Social

Most of Shakespeare’s working life was spent in or around the City of London. By the time he retired, Greater London—a residential as well as a commercial metropolis—was beginning to spring up beyond its ancient limits. By Martin Holmes.

Shakespeare was born into an England rejoicing in the peace and prospects of a new reign, but anxious about the future, writes Joel Hurstfield.

A solid middle-class clan who exported English wool to foreign markets, the Celys have left behind them a graphic record of their private affairs and shrewd commercial dealings, as Alison Hanham here finds.

E.G. Dunning finds that traditional football was a game with few rules, played riotously through the streets and across country. The nineteenth century saw its evolution on the playing fields of the public schools into the two main forms we know today.

George Woodcock compares Canada's two famous gold rushes and their differing economic and social effects on the Pacific West.

Stephanie Plowman examines the letters exchanged between Pitt the Younger and his radical brother-in-law, Lord Stanhope.

J. Hurstfield analyses social conditions in the Elizabethan age.

George Charles Henry Victor Paget, the 7th Marquis of Anglesey, shares the stories behind the trip that his ancestor, the 1st Marquess of Anglesey, paid to the Court of Russia with his sons during the summer of 1839.

Ann Dewar looks back at the Parliamentary debate over the introduction of Daylight Saving Hours, tabled in 1916 by Sir Henry Norman.

Joan M. Fawcett utilises the household records for the Countess of Leicester, sister of Henry III, to retrace a crucial year for the de Montfort fortunes.

Charles Seltman shows how Egyptian memories of Crete and its inhabitants may have given rise to the Platonic legend of the lost island of Atlantis.

Noel Goodwin argues that in the making of Mozart's music there is a key to understanding his form of art and way of life.

Deborah Cohen opens the archives of the Scottish Marriage Guidance Council, founded in 1946, and finds that couples in the postwar years were more than happy to air their dirty linen.