Sarum

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The story covers major points of British history. The following chapter listing parallels major periods and events: Not that the first two thirds are without some faults. The characters are sometimes presented with less depth because of the sheer amount of historical ground that needs to be covered. Descriptions do tend to get a bit heavy and drag down the action at times. And by the time we get to New Sarum, the connections between the families, and their respective places in the town/region can become a bit confusing. (Treating each section as a totally separate story despite references to previous sections will help inoculate the reader against this.) There is also a family tree provided at the beginning to which the reader will refer frequently. This is a book about life in England, not just the location where Stonehenge came to be. We start at one little spot but as the world progresses and changes occur, the focus expands. Today the whole world is one’s oyster. The book’s setting grows in the same way-- Stonehenge, Sarum, Salisbury, Wessex, England, the British Empire and then the entire world. I find it curious that this book has pleased me less than the other two I have read by the author. Paris is a city I love. Perhaps this is why I like that book more! Russka is extremely relevant given the current situation in the Ukraine and Russia. These reasons at least partially explain why Paris and Russka: The Novel of Russia have captured my interest more.

Sarum: The Novel of England by Edward Rutherfurd | Goodreads

a b c d e f Historic England. "Old Sarum (1015675)". National Heritage List for England . Retrieved 5 November 2021. Dearmer, Percy (1907). The parson's handbook: containing practical directions both for parsons and others as to the management of the Parish Church and its services according to the English use, as set forth in the Book of Common Prayer (7ed.). London: Oxford University Press. pp.226–241.A first novel, Rutherfurd's sweeping saga of the area surrounding Stonehenge and Salisbury, England, covers 10,000 years and includes many generations of five families. Each family has one or more characteristic types who appear in successive centuries: the round-headed balding man who is good with his hands; the blue-eyed blonde woman who insists on having her independence; the dark, narrow-faced fisher of river waters and secrets. Their fortunes rise and fall both economically and politically, but the land triumphs over the passage of time and the ravages of humans. Rutherfurd has told the story of the land he was born in and has told it well. The verbosity of a Michener is missing, but all the other elements are present, from geology and archaeology to a rich story of human life. Highly recommended.' How historically accurate is this book? It would take a historian to criticize that aspect of Rutherfurd's storytelling, though obviously everything involving the neolithic settlers, followed by the bronze age settlers, ancestors of the Celts, and pretty much everything up to Roman times, has to be more speculation than known fact. To this day, we don't know for sure exactly when Stonehenge was built or for what purpose, and I remember an Irish history professor in college telling me "Don't believe anything anyone writes about druids - crazy people write about druids." So Rutherfurd's take on the bloodthirsty rites of these Bronze Age tribesmen is probably as likely as any other.

Edward Rutherfurd

A motte-and-bailey castle was built by 1069, three years after the Norman conquest. [2] The castle was held directly by the Norman kings; its castellan was generally also the sheriff of Wiltshire. In 1075, the Council of London established Herman as the first bishop of Salisbury ( Seriberiensis episcopus), [18] uniting his former sees of Sherborne and Ramsbury into a single diocese which covered the counties of Dorset, Wiltshire, and Berkshire. He and Saint Osmund began the construction of the first Salisbury cathedral but neither lived to see its completion in 1092. [18] Osmund was a cousin of William the Conqueror [19] and Lord Chancellor of England; he was responsible for the codification of the Sarum Rite, [20] the compilation of the Domesday Book, and—after centuries of advocacy from Salisbury's bishops—was finally canonized by Pope Callixtus III in 1457. [21]his council came to him there, and all the landholding men of any account throughout England, whosesoever men they were. And they all bowed to him and became his men, and swore oaths of fealty to him, that they would remain faithful to him against all other men. Mayer, Jean-François (2016). " 'We are westerners and must remain westerners': Orthodoxy and Western Rites in Western Europe". In Hämmerli, Maria (ed.). Orthodox Identities in Western Europe: Migration, Settlement and Innovation. London: Routledge. pp.267–290. doi: 10.4324/9781315599144. ISBN 978-1-315-59914-4. In 1917, during World War I, farmland about 1 mile (1.6km) north-east of Old Sarum, along the Portway, was developed as the 'Ford Farm' aerodrome. That became Old Sarum Airfield, which remained in operation with a single grass runway until at least 2019 [39] with a small business park which developed along the north edge of the airfield. As of January 2023 the airfield is still operational, but only by prior arrangement. [40]