non-fiction-authors-from-the-united-kingdom

"where George II died and where Queen Victoria was born is still used as apartments for the sovereign's relatives: Princess Margaret, the , and . The State Apartments and suite occupied by Princess Victoria are open."

"There is a that I will probably never send. I would not dare to. It is a cross of Jesus drawn in fresh blood from an animal sacrifice. Although slaughter for sacrifice contradicts a basic belief of Christianity, it is practiced by local Catholics, Greek Orthodox and other Christians at the in the village of , 20 miles from Jerusalem. "Around 70 to 80 lambs are sacrificed here each year," said the Roman Catholic priest, Father Raed. Similar sacrifices are also made in the towns of d, , and elsewhere in the Holy Land. Yet bloodless altars are a distinguishing feature of Christian churches. One of the tenets of the faith is that Jesus was the ultimate and final sacrifice. Christians atone for their sins without the shedding of blood. They look to Jesus as the who made the ancient belief in sacrifice obsolete. It is surely hypocritical of the churches to encourage millions of tourists and pilgrims to visit Jerusalem to see where Jesus Christ was crucified, but not halt this ritualised sacrifice."

"On 1 October 1918, when only sixteen, my father rode into Damascus with the , hours ahead of T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia), and the colourful . Fighting in the sane campaign were another 100,000 soldiers including the , the only armed Jewish force fighting in Palestine for nearly 2,000 years. From their first steps on the moors of in 1917, these Jewish soldiers were trained to be part of the . After fighting alongside my father on the road to Damascus, some of these fighters went underground to eventually become founding members of Israel's biggest and most effective militia, the , which in 1948 would form the 's original army with a force in mid-May of 35,000 fighters."

"proposed as the chief gardener and William Brown as his assistant. Nelson had already 'sailed round the world in my service for the purpose of collecting plants and seeds and was eminently successful in the object of his mission,' wrote Banks."

"... In 1961 she trained as a newspaper reporter and was sent to London to work for the Murdoch papers on . She filed reports from all over the world and interviewed such celebrities as the Dalai Lama, Marlon Brando, Richard Burton and PG Wodehouse. The Duchess was despatched on several hazardous missions – notably to war-torn Vietnam and gave a graphic account of a strike mission she flew with the carrying . In 1963, she attended a dinner for in Miami four nights before he was assassinated in Dallas. Two years later, she returned to Vietnam, and was one of the first women to write about the effects of the bombing raids launched from Danang, the top secret centre where the US stockpiled its most deadly bombs."

"Our confirmation bias then leads us to seek our further information to confirm those existing views, or to reject information that challenges them."

"Our views are constantly being shaped by through the negotiation between our own identity, our group loyalty, and our relationship to wider society."

"Without salience or social cues climate change sits outside the analytic frame that we apply to make sense of the world around us."

"Compare the appearance and social atmosphere of the average country village having a well-mixed community with those of a modern housing estate composed of all one type of house and garden. Monotony seems to make for squalor or genteel snobbery according to the class of house …"

"Brenda Colvin studied garden design at 1919–1920; set up her own practice in 1922; designed many gardens and estates, school grounds, university campus, cemeteries, also industrial landscapes, e.g. around power stations, and she published several books, including Land and Landscape ... When Colvin, together with , and others, co-founded the , she was a driving force in defining educational requirements. It seems, often Colvin first came up with the ideas (Annabel Downs, personal communication 2021). Colvin had travelled in the USA in 1931 and what she saw hugely influenced her later thinking (Gibson 2011, p. 35)."

"... the spread of urban conditions constitutes a terrible threat until we have learned to appreciate the real necessity for in the surroundings at every stage of human life. We must realize, in all its implications, the truth that , and the full development of intellectual or spiritual life, no less than mere existence, requires contact with nature and natural beauty."

"In our soft too many s become oppressive, and we need a very carefully balanced combination of evergreen and deciduous planting to give us the right degree of comfort, variety and satisfaction. But with a brighter light and greater extremes of temperature, a much higher proportion of evergreen is felt to be right."

"For most of the , tree cover is the normal condition. Any area below the five hundred metre contour that is left to itself and protected from vandalism, or other biotic factors, will revert to forest unless exposed to high s or ."

"When Crassus left for his province he was hounded by a tribune who formally called on the gods to curse the proconsul and the unjust war he planned. Personal hatreds and rivalry loomed larger in most senators' minds than the good of the Republic."

