Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2021 i History Extra

“I’m writing this a few weeks into 2021, and so far the dramatic news agenda of 2020 shows little sign of abating. Here in the UK we’re in lockdown – although there are grounds for hope with the vaccination programme well under way. Meanwhile, soon after we sent our last issue to press, Trump supporters launched an astonishing attack on the US Capitol. The events in Washington were extraordinary, but were they truly unprecedented? In Behind the News, on page 10, we set them in the context of America’s turbulent past. Assuming the pandemic has subsided, next year should see the Bayeux Tapestry on display in Britain. In advance of its arrival, our content director, David Musgrove, has co-written a book on the Tapestry, and in this issue he and…

EYE-OPENER Warts and all Rendered at life size using dark red pigment, and featuring two handprints above its hairy back, this depiction of a wild “warty pig” dates from at least 45,500 years ago – making it the world’s oldest known animal cave painting. The picture was found in a cave in a remote valley on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, and it offers the earliest evidence of human settlement in the area. It appears to be part of a wider narrative scene featuring two other pigs whose images have only been partially preserved. These Sulawesi warty pigs have been hunted by humans for thousands of years, and the species is a key feature of artwork found elsewhere in the region. Experts hope that this latest find, made in 2017…

How Thomas Becket Rose from the Dead (January) gives interesting details of the aftermath of the saint’s murder in Canterbury Cathedral, and notes that, on 21 May 1172, Henry II admitted he was to blame and that part of his penance would include donations in Becket’s name. Just before decimalisation, in 1971, one of my colleagues was examining the Canterbury Cathedral accounts when an entry caught his eye. The amount in question, received from the treasury, had no explanation, and was for £2 13s & 4d. Any entry ending in 13s & 4d or 6s & 8d relates to a medieval entry – these being either a mark or half mark, a unit of account which after the Norman conquest was worth 13 shillings and 4 pence, or two thirds…

Wounded pride The legendary Apache leader Geronimo (shown right), and five other Native American chiefs, rode on horseback down Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington DC in the 1905 inauguration parade for President Theodore Roosevelt. Once a much-feared guerrilla warrior, Geronimo had been more or less a prisoner since his surrender in 1886. Roosevelt said he included him in the parade “to give the people a good show”. Geronimo died four years later, bitterly regretting that he’d ever surrendered at all. Doctor’s orders? Tomato ketchup was once seen as a medicine that would cure indigestion and diarrhoea. In 1834, an American physician named John Cook Bennett decided that tomatoes were some kind of miraculous foodstuff. He concocted his own ketchup recipe and other tomato-centric recipes, claiming the main ingredient could remedy all kinds…

It’s 70 metres long, tells a tale that stretches over land and sea, covers a crucial piece of history, and has a wide cast of characters. Yet the Bayeux Tapestry does not relate the whole story of the Norman Conquest of 1066. It vividly records the head-to-head clash between England’s King Harold II “Godwinson” and Duke William of Normandy, placing these two protagonists firmly in the thick of the action. But it omits pivotal parts and players, notably the other battles of the Conquest year that took place in northern England – Fulford and Stamford Bridge – and one man in particular, Edgar Ætheling, who might have been king in 1066. The Bayeux Tapestry is a unique survival of medieval embroidery (it’s not a true tapestry, despite the name) and…

Ellie Cawthorne: Your new book explores how modern Britain is still shaped by its imperial history. Where can we still see the influence of empire today? Sathnam Sanghera: It’s absolutely everywhere. There are millions of expressions of it. You can feel it in our language – the phrase “juggernaut” comes from Sanksrit; “bungalow”, “shawl” and “sandals” are all words of Indian origin; while “zombie” comes from west Africa and “toboggan” is Native American. A lot of our businesses emerged from the colonial era. Liberty of London began by selling silks and cashmere shawls from the east. The company that became Shell Oil started off importing oriental seashells. Wembley Stadium was originally known as the Empire Stadium, and the roads around it, some of which still exist, were named by arch-imperialist…

In the wake of the SARS and MERS outbreaks earlier this century, as well as the dangers of new strains of influenza, the Ebola epidemic, and popular concerns with threats to the viability of antibiotics, there was already a strong audience for popular medical history. Unsurprisingly, that has grown hugely in the past year. The exposure of grievous inequality by the Covid-19 pandemic, and forced trade-offs between a wide range of social factors, brings the political economy of disease control into focus as never before. Charles Kenny’s book, in the planning since 2015, gains resonance from being able to reckon with the significance and potential aftermaths of the current crisis. It discusses the coronavirus pandemic throughout. Despite its subtitle, this book does not present the story of human infection as…

