there is Nothing Like a Dame!

Recently I received my membership certificate to be a member of the National Society of the Dames of the Magna Charta.     (Click to enlarge)


My sister Christine Knudson did all of the research and shared it with me so I could complete my application. She and her daughter Joann Handler also became "Dames".


OK, what does this mean?  It means one of our Cole ancestors who living in 1215 actually signed the Magna Charta document.


Go to this website and read an interesting article by Jeanette Saddler Taylor that was broadcast in June 2008.
It is very informative as well as amusing.   http://www.mchron.net/ee/radio/celebrating_magna_charta_day/

My hand-painted, large certificate arrived in the mail yesterday, inside a big cardboard tube.  Had to place heavy books on it overnight to flatten it some.  I will frame it this week, and hang it along side my DAR certificate on the den wall.

I am going to order a book from Amazon: 1215: The Year of Magna Carta    Here is a description of the book .  Can't wait to read it. 

"Surveying a broad landscape through a narrow lens, 1215 sweeps readers back eight centuries in an absorbing portrait of life during a time of global upheaval, the ripples of which can still be felt today. At the center of this fascinating period is the document that has become the root of modern freedom: the Magna Carta. It was a time of political revolution and domestic change that saw the Crusades, Richard the Lionheart, King John, and -- in legend -- Robin Hood all make their marks on history.

The events leading up to King John's setting his seal to the famous document at Runnymede in June 1215 form this rich and riveting narrative that vividly describes everyday life from castle to countryside, from school to church, and from hunting in the forest to trial by ordeal. For instance, women wore no underwear (though men did), the average temperatures were actually higher than they are now, and the austere kitchen at Westminster Abbey allowed each monk two pounds of meat and a gallon of ale per day. Broad in scope and rich in detail, 1215 ingeniously illuminates what may have been the most important year of our history."