundwater points out, that this occurred both “across the border and within each kingdom” shows that it was “not only English versus Scottish but internal crime, too”. Although raids weren’t confined solely to the Debatable Lands, most of the bloodiest took place in this untouchable territory, and it essentially became Britain’s fourth country, sitting alongside England, Wales and Scotland: a miniature, no-go area abiding by its own rules.

[It is] probably the oldest national boundary in Europe

The wild, often barren landscape, punctuated only by small communities, certainly adds to the effect. Towns such as Canonbie and Langholm are now local centres for fishing and hiking but grew from the remains of family settlements within the Debatable Lands. There are other well-marked ways of getting personal with the outdoors here. The coast-to-coast Reivers Cycle Route, for example, is a 173-mile stretch from that takes in many Borderland highlights including the Debatable Lands, although, you can pick and choose sections.

Taking another brief detour from the A7, I found myself in Rowanburn, a village with a well-kept public garden and the unmissable imposing wooden carving of Lang Sandy, so-called for his considerable height at more than 6ft, very tall for the 16th Century. Full name Alexander Armstrong, he was the last chief of the all-powerful Scottish Armstrong clan in the Debatable Lands, and a much revered and feared reiver. He long resisted attempts at pacification by the Crown and was eventually hanged with his 11 sons in around 1610, a fate that was to befall many of the region’s reivers.   

Gilnockie Tower is one of the finest remaining examples of a lowland Pele tower (Credit: Kirsten Henton)

The place I really wanted to visit, however, was nearby Gilnockie Tower. Mere minutes from Rowanburn, I was soon ambling up the driveway to what is one of the finest remaining examples of a lowland Pele tower ­­– a compact fortified keep built for defence, unique to the border region – and now home to the Clan Armstrong Centre, a small museum and essential Debatable Lands stopping point.

Confusingly it’s also known as Hollows Tower due to its adjacent location to Hollows Village, something that Ian Martin, project manager at the tower, explained as we headed inside the depths of the more than 500-year-old building.

Perhaps because there are few tangible remains from the period, Gilnockie Tower is a space in which the Debatable Lands comes alive. It’s every bit the defensive tower, from its impenetrably thick stone walls to its tiny high windows and roof-top lookout where you can easily picture a guard keeping watch. The tower, which endeavours to open all year, houses a small exhibition and cafe, and, as Martin tells me, offers tours (booked in advance) that “are designed to take people well into the 16th Century, deep enough to give them a flavour of family life at that difficult period”, including, for example, everyday conditions and the daily chores and traditional dining habits of those living through this unruly time.

The Reiver Trail walking route takes in a number of important reiver sites (Credit: Kirsten Henton)

Discussing my route along the A7, Martin tells me that there’s a desire to see a more concerted effort in attracting visitors to the region: “As you drive up the road to Canonbie, Gilnockie Tower, Langholm and on through the Borderlands,” he said, “the history of the textile industry, both woven and knitted wear, is presented in some wonderful exhibitions [in the likes of Hawick, close to the Debatable Lands]. Much more of these experiences are being developed, all in the effort to open up a visitor route through the A7 corridor that has fundamentally been ignored for years.”

The region’s remoteness, however, was of no concern to the reivers of their day. The Debatable Lands existed in its isolated manner until, officially speaking, 1551, when an agreement between the two countries prompted the building of Scots’ Dike in 1552, which “settled the exact boundary between the countries of Scotland and England,” according to Martin. This man-made embankment, little of which is visible today, was a three-and-a-half-mile-long barrier that finally divided the Debatable Lands in two.

It was initially more symbolic than practical, as this barrier did nothing to stem the flow of reiving. It wasn’t until 1603 that the border areas became a real focus for the unifying monarch, King James VI & I, King of Scotland and the first Stuart King of England, following the Union of the Crowns. New wardens were put in charge of tidying up the region and prominent reivers were rounded up. Some, like Lang Sandy, were hanged, many were exiled, and the process of instilling a semblance of law and order began in earnest.

The landscapes of the Borderlands remain wild and untamed (Chris Strickland/Getty Images)

Winding northwards up the A7, with Gilnockie Tower in the rear-view mirror, I struggled to get my head around how this small patch of land, the most debatable of areas, had excelled at such remarkable lawlessness with colourful characters and tales to boot, while, simultaneously, remaining so very under the radar.

And that’s where the appeal in the Debatable Lands lies; the intrigue of this unfathomable period and, by association, the surrounding towns and villages of the Borderlands, whose natural landscapes remain – almost – as wild and untamed as in the days of the reivers.

