4 comments about Aspects of Aristocracy: Grandeur and Decline in Modern Britain.

1. Paints a vivid and broad picture of the British aristocracy which has declined precipitously in fortune, political power and status since about 1870. Mr. Cannandine's chooses not to explain the causes of the decline, however, with any percision. The various political reform acts, the rise of a rootless proletariate, the democratization of education, the agricultural decline starting about 1870, the decimation of young aristocrats in the trenches of World War One, the loss of confidence in the right to rule-these are either only briefly mentioned by Mr. Cannandine or not mentioned by Mr. Cannandine. He chose not to over-analyze. My chief criticism of the book is that in conclusion, Mr. Cannandine seems overjoyed with the declining relevance of his subject. That is a pity. The British aristocracy has done well by Britain. It is sad that Mr. Cannandine has a soulmate in Tony Blair, who is set to destroy the House of Lords this year.



2. This book claims to be about the decline of the aristocracy, but is really a mean-spirited look at the misfortunes of several aristocratic dynasties and persons. The author gleefully rips apart Winston Churchill, Lord Curzon, Vita Sackville-West and others, while adding no new insight into their characters. Lord Curzon was obsessed with ceremony? Now there's a startling relevation.

   There is very little substance to this book and no conclusions are reached, or even suggested.




3. This is a mean-spirited and vindictive book that makes no pretense about actually revelling in the mounting misfortunes of the British upper classes. It offers very little historical research, but a great deal of waxing eloquent on the uselessness of the aristocracy.
   
   He gets so into this, that much of what he says is wrong: he describes Winston "Churchill's family and forebearers were hardly those which any politician, eager to establish an unimpeachable public reputaition, would have freely chosen." Um, except that they were all well-respected politicians in their own right, and Winston's father had been considered, for many years, next in line to be Prime Minister (a raging case of syphillus drove him mad and that was the end of that... but his affliction was not public knowledge and wouldn't have hampered his son's career).
   
   He takes great joy in describing the misfortunes of the upper classes, without actually examining the causes: more often than not these declines had to do with the rising cost of living in a huge stone palace (as electricity, plumbing, and heating became necessary), the decline of the sevice industry (as factory work became a better option for the lower classes), the decline of the agricultural industry from which most of these people supported themselves with (as cheaper food could be imported from overseas), and a few significant stock market crashes. Instead, he drops hints that the sudden and disasterous lack of money was purely a personal fault.
   
   He discusses the people who hang on to their country houses but require government aid to support them, completely ignoring the fact that 1) the government won't let the owners tear them down because they're historic and architectural landmarks and 2) the owners literally can't GIVE them away because the National Trust is already glutted with them and can't afford the upkeep on the ones they already have.
   
   Cannadine's thesis is one that deserves taking into consideration: that it's time historians stopped fawning over the upper classes and started to look at them, warts and all. However, by the time this book was published, this was hardly an original notion and it was difficult to find a book that didn't take a critical view of the aristocracy. And it should be taken into consideration that, after a career built on mocking the upper classes, Mr. Cannadine's last TWO books have both been fawning histories talking about how the entire British Empire was built on the bravery, daring, and intelligence of the aristocrats. I guess he decided the tide had turned and it was time to jump on another bandwaggon?



4. Well-written, this book is a supplement to the author's Decline and Fall of the British Aristocracy, a full treatment of the landed aristrocracy, and gentry, in the years of decline, from 1870. This book consists of essays on particular aspects of the subject. I thought it was fair in tone, the comments about the Churchills in particular are in line with evaluations in several biographies of Winston that I have read.

4 comments about The Nazi Ancestral Proof: Genealogy, Racial Science, and the Final Solution.

1. This is another in a long line of books that shed no new light on the unfortunate events of WWII. Not one I would make a must read to understand the Holocaust.



