Customer Reviews

The Penguin Historical Atlas of the British Empire (Penguin Reference)

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This book is more politically correct dogma than history. Much basic information is left out to leave room for yammering on with PC dogma. A historian is supposed to tell history as the people of the time understood it -- not judge people by today's standards.

This review can be applied as well to all the atlases in this series.
The title is spot on. Anything you might need to satisfy a lingering curiousity about the Romans, the Celts, the Anglo Saxons and various other peoples arriving or departing from Britain while roaming the world get a highly condensed introduction.
All subjects "animal, mineral, and vegetable", to quote Messrs. Gilbert and Sullivan, can be found herein, plus economical, sociological, and anthropological.
How the inhabitats of the British Isles, a thinly populated group on the edge of the world and how they ended up controlling over half the world is here with more detail on the era since the Renaissance, the period of the the Empire's beginnings. The Dominions and Australia are covered also.
The book is typical of the publisher, well thought, well designed and clear. Each major topic is covered by at least two pages arranged side by side. Each chapter consists of text and one or more cartographic gems commpiled at a scale which facilitates the reader's comprehension of the narrative.
This volume is part of a series of similarly designd volumes, covering matters which are best understood in geospatial terms.
As a professional cartographer and geographer I thoroughly appreciate the thought of which this is the result.
My only quibble is the size of the books in this series. It would be much more useful in the magazine size rather than the trade paperback size it is in. The recommended size is still holdable when seated in your arm chair, and you would not need a stand or table as for full size atlases.
. Unfortunately most historical books lack adequate maps or any at all. I once read one in whiich the major city that was at the center of the narrative was missing from the sorry sketch that was passed off as a map!
A great virtue is its usefulness as a companion to more detailed works on the multitude of subjects merely touched on here.