Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2018 i History Extra

"The Bayeux Tapestry is one of the most iconic sources of English history, yet comparatively few people living here are likely to have seen it in the flesh. That looks set to change following the announcement that the tapestry will be heading to the UK in 2022. Such a move would be fitting in more ways than one – for, in all likelihood, the tapestry was created in England, under Norman direction. And, despite it being a chronicle of Norman victory, it portrays the vanquished Anglo-Saxons in a surprisingly positive light. In our cover feature on page 60, Bayeux Tapestry expert Michael Lewis explores these fascinating aspects of the embroidery’s story. Meanwhile, Michael Wood has used this month’s column (page 17) to share his thoughts on the remarkable news. Another…

It was at about 5.30 in the morning that the Mexicans launched their final assault on the Alamo. Five months earlier, American settlers in Texas, or ‘Texians’, had rebelled against the Mexican government, driving away their forces. During the inevitable Mexican counter-attack, more than 200 Texian rebels had become trapped at the Alamo Mission, near San Antonio. Steadily the besiegers tightened their grip, and now they were ready to finish the job. As the Mexicans attacked, the Texian leader William Travis reportedly yelled: “Come on boys, the Mexicans are upon us and we’ll give them hell!” What followed went down in legend, though the reality was much bloodier and more confused than the myth. For a few minutes, the defenders’ cannons seemed to be winning the day, pouring shrapnel –…

“Byng’s loss of Minorca triggered a maelstrom of public outrage. Politician Charles Townshend wrote to a friend: “The ministers rave, the king swooned, the mob swears, the navy hang their heads & the merchants despair.” Many believed Byng deserved his fate. His effigy was burned in the streets; newspapers, pamphlets, and songs celebrated his execution. But others saw a deeper betrayal, and warned that Byng was a scapegoat sacrificed by the real offenders. The war had not gone well for the British thus far – they had also lost several forts and most of their army in North America. Conspiracy theorists claimed that aristocratic ministers were treacherously undermining Britain’s empire. These aristocrats were allegedly too sympathetic to France and too out of touch with the economic needs of real people.…

Manchester mummies shared same mother DNA testing on the mummies of two elite men, Khnum-nakht and Nakhtankh, has established that the pair are half-brothers. The mummies, which date to 1800 BC, belong to Manchester Museum, and debate as to their possible relationship has been ongoing since their discovery in a joint tomb at Deir Rifeh, 250 miles from Cairo, in 1907. DNA, extracted from the mummies’ teeth, has proven that the pair shared a mother. Earliest tea reference found in Leeds A 17th-century shopping list, discovered in the West Yorkshire archive at Wakefield, may contain the earliest independent reference to tea drinking in England. Dated 8 December 1644, the list, written for an apothecarist, includes a request for 13 bottles of “china drink” – as tea was then known –…

Chester Chronicle 24 May 1799 In late May 1799, as news of the British and Ottoman defeat of Napoleon at the siege of Acre gradually made its way back from the continent, the Chester Chronicle was gripped by defeat of another kind – of plans gone awry and messy endings. Announcing it as an “Extraordinary Story”, the Chronicle set about relating a tale of the late Lord Orford. Being out of town, Orford had left his house in the care of a female servant. One day, a letter had arrived, claiming to say that his lordship would be returning and wanted all of his savings to be removed from the bank, and got ready in the house for the night before his arrival. The woman, being somewhat suspicious, took the…

Gary Oldman’s Churchillian metamorphosis in the film Darkest Hour (pictured right) is to be praised. I hope it helps people to understand what was happening in France at the time. The Routes de l’Exode (Roads to Exodus) saw perhaps 8–10 million French people thrown onto the road, heading west. That represents a significant proportion of the country’s population, joined by Belgian, Luxembourger and Dutch families – the whole lot terrorised by the Nazi onslaught. They had good reasons to be scared, as the Luftwaffe had the delightful trick of gunning down the civilians on these roads. I owe the fact I can write this letter to the German pilot who must have run out of bullets, thus saving my own father’s life. My dad was 10 at the time. I…

