You Say Mortella And I Say Martello

Odd name Martello. Italian by the sound of it. So why did we give that name to the forts we built along the south and east coasts at the beginning of the 19th century? Last night- thanks to Sam Willis' Channel 4 series about castles- I found out.

In 1794 two British warships- HMS Fortitude and HMS JUno- with 106 guns between them- attacked the Tour de Mortella on the French island of Corsica. The 16th century round tower- built by the Genoese as a defence against Barbary pirates- had a tiny garrison and only two cannon, but managed to see off the British attack with the loss of only two men. When- a few years later- the British military were thinking about defending the coast against invasion by the French they remembered the Tour de Mortella and decided they'd like some of the same- but- as Willis pointed out- being Brits- with a high-minded contempt for all things continental- they couldn't be bothered to get the name right.



A Martello tower. This one is at Seaford.

We Have Snow

A Lot Of Different Things In Brief

1.John Cale's new video- for the song I Keep Close Watch- features him pootling into a club full of people young enough to be his grandchildren- all of them wearing masks-  having a drink, then pootling out again. I like John Cale. The video looks like it cost about thruppence.

2. Ailz and I have said we need to update our wills. I know one should but I'd rather not. Wills can be so contentious- and who wants to have his/her dearly beloved muttering out of the sides of their mouths as his/her box  trundles towards the flames. In an ideal world I'd draw everything out of the bank the day before I died and call people into my darkened room one by one and hand it out to them in random wodges- and nobody would know how much anyone else had got.

3. Cale refuses to talk about Lou Reed. Those who do are mostly agreed that he was a sonofabitch. By contrast everyone is falling over themselves to say nice things about David Bowie- or Dai Jones, as Cale calls him.

4. Bowie got himself disposed of with no-one watching. Neat move. My mother's friend Nora did that too. Funerals are awful.

 5 The spiritualist books I was reading at the back end of last year suggest that a lot of dead people turn up at their own funerals and find them gratifying. For myself,  I hope I'll have better things to do.

6. When Edith Nesbit needs a gender-neutral pronoun she uses "it". For example- "The five children went downstairs and each one put on its hat and coat". The effect is a little jarring.

7. I'm currently reading The Story of The Amulet. When Nesbit writes about magic she does so as with the insight and authority of an initiate of The Order of The Golden Dawn.

8. My mother kept asking, "What's that white stuff." The answer was, "Snow" but I was tempted to say, "Cocaine". She can still latch onto a joke, but I think that one would have had to be explained to her.

9. Jeremy Corbyn is saying he'd cancel the missiles but keep the subs that won't be carrying them. Now what on earth would be the point of that? Yes, I know it would appease the unions- but can't we find the sub makers something else to do- like building the Queen a new yatch?

10. I agree with everything Corbyn says but I do wonder if he's tough enough to manage the nasties in his party. He seems such a gentle man.

11. Alan Rickman will be much missed. He was a unique talent. Irreplaceable. I had thought he was younger than he was- because how old is Severus Snape?- but then he'd been a late starter and was always playing characters younger than himself- and getting away with it.  For instance he played Hamlet at 46. His stage performances weren't always well reviewed but I don't think he ever made a film he didn't enhance. Prince of Thieves would be insufferable without him.