I've been busy digging up someone's garden. Was this a good thing, I hear you cry? After all, anyone who knows me will tell you that I know nothing about gardening. It gets worse because the garden I was digging belonged to someone I had never met before. Still, it was all done in the interests of history.
I was in Somerset, taking part in Channel 4's Time Team Big Dig, where ordinary people were encouraged to dig test pits in their gardens and see what could be found. We dug up a well-kept lawn in a small hamlet outside Taunton and found a couple of fine buildings no one remembered were there.

Now, I'm not suggesting this will happen to everyone; I've dug down in my own garden and been lucky to find soil. The builders left it in such a state that the only thing I've learned about gardening in the last couple of years is that begonias don't grow well on old rubber boots and bits of cardboard box.

From the cheapest bedsit to the grandest of mansions it is unlikely you were the first person ever to live in your home. This island is not that big and someone will have hung out their washing in your yard before you. You could dig up the garden but you may not have the energy or, which is more of a problem, you may not have a garden. Trust me, you'll manage. You won't even need Latin or a library card, although I can't think why anyone would do without the latter.

Start your history journey by taking a walk. What are the local place names? Do you know whom or what they relate to? There's a village near me where all the street names were nicked by EM Forster as characters for his novels. Why are some of the streets narrow and winding, but others straight and wide? Did a Roman once march past Starbucks?

I think it makes you feel an inch or two taller about the place where you live. I never tire of boring people passing through a village near me that Nelson slept here on his way to Trafalgar

By the way, did you know that the first European coffeehouse opened in England in 1637? Within 30 years, coffeehouses had replaced pubs as the place to meet for chat, business or politics. At the height of their popularity, more than 2000 coffeehouses were selling the hot bean in England. Women were banned from having coffee in them, and this led to the 1674 Women's Petition Against Coffee. King Charles II was sympathetic and said he would close them down but the men rebelled and it never happened. See – history; and all we did was walk past Starbucks.

Ask yourself lots of questions as you check out churches, chapels and cathedrals, statues and monuments, cemeteries, war memorials, pubs, theatres, cinemas, shops and markets, canals, factories and so on.

How about an old map of what the place used to look like? Try www.old-maps.co.uk. You just put in the name of where you live and up will pop a map. You can even compare it to a modern map. I told you this was simple. How about this – your area will almost certainly have a local history organisation. Check out the British Association for Local History (www.balh.co.uk).

Source

Housing Today

Postscript

Sandi Toksvig is a comedian and author