History Today

John B. Morrall describes how the ideals of monarchy came to be combined with the theory of Natural Common Law.

William Noblett profiles Newbery; Goldsmith’s friend and financial aide was the first English publisher to make a lucrative business out of producing books designed for children.

Alexander Winston describes how, in the middle of personal troubles, Milton became an eloquent defender of Cromwell’s system of government.

John Nowell introduces and translates a contemporary portrait of the eighteenth-century actor at work, originally penned by G.C. Lichtenberg.

Clifton W. Potter profiles the leader of the Parliamentary Jacobites in the early eighteenth century.

C.R. Boxer describes how the Spanish and Portuguese empires were troubled by smugglers and interlopers on the high seas.

Norman Lloyd Williams analyses the observations of Etienne Perlin during his visit in 1553.

The origins of soccer can be found among the people, not the privileged who sought to define it in the 19th century.

The year 1913 marked a resurgence for the Russian empire as the Romanov dynasty celebrated its 300th anniversary and the economy boomed. Had it not been for the First World War the country’s fortunes might have taken a very different turn, says Charles Emmerson.

Towards the end of the fifteenth century, writes E.R. Chamberlin, a young French King took advantage of the Italian ‘genius for dissension’.