Tag Archives: history
Worth Reading 98: Trajan writes his first column
Gove’s proposed history curriculum forgets that we live in 2013, not the 1950s – Anna Claeys explains how the proposed new history syllabus is missing a huge amount of context in the rush to celebrate ‘Britishness’. The Man Behind The Brilliant Media Hoax Of “I, Libertine” – How a night-time DJ created a non-existent literary [...]
Why Jeb Bush will win the 2016 Presidential election
Because history repeats itself, except for all the times it doesn’t. Barack Obama’s re-election this week meant that three successive US Presidents (Bill Clinton, George W Bush and Obama) had all been elected to two terms in office. The only other time this has happened in American politics was 200 years ago, with the Presidencies [...]
Nine years in nine posts
To go one better than Jonathan Calder, and as a reminder that this blog will be reaching its tenth anniversary next year. Here’s what I was writing about on or about the 16th May in previous years: 18th May, 2011: Maths, Hanningfield Style proved that Essex is not larger than Croatia. 16th May 2010: I [...]
History with a finger on the fast forward button
Found via Nosemonkey, this time-lapse map of European history is rather good: Related PostsNo 2 asking your opinion
What if Colchester had been moved to Suffolk?
Here’s an interesting bit of local history for you all, going all the way back to when I was born in 1972. This was a year of many interesting events, and also the 1972 Local Government Act which brought about wholesale changes to the way large parts of the country were governed. It brought in [...]
An Imperial Possession by David Mattingly (2011 book #27)
Not had much of a chance to read over the last few weeks, and when I have, my time’s been occupied by this rather detailed look at life in Britain during its time as part of the Roman Empire. The focus is a bit more archaeological than historical compared to my usual reading, but still [...]
The Inheritors by William Golding (2011 book #26)
Helping me keep up my average of a book a week this year, The Inheritors is Golding’s second novel (after Lord Of The Flies) and like that, it’s also a look at some of humanity’s darker impulses. Here, though, the focus is on humanity’s beginnings as seen from the viewpoint of a group of Neanderthals [...]
Worth Reading 41: Lords, MPs and Elder Gods
But who will be eaten first? The House of Lords by numbers – interesting data on how many Lords of different parties have been appointed in the last few years. The Poisonous Drivel of Dr Denis MacShane MP – A Labour MP and the Daily Mail conspire in quoting something out of context to disparage [...]
From the Gracchi to Nero by HH Scullard (2011 book #22)
Another bit of my attempt to widen my historical knowledge, this book does exactly what it says on the tin an provides a good overview of 200 years of Roman history. There’s obviously a limit to how much detail Scullard can provide in this overview, but he does a very good job of linking the [...]
A History of China by JAG Roberts (2011 book #13)
My book-reading pace has slowed down a lot over the last few weeks for various reasons, and are likely to remain sluggish for the next few weeks with the growing pressure of elections. Still, I have been able to finish off the next part of my attempts to widen my knowledge of world history by [...]
by John Hodgman
by Drew Westen
by Ian Mortimer
by Jeff Greenfield
by Heather Peace
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