Volume 66 Issue 10 October 2016

The Valiant Losers of the 11th Century

History is not only written by the victors. Those chronicling the 11th-century conquests in England and Scandinavia tried to rehabilitate the reputations of Byrhtnoth, Harald Hardrada, and others.

Duke William and his two half-brothers: to his right, Bishop Odo of Bayeux and to his left, Count Robert of Mortain, on the Bayeux Tapestry. Myrabella (CC0 1.0).

Reassessing William the Conqueror

In the popular imagination, William the Conqueror is, without doubt, the villain, yet the sources we have for his life are ambivalent.

Modern painting of Mehmed and the Ottoman Army approaching Constantinople

Opening and Closing of Turkey’s Past

Over the last 30 years, western ideas about the Ottoman Empire have been transformed, just as Turkish attitudes towards the West have become increasingly negative, writes Erik Zurcher.

Head in the clouds: Jorge Luis Borges in Palermo, Sicily, 1984.

Portrait of the Author as a Historian: Jorge Luis Borges

Is reality simply a collection of unconnected moments and impressions? If so, what does it mean for our understanding of the past? For one Argentine writer, fiction was the perfect place to explore such questions.

Young women gazing at Kabul from its hills, c.2014.

Islam’s Forgotten Scholars

The Islamic world produced some of the greatest minds of the Middle Ages, including a number of remarkable female scholars. Arezou Azad examines who these women were and why their place in history has been neglected.