2. In the first third of the twentieth century, Germany was the most technologically sophisticated and scientifically advanced nation in the world. How could such a nation have produced the Third Reich, the author asks. But before 1933 Germany was not the country where antisemitism has its deepest roots, and this book avoids contributing something to enlighten the causes of antisemitismus in general and in Germany in particular.
   Up to now "race" has in many languages two meanings: First, it means a nation as a whole, second, it means a distinct human type with specific, hereditarily based physical and mental characteristics. In its first meaning, racial hygiene could be unterstood as synonymous with social hygiene, in its second, race was a term of physical anthropology. Leading Nazis were well aware of this ambiguity of the term race and played in words with this ambiguity.
   Despite Jews were never a race in the sense of physical anthropology, anthropologists tried to discern Jews from non-Jews on the basis of racial characterics. The strongest part of this book by Ehrenrich is documenting this dissonance between racial scientific theory and racist practice. The author draws upon a rich body of original sources from German archives and publications. His knowledge of such sources is extraordinary exhaustive and his conclusions are of high originality.
   
   In 1933 the democratically elected government of Germany institutionalized the racial ideology of the Nazi party. In the following years millions of Germans had do proof their "Aryan" descent. But because the Aryans were never a race, since 1935 The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor prohibited marriages and extramarital intercourse between "Jews" (the name was now officially used in place of "non-Aryans") and "Germans. The German Blood Certificate (Deutschblütigkeitserklärung) was a document provided to those with partial Jewish heritage during the Second World War that allowed exemption from Germany's racial laws. Hitler insisted on reviewing each application personally. Thousands of soldiers exempted in such a way from the Nuremberg laws, served in the German Army (see Hitler's Jewish Soldiers: The Untold Story Of Nazi Racial Laws And Men Of Jewish Descent In The German Military (Modern War Studies))
   
   However, even after 1935 in the language of the ordinary people, someone had "to prove his Aryan descent". It was not a proof belonging to a race, but a proof of genealogical descent from non-Jews.



3. I am fairly well read in twentieth century European history, and find that Ehrenreich's text covers an area rarely explored in depth--namely the Nazi's attempt to differentiate between "Aryans" and "alien races"-especially Jews. Their primary problem was that a portion of the Jews in Germany had been baptized into Christianity, demonstrated "Aryan" physical characteristics, had Germanic names, intermarried and (in some cases) had been conferred with aristocratic titles. Ehrenreich covers the various attempts to "weed out" the unwanted through geneological records and "biological investigations." The complicity of the various Churches and scientific communites is documented as well. This is a text book, but a relatively brief one, highly organized and enlivened with interesting case studies. If this an an area in which you have an interest or a healthy curiosity, you won't be disappointed.



4. Any book that can change my perspective is worth the time it takes to read it. This is one of those books. Dr. Ehrenreich explains how racist beliefs were considered 'scientifically' legitimate by not only the government but also the top academic institutions. In short, the book made me realize how there is no such thing as race and how it is still used today to justify genocide. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who wants proof of how quickly people can be brainwashed by nonscientific propaganda.

No comments about The Times History of London (Times (Times Books)).

No comments about Apollo's Eye: A Cartographic Genealogy of the Earth in the Western Imagination.

5 comments about Royalty for Commoners: The Complete Known Lineage of John of Gaunt, Son of Edward III, King of England, and Queen Philippa (New 4th Edition).

1. No genealogical researcher should touch this book. All editions have been riddled with errors, and the latest is no exception. The spellings are frequently wrong, the lines are often inaccurate, mythical lines are not distinguished from historical ones, highly conjectural lines are not distinguished from proven ones, and most of the books and articles associated with many of the lines are completely unrelated to the material they allegedly cover. No statement in the book can be trusted at face value. Even if you want to use it just as a finding aid, double check everything.

   Chris Bennett




2. This book has reasonably valid information in it (checked against more reliable sources), but the author makes no attempt to differentiate the reliable from the unreliable, and far too much of it is unreliable. I suspect the author doesn't even keep his database in a computer genealogical program because there are many internal inconsistencies (I'm my own grandpa kinds of inconsistencies) that all the respectable genealogical software would catch.



