Feature

Despite the spiritual rewards of the medieval anchorhold, the desire to break free could be overwhelming. 

The break with Rome set England apart from continental Europe. It was born of personal desires rather than matters of principle. 

The conflicts that devastated Renaissance Europe were justified by ancient ideas rooted in natural law and Christianity. Though replaced by legal frameworks for the conduct of war between states, the killing continues.

The man who conspired to kill Julius Caesar was not quite the friend to Romans and countrymen that his legendary status suggests. 

Henri Pirenne transformed the way historians think about the end of the Classical world and the beginning of the Middle Ages.

The myths that surround the ultimately tragic rule of Charles I mask the realities of a courageous and uxorious king who fell foul of a bitter struggle between two sides of English Protestantism.

During the Second World War, Britain, the US and the Soviet Union worked together in oil-rich Iran. But cooperation was to degenerate into suspicion and hostility. 

In the fashionable female circles of 18th-century Paris, a physician who recommended fresh air, exercise and looser corsets became a celebrated figure.

Pirates captured by an increasingly powerful British state were routinely executed. But what happened to the families they left behind?