France

The marriage of Napoleon Bonaparte to Habsburg Archduchess Marie-Louise. (Photo by API/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)

Napoleon’s other wife: who was Habsburg Archduchess Marie-Louise?

Bill Edwardes, who at the age of 16 joined the army to fight during WW2.

Second World War

The boys who lied about their age to fight in WW2

Charles I's great weakness was that he made a strict distinction between his role as king, in which he could not compromise, and his personal role, which was entirely pleasant and courteous, says Sean Lang. (Photo by Imagno/Getty Images)

8 of the nicest kings in history

Winston Churchill, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin, seated from left to right, in Yalta for the 'Big Three' Conference. In February 1945, British diplomats were already joking that it was actually a conference of the ‘Big Two-and-a-Half’. (Photo by Keystone Features/Getty Images)

Second World War

WW2: When Britain stood (not quite) alone

Napoleon Bonaparte, published in London, 1909. (The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images)

Napoleon Bonaparte: facts about his life, death and career

A portrait of Anne Boleyn. (Photo by DeAgostini/Getty Images)

Anne Boleyn: a 16th-century feminist?

Battle of Verdun. French trench on the front lines, 1916. (Photo by Roger Viollet/Getty Images)

First World War

7 things you (probably) didn’t know about Verdun

As a child king, Henry VI – shown in a c16th-century portrait – learned the lessons of kingship from books. Unfortunately, those books didn't extol the merits of ruthlessness and practising realpolitik. (Photo by Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)

How Henry VI’s love of peace cost him the throne – and his life

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Queen Victoria and her dog Looty. (© Look and Learn/Bridgeman Art Library)

10 famous people in history and their bizarre pets

Illustration of Isabella of France. From the book ‘Our Queen Mothers’ by Elizabeth Villiers. (Photo by Universal History Archive/Getty Images)

Isabella of France: the rebel queen

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A maid polishes a silver dish. Female domestic servants were highly vulnerable to sexual exploitation, but in Reformation France they found some ways to fight back. (Photo by: Christophel Fine Art/UIG via Getty Images)

The Library The women who wouldn’t be silenced in Reformation France

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French writer Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette and husband Willy, photographed c1902. (Photo by Apic/Getty Images)

Who was the real Colette?

The maquis du Vercors were a rural group of French resistance fighters who converged on the Vercors plateau in south-east France. (Photo by Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images)

Second World War

The cruel victory: Paddy Ashdown on the French resistance during the Second World War

15th century French illuminated manuscript: The flight into Egypt. (Photo by Getty Images)

Wonders of the Middle Ages