3. This book is a great bargain for anyone interested in early and middle medieval history and genealogy. Accumulating this data by acquiring other books would cost at least 10 times as much. A caution: legendary, mythical and even fictional lineages are mixed in with the historical lineages, so care should be taken when using the book. Applicable references are given with most of the lineages, so the list of references can be checked for the known scholarly sources (Schwennicke etc), especially on anything before AD 1000. There are also silly errors (I'm my own grandpa type stuff), but most can be spotted by careful reading.



4. This book must be avoided! It is full of mistakes, some big mistakes that could let you dream about some ancestors who are not in fact.
   Biggest errors are for example Makhir/Theuderic and Zaida cases.

   The bibliography is bad, it looks like he added works he never saw!

   Don't waste your money with this book! This is bad genealogy and you cannot be sure of anything from this book.




5. I also own this book and use it extensively, not quite as useful to me as Turton's Plantagenet Ancestry or G. Andrews Moriarity, if you can find it, but what could be. I always research a line several times before accepting it, as one must do if building an accurate family tree. I did not find it "riddled with errors" although my second edition had a number of typos,problems etc. It is easy to sit back and trash someone else's life work, it seems. Many of the very obscure, ancient lines included will probably never be fully verified and remain speculative. One thing I did find maddening however, was the the index, which listed everyone by their FIRST NAME, especially difficult in an age when there were about 13 personal names for nearly everybody. I would recommend the latest editions as a helpful tool, along with the other resources mentioned above.

No comments about The Perthshire Book.

1 comments about Heart for Europe.

1. I read this book a couple of years ago. I recommend it to anybody who is seriously interested in political theory, monarchy vs democracy, the Catholic Church, Europe, World War I, Communism, and any other cross currents of interest within the above.
   The book tells the story of Blessed Charles and Princess Zita, the last Emperor and Empress of Austria-Hungary. It is a story about a deeply religious man who worked very hard for his people...and failed. He was unable to gain peace before the U.S. entered WWI, partially due to the U.S. president's unwillingness to meet with him (as an emperor is unelected). After the war, he was exiled and saw his empire torn apart by nationalism and violence.
   The book will change your views of monarchs if you watch a lot of movies and heard the standard liberal line of monarchy=bad.
   The only reason I have not rated the book a 5/5 is that it is not very readable. It is academic in nature, not pop-oriented like a Thomas Woods book. Nevertheless, it is an important book considering Blessed Charles may soon be a saint, and definitely one worth praying to in our day.

No comments about Durham: Over 1,000 Years of History and Legend.

3 comments about Blood Royal: The Story of the Spencers and the Royals.

1. Ok for all you royalty junkies out there, I know, I know, toothy Camilla and her breeches just don't do it for you, or Fergie now that she've given up toes and taken up Weight watchers. But here is a book for you all! If you are into ancestor worship, it covers the earliest Spencers from a penny pinching arriviste, to Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough (formerly Ms Jenkins, a frisky lady in waiting to King Charles II, my all time favorite royal, the current ones gene pool is so sullied, those ears!). In fact the premise of the book is that Sarah's turbulent blood heritage has washed on down to the current Spencers, the late lamented Diana, her sons, and that Champagne Charlie of a brother of hers. The middle Spencers are not too interesting, mainly obsessed with acquiring goodies for Althorp (the stately home), but as I said it warms up really nicely by Diana's regime.I enjoyed it greatly, particularly the parts of how pained Queen Elizabeth II was by the gossip and infighting. Poor dear. Barbara Cartland's tacky daughter Raine deserves 2 chapters just for how she redecorated a beautiful estate, I'm surprised she didn't roll out the black velvet Elvis paintings. Thumbs up all the way!



2. Not a quickie biography of the late Princess, this is a story spanning centuries and generations.

   It covers the rise of the Spencers from prosperous sheep farmers in the 16th century through the years and the monarchs they served or betrayed. A light - gossipy style helps to make the generations fly by. The foibles of the modern aristocracy pale in comparison with the lifestyles of their predecessors.

