Social history

'The Fountain of Youth', 1546. Artist: Lucas Cranach the Elder

The Tudor swimming guide: how we first learnt to swim

podcast-logo_v4_31-21a6c69

A Nazi serial killer and a Tudor gentleman

podcast-logo_v4_31-21a6c69

British history: the turning points

Labour politician Aneurin Bevan, the chief architect of the National Health Service, 20 August 1945. (Photo by John F Stephenson/Topical Press Agency/Getty Images)

The NHS: what can we learn from history?

Miss Ivy Williams

6 trailblazing women in history

podcast-logo_v4_31-21a6c69

Life in a London slum and the Last Judgement

podcast-logo_v4_31-21a6c69

Ancient civilisations and Victorian shopping

Girls shower at a Woodcraft Folk meeting in Stanmore in 1947. (Photo by George W. Hales/Fox Photos/Getty Images)

Britain’s green  pioneers

New US citizens celebrate after taking the oath at a US District Court for the Central District of California naturalisation ceremony, 2007. (Photo by Anne Cusack/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

Simon Schama on American history

A second-century bronze head of Roman Emperor Hadrian

Hadrian: rescuer of the Roman Empire

A 1950s illustration of Vladimir Lenin on the sealed train between Switzerland and Russian. (Alamy)

General History

10 ways to start a revolution

School_leaver_Aug08_sml-db42c9e

The school leaving age: what can we learn from history?

An engraving showing chimneys emitting smoke during the Industrial Revolution

Industrial revolution

Can history help halt the runaway train?

The 14th-century Gough Map

The Gough Map: a map of medieval Britain

An aerial view of Wilton House

Going Dutch: the Glorious Revolution of 1688