Martin Greig reveals the intimate relationship between the powerful Earl of Lauderdale, Charles II's Secretary for Scotland in the 1660s, and a Scottish spinster who became the earl's 'Presbyterian conscience' during a tumultuous period for kirk and crown.
S.M. Toyne charts the inception and development of this most quintessentially English sport.
During the Anglo-French conflicts that characterised the 14th century, the Oxford theologian John Wyclif challenged the ‘un-Christian’ pursuit of war and wealth. Yet, just like anti-war protesters today, Wyclif had little influence on Parliament or the king, writes Rory Cox.
Sarah Gristwood on the complex issues raised by the restoration of a remarkable Tudor vision of victory over the Spanish Armada.
Helen Castor visits the History Today archive to find Maurice Keen's 1959 analysis of an important collection of family letters that offer an unparalleled insight into gentry life in 15th-century England.
R.C. Richardson describes the fortunes of young women driven by poverty into domestic service. A number fell victim to predatory masters and ended up with illegitimate children, only to be ejected from households.
The rise of the legal profession in late medieval and early Tudor England was greeted with disdain by the wider population. Anthony Musson asks whether the reputation of lawyers and judges as scavengers and social climbers was deserved.
Maurice Keen chronicles a set of 15th century letters - the product of everyday communication between English gentry and officialdom - and suggests how their contents may change the reader's views of the late middle ages. Helen Castor offered her own contemporary historiographical account in 2010.
Lucy Worsley reveals the strange stories of the cast of characters on the King’s Grand Staircase at Kensington Palace, painted by William Kent for George I in the 1720s.
In the mid-18th century – at the height of the power struggle between France and England and the political ferment of both nations – a French spy with a peculiar personal agenda came to prominence in London. Jonathan Conlin tells his story.
