Social

Wills in early modern England tell us much more than simply who left what to whom, and should not be discarded lightly.

In Rites of Passage: Death & Mourning in Victorian Britain, Judith Flanders explores the commercialisation of grief and those who resisted the era’s conspicuous consumption.

Forbidden Desire in Early Modern Europe: Male-Male Sexual Relations, 1400-1750 by Noel Malcolm is an ambitious comparative study that raises plenty of questions.

Pet monkeys became a popular fashion accessory for the Victorians, found in homes across the country. But they were rarely living a life of luxury.

Early modern fairy tale or urban legend? Who was London’s pig-faced lady and where did she come from?

In the Icelandic sagas communal feasting served as cornerstone of celebration. A thousand years on, these cautionary tales still offer sage advice for the Yule festivities.

The Revolutionary Temper: Paris, 1748-1789 by Robert Darnton is a sweeping account of events from the Parisian perspective, from disastrous wars to fights for religious toleration.

Confinement: The Hidden History of Maternal Bodies in Nineteenth-Century Britain by Jessica Cox looks at the engine of the Victorian population boom: motherhood.

A Northern Wind: Britain 1962-65 by David Kynaston is a hyperreal account of Britain on the cusp of modernity.