Legalised Lawlessness
The British Empire’s playbook of force.
Empire
The Murder of Hintsa
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.
Kaiser Karl and the End of the Habsburgs
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.
A Shared Culture
How a German colony laid the groundwork for the alliance between Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.
The Young Crusaders
Inspired by the fashion for Boy Scout groups, Lord Beaverbrook started his own youth movement in support of his pro-Empire campaign.
The Darien Scheme
Scotland’s short-lived, catastrophic Central American colony exposed its precarious relationship with England. Was closer union an inevitable result?
Fall of Africa’s Greatest Empire
The Battle of Tondibi, which resulted in the defeat of the Songhay army, took place on 13 March 1591.
Before Empire
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.
Making Massacre
A Dutch conspiracy trial in the Indonesian archipelago gave birth to a sadly enduring English word.
Captain Cook’s Contested Claim
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?