Tents represent a critical part of the architectural canon spanning both centuries and civilizations but are often overlooked in favour of those buildings that have left a longer-lasting mark on their surroundings. In the introduction to his 1979 book, Tents: Architecture of the Nomads, Torvald Faegre wrote that 'In a sense, tents are the truest architecture: our word architect comes from the Greek archi, "one who directs" and tectos, the "weaving"'. The feting of the late Pritzker Prize winning architect Frei Otto, whose 1972 tensile canopy for the Munich Olympic Stadium is still considered one of the landmarks of world architecture and an apogee of tent construction, demonstrates that tents can be some of the most futuristic and sophisticated building types. However, most tents fulfil a much more basic function for, as Faegre's Tents (1979) reminds us, they also have the capacity to serve a primal need for shelter and flexibility of situation. For many casual observers tents are simply resonant of camping holidays but the stereotype that this conjures distracts from the significance of the tent as a structure that is able to embody messages of both libertarianism and authoritarianism in a single object. Accordingly the architecture critic Tom Dyckhoff, summed up his thoughts on the importance of tents in his 2014 BBC documentary Tents: The Beginnings of Architecture by saying, 'stitched into the fabric of all tents is a defiant streak; they are a rebellious force in both architecture and society at large' ('Tents - The Beginning of Architecture', The Culture Show. BBC2. 24 July 2014). This project considers the tent as an important expression of architecture at an earlier point of apogee through a study of the design of the royal tents and associated temporary structures that were built for the sixteenth-century English court by the Office of Tents and Revels. In doing so it responds to all three of the themes cited above - those of sophistication, itinerancy and symbolism - and pushes the boundaries of our current understanding of early modern architecture and, by association, politics. The project is timed to underpin preparations for the 500th anniversary of the Field of Cloth of Gold in 2020, an event that arguably defined the importance of tents and temporary structures as a tool of European monarchy in the period and as an outlet for creativity in architecture and design. However, the project spreads its net wider than that single event to review the role of the royal tent across the whole period from the accession of Henry VIII to the death of Elizabeth I. Supporting the project is a rich vein of evidence that includes paintings and drawings, account books, inventories, chronicles, furniture and surviving fragments said to be from royal tents that has never before been collated and reviewed as a whole. By doing so this project will both highlight the important role played by tents in European diplomacy and will demonstrate that the Office of Tents and Revels employed renowned craftsmen whose work on temporary structures playfully and experimentally pushed the boundaries of architectural and decorative design at a time widely acknowledged as a great period of development in English architectural history. The project will culminate in the construction of a recreated royal tent that will act as a piece of experimental archaeology or practice-based research and a high-impact way of engaging broad audiences with the themes of architecture, power and magnificence at the Tudor courts.

Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.

At the centenary of 2014, 'Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red' became the surprising star of commemorative activity. This art installation of 888,246 comprised ceramic poppies, planted in undulating waves in the Tower of London moat. Its popularity showed that far from declining, World War I (WWI) commemoration was still intensely popular with the British public. 'Lest we forget' is an innovative project which will use new methodologies to probe a unique and large data set which was collected as part of the installation, and thus to investigate how people made sense of, and engaged with, it. The project will contextualize the installation by explaining the ways in which the public(s) commemorated the First World War more widely, building on a century of WWI historiography and looking at commemoration in a 21st century context. Finally, it will look at whether any other project could achieve public impact comparable to that of 'Blood Swept Lands', and if so, how this might be achieved. Each of the 888,246 ceramic poppies in the installation was created to represent a single life; or rather a death. The number of ceramic poppies and the scale of the installation were its defining features both in terms of the spectacle it created in the moat, but also in the meanings people made of the artwork. Volunteers, staff, visitors and purchasers frequently referred to the emotional significance of 'one poppy, one life'. Each handmade poppy embodied individuality within the conformity which is associated with military service in WWI. No two poppies were the same, connecting the individuality of the dead combatants with the horrifying scale of the war. This project looks beyond the spectacle of 'Blood Swept Lands'. It uses the installation as a case study through which some of the wider issues of WWI commemoration can be understood. It will look at how the public made sense of the WWI centenary, and how they used the installation to create meanings, express emotions, and share these with a wider group of people. It will then explore the ways in which people interacted with 'Blood Swept Lands' through different media; from volunteering to 'plant' poppies, visiting the installation, sharing photographs on social media, and depositing home-made artefacts at the Tower; to attending a nightly roll-call ceremony, or buying a ceramic poppy. The public engaged with the installation on multiple levels, and the levels of public involvement also helped shape the installation and its project, which became a media phenomenon. This research project will investigate the importance of this engagement; it will also critique the way the project was perceived as a 'success' by the public, media and Historic Royal Palaces. It will achieve this by using data collected as part of the Blood Swept Lands project, and applying methodologies from other disciplines to probably the largest data set of commemorative activity available for research. It is timely to study the impact of 'Blood Swept Lands' and its place within WWI centenary commemorations as the 2014-18 centenary draws to a close in 2018. Further fieldwork in 2018 will look at the longer term impact of the 2014 commemorations, and ask whether and how attitudes to 'Blood Swept Lands' and commemoration have changed over the 4 years, 2014-18. The research will explore what constituted the 'success' of 'Blood Swept Lands' and whether this success can be replicated in future commemorations and commemorative programmes. 'Lest we forget' will disseminate its research findings through conference papers and published journal articles. It will bring together heritage practitioners and academics from history, heritage, and memory studies in order to share and discuss future engagement with commemoration in heritage and museums. It will deliver public impact through regular blog posts, public talks and a Teacher Fellowship programme, resulting in 10 new free teacher resources.