As part of its campaigns in 2015, the activist collective Rhodes Must Fall Oxford, which works to address the legacies of colonialism at the University of Oxford, called the Pitt Rivers Museum “one of the most violent spaces in Oxford”. The Brutish Museums forms part of Dan Hicks’ response to that statement. Hicks is professor of contemporary archaeology at Oxford’s School of Archaeology and also a curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum, and he applies both his skills as an archaeologist and a museum curator in the writing of this book. The result is an unprecedentedly detailed – and horrifying – account of the 1897 British Punitive Expedition to Benin City (now the capital of Edo State in modern Nigeria) that frames museums as storehouses of the spoils of war.…

April issue on sale 18 March 2021 Peerless prime ministers On the 300th anniversary of Robert Walpole taking office, historians nominate Britain’s greatest PMs Imperial office Alan Lester explains how a small group of British officials sought to administer a sprawling, global empire Cleopatra and Rome Joyce Tyldesley on the Egyptian queen’s doomed quest for survival Deadly genius Jerry Brotton tells the extraordinary story of the blood-soaked Renaissance artist Cellini…

Sathnam Sanghera I began writing my book much before the recent Black Lives Matter protests, and so it’s been quite surreal to see my niche interest become a massive concern. Sathnam considers how the legacy of imperialism still pervades modern society on page 78 David Musgrove What really struck me while writing (with Professor Michael Lewis) our new book on the Bayeux Tapestry was the bits of the 1066 story that are not included within it. David and Michael examine the events and people the Tapestry excludes on page 41 Katherine Pangonis Writing my first book took me from the ruins of the Middle East to the great libraries of western Europe. In Jerusalem, Antioch, Edessa, Tripoli and Tyre I came as close as I could to the world of…

One of the very few benefits of returning to lockdown living, for some of us, is having the time to read – and Twitter is always a reliable source of book recommendations. Helen McCarthy (@HistorianHelen) asked for nominations of “the best historical biographies of all time – any period or geography, scholarly or popular”. John Gallagher (@earlymodernjohn) was quick out of the blocks, suggesting Lucy Hughes-Hallett’s 2013 biography of Italian poet, playwright and journalist Gabriele D’Annunzio, whose First World War experiences made him a national hero. Gallagher praised The Pike as “propulsive and unput-downable (often said, very rarely true), and formally incredibly exciting”. One of my colleagues at Royal Holloway, University of London, Edward Madigan (@MadiganEdward) recommended “Negro With a Hat, Colin Grant’s 2008 biography of [Jamaican political activist] Marcus…

Harri Fychan ap Harri Brenin ab Edmwnt ab Owain ap Maredudd ap Tudur. It’s quite a mouthful, isn’t it? But that’s exactly how King Henry VIII could have referred to himself if he was taking into account his Welsh ancestry – and it’s a name that his great-grandfather “Owen Tudor” would have recognised. You probably won’t be shocked to learn that Henry’s contemporaries didn’t refer to him by this 13-word moniker. You may, however, be surprised to learn that neither, for the most part, did they call him a “Tudor”. Before his victory at Bosworth, Henry VII was usually known as Henry of Richmond. When staking his claim to the throne, he downplayed the lineage of his grandfather – which is why Richard III and the pretender Perkin Warbeck did…

Everyone should read this book, even if they are not particularly interested in history or indeed the countryside. This is one of those eye opening, revelatory books that overturns myths and centuries of received literary wisdom. It was, and still is, a passionate call to look afresh at the world around you and question everything that you thought you knew. I read it when it first came out in 1986. I was in my early twenties then, and entranced by the detective work and the interplay between the real physical world and the written word. It has radically altered my relationship with the natural world and gave me the opportunity to begin to understand and investigate the great outdoors in a wholly different way. Rackham pulls together archaeology, biology, geography,…

Where does this new instalment of your series take the story? The story starts in Languedoc in 1572, with the Joubert family discussing whether or not they should attend the royal wedding between the Huguenot Henry of Navarre and the Catholic Marguerite de Valois – intended to bring peace to France after 10 years of religious war. From Paris, the action moves to the “city of tears” itself, Amsterdam, and finally to Chartres. What fascinated you about France’s wars of religion? The sequence of wars in the late 16th century was a turning point in French history and left hundreds of thousands murdered, tortured, exiled and imprisoned. Every corner of the land was decimated. Perhaps the most notorious and treacherous engagement was the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, when the Huguenot…

“You’re Dead to Me is different because we try to raise the level up to academic standards” You’re Dead To Me aims to reach an audience that may not necessarily be interested in history. How do you approach this? The idea of the show is to broaden the appeal of history to those who have felt that the subject is dry, difficult, intimidating, challenging or boring. People have often thought: “We can make it fun and get celebrities involved.” But when that happens, you inevitably bring the level of the knowledge down. The aim of You’re Dead is quite different in that we try to raise the level of the entertainment up to academic standards. We pair a comedian who doesn’t know much about the subject with a top academic.…

