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  1. Home
  2. Topics
  3. Weird and wonderful history

Weird and wonderful history

Learn all about weird, yet wonderful, events that happened in history through in-depth history articles, podcasts, video and more…

A young woman sat in front of a mirror applies lipstick, 1967
General Modern

The price of beauty: the dangerous cosmetics used until the 20th century

A kelpie, from British folklore. (Image by Getty Images)
General History

Supernatural stories: 9 unusual British folktales

A scene from the German film 'Ways to Strength and Beauty', 1925. (Ullstein Bild via Getty Images)
Second World War

Germany’s naked truth: the 19th-century nudism movements co-opted by the Nazis

Medieval

How naughty was the past? The hidden depths of the medieval church

Tudor

Hold your noses: the smells, sounds and sights of Elizabethan England

Second World War

How the roller skating craze caught Churchill

More weird and wonderful

Weird & wonderful Q&As

Historians take on questions about bizarre history…
A statue of Alice Nutter
Stuart

The Pendle witches: what happened in the infamous Lancashire witch trial?

Scenic view of Cornwall
General History

Q&A Why is Cornwall called Cornwall?

A 1950s illustration imagines a group of mountaineers catching sight of a large Yeti in the Himalayas
General History

The hunt for the Abominable Snowman: what’s the history of the Yeti legend?

Gussie Moran playing tennis with her lace knickers on show at the 1949 Wimbledon Championships.
20th Century

10 scandalous moments in Wimbledon’s history

Hoaxes and hijinks

Frances Griffiths poses with the fairies
20th Century

Fairies, rabbit births and an ‘ancient’ tiara: what are the greatest historical hoaxes?

In 1733, as part of a plot to blow up a Protestant church, a group of Catholics claimed they were being terrorised by a poltergeist… or so the story went. (Illustration by Ben Jones for BBC History Magazine)
Georgian

5 Georgian ghost hoaxes

Henry VIII, Princess Mary and William Somers
Tudor

Playing the fool: Tudor jesters

Monsters and aliens

Black and white image showing soldiers of the Third Reich surround a huge bonfire
20th Century

Witches, werewolves and vampires: the Nazi’s quest for the supernatural

A photo which was believed to be of the Loch Ness Monster
20th Century

The quest for the Loch Ness Monster

On the evening of 13 March thousands of people in Phoenix, Arizona, and surrounding areas see a triangular formation of lights drifting above the city. Fife Symington, the governor of Arizona at the time, was one of the witnesses and he described the UFO as “otherworldly”. This image shows something similar to what was reported at the time. (Photo by Alamy)
General Modern

UFO history 10 top sightings and a timeline

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