THE SEA KINGDOMS
Alistair Moffat’s journey, from the Scottish islands and Scotland, to the English coast, Wales, Cornwall and Ireland, ignores national boundaries to reveal the rich fabric of culture and history of Celtic Britain which still survives today. This is a vividly told, dramatic and enlightening account of the oral history, legends and battles of a people whose past stretches back many hundred of years. The Sea Kingdoms is a story of great tragedies, ancient myths and spectacular beauty.
ARTHUR AND THE LOST KINGDOMS
The Holy Grail, the kingdom of Camelot, The Knights of the Round Table and the magical sword Excalibur are all key ingredients of the legends surrounding King Arthur. But who was he really, where did he come from, and how much of what we read about him in stories that date back to the Dark Ages is true? So far historians have failed to show that King Arthur really existed at all, for a good reason - they have been looking in the wrong place. In this fascinating and thought-provoking book, Alistair Moffat shatters all existing assumptions about Britain’s most enigmatic hero. With reference to literary sources and historical documents, to archaeology and the ancient names of rivers, hills and forts, he strips away a thousand years of myth to unveil the real King Arthur. And in doing so he solves one of the greatest riddles of them all – the site of Camelot itself.
THE BORDERS: A HISTORY OF THE BORDERS FROM EARLIEST TIMES
This is the story of the border: a place of beginnings and endings, of differences and similarities. It is the story of England and Scotland, told not from the remoteness of London or Edinburgh or in the tired terms of national histories, but up close and personal, toe to toe and eyeball to eyeball across the tweed, the Cheviots, the Esk and the tidal races of the upper Solway. This is a tale told in blood, fun and granite-hard memory. This is the story of an ancient place; where hunter-gatherers penetrated into the virgin interior, where Celtic warlords ruled, the Romans came but could not conquer, where the glittering kingdom of Northumbria thrived, the place where David MacMalcolm raised great abbeys, where the Border Reivers rode into history, and where Walter Scott sat at Abbotsford and brooded on the area’s rich and historic legacy.
BANNOCKBURN: THE BATTLE FOR A NATION
Best-selling author Alistair Moffat offers fresh insights into one of the most famous battles in history. As 8,000 Scottish solders, most of them spearmen, faced 18,000 English infantrymen, archers and mounted knights on the morning of Sunday 23 June 1314, many would have that the result a foregone conclusion. But after two days’ fighting, the English were routed. Edward II fled to Dunbar and took ship for home, and only one English unit escaped from Scotland intact. The emphatic defeat of much larger English force was the moment that enabled Scotland to remain independent and pursue a different destiny. This book follows in detail the events of those two days that changed history. In addition to setting the battle within its historical and political context Alistair Moffat captures all the fear, heroism, confusion and desperation of the fighting itself as he describes the tactics and manoeuvres that led to Scottish victory. The result is a very human picture of Bannockburn that recreates the experience not only of the leaders - Edward II and Robert the Bruce - but the ordinary men who fought to the death on both sides.
THE GREAT TAPESTRY OF SCOTLAND: THE MAKING OF A MASTERPIECE
The brainchild of bestselling author Alexander McCall Smith, historian Alistair Moffat and artist Andrew Crummy, the Great Tapestry of Scotland is an outstanding celebration of thousands of years of Scottish history and achievement, from the end of the last Ice Age to Dolly the Sheep. Like the Bayeux tapestry, the Great Tapestry of Scotland has been created on embroidered cloth, and is annotated in English, Gaelic, Scots and Latin. This book, with a foreword by Alexander McCall Smith, tells the story of this unique undertaking - one of the biggest community arts projects ever to take place in Scotland - and reproduces in full colour a selection of the panels from the completed tapestry, together with descriptive and explanatory material. It is published to coincide with the completion of the tapestry in August 2013.
BRITAIN’S LAST FRONTIER: A JOURNEY ALONG THE HIGHLAND LINE
The Highland Line is Britain’s last meaningful frontier. First recognised by Agricola in the first century AD (parts of its most northerly section mark the furthest north the Romans advanced), it divides the country both geologically and culturally, signalling the border between Highland and Lowland, Celtic and English-speaking, crofting and farming. In Britain’s Last Frontier, best-selling author Alistair Moffat makes a journey of the imagination as well as through geography, tracing the route of the Line from the battlefield at Culloden, along the Moray coast with occasional forays into the mountains. He then swings south-west at Stonehaven before arriving at Glasgow and the Clyde. In doing so he discovers how the Line has influenced life and attitudes for thousands of years. Packed with history, myth, anecdote and sharp observation, this is a fascinating and absorbing book that offers a new perspective on our national history.
HAWICK: A HISTORY FROM EARLIEST TIMES
Beneath the familiar streets and closes lies an immense story - the remarkable and unique story of Hawick. Full of anecdote and history which will appeal to all locals and those who can trace their ancestry back to one of the Borders’ most vibrant communities. As Hawick celebrates the 500th anniversary of the fight at Hornshole, the first stirrings of the defining traditions of the common riding, Alistair Moffat takes the narrative much further back into the mists of prehistory, to the time of the Romans, the coming of the Angles and the Normans. He recounts how Hawick got its name, where the old village stood, who the early barons of Hawick were and then charts the amazing rise of the textile trade, bringing the story right up to the present day. Beneath the familiar streets and closes lies an immense story - the remarkable and unique story of Hawick. If this book shows anything, it shows that Hawick has changed radically over the many centuries since people began to live between the Slitrig and the Teviot. All that experience in one place has created and invented much and the future will turn for the better for a simple reason. Hawick’s greatest invention is her people.
TUSCANY: A HISTORY
Ever since the days of the Grand Tour, Tuscany has cast its spell over the British. Attracted by the perfect combination of history, art, architecture, superb natural beauty and weather - not to mention magnificent traditions of food and drink - British visitors and residents have been at times so numerous that the local word for foreigners was simply ‘gli inglesi’ - ‘the English’. Currently over 10 000 Britons live there, not to mention the huge numbers who travel there for holidays. What is it that makes this exquisite part of Italy so seductive? To answer this question Alistair Moffat embarks on a journey into Tuscany’s past. From the flowering of the Etruscan civilization in the seventh century BC through the rise of the powerful medieval communes of Arezzo, Luca, Pisa and Florence, and the role the area played as the birthplace of the Renaissance, he underlines both the area’s regional uniqueness as well as the vital role it has played in the history of the whole of Italy. Insightful, readable and imbued with the author’s own enthusiasm for Tuscany, this book includes a wealth of information not found in tourist guides, and is the only modern history of the area available in English.
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