England

In the early eighteenth century, writes Robert Halsband, the marriage of an aristocratic young widow and a Drury Lane singer caused violent surprise among her friends.

Elizabeth Linscott describes how English churches and cathedrals, from the twelfth to the seventeenth centuries, abound in memorial effigies to the distinguished dead.

J.B. Whitwell describes how a series of excavations since the Second World War has revealed much important detail about Lindum Colonia.

Richard Wilson describes how, at Ossington, within a period of fifty years, a wealthy Yorkshire merchant family joined the ranks of the Georgian upper classes.

J.L. Kirby describes an episode in the long struggle of the English Kings to keep their fiefs as Dukes of Aquitaine.

F. Bastian finds that in composing his lively Tour, Defoe drew upon memories of journeys he had actually made and also upon the writings of earlier observers.

H.A. Monckton offers a taste of the beer of Elizabethan England, a beverage reportedly, ‘dark in colour, not very heavily hopped, and probably rather sweet and vinous’.

The secret treaty of Dover, which concluded with the diplomatic aid of the King’s sister, Henrietta, Duchess of Orleans, has been much denounced by Whig historians. A.A. Mitchell asks, what is the truth about the King’s intentions?

William Seymour introduces the scientist, architect, gardener, forester and book-collector, John Evelyn; one of the most distinguished polymaths of the English seventeenth century.

Maurice Ashley describes how Cromwell and the Levellers both believed in freedom of conscience and political reform; but character and circumstances divided them.