A Relic of Newcastle's 'Great Exhibition'

(click on images to enlarge)

I am sorry to say that I have again been seduced by an item of historical tat being touted on eBay. This time it is a commemorative copper (or bronze?) medal, issued in 1840 to mark the occasion of what was, effectively, Newcastle's very own 'Great Exhibition' of the early Victorian age. It is about 1.5in in diameter and cost me thirty-odd quid. Honestly, I'm such a sucker for this sort of thing.

I write at some length about this curious event in my book Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Fragments of the Past, vol.2, but, in essence, the five-month jolly during the summer of 1840 was both a celebration of achievement and a vehicle for the education of the masses. The medal's inscription indocti discant et ament meminisse periti means (according to my online Latin translator) "May the ignorant learn and may the experts love to remember." I'm not sure how accurate that is, but I think you get the general idea.

The exhibition spanned several buildings and rooms across Blackett Street, High Friar Street and Nelson Street - essentially between the entrance to the Academy of Arts on the former to the New Music Hall on the latter. Obviously, there were exhibitions of art, as well as examples of innovative local manufacture, a 'magic lantern', a 'centrifugal railway' and lots and lots of hydraulic contraptions. There was even "an ingenious revolving door" placed at the top of the staircase from the Music Hall to Nelson Street below. It was a commercial success, and something similar was repeated in 1848 at the same venue.

Those Victorians certainly knew how to boast! And why not?