England Britain

The historical Merlin was no rough magician: he was a learned figure from the cutting edge of medieval science and adept in astrology, cosmology, prophecy, and natural magic, as well as being a seer and a proto-alchemist. His powers were convincingly real—and useful, for they helped to add credibility to the "long-lost" history of Britain which first revealed them to a European public. Merlin's prophecies reassuringly foretold Britain's path, establishing an ancient ancestral line and linking biblical prophecy with more recent times. Merlin helped to put British history into world history.

Eisenhower's Armies is the story of two very different armies learning to live, work, and fight together even in the face of serious strategic disagreements. The Anglo-American relationship from 1941-1945 proved to be the most effective military alliance in history. Yet there were also constant tensions and disagreements that threatened to pull the alliance apart.

England in the Age of Chivalry … and Awful Diseases covers the events, personages, and ideas most commonly known as “medieval.” This includes Geoffrey Chaucer, the peasants revolt, the Scottish Wars of Independence, the Great Famine of 1315, the Black Death, and the 100 Years War. Central to this time is King Edward III, who started the 100 Years War and defined the concept of chivalry, including England’s order of the garter. His legacy continues to shape our view of England’s history and is crucial in understanding the development of Europe.

In this book, we explore British Colonialism in India, a history of oppression and exploitation, whilst celebrating the contributions that the diaspora and its descendants have made to British society. We explore the origins of the British East India Company, navigating through the dark history of a struggle for independence. On the way we meet Mahatma Gandhi, and recognize his significance in the fight for independence, before we discuss the partition of India and creation of Pakistan. We conclude with Indian emigration to the UK, and the history of the modern-day British Indian.

Since 1066, when William the Conqueror took the throne, English and Scottish kings have sired at least 150 children out of wedlock. Many were acknowledged at court and founded dynasties of their own. Others were only acknowledged grudgingly or not at all. In the 20th century, this trend for royals to father illegitimate children continued, but the parentage, while highly probable, has not been officially recognized. This book is a genuinely fresh approach to British kings and queens, examining their lives and times through the unfamiliar perspective of their illegitimate children.

On January 22, 1879, a massive Zulu host attacked the British Army's 24th Regiment in its encampment at the foot of the mountain of Isandlwana. It was the first major encounter in the Anglo-Zulu War and a disastrous defeat for the colonial power. Later that afternoon the victorious Zulus would strike the tiny British garrison at Rorke's Drift.

Along the banks of the James River, Virginia, during an oppressively hot spell in the middle of summer 1619, two events occurred within a few weeks of each other that would profoundly shape the course of history. In the newly built church at Jamestown, the General Assembly - the first gathering of a representative governing body in America - came together. A few weeks later, a battered privateer entered the Chesapeake Bay carrying the first African slaves to land on mainland English America.

The modern history of Africa was, until very recently, written on behalf of the indigenous races by the white man, who had forcefully entered the continent during a particularly hubristic and dynamic phase of European history. In 1884, Prince Otto von Bismarck, the German chancellor, brought the plenipotentiaries of all major powers of Europe together, to deal with Africa's colonization in such a manner as to avoid provocation of war. This event - known as the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 - galvanized a phenomenon that came to be known as the Scramble for Africa.

The Boer War was the defining conflict of South African history and one of the most important conflicts in the history of the British Empire. Naturally, complicated geopolitics underscored it, going back centuries. In fact, the European history of South Africa began with the 1652 arrival of a small Dutch flotilla in Table Bay, at the southern extremity of the African continent, which made landfall with a view to establishing a victualing station to service passing Dutch East India Company (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie) ships.

In this boldly drawn portrait of 18th-century England, Roy Porter defines a nation from its princes to its paupers, from its metropolis to its smallest hamlet. The topics covered run the gamut, covering diet, housing, prisons, rural festivals, bordellos, plays, paintings, and work and wages.

Warrior and writer, genius and crank, rider in the British cavalry’s last great charge and inventor of the tank - Winston Churchill led Britain to fight alone against Nazi Germany in the fateful year of 1940 and set the standard for leading a democracy at war. Like no other portrait of its famous subject, Forty Ways to Look at Winston Churchill is a dazzling display of facts more improbable than fiction, and an investigation of the contradictions and complexities that haunt biography.

In case 5 of The Missing Cases of Sherlock Holmes, The Adventure of the Absent Wife, Holmes and Watson are called to Liverpool to solve a disappearance. The ending is shocking ... quite shocking, indeed.

In a life of extraordinary drama, Jane Boleyn was catapulted from relative obscurity to the inner circle of King Henry VIII. As powerful men and women around her became victims of Henry’s ruthless and absolute power, including her own husband and sister-in-law, Queen Anne Boleyn, Jane’s allegiance to the volatile monarchy was sustained and rewarded. But the price for her loyalty would eventually be her undoing and the ruination of her name. For centuries, little beyond rumor and scandal has been associated with “the infamous Lady Rochford".

Millions of words of scholarship have been expended on the world's most famous author and his work. And yet a critical part of the puzzle, Shakespeare's library, is a mystery. For four centuries people have searched for it: in mansions, palaces, and libraries; in riverbeds, sheep pens, and partridge coops; and in the corridors of the mind. Yet no trace of the Bard's manuscripts, books, or letters has ever been found.

In The Diana Chronicles, you will meet a formidable female cast and understand as never before the society that shaped them: among them, Diana's sexually charged mother, bad-girl sister-in-law Fergie, and, most formidable of them all, her mother-in-law, the Queen. Add Camilla Parker-Bowles, the ultimate "other woman" into this combustible mix, and it's no wonder that Diana broke out of her royal cage into celebrity culture, where she found her own power and used it to devastating effect.

Discover all the foul facts about the Vile Victorians, including the murderers who wouldn't hang, when the first public loo was flushed and about stag hunting in Paddington Station. These bestselling titles are sure to be a huge hit with yet another generation of Terry Deary fans.

The author of the "dazzling epic" (Lev Grossman, Time) Brilliant delivers an indelible view of the ways silence affects those who seek it and those who have it imposed upon them. Through her original, intertwined histories of the penitentiary and the monastery, Jane Brox illuminates the many ways silence is far more complex than any absolute; how it has influenced ideas of the self, soul, and society.

The half millennium between the creation of the English nation in around 550 and the Norman Conquest in 1066 was a formative one. This groundbreaking series rediscovers the Anglo-Saxons through vivid portraits of 30 incredible men and women, as told by their contemporary admirers.

About empty thrones, a lot can be said. Throughout history, both ancient and near modern, a lack of an heir and the sudden death of a beloved monarch always meant trouble. When the position of a king is up for grabs, a lot of eager hands come forward. Pretenders and would-be heirs, cousins and nephews, bastard sons and daughters - they all came forward staking their claim to the throne. In the history of Medieval England, such episodes were many.

Anne Easter Smith has studied this king and his period for several decades and has given us a compelling and real portrait of a three-dimensional man of his time - neither saint nor Shakespeare’s monster. Richard was known as a loyal brother, compassionate king, faithful husband, and courageous warrior, all the while hiding his cruel scoliosis. This Son of York’s themes are about duty and loyalty, but they also incorporate love, passion, tragic loss and a king’s caring for the common man.