   If all that you want is to read about the young girl who was 'hired' to prop up a tottering throne - then I suggest that you look elsewhere. If however you want an interesting light history of the rise of one of England's great noble families, this is a fine place to start.




3. My wife is addicted to all things Royal with a special sweet tooth for Diana books. Therefore, she went out and picked this up as soon as she heard it was out. She read it, loved it and then suggested I read it because it would give me a good history of the Spencer family. I didn't think I needed this education, but I gave it a go. I must say the book surprised me. Fist off it gave me a lot of history of the family but in doing so I learned a lot of the history of the UK, at least the last 400 years. The book was full of details and read well. It has an easy to read style that always comes through with a good bit of gossip here and there - like how did they spend all that money? Overall it is an interesting book and if you are into the Royals then my wife says it is a must read.

4 comments about Bonaparte's Sons (Alain Lausard Adventures).

1. I spotted this series in a catalogue, and was eager to try out the first volume. Since the story is told from the French perspective, it's a refreshing change from the solidly anglophile array of historical adventures, in English, covering the Napoleonic period: on land, Bernard Cornwell's "Sharpe" novels and a couple of C.S. Forester's tales; on sea, the Hornblower novels of Forester and Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Mathurin books. Richard Howard is not in the same league as Cornwell, Forester, or O'Brian. (A better French-viewed Napoleonic tale is Patrick Rambaud's "The Battle", published in English in 2000). But the book is a worthwhile, entertaining read, ideal for a long airplane, train, or bus trip, or by the poolside or seaside. It begins in the fall of 1795, with the French Directory scouring the prisons of Paris for its armies on the Rhine and in Northern Italy. The main character is part of a squadron of dragoons who are trained and sent to join Bonaparte at the start of his Italian campaign in April 1796. This colorful gang of thieves and cutthroats -- a Napoleonic "Dirty Dozen" -- gradually evolves into an effective fighting unit, acquitting itself ably at the climactic battle of Rivoli in January 1797 and a subsequent raid behind Austrian lines. The author does not stint in his description of the grisly, unglamorous aspects of warfare of this era: harsh discipline, pillaging, the harrowing fate of the wounded, the carnage and confusion of battle. However, I didn't get a good sense of just what role the dragoons, and cavalry in general, played in Bonaparte's army and how they contributed to victory. The book is interspersed with chapters showing Bonaparte himself taking command of the Army of Italy and leading it to breathtaking triumph; this works well, but then stops, and only picks up again in the final chapter. I wish the publisher had provided a map or two, and some historical comments (which are much appreciated in the Sharpe books). Also, some biographical notes about the author would have been interesting: Is he the same Richard Howard whose new translation of "The Charterhouse of Parma" has recently been published in the Modern Library series? Visually, the front covers of the first two volumes of the series, "Bonaparte's Sons" and "Bonaparte's Invaders", are stunning. They reproduce details from marvelous 19th century paintings. The one on the third book, "Bonaparte's Conquerors", does not, and the difference is striking and disappointing.



2. Fans of Bernard Cornwell's "Sharpe" series will undoubtedly enjoy Richard Howard's "Bonaparte's Sons". The novel follows the adventures of Alain Laussard, a disgraced nobleman rotting in the depths of a Parisian prison after the tumultous period following the French Revolution. Laussard, along with a mixed bag of fellow convicts is then recruited into one of Bonapartes elite cavalry units, and sent to the front lines of the 1797 Italian campaign. While the novel itself lacks the stylistic flair of Cornwell or C.S Forrester, it remains an enjoyable work. Readers however, should be prepared for cliched one-dimensional characters (even in the case of the main protagonist), and a fairly routine military story. That being said, the novel contains plenty of action, and a relatively impressive attention to historical detail (though at times Howards research becomes a little too evident, for example do we really need to know the precise speed of a projected cannon ball?). As a writer Howard is not quite in the same league as O'Brian, Forrester or Cornwell, but fans of Napoleonic war literature will definetly enjoy this novel as an entertaining and imaginative read.