This equipment investment project will enable Historic Royal Palaces (HRP) to achieve the full scale of our ambition as a cross-disciplinary Independent Research Organisation (IRO) within the heritage science landscape. HRP is an independent charity which cares for six historic royal sites: the UNESCO World Heritage Site Tower of London; Hampton Court Palace; Kensington Palace; the Banqueting House White Hall; Kew Palace, Kew Pagoda and Queen Charlotte's Cottage; and Hillsborough Castle and Gardens. HRP are the trusted custodians of more than 60,000 objects, with one of the largest number of tapestries, baroque wall paintings and state beds on display in the UK. The Collection is housed in more than 1,000 rooms across the six sites. The HRP scientific laboratory was founded 30 years ago and since then HRP has established a distinguished reputation in the field of heritage science and conservation research, collaborating extensively with academic, heritage and industry partners on innovative projects and the supervision of doctoral students and disseminating results through publications and papers. This work has included the sharing of equipment and access to on site spaces, collections and resources. The HRP scientific laboratory was initially set up to investigate historic textiles, most notably the internationally significant collection of tapestries at Hampton Court Palace. Over the years, however, both the scope of work needed across the entirety of HRP's buildings and collections and developments in technologies and equipment mean that despite ongoing investment by the charity the laboratory is in need of significant capital investment to enable HRP and its collaborators to continue their pioneering research. The proposed equipment upgrade will result in a step-change in the ability of HRP and its partners to undertake detailed scientific and aesthetical analysis of heritage assets and complement the currently available instrumentation by providing in depth information and data on the condition, materials and manufacturing techniques of our palaces and collections. More specifically, the upgrade will enable HRP to pursue three research discovery projects within the early years of the new infrastructure. Banqueting House Rubens Ceilings Paintings aims to undertake complex surveys and cross-discipline analysis to determine how the paintings were created, have altered through material degradation or restoration interventions and establish an accurate record of their present condition to inform changes in visual perception and interpretation over time. Hampton Court Historic Tapestries Protection seeks to integrate and process 10 years of environmental monitoring data and other technical research on the tapestries to improve understanding and preservation of historic tapestries using Building Information Modelling. Non-invasive method to measure damage on historic tapestries using hyperspectral imaging, could be another potential research collaboration between HRP and UCL which would seek funding from AHRC for a larger-scale project to set up a bespoke imaging project in Hampton Court Palace to predict the level of damage on tapestries in-situ using instrumentation funded by this call. HRP receives no funding from central government or the Crown, and is therefore solely reliant on income from visitors, members, donors, sponsors and research funding. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic HRP has seen a shortfall in income of 95 million pounds in the financial year 2020-2021 and does not project recovery of pre-pandemic visitor numbers until 2023-24 at the earliest. Despite HRPs commitment to heritage science and the HRP scientific laboratory, therefore, it is highly unlikely that there will be funds available from within the organisation for the proposed equipment investment for at least the next five years.

The concept of 'traitors' has been a constant in human history, with the crime of treason viewed as the most heinous, prosecuted in most states from the ancient world until the present day. This crime usually involves a power struggle since treason means breaking a bond of loyalty owed to a state or community, challenging the existing order and often trying violently to overthrow it. This can occur in the domestic arena, or through allegiance with some foreign force hostile to the home community of the traitor. Examples of domestic treason are the assassins of Caesar, the Gunpowder Plot, or the assassination attempt on Hitler in 1944. Examples of foreign treachery are renegades in times of war (Roger Casement), nationalists with foreign allegiance (the Sarajevo assassins of 1914), or traitor-spies after the Second World War (the Rosenbergs; the Cambridge spies). As this reveals, the domestic and foreign threads are often interlinked (e.g. Quisling in Norway). How they are interpreted tells us much about any regime's relationship to its citizens, its (in)stability, and the evolving threats posed to its domestic and foreign security. The scale of punishment for traitors also reflects how far the regime feels threatened. Although most concretely defined as a crime, treason is also a subjective concept, best conceived in the eye of the beholder and often specific to one era or the security needs of a particular regime. Our network aims to show that the phenomenon of treason is a highly useful touchstone for measuring social stability, as well as the nature of power struggles, under a range of regimes. Therein lies the past and contemporary relevance of the topic. Indeed, the historic phenomenon of treason still surfaces regularly in the present even if modern states and regimes may now term it 'terrorism' or 'whistle-blowing'. Yet conceptual thinking about treason is singularly undeveloped, often relying on simple public stereotypes. Academic scholarship is also fragmented and skewed towards case studies about particular historical periods. The current network of scholars will rectify this by deepening our understanding of treason as a phenomenon surfacing in every century, while aiding a wider public understanding of the present relevance of the subject. Focusing our discussions on the European and North American continents, we address three themes: (1) treason in law; (2) the cultural representation of traitors; (3) the impact and heritage of treason. Under each theme we think comparatively across time and geography to formulate something of a global history. We expect to find certain similarities in how treason was defined and prosecuted in the past, and how stereotypes of traitors resonated in widely different cultures. At the same time, we envisage finding distinct differences in the laws or language of treason due to the special security threats faced by regimes, the ideological struggles of the era, and the radically singular characters of polity or society on different continents. Discussions among an international group of scholars will also advance interdisciplinary research since, although most network participants are historians, we aim to draw specialists on law, language, social science and ethics into the network. Our discussions will be disseminated through online seminars, interviews and academic publications, and we are also keen to redefine public preconceptions about treason. We will be effecting knowledge-transfer with the Tower of London, seeking its expertise on the heritage and public representation of traitors, while feeding our findings into the Tower's future plans for its exhibitions and engagement with international audiences. Our dual academic partnership between Britain and Germany (Southampton and Freiburg) also ensures that from the start our research and public profile is international, while the network's core members give our research a potential global impact.