The first civilisations Noxious ghosts and evil eyes Humanity has lived in fear of witches’ baleful power for at least 4,000 years “She has given me to drink her life-depriving potion. She has bathed me in her deadly dirty water. She has rubbed me with her destructive evil oil.” Fear of the baleful power of witchcraft has, it seems, haunted humanity for thousands of years – as this incantation written by a resident of Mesopotamia proves. Anti-witchcraft texts found among the cuneiform clay tablets of this ancient civilisation depicted witches as mostly malevolent women, who practised harmful magic. Witches, we’re told, made images of their victims and then twisted the limbs to cause pain. They were also accused of burying these figures in graves in an act of magic that…

Life’s rich tapestry By the dawn of the 1930s, radio was bringing the entire world to listeners’ living rooms “I am just an ordinary housewife with little time for reading at my disposal, but I do look forward to a quiet hour or so… As I thread my needle, I may hear that I am to visit an African village, look at flowers or insects with that ‘inner eye’, or sing myself breathless in Sir Walford’s ‘cross-country run’.” These words – taken from a letter to the Radio Times’ weekly Selections from the Editor’s Post Bag – capture perfectly radio’s power to fire listeners’ imaginations, as this still relatively new form of mass communication entered the 1930s. Selections from the Editor’s Post Bag presented the whole gamut of readers’ views…

Beneath Another Sky: A Global Journey into History by Norman Davies Allen Lane, 768 pages, £30 Written in the wake of Davies’ Vanished Kingdoms, this is in some ways the sequel to that magnificent book about Europe’s lost realms. In other respects, it is not: its remit is global, based on an eastbound circumnavigation of the globe by plane, with at least 12 stops. Davies mixes personal experience and memoir with historical narratives, and combines these with reflections on people, politics and the environment. It is a smörgåsbord of a book. Davies begins in Cornwall, flies to Baku on the Caspian Sea, to the Emirates, Delhi, Malaysia, Singapore, Tasmania, Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, Texas, New York and eventually to Frankfurt. This flight prompts a mental visit to Cambridge, which in…

Henry III: The Great King England Never Knew it Had by Darren Baker The History Press, 416 pages, £20 Today, Henry III is hardly a historical celebrity. In the pantheon of English kings, he is overshadowed by his father, John, whose tyranny necessitated Magna Carta, and son Edward I, the Hammer of the Scots. Yet Henry’s reign (1216–72) was a transformational period in English history. Magna Carta was woven into the fabric of political society, the principle that government must operate within the law was firmly established, and regular assemblies became the norm under a new name: parliament. Perhaps the most significant years of Henry’s reign came between 1258 and 1265. A cohort of barons and bishops were frustrated by the king’s failure to consult them, dismayed by his favouring…

Home Front RADIO BBC Radio 4 Scheduled for Monday 5 March The 13th series of the drama set during the First World War once again focuses on life in Folkestone, and has the overarching themes of sex and morality. By spring 1918, the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps has set up base at the town’s Hotel Metropole – a move denounced by establishment figures, as Folkestone was also a major departure point for troops heading for France. The real historical figures in the series include Rose Allatini, who wrote under the pseudonym AT Fitzroy, and whose Despised and Rejected, which featured gay characters, was banned for its pacifist content.…

Kings of the sea EXHIBITION Ocean Liners: Speed and Style V&A, London Until 17 June - 020 7942 2000 • vam.ac.uk/OceanLiners The V&A is travelling back to the golden age of ocean travel this month, with a new exhibition exploring life at sea from the mid-19th to the late 20th century. The exhibition begins with Brunel’s famous steamship of 1859, the Great Eastern – at its time the largest ship the world had ever seen. Other vessels under the spotlight include the German passenger liner Kronprinz Wilhelm, which launched in 1901; Titanic and its sister ship Olympic; the floating art deco palaces of Queen Mary and Normandie; and the streamlined modernism of SS United States and QE2. More than 250 objects are on show, shedding light on all aspects of…

