Women's history

King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain, 1469. (Photo by Getty Images)

Medieval queens: everything you wanted to know

Eleanor de Montfort, from a 13th-century manuscript. (Photo by Alamy)

At home with the medieval aristocracy

Colour portrait of Jane Austen

A brief guide to Jane Austen, plus 8 things you (probably) didn’t know about her

Portrait of Anne of Cleves

Anne of Cleves: Henry VIII’s most successful queen?

Phyllis Schlafly

The woman who opposed equality with men: Phyllis Schlafly and the real history behind Mrs. America

Taking of Jerusalem by the Crusaders, Painting by Emile Signol (1804–1892), (Photo by Leemage/Corbis via Getty Images)

Blog Medieval(ish) matters 11: Did women fight in the crusades? And why did people follow a goose to the Holy Land?

A 13th-century illumination showing the coronation of Foulques and Melisende. (Photo by Alamy)

Women and the crusades

Queen Emma and her sons, miniature in 'Encomium Emmae reginae', mid 11th century, British Library (Photo by Getty Images)

Are women at the heart of the action in the Norman Conquest?

The coronation of Philippa of Hainault

How did Philippa of Hainault, wife of Edward III, become one of medieval England’s best-loved queens?

Two nannies stop for a chat while walking their charges in a London park, March 1916 (Photo by Getty Images)

Working mothers

Thomas Sully's portrait of Queen Victoria

The young Queen Victoria’s struggle to gain the throne

A portrait of Russian empress Catherine the Great

Hypocrite, reactionary, usurper, sex maniac: is Catherine the Great’s reputation justified?

Rosemary Kennedy (right), the eldest Kennedy daughter. Pictured here with her mother Rose (centre) and sister Kathleen, during the family's residency in Britain in the late 1930s. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

The lost Kennedy: the tragic life of JFK’s sister Rosemary

Queen Victoria of Great Britain with her husband, Prince Albert, and their nine children. (Photo by Rischgitz/Getty Images)

Queen Victoria’s children

Queen Victoria in her coronation robes.

Your guide to Queen Victoria, plus 8 fascinating facts about the monarch