Period

Sweyn Forkbeard, king of Denmark and the first Viking king of England (Photo by Getty)

How Sweyn Forkbeard became the first Viking king of England

A Roman soldier stands on guard during a re-enaction at Birdoswald Roman fort in Carlisle

Roman legions: the backbone of the Roman military

In partnership with Expeditions Rome

A 19th-century lithograph showing a medieval criminal claiming sanctuary by placing his arm through the ring on a church door (Picture by Bridgman)

Sanctuary in medieval churches: how criminals found protection from capture and punishment

America’s Cold War culture boom

Ras Prince Monolulu entertains the crowds at Aintree racecourse, 1931 (Photo by KEYSTONE-FRANCE/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)

Ras Prince Monolulu: the horse-race tipster who transformed himself into an Abyssinian prince

Medieval masterclass 2: Dominium 750-1215

Emily Soldene, actress, writer and rebel

Emily Soldene: actress, writer, rebel

London schoolboys on strike, Shoreditch, September 1911. (Photo by Topical Press Agency/Getty Images)

Schoolchildren on strike: when pupils demanded shorter hours

Painting of Bonnie Prince Charlie

Bonnie Prince Charlie: Scottish superhero or Italian coward?

Margery Kempe HistoryExtra podcast

Margery Kempe: medieval mystic

Greek myths: everything you wanted to know

Bloody Sunday: 50 years on

Episode 1Audio adventures in the 1920s

Illustration by Luke Waller

The Pentrich Rising: England's forgotten armed revolution

BBC employees at work in the control room at the new home at Broadcasting House (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

BBC at 100Broadcasting House: a new home for the BBC

A picture of Charles Darwin in his later years

Q&ADid Charles Darwin coin the phrase 'survival of the fittest'?

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 1944 July Plot to kill Hitler failed?

Elitism in cricket: a history

Medieval masterclass 1: Imperium 410-750

Soldiers from Mao Zedong’s Red Army assemble in Yan’an, Shaanxi province, 1936 (Photo by Getty)

The Chinese Civil War: a guide to the conflict and the rise of Mao Zedong

Princess Elizabeth

Queen Elizabeth II: the constant face of a changing Britain

Cartoon from American satirical magazine Puck, c1885, showing American millionaires playing Monopoly with the country's assets

Who were the tycoons of the Gilded Age? Meet the ruthless 'robber barons' who made millions

Cold war mind games

The Gilded Age preview: “Entry into a world that really hasn't been covered on television before”

America’s “Roaring Twenties”: everything you wanted to know

Escaping slavery in the American South

Queen Anne’s Revenge: why was Blackbeard's flagship named after the Stuart queen?

Blackbeard, real name Edward Teach, seen standing on a dock with fuses in his beard

Blackbeard: dastardly sea-devil or kind pirate?

Barbary pirates Oruç and Hayreddin Barbarossa, the siblings who famously captured Algiers from the Spanish in 1516

Barbary pirates: the Muslim corsairs and their role in the slave trade

Munich: the real history behind the new film