General Modern

Illustration by Davide Bonazzi

Have nuclear weapons helped to maintain global peace?

Prime ministers Robert Walpole and Boris Johnson

From Walpole to Boris: a brief history of Eton College and the 20 prime ministers it has produced

A broker looks at his screens at Frankfurt's stock exchange on 15 September 2008. (Photo by Thomas Lohnes/AFP/Getty Images)

The 2008 financial crisis explained

Actor and comedian Lee Mack in 'Horrible Histories: The Movie – Rotten Romans'. (Image by Nick Wall)

Making history funny: is any historical topic off-limits?

A gamer plays the video game 'Red Dead Redemption II', an action-adventure and multi-platform western video game developed by Rockstar Studios released on October 26, 2018. (Photo by Chesnot/Getty Images)

Red Dead Redemption, L.A. Noire and Battlefield V: the real history behind 3 popular video games

For our forebears, the secret to a good night's sleep lay in the contents of your gut. (Photo by Leemage/UIG via Getty Images)

6 sleeping tips and tricks from history

The Suez canal

How significant was the Suez Crisis?

The ‘Surgeon’s Photo’, taken in 1934, which claimed to depict the Loch Ness Monster. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

5 facts about the Loch Ness Monster

A 15th-century map of the world illustrating a Latin edition of Ptolemy's the 'Geography'. (Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

General prehistory

12 alternative giant leaps for mankind – from carnivorism to Magna Carta

Aidan Turner as Ross Poldark. The BBC television drama is putting Cornwall’s coastline at risk of "over-tourism” as visitors flock to the area to visit the show's scenic filming locations, tourism chiefs have warned. (Photo by BBC/Mammoth Screen/Mike Hogan)

Poldark, Peaky Blinders and 6 other historical TV shows that have tourists flocking to Britain

WM Woodfull of Australia ducks to avoid a rising ball from Harold Larwood of England during the Fourth Test match at Brisbane on the infamous 'Bodyline' Tour of Australia. (Photo by Central Press/Getty Images)

4 historical cricketing curiosities

Illustration by Kate Hazell for BBC History Magazine.

From Churchill and Roosevelt to May and Trump: 75 years of the ‘special relationship’ between the US and the UK

Richard Nixon announces his resignation from the White House, 9 August 1974. Nixon resigned less than two years into his second term, before his near-certain impeachment following the Watergate scandal. (Photo by Dirck Halstead/Liaison via Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

A brief history of presidential impeachment

The ruins of Dunluce Castle, which sit on the coastal cliffs of North Antrim in Northern Ireland. They are thought to have been the inspiration for CS Lewis’s castle Cair Paravel in ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ (1950–56). (Photo by Andrea Ricordi/Contributor/Getty Images)

9 of Britain’s best castles