Gibbon was not alone in his fascination for the Roman Empire, and in the following generation Napoleon Bonaparte expressed his interest rather more practically by attempting to effectively refound it with himself as the new emperor.  So it is quite fitting that in one his first battles as emperor, at Eylau, he should find

Things are bad.  And they are getting worse.  Inevitable disaster looms in the not too distant future.  The only good news is that life is getting so hazardous that in all likelihood we personally won’t survive long enough to see the worst.

  It doesn’t do people or countries any good to dwell too much on past successes or failures.  I am old enough to have been taught at school about Britain’s naval successes and what I was taught was largely mythical.  I think it is a good thing that schools don’t do that kind of thing

It is always good to see a meaty historical issue raised in the Sunday newspapers.  Today the Sunday Telegraph has done just that by letting Eamon Duffy challenge the conventional view of the English Reformation. It was, according to him, a cultural disaster.  Really?

Yesterday was the Summer Solstice.  Here in Britain the weather marked the occassion by soaking the assorted new agers, Druids and general mystics who turned up to celebrate at Stonehenge. The newspapers in turn celebrated the god of cliche by saying that their spirit was undaunted by the weather.  Whatever, it was good to see

Power is always relative.  The Roman Empire had lost some territory to the Persians, but this did not hugely reduce its resources.  It remained the big beast in the jungle.  For the Persians however, acquiring some new provinces enhanced their capabilities considerably over where they had been  before the peace treaty.  They were still at