I have been fascinated by history since I was a small boy. My mother used to buy for me and my sisters a wonderful children’s magazine called Treasure, which ran a serialised history of Britain, from the Old Stone Age until early modern times, including vivid coloured illustrations that seized my imagination and have stayed with me ever since. Seeing my interest, she nourished it in those early years with marvellous Ladybird books, which also had the most beautiful illustrations, of such varied historical stories as that of Julius Caesar and Roman Britain, the adventures of Marco Polo, Queen Elizabeth…