pumpkinstrokemarrow

First, we have a learned book about the trials of Margaret Clitherow, I lady whom I spell with a terminal 'e' rather than a terminal 'w' (Google jury hung), and whom I noticed on 20th July. Ah, I thought to myself, maybe here is a book to explain why she dun it; a matter of some interest to me. But it turns out to be nothing of the sort, rather '... a dense and detailed dissection of the politics of Elizabethan religion that may not easily engage a non-specialist readership ...'. The review includes the interesting word 'synecdoche' which I have yet to consult the OED about. The work of a pair of academic historians more interested in the battles of academia than outreach, so they may lose points in the all important Richter Scale of Relevance to the life of ordinary folk in UK PLC. And I did not end up reaching for the plastic. On the other hand, there was an interesting seventeenth century Dutch engraving of her execution, an engraving which bore little resemblance to my understanding of the matter.

Second, we have a short notice of the recent appearance of the 8th volume of a Hittite Etymological Dictionary, 221 pages of it at just over 1$ a page. From a gang to be found at http://www.degruyter.de/ so Germany is clearly working to regain its 19th century eminence in these matters. A worthy endeavour, but one which, sadly, reminds me of Casaubon in Middlemarch. But I am wrong to sneer; plenty of us spend quality time on this sort of thing. A therapist might say stamp collecting or model trains in fancy clothes.

Third, we have an article on the occasion of the publication of a book about the Nagas. Which contains the idea, new to me, of a place called Zomia; Zomia being the upland interiors of the whole of that part of south east Asia. The upland interiors of Bengal, Burma, Thailand, Vietnam and China. The home of many small peoples, but perhaps totalling 200m, who have been driven into the hills by the more successful rice growing agrarians of the lowlands. With each bunch of agrarians taking a rather arbitary slice of the uplands as they tidied up their boundaries European fashion. Uplands which have been causing problems ever since. An interesting story, a large scale version of that of the Kurds perhaps, but one which is complicated by a peek at my trusty Permagon Atlas (the one done by the Poles and wrapped in green plastic). Zomia is not a nice tidy lump of land, more or less convex, as the western chunk, the chunk containing the Nagas as it happens, has more or less been sliced off from the rest by the Irrawaddy valley.

With that off my chest, FIL is back from the newsagent and it is time to settle down to today's ration of doom from the DT.