The story of the lighthouse is as fascinating and diverse as the design of the buildings themselves.

Roman and medieval attempts to help seafarers navigate, using beacons and other seamarks, preceded elegant Georgian lights, followed in the nineteenth century by huge rock-based lighthouses such as Eddystone, which were great feats of Victorian civil engineering.

This book relates the story of their construction, often undertaken in desperately dangerous and stormy conditions, looks at the lives of their keepers, and considers how automation has changed the modern lighthouse. A gazetteer gives brief details of over 160 lights around the coasts of Great Britain and Ireland.