103: I'm risen. Happy Ēostre!

Hello and welcome to Border Crossing issue one hundred and three, landing on Easter Sunday, ooh yeah, this delicious, well ancient fertility and renewal festival named for the Anglo-Saxon goddess Ēostre (or Ostara) until it was hijacked by the Christians.

An odd sidebar of the Easter story is that for many years, the only real document of Ēostre being celebrated at all, anywhere, was written by the Venerable Bede, in eighth century England. Many later historians (in the 19th and early 20th centuries) were skeptical, convinced he’d just made it all up, in his book (with the somewhat Proustian title) The Reckoning Of Time.

But then in 1958, a new piece of historical evidence appeared: a collection of more than 150 Romano-German inscriptions to ‘Mother Goddesses’ was uncovered, at a place called Morken Harff in the Rheinland.

Aha, they said, here’s the answer we’ve been hunting high and low for. The Goddess names were all dated to the year 150AD-ish. By the mid 1960s, scholars had successfully linked a bunch of them etymologically to Ēostre, confirming that Bede wasn’t bullshitting after all. Easter was real. Yay.

And the bunny originally comes from the goddess keeping a pet hare.

Anyway, I hope you have some lovely eggs.

“Space is going to finally be glam. Let me tell you something. If I could take glam up with me, I would do that. We are going to put the “ass” in astronaut.”
— Katy Perry

Thank you for supporting my writing. On we go.
xx

gems

1

Excellent new podcast What Rough Beast with culture writers Virginia Heffernan (Wired) and Stephen Metcalf (Slate Culture Gabfest) attempts a clear-eyed witnessing of America’s demise. Intellectual, slightly anarchist, striking oil in the long shadow of the great anthropologist David Graeber.

2

David Sedaris does his seasonal classic ‘Jesus Shaves’ (YouTube link). Great idea for today, thank you Kelly Westlake for sharing this on FB. It’s taken from This American Life’s collection ‘Crime Busters + Crossed Wires’, which is over twenty years old now, but this piece still holds up beautifully.

3

I haven’t actually visited this exhibition yet, we almost missed it altogether but luckily the artist Shardcore recommended it at dinner the other night and now we’re going. However, since it’s only got a couple of weeks left, I’m sharing it with you now (rather than waiting til we’d seen it) so you don’t miss out: Tarot: Origins & Afterlives runs at the Warburg Institute in London until the end of this month. The show explores the history of tarot and how it has transformed over time. A niche doozy.

4

Peter Oborne reporting for Middle East Eye, analysing why the UK media adopted a collusion of silence around David Lammy’s secret meeting with Israel’s foreign minister.

5

Apparently, researchers have discovered a new colour, and named it ‘olo’. (BBC News item).

potato gem

• Hot new Nature article on the phased pan-genome of the tetraploid European potato.

• Yet more potato spots opening up around the UK. Both Portsmouth (on the South Parade pier no less and it’s called ‘Spudsea’) and Preston got one. The trend is genuinely spiralling.

•

get in touch

email: chris@christt.com
Instagram: @cjthorpetracey

always there

Try my other newsletter Double Chorus which is irregular short essays. It’s what I think about when I think about music.

Check out the Border Crossing Press shop.

Find out about my one-to-one Creativity Counselling service.

A quick note on Creativity Counselling appointments: this Summer and Autumn 2025 I have a handful of face-to-face slots to offer in different locations to usual, while travelling —

• early June: PARIS / BARCELONA
• late June: GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL
• mid Sept: MANCHESTER / LAKE DISTRICT
• late Sept: GLASGOW / EDINBURGH

If you’re interested check out details and get in touch.

My Pact Coffee discount code is CHRIS-A8UKQG. Sign up for coffee bean delivery, use this code, you get £5 off and I get £5 off a bag.

Thanks again. Look after yourself and your people.

Ten brownie points if you clocked the A-ha gag.

All my love, un oeuf.
Chris
x