(Source: BBC)

Exposure to air pollution may increase risk of Covid death, major study says

ONS finds single-unit increase in pollution exposure over long term may increase death rate by up to 6%

Long-term exposure to air pollution may increase the risk of death from Covid-19, according to a large study by the Office for National Statistics.

It analysed more than 46,000 coronavirus deaths in England and showed that a small, single-unit increase in people’s exposure to small-particle pollution over the previous decade may increase the death rate by up to 6%. A single-unit increase in nitrogen dioxide, which is at illegal levels in most urban areas, was linked to a 2% increase in death rates.

These increases are smaller than found in other research; a US study found an 8% increase and an analysis of the Netherlands found a 15% rise. This may be because those studies assessed earlier stages of the pandemic when the virus was mostly spreading in cities.

Data is so far only available as averages for groups of people and the ONS said this meant no definitive conclusion on the link between dirty air and the worst impacts of Covid-19 could yet be made.

Hazy early morning view of Canary Wharf in London. Photograph: Malcolm Park editorial/Alamy Stock Photo

Instead, individual-level data would have to be examined to rule out other possible factors. The ONS has begun this work for patients in London.

The ONS also found that air pollution could be a factor in explaining why people from BAME backgrounds suffer more from coronavirus.

“The effects of long-term exposure to air pollution as a factor that increases coronavirus mortality appear smaller than those reported in previous studies, though our upper estimates are similar in magnitude to some,” the ONS report said. “[But] it must be accepted that the true picture will likely only emerge once data are available for highly detailed individual-based modelling.”

There are good reasons to suspect that air pollution worsens Covid-19. “Consistent exposure to air pollution is a known cause of breathing difficulties and other long-term conditions in the lungs and heart,” the ONS report said.

”Our data show that 35% of deaths involving Covid-19 had a respiratory or cardiovascular disease as the main pre-existing health condition.”

However, towns and cities have both high air pollution and also high rates of coronavirus infections, deprivation, poor health and dense population. The ONS report was able to take some account of these factors, but teasing out the impact of each factor alone is a difficult statistical challenge.

This is particularly true for minority ethnic populations as they are exposed to higher levels of dirty air than others. The ONS said it was currently impossible to entirely separate the effects of race and pollution. But it said: “If there is a causal link between air pollution and Covid-19-related mortality, it would partially explain the disparities in outcomes for minority ethnic groups.”

The ONS used a novel approach to help take account of the other factors. Instead of using postcodes or other geographical areas for the analysis, it grouped together areas across the country that shared socioeconomic and demographic characteristics.

Prof Matthew Cole, at the University of Birmingham and who conducted the analysis of the Netherlands, said: “The ONS study uses a very unconventional way of grouping the data. This is a real shame as it means we can’t be sure if the estimated results are driven by this unconventional method.

“In the absence of individual level data, fine regional data is the only way to examine these issues,” he said. “It’s a shame therefore that this study uses 175 relatively large regional groupings. This means the characteristics of each region risk being averaged out.”

Geraint Davies MP, chair of the all-party parliamentary group on air pollution, said: “The study neither proves nor disproves the hypothesis that air pollution worsens outcomes in Covid-19. 

However, we know air pollution leads to 62,000 premature deaths each year and weakens people prior to catching coronavirus. Therefore the government has a duty to act and this should be a call to action, not an excuse for further inaction.”

In July, the detailed and comprehensive Netherlands analysis concluded there was “compelling” evidence that air pollution significantly increases coronavirus infections, hospital admissions and deaths. There is also evidence from Europe, the US and China.

The UK government’s expert air pollution advisers stated at the start of July that air pollution was likely to be increasing the number and severity of Covid-19 infections. They said further investigation of the link between dirty air and the coronavirus pandemic was urgently required and may be relevant to how the pandemic is managed.

Also in July, a study of 400 hospital patients in Birmingham linked the severe impacts of Covid-19 on people from ethnic minorities to air pollution and overcrowded and poor-standard homes.

Ninety parliamentarians led by Davies have urged the government to back action on air pollution to help avoid a second wave of coronavirus, while an air pollution inquiry by a select committee of MPs is examining delays in the rollout of clean air zones in cities as a result of the pandemic.

(Source: The Guardian)

Up to 6% of England's population may have had Covid, study shows

Imperial College home testing programme suggests 13% of Londoners have antibodies

About 3.4 million people in England – 6% of the population – have had Covid-19, with infections more common among members of black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, according to the results of a large home antibody testing study.

The results from the study, known as React-2, are based on home finger-prick antibody test results from 100,000 participants across the 314 local authorities in England.

“It gives us the most robust, cross-sectional estimate of the number of people who have been infected during the first wave of the pandemic,” said Prof Graham Cooke, a co-author of the research from Imperial College London. “Because we have done it in scale we can have more confidence about the differences between different groups,” he added.

