The Germanic invaders of Britain, who were to become the English, came from north-west Europe, between the mouth of the Rhine and the Baltic Sea. By Roman standards they were uncivilized people. They had never known Roman rule, and when they reached Britain they were startled by the Roman buildings. Only а race of giants, they thought, could have built them. They avoided the towns, preferring their own simpler settlements.

At first the Anglo-Saxons arrived in small groups. Then, liking the country, they came in larger bands, and began to move inland, finding their way to the heart of England up the Thames and other rivers. The England they found was not much like the England of modem times. То judge from Anglo-Saxon poetry it was а grim, cold place. Thorny forests and barren heaths covered much of the land, swamps and marshes covered more. Rivers were not neatly confined within banks but oozed over the fields. Bears, wolves and wild boar roamed the forests. There were pelicans in Somerset and golden eagles in Surrey. ...

The slow breakdown of Rome coincided with the restless stirrings of more vigorous people. The fierce Huns were expanding westwards from central Asia, and others - Vandals, Goths, Franks, etc. - moved west ahead of them. Among them were the Saxons who came to Britain.

Roman civilization in Britain was dying for many years before the legions departed. Some towns, like Bath, were ruined and deserted before the Saxon invaders reached them. Coins and pottery, which provide such valuable clues for archaeologists, were becoming scarce before 400. Written records disappeared almost entirely. Looking back, we seem to see а gloomy northern mist falling on Britain. Through it we hear the cries and sounds of battle, while now and then some menacing figure looms dimly through the mist, bent on plunder. ...

Эра Кинга началась в декабре 1955 года, после казалось бы совсем непримечательного события в Монтгомери, где это в это время Кинг служил пастором. Чернокожая швея Роза Паркс была арестована за отказ уступить место в автобусе белому пассажиру. Под руководством Кинга негритянская община бойкотировала транспорт Монтгомери 382 дня. В ноябре 1956 году Верховный суд США признал закон о сегрегации (отделении) в Алабаме неконституционным, и уже в декабре черные и белые пользовались автобусами совместно. Кстати, еще дед Кинга в свое время организовал бойкот расистской газеты "Georgian" в Атланте. Когда шесть тысяч черных жителей Атланты перестали покупать ее, она разорилась.

В бурлящее, раскаленное время конца 50-х - начала 60-х годов, когда многие черные националисты твердили о ненависти и готовности к борьбе со всеми силами белой Америки, Кинг убеждал всех в необходимости ненасильственного сопротивления расизму. Итогом движения за гражданские права, включавшего в себя марши, экономические бойкоты, массовые уходы в тюрьмы и т.д. стал Акт о Правах, одобренный Конгрессом США в 1964 году.

Роль Кинга в ненасильственной борьбе за принятие закона, уничтожавшего остатки расовой дискриминации, была отмечена Нобелевской премией мира.

28 августа 1963 года в Вашингтоне на ступенях мемориала Линкольна Кинг произнес свою знаменитую речь, в которой выразил веру в братство всех людей и которая является великолепным образцом ораторского искусства.

"У меня есть мечта, что в один прекрасный день нация поднимется и поймет... что все люди созданы равными... "

· Королева родилась 21 апреля 1926 года в центре Лондона на Брутон-стрит. Ее крестили 29 мая 1926 года в придворной церкви Букингемского дворца, а конфирмация (первое причастие юношей и девушек в англиканской церкви) будущей королевы состоялась 28 марта 1942 года в королевской часовне Виндзорского замка.

· Хотя настоящий день рождения королевы приходится на 21 апреля, но официально он отмечается в июне.

· Королева была членом организации девочек-скаутов (1937) и рейнджер-гайдов-моряков (старшая дружина девочек скаутов) (1943).

· Во время Второй мировой войны тогда еще совсем юная принцесса Елизавета принимала участие в рождественских представлениях для детей. Так, в 1941 году она сыграла роль принца Флоризеля в Золушке. Эти представления происходили каждый год в Палате Ватерлоо Виндзорского замка.

· Королева научилась водить машину в 1945 году, когда поступила на службу в армию.

