Period

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.

Jeremy Irons as Neville Chamberlain, in Munich – The Edge of War

Second World War

A martyr and a hero? How Munich – The Edge of War tries to soften Neville Chamberlain’s rotten reputation

Sudeten-Germans Salute the Arrival of Nazi Guards in Czechoslovakia, 1938

Czechoslovakia’s fate hangs in the balance: the build up to the Munich Conference of 1938.

Henry Avery stands on the shore holding a cutlass, while his ship Fancy battles the Ganj-i-Sawai in the background

The real pirates of the Caribbean: your guide to Nassau's pirate republic

Portrait showing Mary, Queen of Scots with her hand on her hip

Mary, Queen of Scots: your guide to her life and times

Henry Morgan on ship's deck in battle taking a hostage

Q&ADid pirates really live on the island of Tortuga?

The Immortals shown holding long spears on a frieze from the palace of Darius the Great

General ancient history

The Persian Immortals: the feared elite guard of the Achaemenid empire

Gentleman pirate Stede Bonnet is hanged from the gallows

Hunting pirates: how piracy's golden age came to an end.

Female pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read holding cutlasses

Anne Bonny and Mary Read: the deadly female pirate duo

The Gothic: from Dracula to The Shining.

Women of the Rothschild dynasty.

Map showing Sir Francis Drake's privateering fleet attacking Ribeira Grande the capital of Santiago

Privateers, buccaneers and corsairs: why not all pirates were created equal

Simone Ashley as Kate Sharma in Bridgerton, next to a Regency portrait of Kitty Kirkpatrick.

Inspiring Bridgerton: the real South Asian women in Regency-era England

Queen Victoria’s spy network.

Queen Victoria in 1861

Queen of spies? Inside Queen Victoria’s secret intelligence network.

The capture of the pirate Blackbeard, 1718. Painting by JLG Ferris. One of history’s most notorious pirates, Edward ‘Blackbeard’ Teach almost certainly had a West Country twang because he was born in Bristol in around 1680. (Photo by Bettmann via Getty Images)

Q&ADid most English pirates really talk with a West Country accent?

(Illustration by Glen McBeth for BBC History Magazine)

Q&AWhat is the origin and meaning of the pirate expression ‘shiver me timbers’?

A pirate ship flying the Jolly Roger closes in on another vessel during a storm

The golden age of piracy: when pirates ruled the waves

Captain Edward Teach, better known as 'Blackbeard', a pirate who plundered the coasts of the West Indies, North Carolina and Virginia. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

The most famous and despicable pirates from history

The Jolly Roger, a black flag showing a skuyll and crossbones. (Photo by Henry Guttmann Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Q&ADid all pirates fly the Jolly Roger?

A pirate uses his cutlass to force a bound and blindfolded man to walk the plank

Q&AWas walking the plank a real pirate punishment?

Pirates burying a treasure chest on a beach as their captain looks on

Q&AX marks the spot: did pirates bury their treasure?

A 17th century sketch of a peg-legged pirate walking with the aid of crutches

Q&ADid any real pirates wear eyepatches or have peg legs?

Mao’s Cultural Revolution: everything you wanted to know.

How the Beatles were in tune with 60s Britain.

Illustration of King Louis IX.

A king of fire and light: Louis IX's tangled legacy.