Definitely do! Jeg må lære norsk!

I’ve not seen that before. They tend not to be mentioned explicitly by name, but as “Mr. Smith and Mrs. Smith” etc

Amazing!

Didn’t know you knew anything about the EIC… 😛

Middle East related: This Orient Isle, by Brotton. Sword of Persia, by Axworthy. Also enjoyed Science and Leisure by Küçük, but it’s a bit more specialised.

I’m not angry John, never. But I am disappointed 🤣

There are two different maunds in Persia, and sometimes they’re both different weights. Once I realised that some things made sense but others still didn’t. Turns out that’s because they were being concerted in Troy weights, not avoir du poids.

I’ll get the bay leaves, don’t go anywhere…

I’ll take two

Thanks David!

My copy arrived this week too! Looking forward to getting into it after my brief forays into French history

If you want to keep up with Iran, highly recommend @gbrew24.bsky.social

This is then coupled with a lack of expertise in the history/culture/politics of Iran and MENA more widely. Zero strategic forethought seems to go into it.

I promise I’m not shouting…

There’s also no sense where GCHQ or other government orgs seem to want to encourage universities to offer courses. Exeter, SOAS, Edinburgh, St.A, Oxbridge all offer Persian to degree level, so the programmes exist, but seem constantly underutilised. Manchester close their Persian programme recently

As someone with no vested interest in this at all… There has been a pretty steady breakdown in the teaching of Persian/Arabic/other strategic languages in the UK because there’s no pathway to either policy or practice within the Foreign Office/CS, where specialisation is actively discouraged.