Tourist Trinkets: The Medieval Pilgrim Badge
The cult of saints affected everyone in medieval Europe. A voracious souvenir market was one of its consequences.
History Matters
Thoughts, opinions and commentary on all things historical.
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Passchendaele: What’s in a Name?
How did an evocatively named Flanders village become shorthand for a whole series of battles around the Belgian city of Ypres?
Tacitus’ Perfect Man
Accounts of the life of Germanicus are complex, fascinating and open to interpretation.
Censoring Indian History
Laws against religious offence in India have altered the writing and understanding of the nation’s past.
Florence’s Mud Angels
Backpackers, travelling through Europe, forged a new wave of international collaboration.
Burke to the Future: The Evolution of Conservatism
The Conservatives are enduring a crisis of identity and purpose. Not for the first time, the work of the great 18th-century philosopher, Edmund Burke, is seen as offering a path to the party’s reinvention.
The Greatest Library Before Alexandria
The bronze-age city of Mari was second only to Babylon, and the library of tablets it held offers rich insight into all aspects of an intricate political world.
A Good Germany?
Britain’s entry into the Second World War ushered in a wave of anti-German sentiment, creating strange bedfellows across the political spectrum.
The Friendly Recluse
Medieval hermits were the agony aunts of their day.
The Road to Equality
The Sexual Offences Act of 1967 was not the great step forward it is sometimes purported to be.