“I was only a little girl, but I still hear that voice of his in my head when I look back. It was confident, sonorous, and his words were filled with patriotism” Winston Churchill was a British statesman and author who served two spells as prime minister, notably from 1940–45 when his inspirational leadership and powerful oratory guided Britain through the Second World War. His writing career earned him a Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953. Widely acclaimed as one of the greatest Britons in history, he was recently portrayed by Gary Oldman on the big screen in the film Darkest Hour. When did you first hear about Winston Churchill? I first heard about him when I was a child. My father’s name was Winston, and when I was about…

Sicily is a crash course in the history of Mediterranean civilisation, wrapped up in a small yet perfectly formed island package. Temples and other ancient remains dot the beautiful countryside, including the celebrated complexes at Agrigento and Syracuse. The quieter and no less splendid ruins at Segesta and Selinunte make for superb alternatives. Greeks and Roman civilisation later gave way to Byzantine and Norman influence, best seen in the stunning mosaics in the Palatine Chapel in Palermo, nearby Monreale Cathedral and Cefalù’s remarkable Duomo. Along the coast from Cefalu, fortresses from various eras pay testament to the island’s coveted status for competing powers. Keep travelling east and Mount Etna, the volcano that has done much to shape the island’s history, looms into view. If you want to learn about the…

Helen Castor The attempt to piece together a psychological portrait of Elizabeth I is a fascinating challenge. Did she, like Alice in Wonderland, either mean what she said, or say what she meant? • Helen tries to decipher what Elizabeth I was really thinking on page 29 Alexander Watson I find the German Spring Offensive of 1918 fascinating because of the sheer drama. This was Germany’s slim, but real, last chance to win total victory in the First World War. • Alexander tells the story of Germany’s desperate final bid to win the war in 1918 on page 20 Wendy Webster What struck me is that there were new arrivals across all four nations of the United Kingdom. Even many of the islands of the British Isles became increasingly diverse.…

What did ‘prisoner of war’ mean in a medieval sense? It meant that the prisoner had been taken during war and, as a result, could be ransomed, exchanged or sold, as his new master saw fit. Captors enjoyed property rights over their prisoners. When was the term first used in England? Modern dictionaries date the term ‘prisoner of war’ to the beginning of the 17th century, but I’ve discovered it was actually employed 250 years earlier. In court documents from 1357, I found a reference to Bernard, Count of Ventadour being a prisoner de guerre of Edward III. The documents were written in Anglo-Norman, the language used at the English court at this time. Bernard was one of around 2,000 French soldiers captured by the English at the battle of…

The news of President Macron’s proposed loan of the Bayeux Tapestry to the UK has aroused huge interest here in Britain, not just at the prospect of hosting this marvellous work of art, but also in what it symbolises about Britain’s history. That a fragile, 70-metre-long embroidery from the 11th century has survived at all is of course little short of miraculous. It is still virtually intact, apart from the loss at the end of perhaps 3 metres of cloth, which in most experts’ view would have showed William the Conqueror crowned in Westminster Abbey, a scene to match Edward the Confessor enthroned at the start (for a brilliant – and to my eye convincing – reimagining of the lost section by the embroiderers of Alderney, see alderneybayeuxtapestry.com). But after…

Should museums charge entry fees? @sarsar242 They should be free. History belongs to everyone and should be accessible to all @ellowry National museums should. They have huge international appeal with visitors who would think nothing of paying for concerts or other entertainment attractions. The revenue should be reinvested into provincial museums @redmarsrising As a tourist I was amazed at the galleries and museums in London I could get into for free. I would have made a donation, but in several places I didn’t see anywhere to do that. You could start by saying donations are welcome! @HistoryLiv I previously worked in museums and no, they shouldn’t charge. They are the heart of a community and part of the lifelong learning that is a right for everybody @inkandowls As a student,…