3. This is quite possibly the worst series of military fiction that I have ever read!...The author betrays a knowledge of history and strategy clearly gleaned from Britannica Junior, his grasp of tactics is vague at best, and his capacity to develop characters (not to mention theme) ranks with my former 7th Grade creative writing class...Howard ineptly attempts to copy the genre of Cornwell, but without the slightest effort to make himself the master of historical detail apart from superficial (and generally wrong) references to technical terms...Napoleon is an arch-villain, endlessly playing the incarnation of evil with a God complex...The main characters are cavalrymen of superhuman skill who nonetheless petulantly argue the IDENTICAL exchange of dialogue for two pages of every ten (or more often) throughout the entire series!...One fellow has unshakeable idealism, another has religious faith (both are portrayed as buffoons for this), and the protagonist is a murdering cynic who condemns his fellows, the Revolution, the Directory, Napoleon, and every ounce of human existence, but to no visible purpose or eventual growth...This may seem like a overly-tedious exercise in sharing the author's hostility for (and ignorance of) the Age he selected for his work, but Howard does break the monotony with an occasional, and absurdly gory, fight scene...The battles are more dubious than the worst efforts of Robert Ludlum...Our heroes routinely stab various unmounted enemies in various ways three or four times while galloping past them, and the mounted enemies must submit to having their heads grabbed and necks twisted to breaking (of course, all done at the full gallop once again!)...I most wholeheartedly suggest that you turn your attention to Allan Mallinson (or even Delderfield) for a competent plot and skillful writing...I bought this entire series in great anticipation, and it brought me frustration, rage, and (by the third book) merely laughter...The series is not fit for a comic book.



4. This is the first of six books which follow the fortunes of Alain Lausard across the Napoleonic Age in war. The books are well crafted, but not inspired on on individual basis. Still, they each tell a good story in a competent manner.
   
   The true worth of the books, however, are revealed in their totality. The device of one central character across the entire expanse Napoleonic Wars provides a variety of writing efficiencies in character development and it allows the author time to reveal the events in the background and the plotting in the foreground.
   
   Following the progress of Lausard from his jail cell to the Legion of Honor at Jena, and on to further spiritual growth through the tragedy of Eylau, many conflicts arise that are very exciting for the Napoleonic reader. Will Lausard, for instance, be reconciled to the humiliation of of the Revolution? Will he rise on his merits? Will he improbably be one of the few to survive all the major battles and campaigns? What fates will keep him alive? Will he rise to Marshal of France? We he become whole and will he provide a human example of the historical transformations of the age?
   
   These looming questions are wonderful sources of reading interest and it all unfolds in a competent retelling of the famous anecdotes of the era and the great human achievements of the age. Any one of the books is far less valuable alone than as a part in of the ensemble. In the totality of the work can be found a real value, wherein it it is clear the whole is far more valuable than the sum of the parts.
   
   The protagonist Lausard has many internal conflicts and rises in the Army as a dragoon despite his disdain for rank and glory. He grows and survives as his true intelligence and character constantly redeem him in the crisis of the outward conflicts around him. He rises to Sergeant and is widely respected by his fellow soldiers because he fights for them and not for glory itself.
   
   The road map of major events follows the obvious Napoleonic cannon. This first volume culminates on the "fertile plains" of Italy as the French transform from a band of misfits into a force worthy at the Battle of Rivoli to cause the Holy Roman Empire to begin its retreat into history.
   
   It is up to the reader to know what is generally going on. I recommend, as always, a syntopical reading with more a sweeping, factual telling of the campaigns from the strategic perspectives. This book and its companions are a valuable addition to the literature. However, I do not think the real dramatic interest can be obtained and enjoyed without a grasp of the ultimate context and major figures. You have to already know the big picture to get the marrow.