"Lucius Cornelius Sulla was a man of striking appearance, with exceptionally fair skin, piercing grey eyes and reddish hair. In later life his appearance was marred by a skin condition that speckled his face with red patches. (An obscure piece of military law from several centuries later also claims that he had only one testicle, and that his achievements make it clear that such a defect was no bar to becoming a successful soldier.) Sulla could be very charming, winning over soldier and senator alike, but many aristocrats remained deeply uncertain of him. In spite of his late entry into public life he had been reasonably successful, and demonstrated his military skill on repeated occasions. His consulship came when he was fifty, which was unusually old for a first term, and in the preceding decade it had taken two attempts for him to win the praetorship. Many senators probably found it hard to forget the poverty of his youth and the decay of his family. It is common for those who flourish under any system to feel that the failure of others is deserved. Sulla had been poor and revelled in the company of actors and musicians, professions considered extremely disreputable. Such behaviour was bad enough in his youth, and far worse for a senator and magistrate, but Sulla remained loyal to his old friends throughout his life. He was a heavy drinker, enjoyed feasting and was widely believed to be very active sexually, taking both men and women as lovers. For much of his life he publicly associated with the actor Metrobius, who specialised in playing female roles on stage, and the pair were believed to be having an affair."

"Although he paid attention to the effectiveness of the Roman military system, Polybius believed that Rome's success rested far more on its political system. For him the Republic's constitution, which was carefully balanced to prevent any one individual or section of society from gaining overwhelming control, granted Rome freedom from the frequent revolution and civil strife that had plagued most Greek city-states. Internally stable, the Roman Republic was able to devote itself to waging war on a scale and with a relentlessness unmatched by any rival. It is doubtful that any other contemporary state could have survived the catastrophic losses and devastation inflicted by Hannibal, and still gone on to win the war."

"A man who keeps asking you to trust him is always hiding something."

"Roman laws tended to be long and complex — one of Rome's most enduring legacies to the world is cumbersome and tortuous legal prose."

"Hasdrubal had led his close order cavalry in a devastatingly brutal charge against the Roman right wing, shattering and virtually destroying it in a brief pursuit. The Carthaginian had kept his men under tight control and, when they had rested and reformed, he led them behind the Roman main line, moving against Varro on the left, and ignoring the massed infantry in the enemy centre. Varro's allied horsemen were still engaged in their stand-off with the Numidians, but the sight of the lines of Hasdrubal's Gauls and Spaniards approaching from the rear utterly shattered their spirit. Without waiting for the Carthaginians to charge home, the Roman left wing dissolved into a panicked flight in which the consul joined. Their position was untenable, and, if they had in fact formed with their flank on the hills around Cannae, any delay in flight might have resulted in their being trapped. They could not have won any combat with a more numerous enemy attacking from two sides, but their flight sealed the fate of the Roman army."

"The Ptolemies were Macedonians, with an admixture of a little Greek and via marriage with the Seleucids a small element of Syrian blood. (There is no evidence to make us question the paternity of any of the line and suggest that they were the product of an illicit liaison between the queen and a man other than her husband. This remains possible, if not very likely, but an uncertain basis for any argument.) The Macedonians were not an homogenous people and seem to have varied considerably in appearance and colouring. Alexander the Great was fair-haired, although it is always difficult to know precisely what this meant. A Roman copy of an earlier mosaic shows him with medium-brown hair. Fair might simply mean not black or very dark brown. On the other hand, several of the early Ptolemies were blond and comparisons of their hair to gold suggest this was more than simply not black-haired."

"There were no political parties at Rome as we would understand them, nor were elections primarily contests about policy. Quite openly, voters selected on the basis of perceived character and past behaviour rather than the views a candidate expressed. Where an individual's nature was not obvious, the Roman people tended to be drawn to a famous name, for there was a sense that virtue and ability were inherited."

"'I have not heard you swear.Waste of good anger,' Ferox said without looking at him. It was something his grandfather had often said. Do not waste rage. Nurture it, cherish it and use the strength it gives. Hot anger gets a man killed. Cold anger will put the other man in the earth."

"Untrustworthy people tend to be selfish, which makes them simple to understand."

"Most battles from the Ancient World are now all but forgotten, for military as well as civil education has ceased to be based fundamentally on the Classics. Yet Cannae is still regularly referred to in the training programmes of today's army officers. Hannibal's tactics appear almost perfect, the classic example of double envelopment, and ever since many commanders have attempted to reproduce their essence and their overwhelming success. Nearly all have failed."

"Hannibal won the battle through not only his dynamic leadership and the high quality of his army, but also because of a good deal of luck. Cannae was not an exercise in pure tactics, but, like all battles, a product both of the military doctrines and technology of the time and the peculiar circumstances of a specific campaign."

