A History of Britain (TV Series)

Beginnings (2000)

Simon Schama: Self - Presenter

Quotes 

• Self - Presenter : Supposing they would've seen an ancient sculpture like this haunting stone face with its archaic, secretive smile. The eyes closed as if in some mysterious devotional trance. The nose flattened, the cheeks broad. The whole thing so spellbindingly reminiscent of things the Romans must have seen in Etruria or the Greek islands. Would they then have said "Yes, this is a work of art". Well, probably not. Sooner or later they would have noticed that the top of the head is sliced off, scooped out like a boiled egg at breakfast to hold sacrificial offerings. And then they would have remembered stories at Rome told about the grizzly brutality of the druids. Perhaps they would have even taken note of the stories told by the northern savages themselves of decapitated heads who are said to speak mournfully to those who had parted them from the rest of their body, warning of vengeance to come. And then they would have thought "Well, perhaps not. Perhaps we don't want to have much to do with an island of talking heads".

• Self - Presenter : The tax collectors and the magistrates and the town councilors and the poets and the potters and the musicians and the newly Christian priests all said to themselves "Well this couldn't go on forever. We couldn't always look to Mother Rome, and Mother Rome was half-infested with barbarians anyway. We can handle this. We've got the Saxon shore forts. We can hire barbarians to deal with the other barbarians. We can handle this. We CAN handle this".