History & Archaeology Thread

Discussion in 'Taylor's Tittle-Tattle - General Banter' started by StuBoy, Sep 22, 2020.

  1. Bwood_Horn

    Bwood_Horn Squad Player

    Just reserved as ILLs on SPYDUS.
     
  2. I Blame Pozzo

    I Blame Pozzo First Team

    True but I enjoyed it.
    Jocasta next Tuesday.
     
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  3. Bwood_Horn

    Bwood_Horn Squad Player

    Just got the notification from Herts ILL to say they're in. I don't suppose you have a recommended reading order?
     
  4. Keighley

    Keighley First Team

    Start with p.1.
     
  5. Bwood_Horn

    Bwood_Horn Squad Player

    I'm not a student in one of your tutorials.
     
  6. Keighley

    Keighley First Team

    Expecting them to read anythng is a bit ambitious...
     
  7. Bwood_Horn

    Bwood_Horn Squad Player

    Spooling KO?

    When I was more involved with teaching I was given the task of outlining what was expected of a course in biosensors. The biosensors 'text books' as such were very rare and mostly detailed the authors' research interests and didn't do too much for teaching. So brainstorming with my colleagues we came up with two texts that would be useful for a thorough grounding (and beyond) in surface (colloid and surfactant) science and (applied) electrochemistry which the head of group agreed with as long as we pushed 'his' book he edited on biomaterials (fair enough). The books were pricey but they should last a (research) lifetime.

    I would tell prospective student that these would be the standard texts and would complement all the lectures and practical sessions (chapters and problems would be referenced by lecturers and seminars and referred to as 'sets'). I informed the students that the department library kept a few copies of the sets as reference material and the university main library had some but only as short term loans. After the first year I would announce to the 30 students that to buy they could be found (2nd hand) much, much cheaper than Amazon in the SU shop. I used to check at the beginning of each cohort what their stock levels were.

    Year two: 12 sets in SU shop, 6 with unbroken spines all gone in the first week.
    Year three: 10 sets in SU shop, 8 with unbroken spines all gone in the first week.
    Year four: 11 sets in SU shop, 10 with unbroken spines all gone in the first week.
     
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  8. Since63

    Since63 Squad Player

    Probably in the order as listed. The Myers' book gives a good political background on which to pin the rest.
     
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  9. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    Let me read history books in his class. First time came up to me as a first year and said what are you doing ? Showed him a copy of Panzer Leader by Heinz Guderian and he nodded approvingly and walked back to the desk at the front of the classroom.
     
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  10. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    Great news. Quality programming in it's day. Mick Aston and his fellows were superb.

    Two books purchased recently yet to be read. Fifth Sun by Camilla Townsend covering the Aztecs or as they called themselves the Mexica. A new appraisal avoiding muchof the way the conquerors cast the Aztecs in a dark light and dispelling myths such as Cortes being worshipped as a God on his arrival.

    Operation Pedestal by Max Hastings. The account of the convoy that sailed to rescue Malta a vital outpost in the centre of the Mediterranean and critical to the later success of the invasion of Sicily and Italy. A tactical loss but a strategic victory with the iconic image of the tanker Ohio limping into the Grand Harbour to replenish the local Spitfires defending the island and fuelling submarines to disrupt Axis shipping which was key to starving Rommel of equipment and supplies.
     
  11. wfcmoog

    wfcmoog Tinpot

    How old are you Smudge? You strike me as a similar vintage to myself (43)
     
  12. I Blame Pozzo

    I Blame Pozzo First Team

    Natalie H on Clytemnestra on Tuesday. Very good again.
    I'm enjoying this series.
     
  13. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    Two years above you. Traveller. So pretty much the same vintage moogling.
     
  14. wfcmoog

    wfcmoog Tinpot

    Cassio then caught bunking games so moved to New. Must have known each other by sight.
     
  15. wfcmoog

    wfcmoog Tinpot

    My Oedipus is back on. Woodoaks farm in a month's time.

