# Vanished Kingdoms

- Author: [Norman Davies](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies.md)
- Quotes: 7
- Book page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms

## Quotes

> That the United Kingdom will collapse is a foregone conclusion. Sooner or later, all states do collapse, and ramshackle, asymmetric dynastic amalgamations are more vulnerable than cohesive nation-states. Only the 'how' and the 'when' are mysteries of the future.
>
> An exhaustive study of the many pillars on which British power and prestige were built — ranging from the monarchy, the Royal Navy and the Empire to the Protestant Ascendancy, the Industrial Revolution, Parliament and Sterling — indicated that all without exception were in decline; some were already defunct, others seriously diminished or debilitated; it suggests that the last act may come sooner rather than later.110 Nothing implies that the end will necessarily be violent; some political organisms dissolve quietly. All it means is that present structures will one day disappear, and be replaced by something else.

p. 679 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms/that-the-united.md)

> The difference between a referendum and a plebiscite is a fine one. Both pertain to collective decisions made by the direct vote of all qualified adults. The referendum, which derives from Swiss practice, involves an issue that is provisionally determined in advance, but that is then 'referred' for a final decision by the whole electorate.

p. 423 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms/the-difference-between.md)

> Historians usually focus their attention on the past of countries that still exist, writing hundreds and thousands of books on British history, French history, German history, Russian history, American history, Chinese history, Indian history, Brazilian history or whatever. Whether consciously or not, they are seeking the roots of the present, thereby putting themselves in danger of reading history backwards. As soon as great powers arise, whether the United States in the twentieth century or China in the twenty-first, the call goes out for offerings on American History or Chinese History, and siren voices sing that today’s important countries are also those whose past is most deserving of examination, that a more comprehensive spectrum of historical knowledge can be safely ignored.

p. 4 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms/historians-usually-focus.md)

> On reading somewhere that the Welsh name for 'England', Lloegr, meant 'the Lost Land', I fell for the fancy, imagining what a huge sense of loss and forgetting the name expresses. A learned colleague has since told me that my imagination had outrun the etymology. Yet as someone brought up in English surroundings, I never cease to be amazed that everywhere which we now call 'England' was once not English at all.

p. 2 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms/on-reading-somewhere.md)

> One has to put aside the popular notion that language and culture are endlessly passed on from generation to generation, rather as if 'Scottishness' or 'Englishness' were essential constituents of some national genetic code. If this were so, it would never be possible to forge new nations — like the United States of America or Australia — from diverse ethnic elements.

p. 81 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms/one-has-to-put.md)

> The immediate future may be determined by a race between the United Kingdom and the EU over which beats the other to a major crisis.

p. 681 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms/the-immediate-future.md)

> All the nations that ever lived have left their footsteps in the sand. The traces fade with every tide, the echoes grow faint, the images are fractured, the human material is atomized and recycled. But if we know where to look, there is always a remnant, a remainder, an irreducible residue.

p. 393 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/norman-davies/vanished-kingdoms/all-the-nations.md)