"On 2 August 216 BC the Carthaginian General Hannibal won one of the most complete battlefield victories in history. Outnumbered nearly two to one, his heterogeneous army of Africans, Spaniards and Celts not merely defeated, but virtually destroyed the Roman army opposing them....The scale of the losses at Cannae was unrivalled until the industrialised slaughter of the First World War."

"The Roman legion was supposed to operate with wide gaps between its maniples and significant intervals between each of the three lines. The openness of its formation allowed the legion to advance without falling into disorder even over comparatively rough terrain. It is impossible, even for well drilled troops, to march in a perfectly straight line, and the more uneven the terrain, the more probable that a unit will veer to one side or the other. The wide intervals between the maniples of the legion allowed them to cope with such deviation without units colliding and merging together and ceasing to be independent tactical entities. The unusual formation adopted by the Roman infantry at Cannae sacrificed this openness and with it most of the flexibility of the manipular system."

"Augustus pursued power relentlessly and then clung to it, whatever he might pretend in public. Such ambition is surely the hallmark of any successful political leader – and no doubt plenty of less successful ones. Yet in his case he made use of that power for the common good. He worked hard to make the res publica function again, and we cannot deny that he succeeded, since the peace and stability he imposed brought ever greater levels of prosperity. At a basic level more people were better-off under his principate than they had been for several generations. The concerns he dealt with were traditional ones, even if some of his methods were innovative. Julius Caesar had tried to address several of these issues, as had others, but none had the chance to deal with them as thoroughly as Augustus. In the process he made sure that it was well known that he was working for the common good, but once again such advertising was what any Roman politician would have done. By doing favours for individuals and whole communities he placed them in his debt, and so, as so often, personal advantage was intertwined with the wider good. That does not alter the fact that he did rule well, whatever his motivation."

"It was very difficult to disable an opponent with a single blow; either a heavy strike to the head, a massive thrust past shield and through any armour to the body, or a hit on the leg breaking the bone and causing the victim to fall. Attempting to deliver such a strong cut or thrust exposed the attacker to greater risk of wounding, especially as his right arm, and perhaps part of his right side, lost the protection of his shield. It was less risky to deliver weaker attacks to the unprotected extremities of an opponent, even though this was unlikely to kill him quickly."

"Cleopatra may have had black, brown, blonde, or even red hair, and her eyes could have been brown, grey, green or blue. Almost any combination of these is possible. Similarly, she may have been very light skinned or had a darker more Mediterranean complexion. Fairer skin is probably marginally more likely given her ancestry."

"There is a nightmarish quality about many of the descriptions of the aftermath of Cannae....Later sources would invent further horrors, claiming that Hannibal bridged the River Aufidius with Roman corpses. The reality of Cannae was probably even more appalling than such horrific inventions, for it remains one of the bloodiest single day's fighting in history, rivalling the massed slaughter of the British Army on the first day of the Somme offensive in 1916."

"Attila the Hun remains to this day a byword for savagery and destruction. His is one of the few names from antiquity that still prompt instant recognition, putting him alongside the likes of Alexander, Caesar, Cleopatra and Nero. Attila has become the barbarian of the ancient world."

"It is widely believed that Christianity remained an essentially urban cult and that the population of the countryside clung for generations to the old beliefs. The word 'pagan' comes from paganus, or someone who lived in the countryside (pagus). Unfortunately, we know so little about the religious life in rural areas that this remains conjectural. Paganus was usually derogatory – something like 'yokel' or 'hick' would give the right idea – and may just reflect the common belief of urban dwellers that countrymen were dull and backward."

"I would call it inhuman cruelty if that made sense, but it cannot because it was done by men and not monsters."

"I'm English, so obviously do not have a philosophy. I am a Christian, though, if you want to know about important beliefs."

"The Soviet communist leadership may have magnified the prospects of 'European revolution' but it did not invent them out of nothing. Country after country to the west of Russia was experiencing disorder and discontent. Russia itself emerged under Bolshevik rule from years of civil war and foreign armed intervention. The victor powers in the Great War had irresistible force at their disposal if only they could muster the will to deploy it. But they increasingly lacked that will. The Western Allies had not had properly agreed strategic aims since at least 1917, when America joined them."

"The Russian Empire was deeply fissured between the government and the tsar’s subjects; between the capital and the provinces; between the educated and the uneducated; between Western and Russian ideas; between the rich and the poor; between privilege and oppression; between contemporary fashion and centuries-old custom."

"Parvus denied that universal suffrage was an end in itself since the middle class would always had ways to manipulate the electoral system. Freedom could not be begged for: it had to be won. The bureaucracy and officer corps had to be eliminated. What was needed, in fact, was not just an uprising as demanded by the Bolsheviks but a commitment to a struggle to 'make the revolution permanent'."

