The Galileo Affair
Galileo Galilei was an unknown, north Italian professor of mathematics, a lover of good wines with a razor-sharp wit until 1609, when he got a telescope. It changed his and our lives for ever. He learnt the world went round the sun! It led to “The Galileo Affair” that began in 1610 and ended in […]
The Moscow Fire
It was started on 14th September 1812, curiously the Fire of Moscow startedjust before Napoleon’s troops reached the city. The 1812 Fire of Moscow broke out on 14 September 1812, when Russian troops and most of the remaining residents had abandoned the city of Moscow just ahead ofthe French Emperor Napoleon’s troops entering the city […]
The Great Seal of Office
The “Great Seal” signifies that a document carries the force of the will of the Monarch. Interestingly, on December 11th 1688, while attempting to flee to France, James II threw his Great Seal into the River Thames, hoping that the machinery of government would stop. It didn’t. His successors, William III and Mary II just […]
What was the worst storm in Britain?
When asked this question most people say that the storm in 1953 was the worst peacetime weather disaster. It was one that claimed 307 lives in England and devastated parts of East Anglia.. However, the 1703 storm, caused by an extratropical cyclone that spread across the country and wiped out 1/3rd of our Navy! The […]
The Gunpowder Plot – a fool proof plan that wasn’t!
Let’s make history fun, this was a plan that the conspirators, pictured above, thought was fool proof, unfortunately it wasn’t! The Church of Egland had been formed 80 years before, but the conspirators were not happy, they wanted to bring the Catholic religion back to England, and it was obvious to them that James 1, […]
Why the Valley of the Kings?
Before the Valley of the Kings Pharaohs were buried in the great pyramids at Giza, however, there was a problem. They kept getting robbed! Basically, pharaohs were buried in pyramids, with all their belongings. They became a tomb robbers dream. It appears that a pyramid was the wrong place to save valuables. As a result, […]
Do you believe in the Afterlife?
The Egyptians did. To them it was very important, they believed in immortality! This was because they believed that death was just an intermission to life, not an end, which is why they were so supportive and paid such reverence to the gods. For this reason, on death they were mummified, to allow the […]
The Afterlife and the process of Mummification
Do you find this weird? The Ancient Egyptians believed in life after death, and their belief was that parts of them went to the Afterlife, in fact those parts that went into the Afterlife were: The Ka, Ancient Egyptian conception of the soul, which could bring the corpse back to life. The Ba, the spirit, […]
Howard Carter discovers Tutankhamun’s tomb
On November 4th 1922 Howard Carter discovered the tomb of the Egyptian pharaoh King Tutankhamun. He had been employed by Lord Carnarvon since 1907 looking after the excavations of the tombs in Deir el-Bahri, near Thebes. Then in 1914, Lord Carnarvon received the concession to dig in the Valley of the Kings, and again he asked Howard Carter […]
The canal of the Pharaohs
The Suez Canal blocked, what can they do? The Suez Canal became famous recently when the container ship Evergreen got stuck in the canal. The Suez Canal is today’s major route for goods coming from the Far East to Europe. When it got blocked, the world panicked. Today’s canal, which took ten years to build, […]