Bill Nye’s History of England (page 1/4)

See all the images…

Title page detail: Scholarly King

In this detail from the title page, a king (wearing a crown) sits at a table with a pen and an open book, and is also consulting a dictionary. He sratches his head, obviously baffled. [more...] [$]

The Vigil of Arms

“The most peculiar condition required for entry into knighthood was the “vigil of arms,” which consisted in keeping a long silent watch in some gloomy spot—a haunted one preferred—over the arms he was about to assume. The illustration representing this subject is without doubt one of the best of the kind extant, and even in the present age of [...] [more...] [$]

Ploughing 51 B.C.

“Agriculture had a pretty hard start among these people, and where now the glorious fields of splendid pale and billowy oatmeal may be seen interspersed with every kind of domestic and imported fertilizer in cunning little hillocks just bursting forth into fragrance by the roadside, then the vast island was a quaking swamp or covered by impervious [...] [more...] [$]

A Reluctant Tax-Payer

It is night-time and a man’s corpose swings from the hangman’s noose on the gibbet. He is clothed, including boots and a hangman’s hood. In the background the moon looks on, aghast. At one time most people would have been familiar with the sight of a dead man, of hangings, but I [...] [more...] [$]

detail: swinging corpse

This is a version of A Reluctant Tax Payer with the background cut away, to make a more powerful (but less moody) image. [more...] [$]