Contents


About the Author

Foreword


THE ANCIENT WORLD


1. Flavius Josephus, the Roman destruction of Jerusalem, and two millennia of bloodshed in the Middle East

2. Theodosius I: the forgotten man who turned Christianity into a global religion


THE MEDIEVAL WORLD


3. Rome was not civilized and the ‘Dark Ages’ were not dark

4. The Vikings were no worse than the Anglo-Saxons

5. Alfred the Great, king of Wessex, was a Roman Catholic

6. King Harold’s England was multicultural and decidedly European

7. The Battle of Hastings (1066) wasn’t such a big deal

8. The cult of Magna Carta is historical nonsense: Oliver Cromwell called it ‘Magna Farta’

9. The Magna Carta barons were guilty of treason

10. Save the Statute of Marlborough (1267): our oldest law

11. Medieval cathedrals are bursting with colour again

12. Richard the Lionheart and Saladin: chivalry and atrocities

13. Saladin and the fateful battle of Hattin (1187): lessons for the modern Middle East

14. Forget the Da Vinci Code: this is the real mystery of the Knights Templar

15. A stain on history: the burning of Jacques de Molay, Grand Master of the Knights Templar

16. The Turin Shroud is one of the greatest medieval artworks ever created

17. Regicide and ambition: Richard III and the death of the ‘princes’ in the Tower

18. Reburying Richard III: is it the right body?


THE RENAISSANCE AND REFORMATION


19. Medieval al-Andalus: tolerance and totalitarianism

20. Savonarola and Mary Queen of Scots: the bloody underside of the ‘civilized’ Renaissance

21. Columbus, greed, slavery, and genocide: what really happened to the American Indians

22. How the Tudor spin machine hid the brutal truth about the English Reformation

23. Thomas Cromwell was the Islamic State of his day

24. How Protestantism fuelled the deadly witch craze

25. Guy Fawkes. Islamists, converts, and terrorism: some things never change

26. New Year’s Day is too soon after Christmas. Let’s move it back to its proper place—in March


THE VICTORIAN WORLD


27. Haters back off. Lord Elgin was a hero who saved the marbles for the world

28. Greece knows it has no legal right to the Elgin Marbles: that’s why it won’t sue the UK

29. Did Moses read hieroglyphics? The race to translate the Rosetta Stone

30. Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace: coding pioneer a century before Alan Turing


WORLD WAR ONE


31. Fritz Haber: the horror story of the man who invented poison gas

32. When Churchill got it very wrong: Gallipoli


WORLD WAR TWO


33. Agent Garbo: the amazing Spanish spy who took on Hitler and saved D-Day

34. Noor Inayat Khan: a gutsy British World War Two hero, a woman, and a Muslim

35. Dresden was a civilian town with no military significance: why did we burn its people?


THE MODERN WORLD


36. The dark, deep roots of Britain’s fascination with witchcraft

37. How German is the Queen?


First Published…

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