Here is something serious history students can get their teeth into. Can you name each one of the kings in this very famous photograph. Clue: They all descend…
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.
George Washington
George Washington was born in the early part of the eighteenth century (1732), a son of a planter in Virginia, he was a Southerner. At 22 he was…
The Myth of King Arthur
The Myth of King Arthur. Thirteenth century Europe knew much of the legends of a possibly Welsh King called Arthur, who supposedly drove away Britain’s enemies, laid the…
European anti-Semitism in the 13th century
European Anti-Semitism in the 13th century. There can be no doubt that the thirteenth century was the most violently anti-Semitic in all the Middle Ages. Kings in Europe…
The Zimmerman Telegram
The Zimmerman Telegram. On 19 January, 1917, twenty-two months before the end of the Great War (1914 – 18), the United States had still not joined with The…
Nuri as Said, and what Iraq might have been
Nuri as Said, and what Iraq might have been. Though we think of Iraq as a Middle Eastern country, it is really West Asian, bordering on Turkey to…
Is Spain democratic?
Is Spain democratic? April of the year 2014 is with us, and one cannot really face the headache of the news on television every evening, because the country…
News from Dean Swift
The book is taking up all my time and I am doing it alone. Thanks for your patience. I shall try to write a post for General-history this…