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A Reflection On Written And Oral History

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From Shakespeare’s Richard III, Act III, Scene 1:

PRINCE EDWARD

     I do not like the Tower, of any place.
     Did Julius Caesar build that place, my lord?

BUCKINGHAM

     He did, my gracious lord, begin that place;
     Which, since, succeeding ages have re-edified.

PRINCE EDWARD

     Is it upon record, or else reported
     Successively from age to age, he built it?

BUCKINGHAM

     Upon record, my gracious lord.

PRINCE EDWARD

     But say, my lord, it were not register'd,
     Methinks the truth should live from age to age,
     As 'twere retail'd to all posterity,
     Even to the general all-ending day.

It may be that “the truth should live from age to age” but it’s fairly clear that even upon record, should there have been one, it does not. The Normans, not the Romans, build the Tower (or so I think).


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