Cooke said the study, which has not yet been peer reviewed, provides important insights, both for easing lockdown and preparing for a second wave.

Shoppers on Oxford Street in London. Up to 13% of people in the capital may have had Covid-19, a study has suggested. Photograph: Matthew Chattle/Rex/Shutterstock

“There is no evidence of anything near high-enough levels of herd immunity for this to be helpful at a population level and that it is likely there is a high proportion of susceptible people out there still that need to be protected,” he said.

The 3.4 million people that it represents is many times higher than the tally of known cases for the UK as posted by Johns Hopkins University in the US – whose aggregated numbers have become the main reference for monitoring the disease – and which listed the country’s case numbers at 315,546 as of Thursday morning.

The study tracked the spread of infection across England after the pandemic’s first peak, with randomly selected adults testing themselves at home between 20 June and 13 July.

The results show considerable geographical differences. While 13% of people in London had antibodies, this was the case for less than 3% of people in the south-west.

Infections were also more common members of BAME communities, at 17% for black ethnicity compared with 5% for white.

“That probably goes a long way to explain some of the differences in mortality that we have seen between black, Asian and white populations,” said Cooke. Cooked added this greater prevalence of infections can largely be explained by factors such as being more likely to have key-worker status, living in urban centres – particularly London – living in families with larger households, and living in more deprived areas, all of which were linked to a greater prevalence of antibodies.

“From what we can see, it is the social-demographic factors that make the greatest difference,” said Cooke.

People working in care homes (16%) and healthcare (12%) returned far higher results than people who were not key workers, at 5%.

The study also suggests 32% of people who had Covid-19 had no symptoms of the disease – previous research has suggested the figure could be anywhere between 30% and 70% of infections.

“The number we are coming up with is at the lower end, but it is clearly still a lot,” said Cooke.

The team used a highly accurate lab-based antibody test on blood samples from NHS workers who had previously tested positive for Covid, to estimate the proportion of people who have been infected but do not subsequently show antibodies. “We do see a clear association between severity of illness and the likelihood of having antibodies,” said Cooke, although the team noted nearly all those who had had a positive Covid-19 test had antibodies.

The team say the finger-prick test used in the final nationwide study correctly picked up antibodies 84% of the time in individuals with non-hospitalised Covid at more than 21 days since their illness.

Cooke said the team plan to do another round of the study in mid-September in 200,000 people to coincide with the return of schools. But Cooke warned such antibody tests remain of limited value for personal use, noting they are not yet accurate enough for such purpose while it is unclear how protective antibodies are against future Covid-19 infections, and at what levels or for how long.

Health minister Edward Argar said:“Large scale antibody surveillance studies are crucial to helping us understand how the virus has spread across the country and whether there are specific groups who are more vulnerable, as we continue our work to drive down the spread of the disease.”

David Heymann, an epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine who was not involved in the study welcomed the work.

“This is a very important study, and it shows that the population is very willing to participate in activities towards better understanding of Covid-19 and its spread within England – hopefully this will lead to greater interest in participating in activities that will decrease the risk of transmission.”

(Source: The Guardian)

Where to buy face masks for kids as England makes them mandatory

The latest government guidance and the independent brands selling them

Face masks are set to become a part of every day life as lockdown restrictions lift and rules on coverings come into place.

After months of not being compulsory in England, the government made face coverings mandatory on public transport and for hospital visits from 15 June. Uber also made masks compulsory for customers and staff from this date.

As of 24 July, these rules have extended to supermarkets, indoor shopping centres, banks, and post offices and shops.

People who don't wear one will face a fine of up to £100, apart from those with certain medical conditions, children under 11 and those who lip-read.

The new government advice states that children under the age of two should not wear a face mask ( iStock )

If you're picking up a takeaway coffee or food in England, you'll also have to wear a mask, but this rule doesn't apply to sit-in meals. The Northern Ireland secretary, Brandon Lewis, confirmed: “If you’re going in to buy a takeaway, and leaving again, you’re treating it like a shop and you should be wearing a face mask.”

In Scotland, it's compulsory to wear one in shops and has been on public transport since June, except for people with certain medical conditions and children under five.

In Wales, face coverings will be mandatory on public transport from 27 July, including in taxis. The Welsh Government is also advising people to wear masks in crowded places where social distancing is not possible, but this is not compulsory. Face coverings are also compulsory on public transport in Northern Ireland and The Republic of Ireland.

If you have children, you may be wondering how this rule applies. This is what the government guidelines for children are.

What’s the age limit for children wearing face coverings?

