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One thing you need to remember about History
Everybody lies. Two versions of history in collision
OK, I admit it. I’m a history nerd and always have been. I can’t even remember when I was first bitten by the bug but I do remember getting an Unwin Illustrated Book of British History as a birthday present when I was around 7 or 8 — probably from my Hungarian grandmother as it was so age-inappropriate — and reading straight through it from cover to cover.
I fell in love. Here were people from a long time ago and in some ways, they were the same as us, in other ways they were alien and strange. There were babies — but they were tightly wrapped into parcels, just like the Baby Jesus. There were knights in armour, there were princes and Kings and Queens.
There were a few peasants to grow the food, but they were simple and boring people. There were priests and monks and nuns, just like at school. In the later pages all kinds of peculiar machines sprouted and Parliament replaced kings which was much less fun.
I loved the clothes, particularly the medieval and Elizabethan clothes, up to the end of the 17th century in fact. I became absolutely obsessed with the wasp-waisted Elizabethan courtiers and spent hours drawing anatomically improbable ladies and colouring in their beautiful skirts.
