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Great Britons
Nov. 5th, 2002 10:47 amGreat Britons.
There has recently been a series on TV listing the public vote of who were the greatest people the British Isles have ever produced. Naturally, as it was a public poll, it was skewed – Princess Diana made the top 10 list, for example, which is about as absurd as it gets. However, it’s a thought, and so I thought I’d make a list of Davids top 10 British people.
It’s a difficult question, and many of the people are not included because of who they were, but because of what they represent- the spirit of an age or an idea that may best be encapsulated in their person. People who had the greatest impact upon the world, or who achieved the most, or who, whilst they may not have been particularly great in themselves, did things that have resonated down the years and affected society greatly, or just did things that I have to tip my hat to in respect. it should also be remembered that people rarely achieve anything alone - military commanders have troops to do the fighting, scientists tend to have research teams that contribute. Individuals tend to recieve the glory for the sweat of a lot of brows.
Making a list of only 10 people is nigh-impossible to do in any sort of fair or objective way and so I’m not going to order them in terms of importance or even claim that my list is representative. I’m sure I’ve forgotten people who have done more. But it’ll do for now.
Francis Bacon
Without his scientific method – and make no mistake, it was his idea almost solely – the modern world would not exist in any way that we would recognise it. In seeking to bolster the second coming by helping his fellow scholars understand the mind of God, Bacon created science; the religion of the modern world. People put the same faith in science to solve problems as they once put in God, and often with the same effect and with just as much rationality behind their blind faith. Every scientific advance and theory since Bacon owes his ideas to a greater or lesser extent. If one person ushered in our age, it was him.
Charles Darwin
The preface to ‘Origin of the Species’ admits his debt to Bacon, and proudly states that it is formulated in strict accordance with Baconian principles. Darwin knocked man off the top of creation, and listed us amongst the animals – a blow to the arrogant psyche of humanity which I don’t believe that we’ve yet recovered from.
Queen Victoria
Got closer to ruling the entire world than anyone before or since. You’ve got to respect that.
God.
Created Britain and then the rest of the world to go round it. Gave us something to alternately conquer and mock.
Winston Churchill
Was, for a time, the only person of any authority to see the threat that Hitler posed and, thanks mainly due to his immense ego, refused to back down even when defeat was imminent and apparently inevitable just before Operation Sea Lion (the abortive Nazi invasion of England). Instead he managed to bluff Hitler into thinking he’d forged an alliance with Stalin (he hadn’t), which tipped Hitler in thinking he’d better secure his eastern border before knocking out England. The rest is history.
Alan Turing.
Had the particularly British eccentric genius, that resulted in him not only working out how to crack the Enigma code, but then building the worlds first computer processor. Without Turing, no IBM, no Space Shuttle, no Bill Gates, no Counterstrike, no LiveJournal.
William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke.
Principal author of the Magna Carta. A small thing now, but in it’s day groundbreaking – it laid the foundation of a representative system of government which created the idea that the monarch, or head of state, was not above the law and was subject to the judiciary and the people. Marshall acted for purely selfish motives (he wanted to stop the King ordering him about), but his actions and writing were the foundation stone of Western Democracy.
King Henry VIII
People tend to list his daughter Elizabeth 1, but I’m going with Henry. Not the nicest chap in the world, especially to his missus’, but Henrys dissolution of the monasteries freed up immense wealth which his daughter was later to use in the construction of the English Navy. In addition, by breaking the link with Catholism, he made England the first protestant power and set the ground for conflict with – and eventually the seizing of wealth and Empire from – the French and Spanish.
Thomas Jefferson
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
He was a British subject when he wrote it, and I say that counts.
William Shakespeare
Who cares about every theory as to who really wrote the plays attributed to him? In Shakespeares case, the existence of the man has long ceased to really matter – what matters is the explosion of creativity in the language that is attributed to him. Writing with a pen that was both prolific and touched with genius, no one individual can be said to have has as great or lasting effect upon the English language.
Shakespeare trivia: Pslam 49 in the King James Bible: the 49th word from the start is ‘Shake’. The 49th word from the end is ‘Spear’. The translation of this psalm was in 1603, when William Shakespeare was 49. Coincidence?
Sir Isaac Newton
Invented Gravity. If it weren’t for him, Australians would fall off.
As noted by Neil Gaiman, also invented the Milled edge coin (as governer of the Royal Mint), and the catflap. Newton was undeniably one of the greatest minds ever to live; a good example of this was the problem that the great mathematician leibniz declared ‘insoluble’ after years of struggle. Leibniz sent a copy to all the best methematicians in Europer that he knew of, offering a cash prize if anyone could solve it within two years. Newton got home from working at the mint, opened the letter, read the problem, invented differential calculus, solved it, and put the problem back in the post, anonymously, in the morning.
Leibniz received the solution and sent the prize to Newton by return, with a note attached reading “The work betrays it’s master.”
Genius.
Bubbling under: General Sir Hugh ‘Paddy’ Gough, Admital Horatio Nelson, Captain James Cook, ‘Ironsides’ Wellington, Margaret Thatcher, Queen Elizabeth I, King Edward II, Oliver Cromwell, King Alfred the Great, James Trevithick, Wing Commander Whittle, Sir Christopher Wren, Benjamin D’Israeli, Edward Morel…I could go on all day.
Lists like these change with the wind, and I’m sure if I wrote another tomorrow I’d come up with another list.
