All About History

History can be viewed and reviewed through many different lenses, which is something I find endlessly captivating. One lens that appears to be coming up a bit for me recently is religion. What I mean by that is approaching a topic with the understanding that the people involved truly believed in their faith. It wasn’t a broad philosophy or a set of principles to guide behaviour. To them, this was the truth about the world. In my experience, history has tended to be a secular pursuit, which offers it some neutrality in such matters, but removing religion from some events robs them of their core. For something like the First Crusade, that seems pretty obvious, but it can sometimes get lost in talk of dukes, popes and new kingdoms being…

6 September 1997 PRINCESS DIANA’S FUNERAL On 31 August 1997 Diana, Princess of Wales, was killed in a car accident in Paris. A week later, her funeral was held at Westminster Abbey in London. The ceremony was attended by 2,000 people, and thousands more lined the streets to pay their respects as the funeral cortege travelled from Kensington Palace to the Abbey. The service was televised and watched worldwide by over 2 billion people. After the funeral, Princess Diana was buried in the grounds of her family’s ancestral home at Althorp in Northamptonshire. 11 September 2001 9/11 TERRORIST ATTACKS At 8:46am on 11 September 2001, an American Airlines plane flew into the side of the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. Seventeen minutes later, a…

47 CE LONDINIUM FOUNDED The Romans found a settlement, later to become Londinium and then later the capital of Britain. However, the original settlement lasts only 13 years before it is destroyed by Boudicca. It is then rebuilt and soon becomes one of the largest settlements. 60-61 CE BOUDICCA BEGINS HER REVOLT AGAINST ROME Boudicca, queen of the Iceni tribe, leads a revolt against the occupying Roman forces. Her husband Prasutagus has left portions of his lands to Nero, however Emperor Suetonius raids and steals these lands upon his death – Boudicca is flogged and her two daughters raped. Boudicca’s bloody revolt is successful at first but she is finally defeated in battle. c.63 CE JOSEPH OF ARIMATHEA’S PILGRIMAGE TO GLASTONBURY More legend than historical fact, Joseph of Arimathea is said to travel…

Across the English countryside, the remains of large rural homesteads that date to the time of the Roman occupation of Britain have been discovered by archaeologists. These archaeological sites can tell us a lot about the buildings that once stood, particularly about the development of so-called ‘villa rustica’ properties that were such a feature of ancient Roman agrarian life. The term villa rustica was used by the Romans to describe a grand house, located in a countryside setting, that provided a home for the owner and their family as well as accommodation for the workers of the estate and spaces for storage and farm animals. The name for these houses distinguished them from the villas located in or on the outskirts of Roman cities and towns. These country villas were…

The Roman dodecahedrons are one of archaeology’s greatest mysteries. Did they serve a military purpose? Civilian? Religious? No one really knows, but numerous theories exist as to these strange objects’ function. Examples have been found in military camps, the St Pierre Cathedral in Switzerland and even a bathhouse, all dating from between the 2nd and 4th centuries CE. The first dodecahedron was discovered at a site in Germany in 1739 and since then over 100 of these strange objects have been found across Europe, with 33 of them unearthed on British shores. Unusually, not a single example has been discovered in Italy itself — nor can any mention of them be found in Roman literature. While no two dodecahedrons are exactly the same, the examples discovered so far all have 12…

Suetonius Paulinus Roman, c.10 – c.69 CE Suetonius Paulinus had an almost impossible task. He was the Roman governor of Britain during the rebellion of the fierce Icini queen, Boudicca. At the Battle of Watling Street in 61 CE, Suetonius managed to finally gain the upper hand and slaughtered the rebels, Boudicca taking poison before she was caught. At Suetonius’ orders, some 80,000 men, women and children are said to have been killed. Concerned at continuing rebellion due to the general’s aggressive actions, the powers in Rome removed him from his position. Even today, he is best remembered as the Roman general who defeated Boudicca. Constantine III Roman, Unknown – 411 CE The final Roman ruler in Britain, Constantine III’s story is a most unusual one. He was a Roman…