Introduction

This chapter turns to a very different case in north-western Zimbabwe which has a different ecology, one not full of charismatic species or landscape nor great commercial potential, but with a forest location that offers conservation for hydrological purposes further downstream. This unique ecological setting creates enduring liminality for the state as it is caught in between ceding the forest to surrounding communities or retaining it under state control. This is de facto what happened over the last two decades following invasions into the forest as a result of Zimbabwe's Fast Track Land Reform Programme (FTLRP) in 2000. The case is a site of collaborative management arrangements from 1993 to the mid-2000s which the state abandoned once external support was no longer forthcoming, as well as the prevailing political environment of the FTLRP. The case also represents a site where the extreme violent side of the state (Peluso & Watts, 2001; Büscher and Ramutsindela, 2016; Ramutsindela et al., 2022) was unleashed for the second time in early 2019 on forest settlers. The use of brutal state force against land claimants left local people in a liminal situation about what course of action to take next as not all avenues have resulted in restoration of their rights to forest land. The technical state (the FC) has equally been befuddled with the back and forth between the central state and neighbouring forest claimants.

[1] [f. 157r]

[English]

It is to wit that in the year of King Henry V, William Sevenoke, mayor of London, John Perneys and Ralph Barton, sheriffs, William atte Wode, William Ederich, John Reyner and William Ferrour the Elder [were] Masters of this craft and of the fraternity of Brewers of London in the said year, and only for one year [above the line: and no more] at that time, as it is written before in the beginning of this book.

And in that year clothing was made and given to the freemen and brothers of the said craft. And also there was made a dinner called our Feast and on this manner it was used for many years before that time, in each year, to give clothing and make a dinner called our Feast, and to choose new Masters for the next year [above the line: following]. And also for as much as the craft perceived it was a great charge to give clothing each year, the aforesaid Masters and the worthy persons of the craft made an ordinance that the Masters who were next chosen should stand (still) for 2 years and then give clothing, and (to) make a feast and choose new Masters for the next 2 years.

And in the beginning of this aforesaid [scored: Masters] ordinance, the Masters chosen at that time to stand for 2 years were Thomas Grene, Robert Hilton, John Pyken and Robert Carpenter.

To end the story with 1822 is, to some extent, an arbitrary decision. In many ways, the history told here continues rather seamlessly. The shifting of coastal responsibilities between the Customs administration and the Admiralty, for instance, features quite prominently in the post-1822 history of the preventive service, or rather, the coastguard. Neither is the administrative rupture as stark as modern histories of the coastguard will have us believe. Its nineteenth-century history, moreover, is almost as neglected as the one that has been the subject of this study. At the same time, there are certain factors that change the shape of that history. Some of these are external. The ultimate dominance of the Royal Navy over European waters finally achieved the aspiration of a blue-water defence of the domestic scene and greatly facilitated naval operations against coastal threats. The firm integration of Ireland, in 1800, ultimately also removed many of the loopholes afforded by the previous indirect means of domination. And the demise of mercantilist protectionism, perhaps best exemplified, in the present context, with the end of the wool ban in 1824, obliterated many of the incentives previously afforded to the illicit trader. A more professional intelligence service, both abroad and at home, and the relative professionalization of dealing with aliens in the context of the Home Office bureaucracy eliminated another matter that had previously lent urgency to the preventive efforts of the Customs. Some of these things, in fact, had already happened by the 1780s and 1790s, and only the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars had kept the old rationales alive.

In the autumn of 1940 the British Broadcasting Corporation approached me with a request to broadcast regularly short messages over their system to my compatriots, commenting on the events of the war, with the purpose of endeavoring to influence the German public in the direction of the convictions that I have often uttered. I believed that I should not miss the opportunity of making contact, however loose and precarious, with the German people and also with the inhabitants of the subjugated territories, behind the back of the Nazi Government, which had deprived me of all means of exerting intellectual influence in Germany as soon as it had the power to do so. The suggestion was particularly attractive because my words were not to be broadcast from America by short wave, but from London by long or medium wave, and thus could be heard on the only type of radio the German people were permitted to have. It was also enticing to write German once again in the knowledge that the written words would be allowed to fulfill their purpose in the form in which they were conceived—in German. I agreed to send monthly messages, and after a few trials I asked for a prolongation of my speaking-time from five to eight minutes.