· Бракосочетание королевы и герцога Эдинбургского состоялось 20 ноября 1947 года в Вестминстерском аббатстве. Подвенечный наряд королевы был изготовлен по эскизу сэра Нормана Хартнелла из шелковых нитей китайского тутового шелкопряда, которого разводят на ферме в Лаллингстоунском замке. ...

The greatest blessing of Roman rule was the рах Romana, 'Roman peace'. Tribal wars in Lowland Britain stopped, and the attacks of outsiders, like the Picts from the north and the Saxons from overseas, were resisted. The Romans set up law courts and enforced justice, though their idea of justice was not the same as ours and their punishments, which included execution by crucifixion, were cruel.

The Romans built the first towns. London was the largest, with about 30,000 people. Colchester and St Albans each had about half as many, but most Roman towns had only 3,000 or 4,000.

The typical Roman town was surrounded by а defensive wall, and was entered through stone-towered gateways. Streets were laid out in squares, and many of the ordinary houses and shops were made of timber and plaster. Larger, stone houses belonged to local leaders, government officials or merchants. The centre of the town was the marketplace, or forum, and nearby were а town hall, several temples, public baths (the Romans were fond of bathing and even had а type of sauna), and an inn or two. Some buildings, such as the amphitheatre where plays were performed, were outside the defensive walls. ...

At that time the city of Rome was about 700 years old, but the Roman empire was much younger. As late as 211 ВС Rome had narrowly escaped destruction by the Carthaginian general, Hannibal. But Hannibal's defeat left Rome without а serious rival, and by Caesar's time it controlled an empire that stretched from Spain to the Near East.

Two places more different than imperial Rome and Celtic Britain could hardly have existed. Roman society was urban, with grand public buildings built of marble. Britain was а country of mud huts, with no settlement large enough to be called а town. An upper-class Roman lived in greater comfort than any Britisher before the 15th century. His house even had central heating.

The Romans, as heirs of the civilization of Ancient Greece, were interested in art, philosophy and history (Caesar himself wrote good military history in simple prose). The British could neither read nor write. They were not savages, and in some ways Celtic art was superior to Roman, or so it seems to us, but the Romans naturally thought of them as hopelessly primitive barbarians. То the Romans - and to many non-Romans too - there was but one worthwhile form of society, and that was their own. The only useful function of other peoples was to contribute to the glory of Rome.

Britain was а mysterious isle to the Romans. But Caesar knew it contained valuable minerals, and he knew also that the British were helping their cousins in Gaul against Rome. Не decided on invasion. ...

Long ago, the British Isles were not isles at all. Britain was part of the European continent: the English Channel did not exist and East Anglia merged into the Netherlands. Then, about 10,000 years ago - when the last Ice Age had ended, when the bones of the last mammoth had sunk into the mud of the Thames valley, when the climate grew warmer - new rivers and seas were formed and Europe was slowly formed into its present shape.

The people of Britain, like their cousins оn the continent, were simple hunters who lived оn the flesh of wild animals, which they shot with flint-tipped arrows or caught in traps. They killed fish in the estuaries and shallow rivers with spears made from the antlers of deer. They gathered wild fruit, nuts and honey, and probably ate snails, caterpillars and other grubs. They did not build permanent houses, but moved from place to place, sheltering in caves in cold weather.

The people of Britain lagged behind the people of certain warmer lands in their development. While they were still living in caves and scratching about for insects to eat, the Egyptians were building pyramids and writing literature.

Of all the stages between the cave and the skyscraper, perhaps man's greatest leap forward was taken when he became а farmer. The Stone Age farmer of about 5,000 years ago had to clear patches in the forests which covered most of Britain that was not barren heath or swamp. Не cut down trees with stone axes, burned off the scrub, and tilled the ground with а stone-headed hoe. Не kept half-wild cattle and pigs in the forest, where they could find their own food, and in treeless parts, like northern Scotland, he kept sheep. The people who grew grain in southern England had flint sickles to reap the harvest.

By the end of the Stone Age, about 2,000 BC, metal was already being used. The Beaker people, who are named after the clay mugs, or 'beakers', they made, also used bronze knives. They came to Britain from northern Europe, and started the building of the stone monuments at Stonehenge and Avebury (Эйвбери). ...