Just started school yesterday,

and as of today, I've had one of each course. One is on the Ottoman Empire and already I see myth as fact (what I said before about the book I'm working on concerning the Expulsion of the Jews from Spain). It amazes me still (I've only been taking uni course for 4 years, so this may cease to be surprising, especially after this year) that historians and scholars believe such utter nonsense with regard to their subject. It's like they don't even research their areas/topics, just say "oh it's this, it's that" just like they did in the 1700s. Same garbage, same stuff, no change.

One of the other courses that I'll be watching is on Early Medieval Europe and one of the texts we're using has me confused. I tried to read the first bit of the readings in it, and I had absolutely no idea what was being discussed or where it was going. If this is what passes for up-to-date and top-of-the-line scholarship, then it is a terrible state that we are in. The non-recommended, and not in the library books are far better: Richard Fletcher (all works), Ibn Warraq (all works), Henry Kamen, Regine Pernoud (not sure of the spelling but she is French and dead, and far better than any historian that's recommended). Check out all these authors on http://amazon.com .