The official guidance from the government's Covid-19 recovery strategy document explains that if your child is under the age of two, cannot put one on themselves, or has a respiratory condition, they don't need to wear a face covering at all.

All other children can wear one, but for those under the age of 11, it is not mandatory for them to wear a face covering on public transport.

The government was clear in its guidelines that face coverings are not the same as a face mask such as the surgical masks or respirators used as part of personal protective equipment by healthcare and other workers, and it reiterated that these supplies must continue to be reserved for those who need it.

When and where should they wear them?

As of 24 July, in England, face masks are mandatory in all shops, supermarkets, indoor shopping centres, banks, post offices, takeaways and transport hubs. Since 15 June, the government has made face coverings compulsory on public transport.

The World Health Organization (WHO) also updated its guidance to recommend that governments ask everyone to wear fabric face masks in public areas where there is a risk of transmission of COVID-19, in order to help reduce the spread of the pandemic disease.

However, it has stressed that face masks are only one of a range of tools that can reduce the risk of viral transmission, and should not give a false sense of protection.

It's also important to note that while valves are a common sight in some face coverings, avoid buying a face covering with a valve, as they do very little. Marisa Glucoft, director of infection prevention Children’s Hospital Los Angeles explained why they're ineffective: “When you wear a mask with a valve, people around you are not protected because the valve lets all of your breath into the air.”

Where to buy face coverings for kids

Ahead we've rounded up some independent brands who are making their own masks for children.

You can trust our independent round-ups. We may earn commission from some of the retailers, but we never allow this to influence selections. This revenue helps us to fund journalism across The Independent.

Thumbsie

Founded by mother-of-three Jo Bates, Thumbsie creates fabric gloves to help children to stop sucking their thumbs. It has since started to create fabric face masks for kids in light of the pandemic.

While you can’t buy individual masks due to the high demand, you can still buy its two or four mask packs. The packs are available in three sizes, S, M and L, and are suitable for children between three and 16. A pack of two is £18 and a pack of four is £35, and they are available in prints such as pirates, flamingos and superheroes. 

Its masks are made from poly cotton and cotton and have an inner pocket so you can insert your own filter if you wish. The elastic straps are adjustable too.

Visit Thumbsie now

Just Hype

This Midlands-based casual wear label has designed face coverings to buy, having diverted its manufacturing process to create a range of different styles for adults and children.

The masks come in two sizes, one for adults and one for children, and both are available in varying machine washable prints, such as camo and tie-dye, and can be bought individually or in packs of three starting from £9.99.

With elasticated ear loops and fabric made from polyester and elastane, some of the masks come with a built-in filter while others come without, we’re sure the funky prints will keep kids occupied long enough to keep them on. Plus, for some styles, all profits will go to the NHS to help key workers on the frontline.

Visit Just Hype now

Vistaprint

In a surprising turn, stationery brand Vistaprint has manufactured a range of kids and adults face masks that are being dispatched from 28 May, costing £13 each.

There’s plenty of kid-friendly fabrics to choose from including colourful doodles, khaki green, baby pink, stripes, lightning bolts and hearts.

Every mask comes with a replaceable filter system that can be rewashed, a 100 per cent cotton anti-allergenic inner layer, a three-dimensional chin structure, adjustable straps and a nose bridge.

For every reusable mask bought, Vistaprint is also pledging to give 10 per cent of sales to local communities impacted by the pandemic.

Visit Vistaprint

Rachel Riley

You'll find adult and kids masks available in Rachel Riley’s signature prints of flowers, gingham and more.

Each one costs £19 and they are suitable for children aged three and above, and the same designs are available for adults, so you can match if you like. They are made with a cotton satin lining, polyester inner layer and cotton outer layer.

It will also be donating 10 percent of profits from the sales of its face masks to Best Beginnings, a UK charity that supports parents during pregnancy and the early stages of parenthood.

Visit Rachel Riley now

Alex + Nova

This indie US apparel brand has started making organic cotton face masks during the coronavirus crisis. Suitable for children aged between two and eight, the brand offers masks for adults too, and they are available to UK customers.

The masks are available in pink, blue, black or white and cost £17, however, if you buy two you get 20 per cent off, and if you buy four, you can get 25 per cent off.

Every mask is reusable and the brand recommends to wash it with soap and water before air drying or tumble drying on a low heat.

Visit Alex + Nova now

Lancashire Textiles

Made with two layers of a soft cotton blend fabric, Lancashire Textiles has made children's reusable protective face masks for £8.99 each.

There are three different prints to choose from: polka dots, stripes and gingham in pink and blue styles. Each one comes with elasticated straps to keep them in place.

For every mask sold, it is donating £1 to the East Lancashire NHS Trust too.

Visit Lancashire Textiles now

(Source: Independent)