Crime and punishment - Getty Images

Crime and punishment

American citizens Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, following their arrest by the FBI 1950. They were convicted of passing infomation to the Soviets and executed in 1953

The secrets and lies of Cold War spies

Corruption in the ancient world.

Scene of the Peterloo Massacre

Q&AWhy do we say "Read the Riot Act"?

What one duel can tell us about Jacobean England.

Prohibition: busting myths about the ban on booze.

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?.

A photograph of Al Capone, in a suit, looking into the camera

Your guide to the Prohibition-era gangster Al Capone

The Duke stars Jim Broadment and Helen Mirren, pictured with Goya's portrait of the Duke of Wellington

The Duke: The real story of Kempton Bunton and the theft of Goya’s Wellington portrait

Witch hunters: cynical persecutors or misguided zealots?.

First photo of baby Charles Lindbergh Jr

Q&AWho was the Lindbergh baby?

Cillian Murphy as Tommy Shelby in season six of 'Peaky Blinders'

Peaky Blinders: The story so far, plus the real figures to expect in season 6

James Hamilton's 1880s painting 'The Massacre of Glencoe'.

Hell at Glencoe: what led to the massacre in the Scottish Highlands?

Britain’s only war crimes trial.

John Wilkes Booth flees the theatre after shooting US president Abraham Lincoln

Q&AWhy do we say ‘your name is mud’ – and what does it have to do with Abraham Lincoln?

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.

Bloody Sunday: 50 years on.

Illustration by Luke Waller

The Pentrich Rising: England's forgotten armed revolution.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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?