Dominic Selwood

Historian and barrister Dominic Sellwood blends human stories with 50 documents that tell the story of the British identity.

Selwood selects some well-known and lesser-known documents ranging from Anglo-Saxon poetry to medieval music, the first Valentine’s Day letter, Hitler’s kill list of Britons and the Brexit referendum ballot paper. Woven into the story are a female charioteer queen, a plague-surviving graffiti artist, a drunken Bible translator, the eccentric fathers of modern typography and the bankers who caused the finance crisis. Through them all Sellwood tells the story of the British psyche and of the people who built the nation.

‘An original, engaging and deeply researched journey through British history in the words of those who made it.’ Dan Jones

Sellwood is a criminal barrister, historian and novelist. His previous non-fiction books include Spies, Sadists and Sorcerers: The History You Weren’t Taught at School and Knights of the Cloister. His fiction includes The Apocalypse Fire and The Sword of Moses.