    It's gonna be gruesome.
     
  16. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    Probably moogie. Not too much mixing between the years. I expect as I did when a first year found the Sixth formers a bit intimidating. Thank goodness you were not a Pratt. ;)
     
  17. I Blame Pozzo

    I Blame Pozzo First Team

    Morning All
    Not really the correct thread but does anyone know which Betjeman poem,pertaining to locomotives/ railways is the most renowned?
    He wrote a number but neither my sister in law nor I could identify it from my brother's collected works of SJB.
    It's for Laurence's eulogy.
    Thanks in advance if anyone can suggest one.
    IBB
     
  18. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    He wrote several as you say IBB and of course was a campaigner for preserving many old stations and the old Euston Arch/Gate. Two of his most famous and I know are Buffet at Baker.St Station which is hardly pertinent for a funeral. The other is Pershore Station. It has a rather melancholic feel to it, very descriptive and has that encompassing sensation of time passing given by the age of the Pershore Cathedral bells and the contrast between the Victorian engineering and the modern electric light. Not sure if this is of any help.

    There is WH Auden's Night Mail a journey in verse for the famous documentary film. Sincerest condolences in any regard.

     
  19. I Blame Pozzo

    I Blame Pozzo First Team

    Thank you Smudger both for this considerable advice and your wishes.
    Yes I must confess Auden sprung to my mind when Iris mentioned it.
     
  20. Keighley

    Keighley First Team

    Adelstrop by Edward Thomas is, I think, the most evocative train poem.
    https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/53744/adlestrop

    Sorry for your loss, IBB.
     
  21. 262 years ago today HMS Victory keel was laid down
     
  22. UEA_Hornet

    UEA_Hornet First Team Captain

    So even the Royal Navy were keeling before big battles!?
     
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  23. Since63

    Since63 Squad Player

    Howy
    How you getting on with them?
     
  24. Bwood_Horn

    Bwood_Horn Squad Player

    I found Myers fairly heavy going (mainly the turgid writing style - I did read this cover to cover) but the stuff on place names as a measure of the relevant date of wave of settlement was very interesting and it expanded my limited knowledge of the overlooked Jutes. Whitlock I just picked out a few chapters that piqued my interest namely the formation of a codified legal system and - again - the academic writing style made it really heavy going. Something that struck me as odd was that these 'worthy tomes' didn't add much to what I was taught in Furzehill middle school in the early 80's! As such Loyn's book was returned to the library unread...
     
  25. Since63

    Since63 Squad Player

    Yes, there has been an apparent conscious effort by later historians to make the writing style more accessible....more use of notes to underpin interpretations so as not to disrupt a more narrative approach. An improvement for the 'general student' but can be a bit of a pain having to scurry off to find the work being used as the basis for the thesis propounded.
    The more general introductory works used at O & A levels after the '70s did make good use of the large amount of 'academic' publications that appeared from the '50s onwards; many of the theories put forward by such as Whitelock et al were quite revolutionary at the time and as such needed close academic argument to support them, hence the dry nature of the content.
    I had the Marc Morris book as a birthday present so I'll be interested as to what he has to say and what more recent evidence he includes. I'm a bit concerned that the laudatory sleeve comment of 'An absolute masterpiece' is by Dan Snow, however, but at least it should be accessible in style! I'm going to get onto that after my current re-read of Max Adams' "AELfred's Britain: War & Peace in the Viking Age."
     
  26. Filbert

    Filbert Leicester supporting bloke

    Ignore the special needs dog in the foreground.

    That chest. My grandad died when I was young so I’ve always held on to artefacts from him. He was a paratrooper in the RAF and quite a bloke by all accounts. I was thrilled when my nana gave me his prized wooden chest. He was a carpenter by trade, the family still has much of the furniture he made in their houses.

