Hanging with History

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. The first of a 3 episode arc on the Agricultural Revolution.  Yes, this is the Jethro Tull episode. The focus is on engineering and the early inventions often associated with the Agricultural Revolution – the wrong ones.  Then we turn to the Dutch and their development of efficient water transport which allowed for a much larger hinterla...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. Tudor England and the Parish based system to care for the aged.  British and Dutch elites  were better and more competent in the great struggles between the powers.  Partly this is because the method for selecting elites was more robust than France and Spain where birth was so important.  We look at studies done of village life in Englan...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. Background we need for the 3 episode arc on the Agricultural Revolution which runs in episodes 18-20.  The early 16th century Dutch have twice the percentage of people employed in Industry as the rest of Western Europe, as a concomitant they have half the percentage employed in Agriculture.  How can this be?  Trade is the answer.  Basics...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. The Spanish Armada was a consequence of the Dutch war with Spain.  It was a flyweight boxer against a heavyweight.  We look at a few other examples from military history of flyweights winning.  We relate the importance of the defeat of the Armada to the Battle of Jutland.  Then we turn from the Armada via Drake to Foxe’s Book of Martyrs...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. The Dutch contribution the the Miracle part 2.  The 80 years war.  Dutch Independence.  The Sea Beggars and Maurice of Nassau are an irresistible combination.  The determination of the Hapsburg kings to keep their provinces is immovable.  The Duke of Alba and his Blood Court, the Inquisition, the Spanish Fury and the sacking of Antwerp a...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. The Dutch contribution introduction, through the medium of breakfast, with a side order of Portuguese.  Did you know that Flanders was the richest and most advanced part of Europe for a time and soon the Netherlands too?  Clothing manufacture led to trade.  The Mother Trade and the technological marvels that made it possible broke the Ha...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. This is a really superior episode as history.  Only a couple cringey bits, it is getting better. Torture is wrong, only the sophisticated torture.  The future effects of the Black Death are different in England.  Instead of doubling down on serfdom, in England, it ends.  Also we get into church land confiscation with the destruction of t...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. Magna Carta, a unique document that is one of England's many great gifts to the world.  Magna Carta is, or is a marker for, one of the greatest innovations in world history.  It, like Modus Tennedi Parliamentum, rests upon a common delusion.  It's great success was based on failure.  Is this a Doctor Who episode or is it histor...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. A mad dream escapes into the world and becomes real.  We know this dream as Parliament.  Modus Tenendi Parlementum.  Parliament achieves a secure place in the English conception of society and politics while representative bodies lose power all over Europe. The Domesday survey reveals 9 percent of the English were slaves.  William would...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. Takes a few minutes to get into 1066 narrative.  We have distinguished how Europe was different from the world and how Britain was different from Europe,  We cover the history of Canute the Great and the year 1066.  Was it an Annus Horribilus or something necessary for the Miracle?  William the Bastard should maybe be called William the...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. A strong episode on Vikings.   We continue our very historical, but unconventional pro-Viking approach.  Also a good discussion on Scandinavia that might be useful for others. The story of Forkbeard's rapid conquest of England is complete.  And he dies 5 weeks later.  Along the way we cover Thorkell's invasion and his short liv...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. These have been very popular.  We take a very historical, but unconventionally pro-Viking view. The Vikings in the Danelaw are settling down and spreading out, a good time had by all (by gruesome 10th century standards), but they couldn't leave well enough alone.  Politics ensue.  An introduction to exponential growth and how it mat...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. 3rd of 6 Viking story arc.  These have been very popular.  We take a very historical, but unconventionally pro-Viking view. Vikings conquer 3 English kingdoms and settle down.  They just seem unstoppable, until they decide to stop.  The Danelaw is established with long term consequences for the history of England, the English language an...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. 2nd of 6 episode Viking story arc.  These have been very popular.  We take a very historical, but unconventionally pro-Viking view.    About this episode we introduce the idea that the Vikings were just more effective man-for-man than the Anglo-Saxons of the time, with a few exceptions.   There is a little pointless grumpiness, but hey w...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. The first of the British history episodes and also the first in a 6 episode arc on Vikings.   These have been very popular.  We take a very historical, but unconventionally pro-Viking view.  We begin with Pelagius and the Joseph of Arimathea legend.  A unique foundation myth for the British church.  And then England catches the worst cas...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. An important background episode with a lot of interesting ideas.    Possibly wastes some time defending conventional views that don't need defending. We look at the good and the bad and the very bad of settled agriculture.  After a little Aristotle we move on to the great anthropologists, and their views of family structure and how...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. Why was Britain the source and origin of the Miracle?  Just introducing the topic, with a number of digressions about Charles I, the Republican period, Cromwell and more Stupidity Smart People Commit.  Another about the Anabaptists and their role in the American Revolution.  Religion and Literacy.  Ending with a discussion of a special c...

You can send a text, include contact info to get a response. The Industrial Revolution was a miracle.  We explore the concept of a miracle through Tolkien's made up word eucatastrophe and give an example from the Lord of the Rings.  Was it a mistake to leave the paleolithic hunter gatherer lifestyle?  Please enjoy your Malthusian limits. A kwirky style, but intellectually ambitious with the g...