History Today

Eighteenth-century ambassadors to the Sublime Porte found little to admire in Turkey, writes Lavender Cassels, and suffered many humiliations before they reached the Sultan’s presence.

In the Elizabethan Age feminine extravagance was often satirised by English dramatists and poets. During the seventeenth century, writes Brenda Gourgey, it rose to even more fantastic heights.

Tom H. Inkster describes how, nearly four months after the collapse of the Confederacy, a gallant Confederate naval officer was still bent on the destruction of Union shipping.

During the 17th century commercial and colonial interests embittered Anglo-Dutch relations. In both camps, writes C.R. Boxer, journalists and pamphleteers helped to keep the feud alive.

In 1666, writes Martin Holmes, much of the ancient City of London went up in what Samuel Pepys described as a ‘most horrid malicious bloody flame’.

During the troublous reign that began when he dethroned his cousin Richard, Henry IV encountered a long series of exhausting crises. He met his troubles, writes A.L. Rowse, with resilience and courage.

Among the English pioneers in Southern Africa must be honoured the name of John Gregory of Lyme Regis, writes W.F. Rea, who embarked for Mozambique from the Jesuit College at Goa during the reign of Charles II.

Past services cannot determine future policy, writes Brian Bond, but the record of the Territorial Army suggests that the force has always given returns out of all proportion to the small amount invested in it.

About the beginning of the fourteenth century, writes A.L. Moir, a prebendary of Lincoln Cathedral completed his ambitious world map, in which geographical information is mixed with historical details and pictures of fantastic legendary monsters.