Dockers unloading wine barrels

Social history

Picture of a court jester

10 April Fools pranks through history that went wrong.

Servants pour wine to Jacobean gentlemen in a London tavern, c.early 17th century

A better deal than Downton? A day in the life of a Jacobean servant.

The Oxford boat on the Thames during first ever Boat Race between between the Oxford and Cambridge university boat clubs, 1829.

Oxford v Cambridge: A history of the boat race

Claudia Severa’s preserved party invitation from Vindolanda

Q&AWhat was written on the Vindolanda Tablets?

A silhouette of Roman soldiers against Hadrian's Wall

What was life like on Hadrian's Wall?.

Rapa Nui’s island mysteries.

The history of beauty: everything you wanted to know.

Four flapper women line up along a wall and chug bottles of liquor in the 1920s.

Flappers, sanitary pads and public drinking: was the 1920s a time of increased liberation for women?

The 30th Annual Academy Awards, Los Angeles, 1958. (Ralph Crane/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

13 remarkable moments in the history of the Oscars

Naked statues, naughty gods & bad wine.

Workers reaping and binding sheaves, from the Luttrell Psalter c1330

What was feudalism?

A 16th-century portrait of Bess of Hardwick. Bess's talent, ambition and eye for a well-connected husband elevated her to dizzying levels of wealth and power in Tudor England. (Photo by Bridgeman Art Library)

Bess of Hardwick: schemer, social climber, scourge of Elizabeth I

A painting of the Coniston, a ship that befell tragedy

Q&AWhat is the greatest mishap caused by someone not realising the clocks had moved forward or back?.

Episode 3The corporation at war.

Regé-Jean Page and Phoebe Dynevor meet for a dance in Bridgerton

Q&AHow did people learn to dance in Baroque and Regency times?.

c1935: Beatrice Shilling sits astride her Norton motorcycle. (Photo by Fox Photos/Getty Images)

5 women inventors you should know about from history.

Prohibition: busting myths about the ban on booze.

Stitching together the history of fabric.

A woman holds a pitchfork in an image from a recruitment poster for the Women’s Land Army, 1940s.

Dig for Victory: Britain's WW2 war on hunger.

Picture of a 19th-century bloomer costume

Q&AWhen did women start wearing trousers?

Carrot conspiracies & digging for victory: feeding Britain in WW2.

Molotov cocktails, Ukraine

Q&AWhat is a Molotov cocktail?

Children of the Norman Conquest.

Photo of Chinese Red Guards

The Gordons: Prisoners of the Cultural Revolution

An illustration depicting a woman lying in bed who has recently given birth to twins. Other women busy themselves with tasks around her, such as stoking a fire and holding one of the babies.

General History

Q&AWhere does the word ‘gossip’ come from – and what has it got to do with childbirth?

Gladiators: everything you wanted to know.

St Patick depicted in a 13th-century folio

The history of St Patrick's Day traditions – and the importance of the colour green

Illustration showing a scene from the Battle of Moore's Creek

The Highlanders of North Carolina & the battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge.

General History

Eugenics: a toxic history.

A family in Soviet Ukraine during the Holodomor

Stalin’s famine: a brief history of the Holodomor in Soviet Ukraine