Stephen Hawking 1942-2018 IN PROFILE Stephen Hawking was a British theoretical physicist and cosmologist, best known for his book A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes (1988), which has sold more than 10 million copies. In 1963 the Cambridge academic was diagnosed with motor neurone disease; he died aged 76, after living with the disease for more than 50 years. The twice-married father of three’s life story was told in the hit biopic The Theory of Everything (2014). “Hawking’s correspondence with my brother changed my family’s path. My brother even had an electric wheelchair race with him” Bobby Seagull, star of University Challenge, is a mathematician, teacher, writer and broadcaster. His book, The Life-Changing Magic of Numbers, is out now. His Twitter is @Bobby_Seagull When did…

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Statues of historical figures in England are set to be given greater legal protection from being removed or altered, the government has announced. The new safeguards mean that statues can only be removed in exceptional circumstances, with a policy of “retaining and explaining” for future generations. Any proposed changes will be subject to planning permission, consultation with the local community and, if the governmental body Historic England objects, a final decision at ministerial level. Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, the communities secretary Robert Jenrick advocated for a “considered approach” to historical monuments, arguing that “they are hugely varied, some loved, some reviled, many forgotten, but all part of the weft and weave of our uniquely rich history”. The move is the latest development in an ongoing debate about the commemoration…

“Sitting among the discards of old books, I felt a flood of emotion” It’s time for a book clear out. I’ve been avoiding this moment for some years, but (and I’m sure many readers feel the same) our house is sagging under a lifetime’s accumulation of history books, especially from second-hand bookshops. Arlington and Lewisohn’s In Search of Old Peking (10p from a stall in Bath); Letters of Lupus of Ferrieres (9 francs from a bouquiniste on the Quai Voltaire in Paris). The latter inspired me to write a book about his friendship with Einhard, which is still in my drawer. There’s even a tiny battered Gertrude Bell from Baghdad’s open-air book street, still with a Farida beer-label bookmark. Stories, experiences, memories. But will I ever read them again? Be…

The greatest generation? In January’s Letters, Marek Pruszewicz refers to Britain as having an “obsession” with the Second World War, and implies that the British have a deep national conviction that Britain has always been a “good” country. I think he is entirely wrong in this, and that he confuses obsession with a deep admiration and a profound gratitude for the achievements of that generation, which fought and lived through the most devastating war in history, allowing us now to live in this country as free people. Pruszewicz finds himself amazed that part of Churchill’s funeral was re-enacted to mark its 50th anniversary and that no British person he spoke to found it odd that it was done. No wonder it was done. Churchill led his country and its people…

Cathy Newman on history’s greatest duos “When I embarked on my book It Takes Two, I didn’t want to write just about cloying romantic couples. Obviously great love stories are part of it, but it’s much more about the nature of partnership and collaboration, and what it is about the nature of a relationship between two people that can lead to something special, whether it’s business duos, sibling relationships or creative partnerships.” Padraic X Scanlan on slavery’s ongoing links to the British empire “I think there’s a national myth that, although Britain may have once been a slave trader, in the 19th century it turned against slavery and went from an empire devoted to slavery, to an empire devoted to freedom. But this is just not true. One of the…

The decisive role of the individual in making history is an unfashionable concept for many modern historians, but Professor Frank McDonough is not among them. For, as he argues in this second volume of his vast history of the rise and fall of the Third Reich, had Hitler never lived, the Second World War would not have happened, and the shape of today’s world would look very different. It was Hitler’s powerfully amoral will, mesmerising charisma, and above all his insanely obsessive mania to eliminate the Jews, vanquish Bolshevism, and win Germany Lebensraum (living space) in the east that made him ruler of much of Europe, but eventually destroyed him and his evil regime and left the continent in ruins. The book opens with the führer master of all he…

COLONIALISM Green Unpleasant Land by Corinne Fowler (Peepal Tree Press, 324 pages, £19.99) What lies beneath our landscapes The countryside has long been thought of as a bastion of Britishness, a rural idyll steeped in a nostalgic pastoral past. But Corinne Fowler offers a different perspective, revealing how rural landscapes have been shaped by colonial connections, conflict and oppression. This is self-professed “uncomfortable reading”, intended to challenge preconceptions and raise awareness of often unpalatable truths. CULTURAL Sailor Song: The Shanties and Ballads of the High Seas by Gerry Smyth (British Library, 160 pages, £14.99) Warbling on the waves In terms of surprising recent viral hits, sea shanties rank pretty high. Released early to capitalise on the phenomenon, this compendium of raucous melodies provides all the necessary historical background to understand…