Just What Are We Missing in Our History?; Finola Lynch Suspects a New Labour Agenda Behind the Proposed Rewriting of the School History Syllabus

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What are we missing if Canute, Alfred the Great and Bede are banished from our children's history lessons?

"Well, 'what', 'are' and 'we' for a start," replies Professor Jane Roberts, Professor of English Language and Medieval Literature at Kings College, London.

"The core of our language as it was then spoken has survived, English before the conquest." That's 1066 to you and I.

It is fair to suggest we would not be asking the question if it had not been for those 700 years education experts want to slice from today's A-level history syllabus.

From 410, the contentious fixed date that marks the official end of Roman Britain through the 200-year-old …