Abraham Ortelius (1527–1598) is justifiably famous for having produced the world’s first modern atlas, that is a bound, printed, uniform collection of maps, his Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. Ortelius was a wealthy businessman and paid for the publication of his Theatrum out of his own pocket, but he was not a printer and had to employ […]
The man who printed the world of plants — The Renaissance Mathematicus
Our beautiful planet earth is all bordered up by us humans! Historically, our ancestors started protecting their cultures and values by living among like-minded people who had the same interests and making borders to have control over who could enter or exit their kingdoms. We made the borders even more complicated as the geographical-related sciences […]
Top 25 weirdest borders in the world — Delusional Bubble
Whatever did Britons (and others) do for news stories before Brexit?
When this long running political and parliamentary shenanigans is finally sorted (if) – will we actually, in some strange way – miss it?
Now that ‘the can has been kicked down the road’ once more, as they say, there is still no end in sight, not even with a ‘flextension’, where the United Kingdom could leave at any time before January 31 2020. But don’t hold your breath, expect the unexpected might be a good statement to keep in mind.
The whole issue of Brexit reminded me of the people of Great Britain’s long running in/out relationship with the continent of Europe, not merely historically, politically and economically, but geographically.
When the ice sheets melted at the end of the last ice age, roughly 10 to 11000 years ago, what is now the island of Great Britain was, for a time, connected to the continent by an ever diminishing land bridge, which eventually disappeared.
It would appear this separation was wholly and permanently defining for the people of Great Britain, wherever they came from, and remains so right up until the present day. Britain is part of Europe, yet it is clearly a very distinct part of it, symbolised by its island status and the fractured relationship it has had, and still has, with Europe’s varying political institutions.
In the next piece I will look at other examples of ‘Brexit’ from the past.
copyright Francis Barker 2019
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