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Perkin Warbeck, an imposter and pretender to the English throne, being humiliated in the stocks before his execution in 1499. Warbeck was used by Henry VII’s Yorkist enemies in an unsuccessful plot to threaten the new Tudor dynasty. (Getty Images)

Imposters in history: 16 famous con-artists and pretenders

Second World War

Churchill’s greatest speeches

History explorer: the Pendle witches

Dan Jones on the secrets of popular history

Dan Jones on the secrets of popular history

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Today’s events in historical context…

7th January 1926: Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire, HQ of the Allied cryptopgraphers during WW II and where the German 'Enigma' and 'Lorenz' codes, both considered unbreakable, were deciphered. (Photo by Evening Standard/Getty Images)

Second World War

7 phases of the history of Artificial intelligence

Beard presents an episode of the BBC's 2018 headline arts series, 'Civilisations'. (Image credit: BBC/Nutopia)

Mary Beard: “I couldn’t give a toss what Roman emperor Donald Trump was most like” plus 3 other things we learned about her

Illustration by Joey Guidone

The big question: Has terrorism ever achieved its aims?

Public sector workers taking industrial action protest in the centre of Bristol on July 10, 2014. (Photo by Matt Cardy/Getty Images)

The historians’ view: is wage stagnation a modern phenomenon?

The Second World War

Everything you need to know...

Stalag Luft III

Second World War

5 myths of the Second World War’s Great Escape

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Second World War

The big questions of the Holocaust

Deposed Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, German officer Paul Schmidt and Adolf Hitler survey damage at Hitler's eastern front military headquarters, ‘the Wolf’s Lair’, hours after a failed bombing attempt by Lieutenant Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg. (Photo by Heinrich Hoffmann/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

Second World War

Should we be glad the plot to kill Hitler failed?

From The Library

Atomic bomb damage in the city of Hiroshima, 1945. The atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 “razed and burnt around 70 per cent of all buildings”, according to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Second World War

Was the US justified in dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the Second World War? You debate

British prime minister Winston Churchill delivering a speech at Westminster College that addressed the Communist threat in 1946, in which he uttered the now-famous phrase 'Iron Curtain'. (Photo by George Skadding/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

Second World War

Churchill’s greatest speeches

A mushroom cloud over Nagasaki after the dropping of the second atomic bomb, 9 August 1945. The dropping of the bomb prompted Japan to agree to surrender unconditionally, as it now seemed likely that the Americans could mount an inexorable process of bombing. (Photo by Time Life Pictures/Us Air Force/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

Second World War

WW2 10 of the most important Second World War dates

Read more on the Second World War

The Library

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A statue of Robert the Bruce Statue at Stirling Castle, Scotland. (Dreamstime)

Bannockburn: Robert Bruce’s fight for freedom

From The Library

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The Duke of Wellington and Alfred the Great

From The Library

An aerial image of Maiden Castle, site of Britain's largest hillfort. (Photo by Robert Harding/Getty Images)

History explorer: life in the Iron Age

From The Library

Laurence Olivier plays Richard III in the 1955 film adaptation of Shakespeare's play. In it, the controversial monarch is damned as everything from a "bottled spider" and "lump of foul deformity" to a "poisonous bunch-backed toad". (Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Why did Shakespeare revile Richard III?

From The Library

More from The Library

The Bayeux Tapestry

How much do you know about the medieval embroidery?

A scene from the Bayeux Tapestry depicting a naked man with an erection reaching out towards a naked woman, who is covering both her face and her pudenda with her hands. (© Bayeux Museum)

The Bayeux Tapestry with knobs on: what do the tapestry’s 93 penises tell us?

A scene from the Bayeux Tapestry depicting the Norman conquest of England in 1066. (Photo by DEA/M. SEEMULLER via Getty Images)

The Bayeux Tapestry now and in the future

Podcast Website large Kathryn Hurlock

The story of the Bayeux Tapestry

A scene from the Bayeux Tapestry, depicting the Norman invasion of 1066. The majority of historians now agree that the tapestry was probably commissioned by Odo of Bayeux, the half-brother of Duke William. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

5 Bayeux Tapestry facts: what is it, why was it made and what story does it tell?

The charging Norman cavalry shown in glorious technicolour at the battle of Hastings in this masterpiece of storytelling. (Art Archive)

How English is the Bayeux Tapestry?

Norman cavalry on the charge in the Bayeux Tapestry. (Image by Bettmann/Getty Images)

Second World War

Why the Nazis fell in love with the Bayeux Tapestry

From The Library

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Captain Cook’s Endeavour

By the time George II came to the throne in 1727, Britain was a nation addicted to gaming. A Georgian gaming table is shown in this sketch by Thomas Rowlandson. (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

“A nation addicted to gaming”: the Georgians’ crackdown on addictive betting

The first baby is born to English settlers in the Americas. (Illustration by Lynn Hatzius)

A big day in history: The first baby is born to English settlers in the Americas

Queen Victoria with her children and grandchildren

The marriages of Queen Victoria’s grandchildren

History Extra Podcast

The latest episodes from the History Extra podcast

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Mary Beard’s life in Classics

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Historical fact and fiction

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Ian Kershaw on postwar Europe

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Inside the mind of Elizabeth I

Britons under Nazi rule podcast

Second World War

Britons under Nazi rule

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Islam’s struggle with modernity

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History Quizzes

How much do you know about history? Test out your knowledge with our quizzes:

The results of the poll: 100 women who changed the world. (Photos by Getty Images/Alamy)

Quiz: 100 Women Who Changed The World

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Great Fire of London quiz – how much do you know?

Second World War soldiers

Second World War

Second World War quiz

In this painting from c1650, a witch wields a broomstick as demons and 'familiars' (helpers of witches) congregate before her. (Photo by Rischgitz/Getty Images)

History quiz – witchcraft and superstition

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