Feature

The Rock of the English Kingdom

Despite her valiant efforts on their behalf, Margaret of Anjou would lose both her husband and her son in the dynastic tragedy of the Wars of the Roses. 

The Shanghai Race Club

Though horse racing was a symbol of British colonialism, it became a surprisingly inclusive pastime in China’s major International Settlement. 

Before Empire

In its earliest days, the East India Company was seen not as a threat to Asia’s elites, but as a means of strengthening their powers.

Why Study the Past?

History can teach, inspire, warn, include and exclude; its uses change to fit the present moment.

The First Blind Medical Trials

Cures and treatments have always offered potential riches to their inventors. But how was one supposed to know what worked and what didn’t? 

Abbots Ascendant

William Chester Jordan’s study of one of medieval Europe’s great monastic rivalries suggests that social mobility may have been more common in the Middle Ages than historians previously thought.

Escape from Vesuvius

In October 1943 the Allies liberated the area around the infamous volcano in the Bay of Naples. Its sudden eruption in March 1944, as war in Italy raged, stretched the resources of the combined services to the limit. What followed was an exemplary emergency operation.

Frankenstein: Between Two Worlds

Mary Shelley’s great novel is not a commentary on the Industrial Revolution, nor is it a simple retelling of the myth of Prometheus. It is far more original than that.