Historical people

A fourth to fifth-century AD Roman mosaic shows a woman spinning. The household was considered a woman's natural environment; the political arena certainly was not. (Photo by DeAgostini/Getty Images)

6 women who changed the course of Roman history

c1400, English troops use siege towers to capture a French town during the Hundred Years' War between England and France. Original Artwork: An illumination from Froissart's Chronicles. (Photo by Rischgitz/Getty Images)

7 facts about the Hundred Years’ War

Detail from the Bayeux tapestry, which depicts the Norman conquest of England in 1066. (DeAgostini/Getty Images)

10 medieval dates you need to know

King William II is often overshadowed by his Norman father, William the Conqueror. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

7 forgotten monarchs.

Q&AWas Captain Bligh hated by the crew of the Bounty?

Mahatma Gandhi in Britain

Gandhi in Britain

History heroJeremy Corbyn chooses Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–97).

Black faces of Tudor England.

The real history behind ‘The White Princess’

The operation

John Hunter and the horrors of 18th-century surgery.

Scandal, conspiracy and the affair of the poisons: inside the court of Louis XIV.

Who decided Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, should be executed?

Ruth Williams Khama: first lady of Botswana

Full-length portrait of (left) American showman Phineas Taylor Barnum (1810–91) and entertainer Commodore Nutt (1814–81), c1862. (Photo by HultonGetty/GettyImages)

Circus sensation: PT Barnum's greatest wheezes.

A portrait of James Gordon Bennett, Jr (1841–1918), by Alexis Joseph Perignon, 1867. (Photo by The New York Historical Society/Getty Images)

Q&AWhy do we say ‘Gordon Bennett’?

Benjamin Franklin in London.

Hatshepsut: a guide to the life and rule of ancient Egypt's female pharaoh

First World War

Life of the Week: Kaiser Wilhelm II

Life of the Week: Romulus Augustus

A portrait of the writer and antiquarian John Aubrey

John Aubrey: chronicler of the 17th century.

Princess Victoria Melita: the British princess who scandalised the royal family.

A portrait of Joan of Arc,

The real Joan of Arc

An engraved depiction of John Lilburne, who "stands as a towering icon of the liberal tradition". (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

My history hero: John Lilburne (c1615-57)

History heroJo Brand chooses Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–97).

Ptolemy World map. Artist: Germanus, Donnus Nicolaus (ca. 1420-ca. 1490)

Ptolemy's maps: the father of modern Geography.

‘Portrait of a Lady’ by Netherlandish painter Rogier van der Weyden, c1460. From the collection of the National Gallery, London, United Kingdom. (Photo by Art Media/Print Collector/Getty Images)

Medieval underwear: bras, pants and lingerie in the Middle Ages

Charles Théveneau de Morande: an 18th-century French spy in London.

The 10 worst Britons in history