The first king of this tiny country, washed by the Atlantic, and blessed with fine seamen, navigators and harbours, was Alfonso I, in 1139, but the Portuguese Empire…
Author: Dean Swift
‘Dean Swift’ is a pen name: the author has been a soldier; he has worked in sales, TV, the making of films, as a teacher of English and history and a journalist. He is married with three grown-up children. They live in Spain.
Two Popes with the name Julius
In this case I cannot do my usual playing with papal names and invented adjectives; some of my faithful followers might like to read about ‘Julian Popes’, as…
Further thoughts on the Khmer Rouge
In 1970, serious trouble boiled up again when the Prince Sihanouk was knocked off the throne by a Cambodian communist guerilla force called Khmer Rouge. This brutal, well-organised…
Four revolutions of 1848
Revolutions are a regular feature in all history, human nature being what it is. The careful student can probably find a revolution of some kind every year since…
Important European families: Este and Esterhazy
Any family that distinguishes itself for eight hundred and seventy-five years must have something special, and the Italian family d’Este has it. Appearing first in the misty beginnings…
The murder of Elisabeth Feodorovna
This beautiful, doomed woman was the sister of the Tsarina Alexandra of Russia, and of Prince Ernest of Hesse-Darmstadt, and the daughter of Princess Alice of Great Britain,…
Seven Christian kings in Scandinavia
Christian I was born in 1426 and became King of Denmark in 1448, King of Norway in 1450 and Sweden in 1457. In case this seems greedy he…
Further thoughts on Thomas Becket, martyr and saint
Thomas Becket, or Thomas à Becket as he was called by my teacher of History, was not a Saxon. He was a son of a wealthy Norman merchant…
‘Benedict’ popes before Benedict XVI
Pope Francisco recently reached the throne of Peter because his predecessor decided, wisely perhaps, to retire from the Papacy before his death – a rare festivity in the…
Bundeswehr
After Federal Germany’s entry into the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in May, 1955, the Federal German Armed Forces came into being under the name Bundeswehr. At first,…