The broadcasts at first were transmitted in this way: I cabled my texts to London, where they were read by a German-speaking employee of the BBC. At my suggestion, a more complicated but more direct and therefore more attractive method was soon adopted.

It is probably too late to redeem Edward Martyn from his eccentricities: his most recent biographer describes him as ‘little more than a footnote in the annals of Irish history’. This seems unfair, even if Martyn's wilfulness, rebarbative misogyny, patrician contempt and obsequiousness in the matter of religious orthodoxy collectively account in fair measure for the general neglect that has befallen his achievements since his death in 1923. Yeats swiftly disavowed these achievements in the aftermath of his own success; Joyce identified his ‘incorrigible style’ as a fatal impediment to his reception, and George Moore, once upon a time his friend and companion, made him the Don Quixote of the Irish revival. ‘Dear Edward’, as Moore persistently calls him in Hail and Farewell, was not destined to be taken altogether seriously.

To distinguish between Martyn's difficult personality – his first biographer, Denis Gwynn, termed him ‘an uncloistered monk’ – and the preoccupations that animated his exceptionally versatile interest in the prospect of Irish cultural revival is nevertheless a worthwhile enterprise. If we recall that Martyn was a co-founder of the Irish Literary Theatre (with Yeats and Lady Gregory), a prominent member of the Gaelic League almost from its inception, the first president of Sinn Fein, an ardent supporter and vice president of the Dublin Feis Ceoil (from 1899), founder of the Palestrina Choir, an inveterate correspondent and essayist who prolifically contributed to several Irish periodicals, most notably D. P. Moran's The Leader, and a writer who championed the cause of Irish music for much of his working life, his eccentricities may at least begin to recede.

In 1766, Elizabeth Montagu – salon hostess, landowner, literary critic and letter-writer – wrote a series of letters recounting her experiences of a leisure trip to Scotland taken in the August of that year. She effuses over the view of Loch Lomond, the mountains of the Western Highlands and the hospitality that she received from the Edinburgh literati Henry Home, Lord Kames (1696–1782), Hugh Blair (1718–1800), William Robertson (1721–93) and John Gregory (1724–73). In her representation of the Scottish landscape, conveyed in letters to her husband, sister and friends, the same sets of phrases recur. She consistently praises the landscape for its ‘cultivation’, combined with its ‘noble prospects’ and ‘sublime beauties’. The use of repetition as a device, and the occurrence of these phrases in combination with other creative moments of epistolary expression – contrasting clauses, and more complex patterns of replication, revision and circulation – signals Montagu's use of the letter's formal characteristics in expressing her approach to cultivation and agricultural improvement. As this chapter will address, through such representations, Montagu uses her epistolary landscapes to participate in the debates raised by Scotland's mid-century rational agricultural reform – debates on improvement practices, the notion of progress, and the role of literature in each. Montagu's engagement with Scottish improvement by these means reveals, first, her deep intellectual and methodical involvement in Enlightenment improvement in Scotland as a textual and material process, and second, it illuminates her innovative use of the formal qualities of the letter to engage with issues of improvement.

Behind every great endeavour, there is a dream, but where do dreams come from? In the previous chapter, I introduced the context surrounding the aspirations of Alfonso X to the throne of the Holy Roman Empire. An almost torturous path enlightened by the conviction, which some would call obstinacy, of the Learned King to achieve a position that he considered rightfully his. But beyond this obstinacy lay an idea of empire that transcended the Pisan proposal of 1256.

The Fecho del Imperio was one of the most remarkable passages in the life of Alfonso X, and his attempts at achieving this ambition would even be remembered as stubborn and financially damaging to the kingdom by his successors. Alfonso X relentlessly pushed for his dream to come true, but in the end he seemed to be alone in this endeavour. However, the rule of Alfonso X had not been one of constant failure; there was progress in the conquest of the Muslim territory of the Iberian Peninsula, and, above all, in the intellectual achievements of his reign, materialised in the creation of a vast cultural and legislative corpus that, effectively, achieved some sort of royal centralisation and peninsular hegemony. As witnessed by his epithet of ‘the Learned’, his military, cultural and legislative successes begin to explain the king's tenacity but do not quite justify why he became almost obsessed with obtaining the crown of the Holy Roman Empire.

