Historical people

An engraving showing a young woman in a pale blue dress, wearing a frilly bonnet on her head

Sex, slavery and royal scandal: how Jane Austen's novels exposed a darker side of Georgian Britain.

A man in a suit and ruffed collar in front of a blue background

George Washington is an American hero – so why was he the pride of Victorian England?.

We often refer to countries as 'female' – so why has history excluded women from nation-building?.

A large illustration of Henry VIII with several images imprinted on him

Porpoise for breakfast and late night sex visits: Henry VIII's life in a day.

A marble bust of a man

Julius Caesar's hellraising youth: did he really defy tyrants and crucify pirates?.

A woman wearing a black dress and white hood, praying in front of a Bible

Married three times by the age of 15: Margaret Beaufort, the woman who birthed the Tudor Dynasty.

A pink flower with various contraptions in the background

From goat eyelids to bread: history's 12 strangest sex toys.

A collage of a man in Nazi uniform in front of a large building

I've just been inside a Nazi monster's mansion – and what I found there was deeply haunting.

A painting of two men, dressed in colourful robes, hug each other. One man is standing on top of a lamb, the other on a lion

Michael Wood on the rise and fall of Asian empires.

This late 15th-century illustration shows crusader forces besieging Damascus during the ill-fated Second Crusade in 1148. The armies of King Baldwin III of Jerusalem, Emperor Conrad III of Germany, and King Louis VII of France converge on the city, only for the campaign to collapse in defeat. Likely produced in Bruges for a chronicle of the Crusades, the image reflects how later medieval artists interpreted one of the crusading movement’s most damaging failures.

Who won the crusades? The causes, death toll, and number of medieval holy wars explained

Fake news and the Dreyfus affair: the media-fuelled scandal that divided France.

After Franco: Spain's miraculous transition to democracy.

An illustration showing a samurai soldier dressed in a black and blue robe. Behind him is a person holding up a bar with two buckets of poo hanging from it.

Let’s think before we flush, with Dr Christopher Harding.

A red and black illustration showing a large wolf jumping up, above a man laying on the floor. Around the central wolf, there are several others

Spectral beasts and hounds of hell: a spooky history of Britain's ghost dogs.

A black and white photograph showing a young boy playing with two girls in the sand

"Imagine starting a life with so little": the stories of South Asians in Britain.

Hermann Göring in his office at the Reichstag, where he served as a leading figure of the Nazi regime. As Hitler’s deputy and head of the Luftwaffe, Göring wielded immense power during the Third Reich, later facing prosecution for war crimes at Nuremberg.

Second World War

Who was Hermann Göring? The truth about Hitler’s drug-fuelled enforcer who met his downfall at Nuremberg

A selection of illustrations of medical procedures, including childbirth and someone vomiting, around a circular chart that depicts flasks of different coloured urine

Marvellous medieval medicine: why their curious cures were better than you think.

A pair of swords in a cross shape, on top of an orange background that features warriors fighting on horses

The assassins' reign of terror: how these 12th-century killers spread fear in the Middle East.

A painting showing a man dressed in armour, with a blue and red flag over him, riding a white horse amongst a busy battlefield

5 things you (probably) didn't know about the Tudors.

A painting shows a topless woman sitting up in bed, holding her hand against the face of the man leaning over her

What did the Tudors think was ‘good’ sex? These tips and tricks were key to relationships in the 16th century

Two men stand next to each other holding large guns. They are dressed in black suits and ties with sunglasses and are standing against a blue and black background. Above them, the words "MIB: MEN IN BLACK" are written

Gray Barker: UFO conspiracy theorist.

An illustration depicting five stone hands piled on top of one another, on a small patch of grass, against a pink background

Let’s get things done together, like the builders of Stonehenge did.

Author/veterinarian Dr. James Alfred Wight (pen name James Herriot) holding up a black cat that he is examining at his veterinary surgery. (Photo by Ian Cook/Getty Images)

Who was the real James Herriot?The true story behind All Creatures Great and Small

An illustration showing a king dressed in green and orange, sitting on a blue throne made out of books. He is reading from a long scroll

Love learning like Æthelstan.

A scene from the Bayeux Tapestry shows a group of men sitting at a high

Why you should avoid hair-pulling, and cannibalism, at royal banquets.

An illustration shows five women in colourful headscarves sewing a large piece of cloth with soldiers and horses on it

Michael Wood on women's contributions to the Bayeux Tapestry.

An edited image of a man with long curly hair and a lacy ruff. The right hand side of his face is colour inverted so it appears black with a red eye

The sinister secrets of Samuel Pepys.

A painting showing a black beast biting the leg of an orange man dressed in a loincloth

What have the Etruscans ever done for us?.

An illustration of a king dressed in a green and orange robe. He is wearing a crown and holding a sceptre

King Æthelstan: England's colossus.

A drawing of a king holding a crown on his head, against a black and white image of a church

Far away from England, the mystery of Harold Godwinson's lost crown might have just been solved