By Tim Murgtroyd

AT LAST it’s over. Or sort of. For now, at least, the hurly-burly’s done and the battle is lost and won. I refer, of course, not to Macbeth’s military exploits but the bitter contest of General Election 2017.

Still, history isn’t dead and like time the Ouse keeps flowing through our beautiful city of York. With that fact in mind, last weekend felt a good moment to forget about party politics for a while and instead look around our crowded streets and what they can tell us. Maybe even find something closer to the best kind of party – and I mean the fun kind.

Please be ready for a tale of two cities, both quintessentially York, both separated by a millennium of unimaginable change.

First off came York Pride. The spectacle of thousands of people massed outside the Minster was like a human rainbow set against the grey, rain-laden sky. Smiles were on every face, despite the weather.

With whistles blowing, a carnival atmosphere echoed off the Minster’s gargoyles and stone carvings before the parade snaked right round town and out to Knavesmire. The number of organisations supporting Pride, including York secondary schools, was striking. Also highly visible were business and community groups, as well as families and parties of friends.

How encouraging that the bigotry of homophobia can be challenged so openly and with such good humour.

York Press:

The York Pride event at Knavesmire

I am old enough to remember when being gay invited routine “bashing”, abuse and intimidation. Indeed, when it was illegal not to condemn homosexuality in schools. Seeing so many young people applauding LGBT rights gave me a real sense of optimism. Yes, we can learn to be a kinder, more tolerant society.

After the noise and bustle of Pride my post-election odyssey took me to a temple of culture. Of course, we’re spoilt for choice when it comes to museums in York. And I’m saying that as a grateful council tax payer happy to fund our heritage. After all, living in historic York gives us a responsibility to preserve our treasures for future generations.

Yorkshire Museum’s new exhibition, Viking: Rediscover The Legend, is certainly worth a trip into town.

The exhibition is a collaboration with the British Museum and some of the artefacts on display are show-stoppers. Check out the solid silver neck and arm rings that were awarded to warriors by their forgotten kings. Or the virtual reality headset featuring a Viking camp.

I particularly enjoyed the intelligent balance applied to these complex folk who made York the centre of the Viking world. Actually, their society seemed oddly reminiscent of our own: enterprising, well-travelled and dynamic, but with a dark moral underbelly centred round military conquest and power.

Nevertheless, there were plenty of exhibits showing how everyday Viking life was centred round the home and work. Indeed, around the family. Although the popular stereotype of a Norseman is a hairy, fierce warrior wielding an absurdly large axe, one revealing display discussed the power of women in maintaining the household.

To me, this set all the rest in context. Here were families striving as all people strive to prosper and bring up their children well.

Even so, stepping outside into the Museum Gardens and wandering for a while by the Ouse, I couldn’t help reflecting on the way time changes not just the physical realities of people’s lives, but their fundamental attitudes. To a Viking, the tolerance and acceptance of otherness vocalised by York Pride would have seemed beyond bizarre. In their culture, being gay was at best a dirty secret.

Yes, the Viking exhibition was a reminder dark ages can occur all too easily. Yet within apparent times of savagery the seeds of a better world are always waiting for the right circumstances to bloom.

Every gardener knows the importance of patience, persistence and care.

Those are dilemmas each generation must answer in their own way.

That’s why I take pride in York Pride. But pride also in the respect for culture and history’s lessons embodied by our marvellous Yorkshire Museum. And the river is still flowing...