Born To Blog.

If you didn't know already I'm Brendan Clayton, a photographer who lives in Barnsley, South Yorkshire in the UK. I love to travel & even though I work as as a professional freelance photographer in my everyday life I love to take photos of the places I travel to & explore too, photography is both my work & hobby so I'm never too far from a camera. Adventure is my happy place & I recently started a new series called #HistoryWithBrendan on my Instagram (@ExploreWithBrendan) which shares a little bit more history about the places I visit rather than just sharing pretty pictures (There's plenty of those too though), so I thought why not transfer that over into a blog format so it's all in one lovely history shaped bundle. The places I visit have such a wealth of information & history about them so I think sharing that with others makes the whole journey worthwhile. One of life's great commodities is being able to learn something new everyday, you will never know it all but it's great to start somewhere.

This one's all about Lud's Church, which is a place that's been on my radar for a few years now but I hadn't visited it myself until this year. It is described as a deep, moss-covered chasm full of history, myths and dark green. It's an eerie place one with a sense of wonder & magic unlike most of the places you will visit in your day to day life. Not Far from The Roaches it is located in a wood known as Back Forest, in the Dark Peak, towards the southwest fringe of the Peak District National Park about 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) west of the A53 between Leek and Buxton. The chasm is over 100 metres long and 18 metres deep, all but the upper third of the slope has slipped forward towards the River Dane. 

The area has a grand place in Christian history: the Lollards were a pre-Protestant Christian religious movement that existed from the mid-14th century to the 16th-century . It was initially led by John Wycliffe, a Roman Catholic theologian who was dismissed from the University of Oxford in 1381 for criticism of the Roman Catholic Church. The Lollards' demands were primarily for reform of Western Christianity. They formulated their beliefs in the Twelve Conclusions of the Lollards. They are supposed to have used Lud's Church as a secret place of worship during the early 15th century, when they were being persecuted for their religious beliefs. Lollards were effectively absorbed into Protestantism during the English Reformation, in which Lollardy played a role. Since Lollards had been underground for more than a hundred years, the extent of Lollardy and its ideas at the time of the English Reformation is uncertain and a point of debate. The origin of the name Lud's Church is not known but it is stated that it may have been named after Walter de Ludank or Walter de Lud-Auk who was captured there after one of the Lollard's meetings.

There isn't that much more history regarding Lud's church but what is out there is still pretty interesting as it seems to have played a key part in the lead up to the English Reformation. So protestant Church Of England lovers might want to treat this place as a pilgrimage, if you're inclined that way. If not it's just a super cool place to visit as you can see if you check out the photos below. I'm also selling prints at the moment so if you'd like to purchase any of these photos as prints be sure to send me a message or check out my Instagram Prints tab on this site.

Peace Out. x