Elizabeth I is an icon. The Virgin Queen is more instantly recognisable even than her monstrously charismatic father, Henry VIII. But she is also an enigma. The image of ‘Gloriana’ is a mask – literally so, in the ‘mask of youth’ portraits painted in the last two decades of her life. In these paintings, Elizabeth’s unlined face remains ageless and changeless, unlike the sitter on which they were modelled. And it is a mask that was – and is – remarkably difficult to shift. As England’s sovereign, Elizabeth said a great deal. She gave speeches, wrote letters, poems and prayers. Her comments, in public and private, were recorded by ministers, courtiers and ambassadors. But it is often difficult to be certain of what she actually meant . Her intellect is…

On the night of 8 April 1941, an RAF Whitley took off from Newmarket – home of the Special Duties squadron which dropped agents behind enemy lines for British intelligence. The plane was attacked by anti-aircraft fire near Zeebrugge but the rear gunner managed to take out one of the searchlights. As it approached the Franco-Belgian border, the dispatcher was told to “commence operations”. But what emerged from the plane and glided to the earth below wasn’t highly trained spies, it was carrier pigeons. The April flight was the first drop for a new secret operation – codenamed Columba. It was unusual because it relied on the contributions of British pigeon fanciers. The birds they donated were placed in containers which then floated to the ground in Europe beneath a…

Female scientists with international reputations were “shut out” by male colleagues A Lab of One’s Own: Science and Suffrage in the First World War by Patricia Fara Oxford University Press, 352 pages, £18.99 Helen Gwynne-Vaughan was one of the first female professors of botany in Britain. As a mycologist based at Birkbeck College, fungi were her passion. Her aim, she explained, was to present “the fungus as a living individual”. Gwynne-Vaughan’s meticulous microscopic work was widely admired, but it took guts in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to talk to male scientists about the reproductive processes and sexual proclivities of plants. Indeed, as Patricia Fara’s fascinating new book highlights so skilfully, it took courage for a woman to become any sort of scientist. Gwynne-Vaughan had been born in…

The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar Harvill Secker £12.99 Jonah Hancock is not your typical protagonist. A portly middle-aged Deptford widower, he lives alone with a niece who acts as his housekeeper. Decent but a little dull, he is an archetypal member of the 18th-century mercantile class. Nothing of any great note has ever happened to him and he has done nothing to disturb the smooth running of his comfortable life. All that is about to change, as debut novelist Imogen Hermes Gowar leads him on an unpredictable adventure through the streets of Georgian London. Hancock’s old friend and business associate, Captain Tysoe Jones, returns from a trading voyage with startling news. He has sold Hancock’s ship and invested the money in a rare curio – the…

The Day When… TV Yesterday Scheduled for Wednesday 21 February You don’t have to subscribe to the ‘great man’ theory of history to realise there are times when one leader’s actions profoundly shape what will follow. This new series uses archive material and dramatisations to hone in on days key to the course of the Second World War. It begins with Winston Churchill’s determination to keep fighting in 1940, even as Hitler’s armies conquered western Europe in the blitzkrieg offensive. The second episode focuses on Charles de Gaulle and his decision to fly to Britain to become leader of the Free French rather than sign up to a request for an armistice.…

The Miniaturist DVD (Spirit Entertainment Limited, £12.99) It’s 1686 and 18-year-old country girl Nella Oortman (Anya Taylor-Joy) arrives in Amsterdam to begin her new life as the wife of merchant Johannes Brandt (Alex Hassell). Her wedding present from her husband is a cabinet-sized replica of their home. It will be furnished by a model-maker who appears to have an uncanny knowledge of what goes on in a secretive household behind closed doors. Based on Jessie Burton’s bestselling novel from 2014, a book in turn inspired by a real dolls’ house held in Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum, The Miniaturist explores a puritanical world where personal freedom can never be taken for granted – certainly not for Johannes, whose homosexuality is regarded by his community as a sin, or for any woman who aspires…

