Brexit and King Arthur
England’s exceptional weather this summer has attracted foreign tourists in record numbers and persuaded the English to stay in England. No surprise, then, that Cornwall is almost Mediterranean in its colours and packed with international tourists. On most visitor’s bucket-list is Tintagel, home to King Arthur. Tintagel in Cornwall, UK I have visited Tintagel many times but when I was almost alone. Throngs of tourists change the place. They make you appreciate the workmen rep
Yanis Varoufakis and Homer
As a baby-boomer who has enjoyed the extraordinary benefits of the post-war European project, it is hard not to be deeply affected by Yanis Varoufakis’s personal account of his struggle with the European leadership in 2015. Adults in the Room (2017) is not an easy read, well-written though it is. Most of all, with its heroic theme, it might seem to be an attempt to re-write history. Yet, so much has happened since the Greek Spring of 2015 – Brexit, Donald Trump’s election, th
The Battle of Monte Cassino project
The Second World War battle at Cassino occurred between December 1943 and May 1944. At times it involved over 30 different nationalities in a struggle that has been likened to Stalingrad in its ferocity. The battleground encompasses three modern regione – Lazio, Campania and Molise (in 1944, the Abruzzi). Cassino and its celebrated monastery, Monte Cassino, are in Lazio. They occupy the footprint of ancient sites – a massive, walled Samnite sanctuary in the case of the monast
Rediscovering Pronnoi (Kefalonia)
The murky photos of medieval remains in Klavs Randsborg’s books on Kefalonia had long lingered in my mind, as had his sense that Pronnoi was one of the great archaic cities of Greece. It belonged to the Kefalian Tetrarchy before succumbing to a Roman siege in the second century BC. High above Poros bay, the concial crags in the hazy light seemed to defy me, and now, John Moreland and I in the sharp morning sunshine were making an assault on its north flank. We worked our way
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