Alan Wilson Historian - The Hidden History of Britain
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Alan Wilson is a British historian specialising in the origins and ancient history of the British and the history of the ancient British kings including two real King Arthurs.
Arthurian research:
In 1976, after a chance meeting with historical researcher, Anthony Thomas 'Baram' Blackett, at the public library in Newcastle upon Tyne, the two men decided to put up many thousands of pounds of their own money to fund full-time research into the origins of King Arthur. The Arthurian stories, so popular today, came out of South-Eastern Wales into France, via the Normans, in the 12th century and this encouraged them to start their search in the same place. The search soon moved beyond Wales to include the English Midlands which had been dominated by the old Welsh Kingdoms for centuries.
To date, Wilson and Blackett have published seven books that provide information based upon Old Welsh records that date to the 12th Century. They believe that these provide a final solution to the King Arthur story and have clearly identified the true sites of the battles of Badon (Mynydd Baedan) and Camlann.
In 1983, Wilson and Blackett discovered what they believe to be King Arthur's memorial stone at the small ruined church of St Peter-super-Montem on Mynydd-y-Gaer in Mid-Glamorgan, which they subsequently purchased. The stone was offered to the National Museum of Wales (Amguedda Werin Cymru) for analysis, but the offer was not taken up. Subsequently it went on public display in various venues for some time. Following this, they employed the services of two archaeologists, (Professor Eric Talbot and Alan Wishart) in 1990, to lead a dig at the same place. During the excavations, which were authorised by the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales, several artefacts were discovered including an ancient axe, a knife and a small cross weighing two and a half pounds, that reads Pro Anima Artorius (For The Soul Of Arthur). The cross was subsequently tested by an independent metallurgical house, Bodycote PLC, and found to be made of electrum, and so certified. The cross was offered up to the National Museum of Wales for public testing, but this also was declined.Wilson and Blackett had already identified the church as an ancient historical site possibly originally dating from the first century A.D. Other major Welsh kings are buried locally.
More recently, Wilson and Blackett began a search for what was known as 'The Greatest Work of the Cymru' - Cyfrangon. This is allegedly a massive, hollow, man-made hill concealed somewhere in Wales (similar to Silbury Hill). Treasure hunters in Wales have long sought this fabled hill in which, it is believed, lie several objects of tremendous historical and archaeological value, many of which may be covered in gold or copper.
The use of deep ground probing metal detection and analysis equipment revealed non ferrous metal artefacts some fifteen feet below the surface of the hill at Twyn y Glog, near Ynysybwl in mid Glamorgan. Further investigation by collaborators proved that the original height of the hill lies some 30 or more metres below the Ordnance Survey height, and that the hill is therefore an artificial construct. (Berkly, G., 2007).
No further tests have been made to date (10 September 2007).
Lecture tours:
Alan Wilson and his colleague lectured extensively in the United Kingdom, including Manchester and Jesus College at the University of Oxford, and Alan Wilson gave the prestigious Bemis Lecture in Boston in 1993. Research into claims that the Welsh settled in mid-western America in antiquity led to Wilson and his colleague, Baram Blackett, accepting invitations from American supporters to visit US sites of historical significance in 1994. The visit led to several television appearances and the deciphering of alphabetic inscriptions claimed to be in the old 'Coelbren' alphabet. Wilson also concluded that the many snake mounds in the American Mid-west were of ancient Khumric-British construction. Whilst in America, the two men were also commissioned to produce a detailed genealogy for the Bush family (friends and supporters of President George H. W. Bush).
Published works:
Arthur, King of Glamorgan and Gwent (with Baram Blackett, MT Byrd Partnership, 1980)
Arthur and Charter of the Kings (with Baram Blackett, MT Byrd Partnership, 1981)
Arthur The War King (with Baram Blackett, MT Byrd Partnership, 1982-3)
Artorius Rex Discovered (with Baram Blackett, MT Byrd Partnership, 1986)
The Holy Kingdom (with Adrian Gilbert and Baram Blackett, Bantam, 1998)
King Arthur Conspiracy (with Grant Berkley and Baram Blackett, Trafford, 2005)
Moses in the Hieroglyphs (with Grant Berkley and Baram Blackett, Trafford, 2006)
The Discovery of the Ark of the Covenant (with Grant Berkley and Baram Blackett, Trafford, 2007)
Auburn Coach Wife Kristi Malzahn Agrees with Match & eHarmony: Men are Jerks
My advice is this: Settle! That's right. Don't worry about passion or intense connection. Don't nix a guy based on his annoying habit of yelling Bravo! in movie theaters. Overlook his halitosis or abysmal sense of aesthetics. Because if you want to have the infrastructure in place to have a family, settling is the way to go. Based on my observations, in fact, settling will probably make you happier in the long run, since many of those who marry with great expectations become more disillusioned with each passing year. (It's hard to maintain that level of zing when the conversation morphs into discussions about who's changing the diapers or balancing the checkbook.)
Obviously, I wasn't always an advocate of settling. In fact, it took not settling to make me realize that settling is the better option, and even though settling is a rampant phenomenon, talking about it in a positive light makes people profoundly uncomfortable. Whenever I make the case for settling, people look at me with creased brows of disapproval or frowns of disappointment, the way a child might look at an older sibling who just informed her that Jerry's Kids aren't going to walk, even if you send them money. It's not only politically incorrect to get behind settling, it's downright un-American. Our culture tells us to keep our eyes on the prize (while our mothers, who know better, tell us not to be so picky), and the theme of holding out for true love (whatever that is—look at the divorce rate) permeates our collective mentality.
Even situation comedies, starting in the 1970s with The Mary Tyler Moore Show and going all the way to Friends, feature endearing single women in the dating trenches, and there's supposed to be something romantic and even heroic about their search for true love. Of course, the crucial difference is that, whereas the earlier series begins after Mary has been jilted by her fiancé, the more modern-day Friends opens as Rachel Green leaves her nice-guy orthodontist fiancé at the altar simply because she isn't feeling it. But either way, in episode after episode, as both women continue to be unlucky in love, settling starts to look pretty darn appealing. Mary is supposed to be contentedly independent and fulfilled by her newsroom family, but in fact her life seems lonely. Are we to assume that at the end of the series, Mary, by then in her late 30s, found her soul mate after the lights in the newsroom went out and her work family was disbanded? If her experience was anything like mine or that of my single friends, it's unlikely.
And while Rachel and her supposed soul mate, Ross, finally get together (for the umpteenth time) in the finale of Friends, do we feel confident that she'll be happier with Ross than she would have been had she settled down with Barry, the orthodontist, 10 years earlier? She and Ross have passion but have never had long-term stability, and the fireworks she experiences with him but not with Barry might actually turn out to be a liability, given how many times their relationship has already gone up in flames. It's equally questionable whether Sex and the City's Carrie Bradshaw, who cheated on her kindhearted and generous boyfriend, Aidan, only to end up with the more exciting but self-absorbed Mr. Big, will be better off in the framework of marriage and family. (Some time after the breakup, when Carrie ran into Aidan on the street, he was carrying his infant in a Baby Björn. Can anyone imagine Mr. Big walking around with a Björn?)