Lost Colonies and Nutcrackers

Field trip weekend at SGS! Dagfari and I accompanied ProfDad and some of his Honors history students to the North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh, where we saw the Lost Colony exhibit. Most impressive for D were the 70 John White watercolors and Theodor de Bry engravings on loan from the British Museum. I found White's (completely fanciful) paintings of ancient Picts and Britons especially interesting, since I'd never seen them before, and since we're reading up on ancient Scotland for our Macbeth study.


White's Pict has no basis in historical fact, but he puts modern tattoo enthusiasts to shame! White supposedly included these pictures in his album on the Algonquin to show his British audience that their ancestors were even less civilized than the North American "savages". Whatever you make of his premise, the pictures are fascinating.

On Sunday night D and I attended NCSA's production of the Nutcracker (poor ProfDad had to work). Tchaikovsky's holiday confection is wonderful performed by young, talented, and energetic NCSA students. Dagfari staged his own version next to our Christmas tree when we got home. Unfortunately he only got to do the first half, before his philistine parents insisted on going to bed. He was most indignant, but the suffering is probably good for his art.