Weird and wonderful

Edward Jenner

Q&A When did medical practitioners start to be called ‘doctor’?

This 15th-century painting from a manuscript shows men fishing in a river. In medieval England, eels were both meals and de facto currency. (Photo by Bridgeman)

Fishing for gold: how eels powered the medieval economy

'Merry Christmas' Victorian illustration of Santa Claus holding toys and blowing on a trumpet, chromolithograph, 1915. (Illustration by GraphicaArtis/Getty Images)

Father Christmas and Santa Claus: a brief history of two Christmas champions

Vintners in an ale house, 1642. From a broadsheet titled ‘Health to All’, artist unknown. (Photo by Historica Graphica Collection/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

Did Oliver Cromwell ban Christmas? The Puritan assault on Christmas during the 1640s and 1650s

A2YTPA St Nicolas In Holland 2

Zwarte Piet: the history behind the Christmas controversy

Edith Hall on the HistoryExtra podcast.

General ancient history

The ‘lost’ city of Atlantis

British mystery writer Agatha Christie, c1926. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

The mysterious disappearance of Agatha Christie

Henry VI of England. (Photo by iStock/Getty Images)

Henry VI may have had a “sex coach” – plus 4 more curious facts about his life

A 14th-century illustration showing medieval butchery. (Photo by Prisma/UIG via Getty Images)

The medieval marketplace: a time traveller’s guide to shopping in the Middle Ages

Boys playing conkers in 1926. Horse chestnuts played an unlikely role in the war effort just a few years earlier. (Photo by Fox Photos/Getty Images)

First World War

Did conkers help win the First World War?

Roman toilet

Tales of the toilet: a historical A–Z

Gillian Anderson as Margaret Thatcher in season 4 of 'The Crown'

The Crown S4 E5 real history: Michael Fagan’s Buckingham Palace break-in and the Falklands crisis

Statue of King Alfred the Great in leafy Trinity Church Square, Southwark. It is thought to be the oldest statue in London.

Q&A What’s the oldest statue in London?

Buckingham Palace intruder Michael Fagan

Buckingham Palace intruder Michael Fagan: what happened and why did he break in?

President Donald Trump

Life after the White House: what the US presidents did next