Religion

A big day in history: The day Pope Urban II exhorted Christians to go on crusade

A ceiling fresco depicting Christ. (DeAgostini/Getty Images)

Christianity under Roman rule: a new church is born

A relief showing Emperor Constantine's over Maxentius at the battle of Milvian Bridge. (Prisma/UIG/Getty Images)

A big day in history: “A cross of light” leads Constantine to victory

William Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne and British prime minister from 1782–83, was instrumental in the Genevan exiles’ move to southern Ireland. (Getty Images)

The watchmakers of Waterford

Procession portrait of Queen Elizabeth I. (Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

How Elizabeth I used parties as a weapon against the Catholic threat to her throne

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The War on Heresy: Faith and Power in Medieval Europe

Major Roy Farran (seated, centre) at a press conference on his return from Palestine, 1947. (Bentley Archive/Popperfoto/Getty Images)

Trouble in Palestine

The death of Aelfeah at the hands of the Danes, portrayed in a window of St Luke's church, Bath. (Photo by: MyLoupe/UIG via Getty Images)

St Ælfheah: Canterbury’s other martyr

Painting depicting medieval nuns. (Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)

17th-century nuns on the run

Line engraving depicting the burning of Rawlins White, c1555. From a late 18th-century edition of John Foxe's 'The Book of Martyrs'. (Alamy)

The Making of Martyrs

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Ten Popes Who Shook the World

The Siege of Antioch during the First Crusade, c1200. (Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

Why Islam crushed the crusaders

A Saracen attack on Crusaders, from the French manuscript 'Chroniques de Saint Denis', c1200. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Traders and crusaders

The ruined site of Clonmacnoise in County Offaly, Ireland. (Getty Images)

Where history happened: the Wars of the Three Kingdoms part 2

An engraving of the frontispiece to the first edition of the King James Bible. Published in 1611, the Bible was soon to become required reading across the English-speaking world. (Culture Club/Getty Images)

The making of the King James Bible