Empire

The death and mutilation of the chief of the Xhosa in 1835 at the hands of the British was a ‘barbarous’ deed, concealed by the perpetrators in a web of lies. 

Fifth in line to the throne, Karl I was not expected to become the Habsburg emperor. By the time he did, in 1916, it was already too late for the crumbling empire.

Inspired by the fashion for Boy Scout groups, Lord Beaverbrook started his own youth movement in support of his pro-Empire campaign. 

Scotland’s short-lived, catastrophic Central American colony exposed its precarious relationship with England. Was closer union an inevitable result?

The Battle of Tondibi, which resulted in the defeat of the Songhay army, took place on 13 March 1591.

In its earliest days, the East India Company was seen not as a threat to Asia’s elites, but as a means of strengthening their powers.

A Dutch conspiracy trial in the Indonesian archipelago gave birth to a sadly enduring English word.

The concept of terra nullius has long been at the heart of explanations of why the British did not treat with Aboriginal people following Cook’s arrival in Australia. But should it be?