The 17th century anti-monarchist and former Lord Protector of England attacked the town of Drogheda in County Louth in 1649 with 12, 000 Roundheads.

BBC: Anger over Cromwell death mask plan

But, with his ally Lord Mandelson functioning these days as a sort of Lord Protector Mr Brown has plainly thought hard about future sources of growth for the British economy.

ECONOMIST: Britain��s prime minister

Was it really the Lord Protector's head that was rammed on a pike in Whitehall, to discourage regicides, only to be blown down in a gale and swiped by a soldier?

ECONOMIST: Oliver Cromwell

It is entirely appropriate to remember a great, no-nonsense Englishman, the Lord Protector Cromwell, instituted the Commonwealth of Great Britain long before the French or American revolutions, and he showed us a model without that Greco-Roman name of republic.

ECONOMIST: Letters: On Cyprus, gold, cloud computing, education, LED lighting, infrastructure, the British monarchy | The