History Today

Nicolas Cheetham describes how the Fourth Crusaders captured Byzantium in 1204 and French noblemen created feudal principalities in Southern Greece.

Michael Grant describes how the most essential single fact in the whole history of the Etruscans was their division into separate city states.

Windmills abounded in England from the twelfth century onwards. Terence Paul Smith describes how their bodies usually revolved on a vertical post so that the miller could face the sails into the wind.

Over four centuries the University of Padua attracted a large number of foreign students, writes Alan Haynes, among whom the English were prominent.

Samuel Stanley describes how a tribe resembling the Aztecs of Mexico flourished on the banks of the lower Mississippi until they encountered the French.

The last operation of the Japanese Naval Command, writes Albert Vulliez, was a deliberate act of suicide. It was received by the people with a ‘sombre bitterness’. Translated by Patrick Turnbull.

C.R. Boxer describes how porcelain, silks and, above all, tea formed the basis of a lucrative trade between the Chinese and Dutch in the eighteenth century.

Duchess by bigamy, but a Countess by marriage, Elizabeth Chudleigh found refuge from her marital troubles in St Petersburg, writes Anthony Cross.

Christopher Lloyd describes how, trying to fight his way from Egypt to Constantinople, Bonaparte was checked by Sidney Smith’s defence.

The preeminent Restoration actress and infamous Royal mistress died in 1687 at the age of 37. Jane Hoare describes how Charles II had left her well provided.