Lost Realms: Histories of Britain from the Romans to the Vikings

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Though the author is a critic of Bede and Gildas as well, making me look at those authors differently and reading all the notes because of it which took some time. Ultimately I would have preferred some more stranger than fiction tales of characters, deeds and events - but that is not what this book is trying to do, so can't fault it. The subject matter is a point of fascination for me, though, and I liked the way he doesn't try and force a theory but lays them all out before you. Williams has a fine command of the literary, administrative, religious and archaeological sources of early medieval Britain.

Adding nothing to the information, they sound like they've been shoe horned in from an over written memoire written by someone with literary aspirations. After a stirring Prologue which sets the tone of the book, coming across as sceptical of recent revisionism and also somewhat romantic about the period, Williams sets out in an introductory chapter his process of choosing nine “little kingdoms”, lost realms, from the time in Britain between the withdrawal of the Roman Empire in about 410 until the Viking invasions that are the subject of an earlier book by Williams.This is absolutely not a bad thing in any way but it bears acknowledging since you are not coming away with a definitive history of Elmet, Hwicce, Lindsey, Dumnonia, Essex, Rheged, Powys, Sussex and Fortriu. Just place names that once referred to Elmet and other place names that refer to a British church in Old English (Eccles). Not too much of the x son of y, brother of z (which I always find a bit dry) and the author manages to pique and then satisfy the reader's interest by bringing places to life and putting some historical perspective into them.

The same might be said for the frequent over written passages that attempt to evoke the fading kingdoms. There is irrelevant reference to poetry by Ted Hughes set in the general area, but in the eighteenth century). They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites.In Lost Realms, Thomas Williams, bestselling author of Viking Britain, uncovers the forgotten origins and untimely demise of nine kingdoms that hover in the twilight between history and fable, whose stories hum with saints and gods and miracles, with giants and battles and the ruin of cities. If you do not allow these cookies we will not know when you have visited our site, and will not be able to monitor its performance.

Thomas Williams is a historian of the early Middle Ages and a former curator at the British Museum’s Department of Coins and Medals (2017-2018). Ultimately, it felt like lots of academic essays about historical places linked together in a book with some historic poetry thrown in. Ebooks fulfilled through Glose cannot be printed, downloaded as PDF, or read in other digital readers (like Kindle or Nook).I think that the drawback from four stars is a lack of some illustration or visualization that really would have pushed to this book forward. Overall a tougher read than expected, perhaps because of the poetry within the book sometimes confusing the chronology. Some curious choice of language used at times too, for example kipple, a colloquial word introduced in Philip K. The over all effect, and 'horny relish' is a good example, is of a style that sounds like the worse kind of tv history sacrificing accuracy for sound bites. With so few facts to make generalisations, the author appears happy to meander off-topic, for example to discuss differences between the calculation of the date of Easter between Roman and British Christians.