Byzantium by John Julius Norwich
A three volume history of the wars, politics and intrigues of the Byzantine Empire.
The History of the Medieval World by Susan Wise Bauer
A breezy narrative covering a lot of history but not in much depth.
I Belong To The Brexit Generation
I was born in 1960 and so was 17 when Richard Hell and the Voidoids released ‘Blank Generation’. The title of this post is a play on the title of the song. It wasn’t a huge hit when it first came out and it hasn’t particularly stood the test of time, so I imagine you’d […]
Parthenon Marbles – We’re Still Looking At Them
It’s high time the Brits showed a bit of class and sent the Elgin marbles back to where they came from.
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
Lessons in Chemistry is a well-paced and light-hearted book which is well worth a read.
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell
A fictional account of the Dutch East India Company gives an insight into what it must’ve been like to work for them.
Rings of Power – Not The Immediate Disaster I Expected
So the hour long foretold has come. Amazon’s Tolkien product is finally with us. I’m not sure what to call it – it isn’t really an adaptation. The appendices of the Lord of the Rings were clearly never intended as a standalone piece of work. I suppose an extension is the best description. The story […]
Some Thoughts Inspired by the Bragg Equation
As a small boy I desperately wanted a telescope. I loved looking at the stars and the Moon. Light pollution meant I could only rarely make out the Milky Way – when I did it just looked like light cloud – but I really wanted to see it in more detail. I’d also heard that […]
Chosroes, King of Persia – Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Chapter 42 Part 3
It is easy to forget that the biggest threat to the Roman Empire throughout its history was the Persians. We read a lot about all the barbarian inroads into the empire, and know that the western empire was destroyed by the Goths and the eastern one by the Turks, so it is easy to underestimate […]
Trouble in Persia – Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Chapter 46 Part 1
The Persians and the Romans had been longtime rivals. In fact from Julius Caesar’s time when Pompey had established hegemony over Armenia and Colchis the Persians had been either resisting further Roman expansion, attempting to subvert Rome’s clients in the region or when the wind was up their tails trying to push back into Egypt […]