1. Who or what was a knocknobbler? 2. What links Vauxhall, Ranelagh and Marylebone? 3. What is said to have sparked a war between the rival city states of Bologna and Modena in 1325? 4. Who was Evgenia Petrovna Shelepina and who did she marry in 1924? 5. Which word has its origins in the ancient Greek term for a selfish individual who took no part in public life? 6. Which British prime minister built the majority of the wall pictured below with his own hands at his home in Kent? QUIZ ANSWERS 1. A person employed to drive unruly dogs or children out of churches. 2. They were 18th-century pleasure gardens. 3. The theft of a wooden bucket. 4. Leon Trotsky’s secretary. She married Arthur Ransome, author of Swallows…

As possibly one of the most stunning geological monuments in the world, it’s no surprise that the highest, southern peak of The Rock of Gibraltar was recognised as a Unesco World Heritage Site in 2016. Positioned at the south-western tip of Europe, the staggering elevated mass of limestone is the result of Africa pushing into Europe over the course of millions of years. In classical times, it was said to be one of the Pillars of Hercules, and by the time the British captured Gibraltar in 1704, it was known as the ‘fortress of all fortresses’. The southern peak of The Rock was recognised as a World Heritage Site primarily because it provides evidence of its earliest inhabitants, the Neanderthals. But the limestone block and the military structures within are…

RATS A recent study has claimed that human fleas (above) and body lice were to blame for the Black Death rather than rats, which have been traditionally linked to the spread of the devastating disease. MOSAICS A 3-metre by 2-metre Roman mosaic found in Leicester has been lifted, reassembled and preserved. Dating to the late third or early fourth century AD, the mosaic once formed part of the floor of a Roman townhouse. TREES A project to help safeguard trees in England’s historic parks and gardens has been launched by the University of Southampton in partnership with Historic England. The study will assess the level of threat to historic green spaces.…

Don’t move the tapestry As the author of the historical novel 1066: The Conquest, which describes the life of the Duke of Normandy leading up to the battle of Hastings, I am not sure that moving the Bayeux Tapestry is a good idea. I am already dubious over the business of temporary exhibitions, which require transporting major works of art around the planet, with all the risks it brings. The size and delicate fabric makes packaging and transporting the tapestry extremely difficult. Bayeux is not far, and easy to reach, so why move it across the Channel? Leave it where it is in its natural surroundings. Peter Fieldman, Madrid Drugs and dancing I write in response to Helen Carr’s article (The Medieval Dance of Death, Christmas) where ergot mould is…

I have been championing the possibility of the Bayeux Tapestry coming to Britain since 2013 – when I joined the tapestry’s scientific committee – so I am absolutely delighted by news of the loan. As far as we know, this is the first time that the embroidery has left France since it was originally sent to Bayeux in the 1070s. It is extremely generous of the French state (which owns the tapestry), and the City of Bayeux, (its custodians), to allow this to happen. It is an act that speaks volumes of the closeness between Britain and France. Although the tapestry documents a time of conflict, it is not lost on the people of Normandy that these events were reversed in 1944, when ‘the conquered’ became ‘liberators’. Theresa May was…

The SA was vital to the Nazi project, even after its cudgels and knuckledusters had been set aside Stormtroopers: A New History of Hitler’s Brownshirts by Daniel Siemens Yale, 504 pages, £25 History has largely by-passed the Sturmabteilung, or Stormtroopers. Also known as the Brownshirts, or the SA, Hitler’s thugs and boot boys provided “hall security” for the Nazis in their early years, and were notorious for battling their communist and socialist counterparts for control of the streets in the dying days of the Weimar Republic. Yet, despite its significant role in Hitler’s rise, the SA has only rarely been the subject of a dedicated study, lacking as it does the diabolical glamour of the SS or Gestapo. Daniel Siemens’ latest volume is welcome, therefore, but not just by virtue…

