History Today

Members of the Ulster Unionist party sign a covenant on ‘Ulster Day’ as part of their campaign to halt the passage of the Third Home Rule Bill, 28 September 1912.

Solving the Insoluble

Was the partition of Ireland an inevitable act?

A Young English Woman, by Hans Holbein the Younger, 16th century.

The Historian Embodied

Dressing in historical clothes can reveal things about the past that no book can.

Fear of Plague in the House of Fitzeisulf, a detail from Trinity Chapel window, Canterbury Cathedral, 14th century.

Pandemics in the Parish

The medieval approach to emergency planning may offer lessons for the 21st century.

Alfred the Great’s statue in Wantage, by Count Gleichen, 1877.

How Great was Alfred?

In uniting the peoples of Wessex and Mercia, the celebrated king left an ideological legacy of lasting importance.

For wealthy tourists travelling to the Middle East in the 19th century, the services of a dragoman were an essential purchase. Yet the often difficult lives of these local agents and guides remain elusive.

A woman doing the laundry while smoking, 1954.

Disney Dreams

The alternative paths towards happiness and fulfilment in the postwar period.

Et in Arcadia Ego

Even in a pastoral idyll, there is death.

On the Spot: Ruth Scurr

‘Timing is everything.’

‘Catullus and Lesbia, who in his arms seek solace for the death of her sparrow’ by ist Nicolai Abildgaard, 1809. Nivaagaard Museum. Public Domain.

Catullus and Lesbia’s Sparrow

Roman poet Catullus transformed an unremarkable bird – the sparrow – into a contested symbol of eroticism.

Yemen’s Endless Wars

For more than a century, what is now Yemen has seen waves of insurgency and conflict backed by competing foreign powers.