"Centuries of Darkness was particularly critical of modern Egyptologists. ‘Early Egyptologists were usually more tentative about their chronology, continually revising their opinions in the light of fresh evidence. Sadly the study of Egyptian chronology seems to have become so ossified that it cannot question its fundamental assumptions, accepted more for familiarity than for any basis in fact.’"

"Peter James wrote as recently as 2012, ‘scientists and archaeologists are still learning how to apply the radiocarbon method properly.’"

", tittle-tattle, tale-bearing, are the very bindweed of society; as the bindweed destroys the flower, so do they choke every kindly feeling and every noble thought."

"The enjoys such , and so much authority as to be almost a king in his inland territory. By his manorial rights he receives tithes of corn, apples, and lambs, he presides over the petty court which assembles three times a year, called, The Chief Pleas, at which, though he has no vote, yet his veto, or consent is necessary to all their decisions. By virtue of his patent (which however he never exerts,) he can prevent the building of any house without his leave, or the solemnization of any marriage without his consent, and the of the island is also in his gift."

"THE ISLAND OF , separated from by , is not inhabited, except by rabbits burrowing in the heath, the wild bee in its rose-leaf cell, and the which rests and lives on its rocks. The late Governor, , to whom the belonged, built a cottage on it to shelter the fisherman or shipwrecked mariner; but it has fallen into decay. The stormy petrel, rarely found on the British coast, may be taken here with the hand; but it has the singular defence of ejecting a fetid fluid from its bill when alarmed or hurt, which often saves it from capture."

"All our farinaceous plants contain abundance of , especially wheat, barley, oats, maize, rice, ; and the s differ from each other in size and form so decidedly, that they cannot well be mistaken by a careful observer. They are prepared for the microscope, and sold as polariscope objects, because the examination of a starch granule with shows it with a beautiful black cross, revolving with the polarizer; or, if over a selenite stage, a brilliant play of colours is obtained."

"There is felt by many seaside ramblers a want of some unscientific, easy to the s and contents of s on the English coast. There are most valuable works by }} and }} on the subject, but more expensive and more scientific than suits the minds of those who seek for health and rest in the sweet summer months by the seaside. To supply that want I purpose describing the Seaweeds, not exactly in the order arranged by Algælogists (though a systematic aid is given for the use of Collectors); but, taking the coast anywhere as a book, opening and closing as the great sea ebbs and flows, I shall begin with the first-tide pools, and find interest for my readers until the next range is uncovered, and more objects may be found. Then we shall take advantage of a gale of wind, and see what the waves cast up from depths unattainable by mortal hand."

"... books, like Louisa Lane Clarke's The Microscope (1858) and 's A World of Wonders Revealed by the Microscope (1859), were directed to broader audiences in a drive to recruit more new microscopists from the general public."

"The Russians are fascinating, ingenious, creative, sentimental, warm-hearted, generous, obstinately courageous, endlessly tough, often devious, brutal and ruthless. Ordinary Russians firmly believe that they are warmer-hearted than others, more loyal to their friends, more willing to sacrifice themselves for the common good, more devoted to the fundamental truths of life. They give the credit to the Russian soul, as broad and all-embracing as the Russian land itself. Their passionate sense of Russia’s greatness is paradoxically undermined by an underlying and corrosive pessimism. And it is tempered by resentment that their country is insufficiently understood and respected by foreigners."

"Russians, like the rest of us, prefer to believe that their history has progressed in a straight and positive line. They explain away troubling events – such as the brutal reigns of Ivan the Terrible or Stalin – as necessary stages on the path to greatness."

"Russia has not yet lost its imperial itch. Putin's brutal invasion of Ukraine has postponed for many decades the prospect that Russia will become the modern democratic state at peace with its neighbours, which so many courageous Russians had fought so hard to create. But no people should ever be written off beyond redemption. I hang on to the golden image of the firebird which fleets through the dark forests of the Russian folklore to symbolise the hope that Russia will see better days."

"People often call vegans extremists, and yet veganism is merely living by the principle that if I am against cruelty then I will do what I can to avoid perpetuating systems that cause physical and mental harm to animals. It is a clear indictment of how ingrained our state of cognitive dissonance is that we see attempts at moral consistency as signs of extremism. Is it not strange that we call those who kill dogs animal abusers, those who kill pigs normal and those who kill neither extremists? Is it not odd that someone who smashes a car window to rescue a dog on a hot day is viewed as a hero but someone who rescues a piglet suffering on a farm is a criminal?"