Paradise in Chains by Diana Preston Bloomsbury, 352 pages, £25 Ever since Ferdinand Magellan’s voyage across the Pacific in 1520-21, the vast ocean has beguiled European imaginations. However for the next two centuries, the ocean largely retained its mystery. All that changed in the mid-18th century, thanks to improved ships, as well as advances in medicine and navigation. Knowledge of the Pacific exploded with the voyages of navigators such as Samuel Wallis, Louis De Bougainville and James Cook. Paradise in Chains offers a shipshape addition to a flotilla of books on Pacific maritime history, narrating two crucial early British endeavours and the subsequent explosive intrusion of European activity: the establishment of the convict colony in New South Wales, and the mission of the HMS Bounty to transport breadfruit from Tahiti…

Theft of Life Imogen Robertson (2014) Set in 1785, the fifth (and most recent) instalment in Imogen Robertson’s series about proto-feminist Harriet Westerman weaves a clever plot around the death of a West Indies slave-owner whose body is found outside St Paul’s Cathedral. As Harriet and her friend, eccentric scientist Gabriel Crowther, investigate the circumstances surrounding the death, secrets of the dark world of the British slave trade are forced into the light. The Revelations of Carey Ravine Debra Daley (2016) In 1770s London, narrator Carey Ravine and her husband Oliver Nash are living beyond their means, and flirting with a dangerous world of professional gambling. Further troubles beckon with the sudden arrival of a mysterious man who threatens to unearth secrets from Carey’s past and the disappearance of her…

It’s covered elsewhere in these pages (see feature on page 34), but it would be remiss not to flag up Civilisations (BBC Two, March), the nine-part update of the classic 1969 art history series. This time around, the focus is global rather than just the west, and the presenters are Simon Schama, Mary Beard and David Olusoga. On BBC Radio 4, forthcoming episodes of Costing the Earth include ‘Heroes of the Reef’ (Tuesday 27 February), focusing on Charlie Veron, a scientist who has been diving on the Great Barrier Reef for half a century. Why were his warnings in the 1980s about rising sea temperatures and coral bleaching ignored? On Thursday 1 March, the ever-excellent In Our Time finds Melvyn Bragg and guests turning their attention to military strategist Sun…

1. ANAESTHESIA HERITAGE CENTRE A unique medical science museum devoted to the history of anaesthesia and pain relief. The current exhibition ‘Brave Faces’ shows how the innovations of Ivan Magill and Stanley Rowbotham revolutionised facial surgery. heritage@aagbi.org | 020 7631 1650 2. BAMBURGH CASTLE A stunning coastal fortress at the heart of an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Explore fourteen rooms, The Aviation Artefacts Museum, archaeology, cafeteria, grounds and battlements. Discover an amazing eclectic collection of 3500 items. bamburghcastle.com | 01668 214515 3. ROSSLYN CHAPEL Founded in 1446, the beauty of its setting and its ornate stonework have inspired and attracted visitors for generations. Just seven miles south of Edinburgh, with good transport links, Rosslyn Chapel is open all year. rosslynchapel.com | 0131 440 2159 4. NATIONAL TRUST CALKE ABBEY The house where…

Bazmaawurd A fragrant flatbread packed with lemony chicken, walnuts and fresh herbs, Bazmaawurd is a light Persian dish bursting with aromatic flavours. This particular recipe comes from the royal court of the Muslim caliph al-Ma’mun. In the early ninth century, al-Ma’mun ruled over the mammoth Abbasid empire from Baghdad, then the cultural capital of the Islamic world. Despite being more than a thousand years old, this medieval recipe has a surprisingly contemporary taste, and wouldn't feel out of place in a 21st-century cookbook. Designed to be a mouth-watering opening course at a court banquet, the dish takes its name from the Persian words bazm, meaning ‘banquet’, and awurd, meaning ‘bringing’. As the name suggests, it’s perfect to share around a dinner party table. While this recipe uses lemon, the ninth-century…