Dockers unloading wine barrels

Social history

c1916: British soldiers sitting around a lamp in their trench. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

First World War

10 First World War slang words we still use today

A closer look at the Staffordshire Hoard.

St Fagans Castle and gardens

A visit to St Fagans National Museum of History, Cardiff.

The 'Afghan Elvis': the extraordinary life of Ahmad Zahir.

Out of the closets and into the streets: the legacy of the Stonewall Riots.

How wild was the Wild West?

Victorian freak shows.

Winston Churchill, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin, seated from left to right, in Yalta for the 'Big Three' Conference. In February 1945, British diplomats were already joking that it was actually a conference of the ‘Big Two-and-a-Half’. (Photo by Keystone Features/Getty Images)

WW2: When Britain stood (not quite) alone.

Winston Churchill gives his famous 'V for Victory' sign while addressing crowds from the balcony of City Hall in Sheffield, November 1941. Churchill's "inspirational" wartime speeches "galvanised the country and became part of our national lexicon", says historian Dr Nick Lloyd. (Photo by Capt. Horton/ Imperial War Museums via Getty Images)

Debate: Is British history too fixated with the story of the world wars?.

Women in traditional Welsh dress, c1896. (Past Pix/SSPL/Getty Images)

Wales: In search of a history.

What did Magna Carta mean to the English in 1215?.

How is the image of revolutionary Che Guevara commodified? Alex von Tunzelmann explores. (Photo by Francois ANCELLET/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)

Che Guevara: face of the revolution.

Richard II sails down the Thames to Greenwich to meet the rebels. (Photo by Chronicle/Alamy Stock Photo)

Why did the peasants really revolt?.

John Hardyng: Henry V’s secret agent.

TravelExplore Nashville, Tennessee: the beating heart of the American south.

Anna WhitelockConfronting slavery’s legacy.

The acclaimed English author Charles Dickens. (Photo by Apic/Getty Images)

7 things you (probably) didn’t know about Charles Dickens and his family home.

10 photographs that made history

A painting depicts a 14th-century sea battle

Medieval inspiration: what the fantasy genre owes to the 14th century.

Panorama of Machu Picchu

The last days of the Incas.

MK Ultra: the secrets of the CIA's mind-control programme.

Live Aid stage at Wembley, London, in 1985

When Live Aid rocked the world.

Between 1613 and 1754, a legal loophole meant that on-the-spot marriages could be carried out in an area surrounding the Fleet Debtors’ Prison known as the ‘Liberties of the Fleet’. (Photo by Getty Images)

General History

10 things you (probably) didn’t know about the history of London

A 19th-century painted glass rolling pin and wooden pastry jigger. (Photo ©Emma Kay)

Biscuit tins and pastry jiggers: the history of 6 baking tools.

Jacob Rees-Mogg. (Photo by Getty Images)

Jacob Rees-Mogg on the Victorians.

Men enjoying a drink and a chat in a coffee house, 1674. Coffee houses became known as ‘schools of the wise’, where people would gossip, argue and discuss the breaking news of the day. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

A drink for the devil: 8 facts about the history of coffee

Peasants in the Middle Ages at a cattle market. Cows appear to have been difficult to manage in the medieval period, and caused several deaths. (Photo by INTERFOTO /Alamy)

5 strange causes of death in the medieval period.

A group of household servants photographed in Northumberland, c1860–80. (Photo by SSPL/Getty Images)

What was life like as a 19th-century servant?

In his native Como, Pliny the Younger's fame is reflected in his statue on the city cathedral's imposing west front, which was built in the 15th century. (Image by AKG Images)

Pliny's Rome: Vesuvius, vice and vestal virgins.

A portrait of Fridtjof Nansen, taken after his daring expedition across Greenland. (Image by Alamy)

My history heroPaul Rose chooses Fridtjof Nansen