Hey everybody! Time for our weekly update. Thankfully, I’m now more or less fully recovered from the heart inflammation I wrote about in the last update, so I had a full week of work this past week. So, here’s what went up on the site this week.

We added a new lecture to the course on the American Revolution, giving a basic outline of the British Monarchy during the lead-up to the revolution. We discuss the Crown, its prerogatives, and executive organs (such as the Privy Council, Cabinet, etc.). Access the American Revolution course here.

We also added a lecture to our medieval England course, covering Guy de Brionne’s revolt against Duke William of Normandy and its culmination at the Battle of Val-es-Dunes (1047). Access the medieval England course here.

I also got up a blog post this week, the first in a three-part series discussing the House de Bellême – one of the most rapacious noble houses of medieval Normandy. This post, covering up until about 1050, discusses William I de Bellême and his son, William II ‘Talvas’. Murder, betrayal, mutilation – this story has it all!

I was hoping to get up a podcast episode this week, and I have the episode all researched and written and ready to go, but sadly, my toddlers got to my microphone and it has apparently gone to trill sweetly in the choir eternal. My new microphone should be coming Sunday, so we will have a new podcast coming out possibly as early as Sunday, probably on Monday, and certainly by Tuesday.

Next week, I hope to continue the saga of the House of Bellême, as well as release two new lectures: one for the American and one for the Roman history course. I’ll see you then!