Death

Grave of a fallen soldier in World War I

“Their name liveth for evermore”: the difficult task of locating, identifying and honouring the dead of WW1. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

An engraving of a prison hulk at Deptford, from a c1826 painting. (Photo by: Photo 12/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Floating hell: the brutal history of prison hulks

Should mummies be on display?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Closeup of Henry VIII's face

The slow death of Henry VIII

Photo of Holy Trinity Church

Q&AWhere is William Shakespeare buried – and is there a curse on his grave?

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?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Shakespearean deaths: swordfights, snakebites & poison. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

A lobbycard for the 1923 film Is Conan Doyle Right? (Photo by LMPC via Getty Images)

The supernatural interests of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Outbreak of dance mania

The medieval dancing plague: what caused people to dance themselves to death?

Froissart illustration of Hugh Despenser the Younger's execution by being hanged, drawn and quartered. Despenser is on a ladder, as a man beside him disembowels him and tosses his entrails into a fire

‘Godly butchery’: the horrifying history of hanging, drawing and quartering

Searching for WW1’s fallen soldiers. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Ghosts, necromancy & the underworld in ancient Mesopotamia. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Anne Boleyn, who was executed by beheading on 19 May 1536 after being found guilty of high treason, was said to have had "much joy and pleasure in death". (Photo by Ann Ronan Pictures/Print Collector/Getty Images)

The final days of Anne Boleyn: why did she die?

Bog bodies: what can they teach us?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Women 'take the air' in an attempt to ward off the Spanish Flu

"Far too little, too late": what happened when Spanish Flu hit Britain?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Dr Jenna Dittmar, who has been studying medieval skeletons, reveals what her findings can tell us about injuries and violence in the era. (Image by Getty Images)

Fatal accidents and violent injuries in the Middle Ages. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Victorian pet cemeteries: animals in the afterlife. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Why Charles I had to die. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Illustration of a mummy with mask

How to make an Egyptian mummy in 6 steps. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Queen Victoria

The final days and death of Queen Victoria

The decline and death of Henry VIII. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Thomas Becket: from murder to martyrdom. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Workers repair Fleet sewer in 1854. London’s creaking sewer network sparked anxieties over what lay beneath the sprawling capital. (Photo by Guildhall Library & Art Gallery/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

Living in fear: the dangers of Victorian London. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Vahalla is depicted as a round-topped building in this funerary stone from 8th-century Sweden

Valhalla: fighting and feasting in the Viking warrior afterlife

This engraving by William Hogarth shows the final instalment of a sequence of artworks called 'The Four Stages of Cruelty' (1751). In it, the fictional Tom Nero is being dissected for anatomical studies at Cutlerian theatre near Newgate prison after being hanged for murder. Nero looks like the Dead-Alive, as though he can see and smell his own executed body on the dissection table. The chief physician sits in the centre on a high-backed chair, resembling a high court judge. He is surrounded by various medical men, including penal surgeons, who did gallows work. The skeletons of dissected criminals were usually refused a Christian burial and so were displayed as specimens, as can be seen top left and top right. (Photo by Guildhall Library/Getty Images)

Surviving the gallows: the Georgian hangings that didn't go to plan. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Women in black: the surprising history of widows. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The White Ship disaster

The White Ship disaster"The most disastrous moment in British maritime history". This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The White Ship: a medieval royal tragedy. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Anne Boleyn

Anne Boleyn’s final battle: Tracy Borman reveals Henry VIII's final 'kindness'. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Rescue workers at the scene of the wrecked Pantglas Junior School at Aberfan, South Wales. (Getty Images)

Death under the black mountain: surviving the 1966 Aberfan disaster