So what’s your list, and why?
There has recently been a series on TV listing the public vote of who were the greatest people the British Isles have ever produced. Naturally, as it was a public poll, it was skewed – Princess Diana made the top 10 list, for example, which is about as absurd as it gets. However, it’s a thought, and so I thought I’d make a list of Davids top 10 British people.
It’s a difficult question, and many of the people are not included because of who they were, but because of what they represent- the spirit of an age or an idea that may best be encapsulated in their person. People who had the greatest impact upon the world, or who achieved the most, or who, whilst they may not have been particularly great in themselves, did things that have resonated down the years and affected society greatly, or just did things that I have to tip my hat to in respect. it should also be remembered that people rarely achieve anything alone - military commanders have troops to do the fighting, scientists tend to have research teams that contribute. Individuals tend to recieve the glory for the sweat of a lot of brows.
Making a list of only 10 people is nigh-impossible to do in any sort of fair or objective way and so I’m not going to order them in terms of importance or even claim that my list is representative. I’m sure I’ve forgotten people who have done more. But it’ll do for now.
Francis Bacon
Without his scientific method – and make no mistake, it was his idea almost solely – the modern world would not exist in any way that we would recognise it. In seeking to bolster the second coming by helping his fellow scholars understand the mind of God, Bacon created science; the religion of the modern world. People put the same faith in science to solve problems as they once put in God, and often with the same effect and with just as much rationality behind their blind faith. Every scientific advance and theory since Bacon owes his ideas to a greater or lesser extent. If one person ushered in our age, it was him.
Charles Darwin
The preface to ‘Origin of the Species’ admits his debt to Bacon, and proudly states that it is formulated in strict accordance with Baconian principles. Darwin knocked man off the top of creation, and listed us amongst the animals – a blow to the arrogant psyche of humanity which I don’t believe that we’ve yet recovered from.
Queen Victoria
Got closer to ruling the entire world than anyone before or since. You’ve got to respect that.
God.
Created Britain and then the rest of the world to go round it. Gave us something to alternately conquer and mock.
Winston Churchill
Was, for a time, the only person of any authority to see the threat that Hitler posed and, thanks mainly due to his immense ego, refused to back down even when defeat was imminent and apparently inevitable just before Operation Sea Lion (the abortive Nazi invasion of England). Instead he managed to bluff Hitler into thinking he’d forged an alliance with Stalin (he hadn’t), which tipped Hitler in thinking he’d better secure his eastern border before knocking out England. The rest is history.
Alan Turing.
Had the particularly British eccentric genius, that resulted in him not only working out how to crack the Enigma code, but then building the worlds first computer processor. Without Turing, no IBM, no Space Shuttle, no Bill Gates, no Counterstrike, no LiveJournal.
William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke.
Principal author of the Magna Carta. A small thing now, but in it’s day groundbreaking – it laid the foundation of a representative system of government which created the idea that the monarch, or head of state, was not above the law and was subject to the judiciary and the people. Marshall acted for purely selfish motives (he wanted to stop the King ordering him about), but his actions and writing were the foundation stone of Western Democracy.
King Henry VIII
People tend to list his daughter Elizabeth 1, but I’m going with Henry. Not the nicest chap in the world, especially to his missus’, but Henrys dissolution of the monasteries freed up immense wealth which his daughter was later to use in the construction of the English Navy. In addition, by breaking the link with Catholism, he made England the first protestant power and set the ground for conflict with – and eventually the seizing of wealth and Empire from – the French and Spanish.
Thomas Jefferson
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
He was a British subject when he wrote it, and I say that counts.
William Shakespeare
Who cares about every theory as to who really wrote the plays attributed to him? In Shakespeares case, the existence of the man has long ceased to really matter – what matters is the explosion of creativity in the language that is attributed to him. Writing with a pen that was both prolific and touched with genius, no one individual can be said to have has as great or lasting effect upon the English language.
Shakespeare trivia: Pslam 49 in the King James Bible: the 49th word from the start is ‘Shake’. The 49th word from the end is ‘Spear’. The translation of this psalm was in 1603, when William Shakespeare was 49. Coincidence?
Sir Isaac Newton
Invented Gravity. If it weren’t for him, Australians would fall off.
As noted by Neil Gaiman, also invented the Milled edge coin (as governer of the Royal Mint), and the catflap. Newton was undeniably one of the greatest minds ever to live; a good example of this was the problem that the great mathematician leibniz declared ‘insoluble’ after years of struggle. Leibniz sent a copy to all the best methematicians in Europer that he knew of, offering a cash prize if anyone could solve it within two years. Newton got home from working at the mint, opened the letter, read the problem, invented differential calculus, solved it, and put the problem back in the post, anonymously, in the morning.
Leibniz received the solution and sent the prize to Newton by return, with a note attached reading “The work betrays it’s master.”
Genius.
Bubbling under: General Sir Hugh ‘Paddy’ Gough, Admital Horatio Nelson, Captain James Cook, ‘Ironsides’ Wellington, Margaret Thatcher, Queen Elizabeth I, King Edward II, Oliver Cromwell, King Alfred the Great, James Trevithick, Wing Commander Whittle, Sir Christopher Wren, Benjamin D’Israeli, Edward Morel…I could go on all day.
Lists like these change with the wind, and I’m sure if I wrote another tomorrow I’d come up with another list.
So what’s your list, and why?
