Drawing of Christopher Columbus

General Early Modern

HistoryExtra Academy witchcraft quiz – week two

Demonology, with Professor Marion Gibson

HistoryExtra Academy witchcraft quiz – week one

What is a witch? with Professor Marion Gibson

An illustration of a crow chasing a silhouette of a man running away in the distance

The supernatural signs that unmasked murderers in early modern England

Illustration of a woman with an insect net looking at some larger-than-life butterflies and moths.

General Early Modern

Eleanor Glanville: the butterfly collector

Ships in battle on the sea

General Early Modern

When pirates ruled Asia's waves

A purported portrait of Elizabeth Báthory as a young woman

General Early Modern

Elizabeth Báthory: a 17th-century 'serial killer'

Photo of Hiram Bingham

General Early Modern

How a proto-Indiana Jones rediscovered the Inca stronghold of Machu Picchu

Jai Singh II (third from left) built astronomical observatories across northern India in the 18th century, incorporating knowledge he’d sourced everywhere from China to Portugal (Photo by Dinodia Photos/Alamy Stock Photo)

Why the scientific revolution was far from just a European phenomenon

Athénaïs de Montespan, one of the official mistresses of Louis XIV, was a suspect in a scandalous plot to murder the French king (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

The Affair of the Poisons: who plotted to kill King Louis XIV?

A mermaid combing her hair

General Early Modern

Tails from the deep: separating the real folklore of mermaids from Disney stories

Paris became a charnel house during the St Bartholomew’s Day massacre, as shown in this painting by François Dubois (Photo By DEA / G. DAGLI ORTI/De Agostini via Getty Images)

General Early Modern

Catholics vs HuguenotsYour guide to the French Wars of Religion

An engraving of the pirate Henry Avery with his ship in a notorious raid that almost pushed England and India to war (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

Hell on high water: the rise and fall of the golden age of piracy

Grisly killings & mysterious motives: murder in early modern Britain

Historian Caroline Dodds Pennock (Photo by Ellie Grace)

Caroline Dodds Pennock“Indigenous Americans were horrified by inequalities in European society”

General Early Modern

15 minutes of fameMargaret MacMillan chooses Babur

A whistle-stop tour around the world in AD 1500

Coloured engraving of Malintzin

General Early Modern

15 minutes of fameCaroline Dodds Pennock chooses Malintzin

The leader of the Luddites, 1812. Found in the collection of British Museum. Anonymous artist. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

5 of the worst years in British history

Photo of Ginger Rogers

Q&AWhen did people start wearing sunglasses?

Regé-Jean Page and Phoebe Dynevor meet for a dance in Bridgerton

Q&AHow did people learn to dance in Baroque and Regency times?

Suspected witch Mary Sutton is “swum” in a Bedfordshire millpond in 1612, as shown in a contemporary illustration. (Picture by Getty Images)

Witchfinding: what drove the hunters’ cruel crusade and what methods did they use?

Portrait of Maria Sibylla Merian, by Jacob Marrel, 1679 (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images via Getty Images)

Maria Sibylla Merian: the artist who challenged the natural world

Nineteenth century engraving depicting raining cats and dogs

General Early Modern

Q&AWhy do we say 'raining cats and dogs'?

Colourful illustration of 12 historical figures's heads (Winston Churchill, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Thomas Cromwell, Richard III, Elizabeth I, William Shakespeare, Anne Boleyn, William Marshal, Jane Austen, Hatshepsut, Gandhi and Catherine the Great) shown in a grid pattern.

Top historical figures: 100+ of the most famous people through history – in chronological order

A axe stuck in a piece of wood

General Early Modern

Q&AWhy do we say 'bury the hatchet'?

Women carrying flags and scythes or beating drums - one has a child on her shoulders - march on the Palace of Versailles to protest to the king

General Early Modern

Women in the French Revolution: fighting for equality

Illustration of the man in the iron mask standing by the window of his cell and guarded by two musketeers

Unmasking the 'man in the iron mask': do we know the identity of the famous prisoner?

General Early Modern

The Bloody Code: your guide to the severe legal system