Friday, March 2, 2007

Coke of Holkham and his sheep

That's the great man on the left. Holkham Hall, his great stately home and exhibition centre is in the background there. He started with the Norfolk Horn sheep- black faced, shaggy and skinny, with horns, and mixed them with just about anything and everything in the way of breeds. He also worked to popularise the Southdown, and turn it into a "gentleman's sheep". These are definitely not the white teddy-bearish Southdowns of today, anyway. Apparently one of the problems with the Norfolk Horn was that it didn't like being fenced in!

The shepherds' smocks fascinate me. Other farmers wore smocks too, but shepherd ones seem to be longer than most.