    I love the chest and we keep blankets in it. Turns out my dear old gramps kept his porn stash in it. Yep, my nan finally admitted that she’d peeked in there in the 60’s and found a stash of absolute grot apparently,

    Now it’s in his only grandson’s living room. I’m so ******* proud of the old boy. Go on my son! 66CAEF85-47D3-47E5-8144-EBCE9936B4C0.jpeg
     
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  27. WW2 started 82 years ago today
     
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  28. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    A troubled genius. The life of Michael Ventris.

     
  29. AndrewH63

    AndrewH63 Reservist

    I have just bought a couple of new (to me) history books. The Anglo Saxons A History of the beginnings of England by Marc Morris and rolling on a millenia - Blood and ruins The Great Imperial War 1931-1945 by Richard Overy.

    was going to start with the Marc Morris, but as mentioned above as WW2 started in Europe in September, I think it will be the Richard Overy to discover why everybody was 8 years out and WW2 really started a hundred years ago.
     
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  30. Bwood_Horn

    Bwood_Horn Squad Player

    That's easy: China & Japan.
     
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  31. BigRossLittleRoss

    BigRossLittleRoss First Team

    Reading both these currently, one at bed times and the other one when I get up, although they do cross over so am getting a little confused between the two.

    Screenshot 2021-09-23 at 17.21.04.png

    Always been very intrigued by history of cities, mainly because they are the foundry from which civilisation is cast.

    The modern multicultural cities , (London and New York being the leading two), provide humanity with a template for the future , not so much in their material manifestation but in the spirit of cross pollination of various cultures to create a new, hybrid culture.

    What many dont realise is that the great historic cities of Rome and Greece became very multicutural as their increasing expansion increased the need for expertise beyond its native citizenry.
     
  32. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    Two rail projects. Both misguided and environmentally damaging prestige elephants when local networks could be upgraded and restored instead. But both turning up archaeological discoveries

    HS2. Roman statues discovered.

    https://www.theguardian.com/science...arthed-at-norman-church-ruins-on-route-of-hs2

    One of the great Mesoamerican civilizations which consistently gets overlooked in this side of the hemisphere the Maya. An ancient canoe found in a cenote one of those pools formed by limestone dissolving around lines of weakness created by a certain impact.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-59101592
     
  33. Since63

    Since63 Squad Player

    The harsh level of reparations imposed on Germany after WW1 in the 1919 Treaty of Versailles almost single-handedly guaranteed the economic and social collapse of the Weimar Republic which played into the hands of the various anti-democratic movements that were very strong across Europe at the time, and in particular in Germany. The effects of the clauses of the treaty, when allied with the misguided belief in the idea of 'the stab in the back' being the actual cause of Germany's rapid collapse in 1918, eventually led to the circumstances that allowed the Nazis to gain power.
    In that context, it could be argued that in many ways WW2 represented the final playing-out of the tensions that resulted in WW1 but which were not satisfactorily resolved at that conflict's end.
     
  34. Since63

    Since63 Squad Player

    Access to Roman citizenship was a major tool in the successful absorption and ongoing control over the various provinces conquered by the Romans. Allow the local elites to become full Romans and they would identify their own interests with those of the Roman state and do the local policing work themselves.
    There was little real ethnic discrimination in that Empire; discrimination based on economic and social standing, yes, but not overtly racist.
    Septimius Severus, the so-called 'last good Emperor' was part Punic on his father's side, so even being descended from members of the Carthaginian nobility was not a bar to him becoming Emperor. Well, not after he'd defeated and killed all the rival Emperors in the 190s anyway!
     
  35. Smudger

    Smudger Messi's Mad Coach Staff Member

    Building Anglo-Saxon England by John Blair. A recent publication featuring new discoveries about Anglo-Saxon settlements. Still to read but looks enticing.

    Woodsmoke and Sage: The Five Senses 1485-1603: How the Tudors Experienced the World by Amy License.

    As the title states this deals with how people of the Tudor period would experience their world. The smells, colours, tastes and sounds. The clothes worn, the trinkets kept and the tools used. And how they thought about the world. Also a recent publication.
     

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