History Today

Alexander Kazhdan considers the influence of totalitarianism and meritocracy in the Byzantine empire – and its relationship to the growth of the Russian and other successor states in the East.

Clare Thomson on the pace of change in the Baltic States.

David Thompson on the labour movement and an educational reformer and founder of the WEA.

John Benson on the history of attempting to encourage people into self-employment and entrepreneurship.

Neil Dalton discusses the historic separation of the legal profession

Oswald and Margaret Dilke discuss the work of the cartographer-cum-Crusade-propagandist Marin Sanudo, who used his work to urge on a 14th-century initiative to recover Palestine from the infidel.

Ann Hills on the European links in the largest Central American country

Christopher Elrington on the work of the Victoria County History

A tale of kidnapped Africans and an abortive trading voyage casts light on the uneasy relationship between conscience and commerce in New England argues Larry Gragg.