The Yorkshire Ranters were a loose group of far-Left troublemakers who went about the country shortly after the Civil War, spreading dangerous ideas about common property, the equality of citizens, the need to destroy the priests' doctrine of sin, and similar stuff. The movement was centred about Kildwick, not far from where I was brought up. They were fairly similar to the Diggers over the border in Lancashire, whose most famous leader, Gerrard Winstanley, is the icon of this period of revolutionary ferment. (He's buried in Barnes, Surrey, of all places, and got a mention on a statue in St Petersburg after the Russian Revolution.) Their style is familiar to anyone who has ever encountered a ranting Yorkshireman - firebrand rabble-rousing at meetings summoned in pubs. This blog is meant to have some of the same character.