This work is an attempt to transfer into written form short lectures normally given in places of historical interest – churches, museums, archaeological sites – or, in the open, where important events took place in the past. It is the result of requests from interested and curious listeners to these talks to be able to take away with them a written record of what was said so as to have the chance of looking at it again later, when they had returned home and been able to think over the experiences gained from the trip, in conjunction with photographs taken. 

The immediacy of a spoken account on the site of a monument, or in a historically significant place with a beautiful view, cannot of course be translated faithfully onto paper or the computer screen. But the writer hopes that such losses are balanced by the additional information and views which the spoken form precludes but a written version can contain.