Junk history is miring a generation in ignorance

Children are being taught nonsense masquerading as facts as part of a push for more ‘inclusive’ schooling

‘Beethoven?” “Black!” “Mozart?” “Black!” “William Shakespeare?” “Undoubtedly black, without question”. Henry VIII was black, too – although the jury remains out on Abraham Lincoln. This scene from an episode of Louis Theroux’s Weird Weekends is now more than 20 years old, but in some ways it might as well be 200.

As always with Theroux’s documentaries, he is visiting people whose beliefs and lifestyles put them well outside the realms of normality. In this case, members of the Black Hebrew Israelites, a religious movement that claims that African Americans are not only the descendents of the biblical Hebrews but are also responsible for practically every major invention and moment of progress in human history. Theroux reacts with trademark gentle incredulity; and it is this that so dates the episode. Now, something the BBC might have ridiculed even in 1999, seems to be becoming the stated belief of a growing number of academics, historians and public intellectuals.

There has been an explosion in a historical propaganda masquerading as official history. No coincidence that it is often aimed at young people. One recent children’s history book, Black In

Time, included the Roman emperor Septimius Severus in a list of “awesome black Britons” – even though he was neither black, nor British, but a North African of Romano-carthaginian descent who happened to live in Britain for a few years. Another book goes further, claiming that Stonehenge was built when “Britain was a black country”. Luton council has included the pyramids of Giza in a timeline of “black” history for school children.

Such claims aren’t just false but reductive; if the word “black” is used to refer to anything “non-white”, it erases a host of histories and experiences in the process. Talk about cultural appropriation.

Junk history sometimes leads to embarrassing mistakes, as when a BBC plaque commemorating Beachy Head Lady as the “first black Briton” had to be removed after new DNA evidence suggested the ancient skeleton actually came from the East Mediterranean. You almost wonder who or what will be next; surely the Black Prince comes ready-made with a moniker?

What makes this trend for inventing or misassigning historical figures so odd is that there is documentary evidence for black British history pre-windrush. One of the most intriguing figures in early modern England was John Blanke, a black trumpeter at the court of Henry VIII, who is believed to have arrived with Catherine of Aragon. His presence tells us much about the movement of people, diplomacy, music and race. When genuine examples like this exist, it’s intellectually insulting to lie to future generations about the druids being early Rastafarians or whatever. But part of the reason Blanke is so interesting is precisely because there are so few comparable examples.

It is said that when America sneezes, Britain catches a cold, and the insistence on seeing all history through a politicised, Blm-style lens is one example. “Junk history” isn’t just divisive. It often accompanies calls for specific policies, such as reparations or open-door migration, often defended on the basis that “Britain has always been a nation of immigrants”. It’s inevitable that the politics of today will inform how we tell the stories of yesterday, but the further those narratives get from objective reality, the more dangerous it is for us all.

If only denying reality were an ‘

option in January – hands-down winner of the year’s most miserable month. All made worse by Dry January. Its logic is clear; December is a month of excess which must therefore give way to 31 days of Puritanism. However, two problems present themselves. First, if any month requires the soothing ministrations of the occasional alcoholic drink, it is January. Whether a nip of sloe gin from a hip flask on a rainy walk or beating the gloom with a catch-up pint in a cosy pub corner after the chaos of Christmas, January is in fact the single month least appropriate for eschewing alcohol.

Second – and most appropriately, given the quasi-evangelistic tones in which participants will mention Dry January – there is a theological problem. The 12 days of Christmas in fact last until January 6 and, historically, the feast of Christmas doesn’t end until Candlemas on February 2, so the whole of January arguably counts as a feast. The medieval church understood people needed a bit of cheering up at this time of year, unlike Gwyneth Paltrow or whichever reincarnation of Cotton Mather runs the NHS “live well advice programme”.

This isn’t to say we must do “Monsoon January”. My mother – who drinks only occasionally, and in moderation – turns 69 this week and I’m convinced the fact that most people assume she has either a hideous portrait in the attic or a dedicated team of plastic surgeons is in part down to this healthy relationship with alcohol. But for those desperate for a period of genuine abstinence, there is a better precedent – Lent. Many forget that Sundays and feast days are considered exempt from Lenten discipline; so all in all a much healthier, more realistic model for resetting your relationship with alcohol than an entire enforced month of continued rainy, boozeless misery.

This year Lent begins on February 14. So why not forgo your Valentine’s Day glass of fizz and support your local pub this January instead?