Volume 28 Issue 3 March 1978

Who was John the Baptist?

In the New Testament layers of tradition overlay accounts of John the Baptist. J.K. Elliott describes how these accounts were imposed by writers who altered historical details to suit their own doctrinal ends.

The Sea-Otter and History

Across the Pacific, writes C.M. Yonge, from northern Japan to the Californian coastline, the relentless hunt for the sea-otter’s precious fur had international consequences.

Queen Adelaide: A Portrait

Joanna Richardson describes how the prosaic alliance arranged between the middle-aged Duke of Clarence and Princess Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen became at length an extremely happy marriage.

Peter Semenov in Central Asia, 1856-1857

During the 1850s, writes W. Bruce Lincoln, an intrepid Russian traveller penetrated hitherto almost unknown territory, making large collections of botanical and geographical specimens, and exploring twenty-three difficult mountain passes.

Greenwich and Standard Time

Not until the second decade of the twentieth century, writes Alun C. Davies, was a standardised method of time-keeping established throughout Britain.