HISTORY came alive for dozens of children in Brentwood when a famous illustrator visited the town.
Horrible Histories artist Martin Brown has helped make history more fun for two decades and on Friday he visited Chicken and Frog bookshop in Ongar Road, to give children some top drawing tips.
"Drawing is definitely teachable," he told the Gazette.
"Everyone likes to draw when they are young, but then people get older and tell themselves 'my horse doesn't look like a horse, I'm lousy at drawing' but it's a skill, you have to work at."
Mr Brown said he thought the secret to the famous book series was the way the cartoonists and writers were not afraid to mock "more ridiculous" aspects of history.
"One of my favourites was about the Normans," he added. "They used to use their own personal seal to sign their letters.
"So in the book I drew a Norman with a great big seal, the mammal type, slouched over a writing desk."
Harry Cooper, seven, from St Thomas of Canterbury School in Brentwood, joined the queue to get the illustrator's autograph.
The youngster said of the Horrible Histories books: "I like the fun jokes and I learn a bit as well."
Another fan, Ellea Evans-Hayden, nine, put it simply: "They've got blood and guts and gore."
