Elizabethan - Getty Images

Elizabethan

First built in 1576, the Globe theatre burnt to the ground in 1613. During a performance of the play now known as 'Henry VIII', a set of stage cannons were fired and a piece of flaming material from one of the cannons landed on the theatre’s thatched roof, causing the fire. (Photo by Time Life Pictures/Mansell/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

5 facts about Shakespeare’s Globe theatre

Portrait of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. (Photo by Ken Welsh/Design Pics/Corbis via Getty Images)

Princely pleasures at Kenilworth: Robert Dudley's three-week marriage proposal to Elizabeth I

8 of Britain’s best historical houses and gardens

Shakespeare’s greatest actor

Shakespeare’s best (or worst) villains

An engraving from Ulrich Molitor’s ‘On witches and female soothsayers’, depicting witches bringing down the rain. Germany, 15th century. (Photo by DeAgostini/Getty Images)

A spell-binding history of witches

Elizabethan England’s relationship with the Islamic world

Elizabeth’s love rival

Cornwell on Shakespeare

The 19th-century auction that saved Shakespeare’s birthplace

Anne Boleyn in the Tower

Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII and Elizabeth I in their own words: 5 fascinating letters from Tudor monarchs

Historical fiction and a US murder scandal

Irish national hero Hugh O'Neill, the 2nd Earl of Tyrone, makes a formal submission to the English following the suppression of his Irish rebellion, 1603. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

The LibraryHugh O'Neill: Elizabeth I’s Irish nemesis

The Reformation

Peter Snow’s six most important documents in history

The reluctant ambassador: the life and times of Tudor diplomat Sir Thomas Chaloner

Tudor monarchs and a medieval civil war

Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton star in the 1967 film adaptation of William Shakespeare's 'The Taming of the Shrew'. One of the playwright's most notorious couples, Katherine and Petruchio are far from a harmonious love match. (Photo by Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images)

Shakespeare’s 7 most notorious couples

Shakespeare’s world and cricket in South Africa

Shakespeare’s London: playing a dangerous game

Swan Theatre, Bankside, London, interior from drawing by Johannes de Witt. The Shakespearian theatre, erected c1593 on Bankside – could hold 3,000 spectators – typical of the time. (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

At the playhouse: watching Shakespeare's plays in Elizabethan England

Elizabeth I of England

Personal politics in Elizabeth I's court

Mary, Queen of Scots is executed © Getty

Horrible Histories author reveals 10 ways to die in Elizabethan England

Shakespeare: the historians’ view

A portrait of Queen Elizabeth I painted by Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger. (Photo by Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)

How Shakespeare rewrote history

An illustration of Edmund Spenser’s poetic work ‘The Shepheardes Calender’. (Photo by Culture Club/Contributor/Getty Images)

The dark side of Elizabethan England

Muslims and Jews in the 16th century

Chess, gambling and cards: Tudor games and indoor pastimes

Photo of a couple holding up a fan

Q&AWhat signals were used in fan language?

In pictures: John Dee, the 'Elizabethan 007'