Book description
'The past is a foreign country' has become a truism, yet the past
differs from the present in many unfamiliar ways and historical memory
is extraordinarily imperfect. The degree to which we think of the
European past as the history of France, Germany, Britain, Russia and
so on, actually obstructs our view of former reality, and blunts our
sensitivity to the ever-changing political landscape. Europe's past is
littered with kingdoms, empires and republics which no longer exist
but which were some of the most important entities of their day - 'the
Empire of Aragon', which dominated the western Mediterranean in the
thirteenth century, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the largest country
in Europe for part of the eighteenth century. This book shows the
reader how to peer through the cracks of mainstream history-writing,
and to catch a glimpse of the 'Five, Six or Seven Kingdoms of
Burgundy'. How long will it be before the USSR, until recently one of
the world's two superpowers, is wholly or half-forgotten as most of
these? The histories of the lost echo across the centuries, mixed in
with more familiar sounds. One of the purposes of this book is to help
us hear them again more clearly, and appreciate where they came from.
As in his earlier celebrated books Europe and The
Isles, Norman Davies aims to subvert our established view what
looks familiar in history and urges us to look and think again. This
stimulating book, full of unexpected stories, observations and
connections, gives us a fresh and original perspective on European history.
Professor Norman Davies is an English historian of Welsh descent,
known for his publications on the history of Europe and the British
Isles. He is the author of the prize-winning history of Poland,
God's Playground
(1981) and the Number 1 best-seller in Britain
Europe: A History
(OUP, 1996). Professor Davies has been awarded the CMG in 2001 for
services to history, and has collected several Polish distinctions,
including the Order of Merit.