The programme on 25 April consisted entirely of works by Beethoven: the overture Die Weihe des Hauses (The Consecration of the House); the ‘Emperor’ Concerto [no. 5] in E-flat, played by Liszt, who followed it with a transcription of the song Adelaide; the ‘Kreutzer’ Sonata in A played by Massart and Liszt; and the Pastoral Symphony conducted by Berlioz. Three lines about a singer that end the review are omitted.

This concert had a fine and noble purpose! It was a homage rendered to the greatest modern composer by the leading virtuoso of the day. Liszt is busy, as we know, putting together the sum needed to complete the Beethoven monument. He has already given several concerts in Germany for this cause, so he could not fail to invite the Parisians to add their belated offering as well; and they have responded with the best will in the world! The hall was full, the audience brilliant, full of enthusiasm and supremely intelligent.

The overture [Die Weihe des Hauses] op. 124, which opened the concert, was still unknown to the French public, but its fine qualities were immediately recognised, at least to judge by the warmth of their applause. It's one of six overtures in C by Beethoven, who had a particular affection for this key. The imposing, majestic introduction contains a theme of great beauty for the wind instruments. Then comes a trumpet fanfare whose style, despite its glitter, could be more distinguished; a very odd passage for bassoons is heard beneath, the tempo increases bit by bit to lead gradually from Andante maestoso to Allegro, as a way of passing from the first part of the work to the second without interruption.

In October 1959, the following note appeared in Der Spiegel: “Pola Negri, 62, once a diva of German silent film, now an American businesswoman and homeowner, traveled overseas again after waiting in vain in a Munich hotel for over a month for the finished screenplay of the film Herrin der Welt [Mistress of the World]. According to the wishes of director William Dieterle and producer Artur (‘Atze’) Brauner, she was to reap accolades in this new film once again. However, Negri did not like the first version of the script because the deviation from the treatment she agreed to seemed too far-reaching. After her departure, she declared she would only come back ‘when everything was in order.’”

Pola Negri was one of Weimar cinema's most internationally acclaimed stars, and Die Herrin der Welt (The Mistress of the World, Joe May, 1919/1920), which Hollywood veteran William Dieterle was slotted to remake, was one of the most monumental and expensive international adventure films of the Weimar Republic. Set against opulent domestic studio backdrops, May's eight-part silent adventure serial tested the possibilities of staging cinematic attractions by chasing an action heroine around the world from Europe to China, Africa, and the US, while showcasing a variety of technological gadgets. The Polish actress Pola Negri, daughter of a Romani tinsmith, moved to Berlin in 1917 to launch a successful career as an “exotic” vamp in early Weimar cinema, as Anjeana Hans discusses in this volume.

INTRODUCTION

Elizabeth Bathgate lived in the small coastal town of Eyemouth in Berwickshire. Her husband, Alexander Pae, was a maltman, and the couple seem to have been comfortably off, lending money and employing more than one servant. She was caught up in a local witchcraft panic in 1633, but achieved a narrow escape in her 1634 trial with the aid of a supportive husband and effective lawyers. Her case reveals much about community interactions and about sophisticated legal argument.

The Eyemouth panic began in the summer of 1633, and gathered momentum in the autumn with accusations against Agnes Allanshaw, Agnes Wilson, Alison Wilson, Elspeth Wilson and Katherine Wilson. The privy council granted a commission of justiciary for their trial on 26 November 1633, with the commissioners including John Ramsay of Edington, sheriff depute of Berwickshire. Elizabeth Bathgate's own trial record tells us that the confessions of Agnes Wilson and Alison Wilson named Isobel Sinclair, and Bathgate herself, as fellow-witches. On 9 December, the two Wilsons were made to ‘confront’ Sinclair and Bathgate, and the Wilsons declared that Sinclair and Bathgate had been with them at the sinking of George Huldie's ship by witchcraft. A commission of justiciary for the trial of Isobel Sinclair would be granted on 14 January 1634. But Elizabeth Bathgate proved to be harder to deal with.

The prosecutors imprisoned Bathgate in the tolbooth of Duns, the head burgh of Berwickshire. The leaders of her prosecution were Sir Patrick Home of Ayton and John Home, minister of Eyemouth, who were part of the team that had driven forward the prosecutions so far. Quite possibly the Homes hoped to torture her with sleep deprivation; there was mention at her trial of testimony that had been gathered during the previous ‘watching’ of Agnes Wilson. However, Bathgate's husband, Alexander Pae, acted promptly.