Whilst doing some research over the last couple of days, I came across these World War Two defences still in place in Chelmsford, Essex, and being relatively close, I decided to go and see them for myself.

The Antikythera Mechanism and the Problem of Being Too Early

When Howard Carter uncovered the sealed tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922, the discovery was immediately recognised as extraordinary. Unlike other royal burials in the Valley of the Kings, this one was largely intact. Objects lay where they had been placed more than three thousand years earlier. The moment carried a sense of intrusion as much as triumph.

History is usually written as a chain of evidence. Dates, objects, conclusions.

I went down to Execution Dock on Sunday morning with my friend Darryl, making the most of a low tide and a clear run of time. We parked near the Captain Kidd pub and stepped down onto the Thames foreshore just as the river had reached its lowest ebb. It felt like a narrow window. Miss it, and the place remains largely inaccessible, separated by water rather than distance.