Religion

Has our image of Henry VIII's elder daughter as 'Bloody Mary', burning Protestants and unhappily married to Philip of Spain, clouded our assessment of how close she came to restoring the old religion? 

Peter Higgs looks at how a monumental Hellenistic statue sheds light on culture, religion and identity in Roman North Africa.

Xinzhong Yao examines the prospects for Christianity in China based on past performance.

Richard Cavendish discovers the riches and Diaspora and beyond in the Manchester Jewish museum.

Diana Webb looks at the miracles and saints populating the basilica of the San Frediano in Lucca.

Fernando Cervantes explores the conversion process from polytheistic human sacrifice to devotion to the Mother Church.

Every commune had to have one - Diana Webb explains how the cult of a holy man or woman and civic PR went hand-in-hand in medieval Italy.

Greg Walker reassesses the evidence for believing that Lollard 'known men' and other evangelicals acted as the underground army that undermined the medieval Catholicism of Henry VIII's church.

Edward Norman on the Eastern promise of Western sainthood to be encountered in the Church of the Bom Jesus in Goa.