I don’t know how to tell you this but Dan Jones has made further appearances on our television screens this spring. Thankfully, both C5 three-part series have featured him as a sidekick to Suzannah Lipscomb, so his prejudices against various monarchs have had little exercise.
The first of these was about Elizabeth I, featured Lily Cole so the make-up bill was probably limited to a tin or two of Cuprinol. It covered Elizabeth’s life quite well although I learned much less than their series on Henry VIII.
The second series moved on to the Great Fire of London and Jones must be annoyed that he couldn’t vent his theory that Richard III came back to life and carelessly discarded a cigarette butt. By including Rob Bell, an engineer who explained the scientific details of the fire and its effects, in the presentation team makes it much more of a team affair and there was a lot more informative detail from that momentous week. Perhaps it could have been made nine months earlier and broadcast on the 350th anniversary?

 


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10 responses to “Rei(g)ned in?”

  1. […] this post about mediaeval London and this one that refers to the […]

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  2. […] Rob Bell seems to be on television a lot at the moment. Although he is an engineer and not quite a historian, many of his programmes go back in time as structures were built. Walking Britain’s Lost Railways, for instance, goes back under two centuries because of the subject matter, but Great British Ships (both Channel Five) has already covered HMS Victory and the Mary Rose, which was built in 1510 and sank in 1545. At the same time, possibly literally, Bell is appearing on BBC1 and BBC4’s (repeated) Engineering Giants, projects which he narrates actively with enthusiasm and technical knowledge, together with an interest in the local culture. Fore example, he tells viewers of Brunel’s great feats, tries to explain why the Mary Rose sank and walks most of the Dartmoor route from Plymouth to Exeter, although a small stage of this track has re-opened in recent years. […]

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  3. […] let Dan Jones out? At least, as in his last outing, he is accompanied both by a historian (Suzannah Lipscomb) and an engineer (Rob Bell), narrating […]

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  4. […] walked, and that their history can be traced through the old city of London, as it was before the Great Fire of […]

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  5. I am so glad that I was not drinking something just now… 🤣

    “Jones must be annoyed that he couldn’t vent his theory that Richard III came back to life and carelessly discarded a cigarette butt. “

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  6. […]  mansion became Drapers Hall.  Drapers Hall was destroyed in the destruction that was the Great Fire of London.  Rebuilt in 1667 it was once again badly damaged by fire in 1772.  It was  again rebuilt and […]

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  7. […] would seem that, according to the Daily Mail (third feature),  a certain most humble and lovable Tudor historian, has gone ahead and had a pricey and painful hair transplant. He announced this at the ‘Bad […]

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  8. […]  mansion became Drapers Hall.  Drapers Hall was destroyed in the destruction that was the Great Fire of London.  Rebuilt in 1667 it was once again badly damaged by fire in 1772.  It was  again rebuilt and […]

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  9. […] Suzannah Lipscomb and the ubiquitous Dan Jones, has been the “engineering historian” Rob Bell, who has toured bridges, ships, buildings and lost railways in his own amiable, enthusiastic but […]

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  10. […] six lovely old churches some of which were destroyed in the disastrous conflagration known as the Great Fire of London in […]

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