As so often in study of the past, continuing to ask the question matters more than agreeing upon an answer. Buildings made of ...

Why are you a historian of the Atlantic World? The Atlantic World is so vast and diverse; I’ll never run out of places and peoples to study. Marcus Rediker’s The Slave Ship: A Human History, as it ...

Disputing Disaster is a book about the First World War’s origins and causes, not – as its title suggests – the war itself. It discusses six historians who have written on a century-old debate that has ...

The sound of the Houses of Parliament clock chiming the hour signifies a daily ritual for many a radio listener. Sited in St Stephen's Tower, the clock is better known as Big Ben - though the name ...

In 1941, down a narrow street in Rochdale was a small dark shop, visited by women with a very specific and urgent requirement. The proprietor was a ‘deep-bosomed’ lady in her sixties, overly made up ...

Kashmir, a small valley in the Himalayas, plays an outsized role in the national imaginations of both India and Pakistan. Formed by the river Jhelum and its tributaries, and measuring a mere 89 by 25 ...

On 27 November 1776 a case came before Lord Mansfield, Chief Justice of the Court of King’s Bench, in which, the Morning Chronicle reported, proceedings were repeatedly interrupted by the ‘loud and ...

It is, and of long time hath been, my well-beloved sister, a custom in the beginning of the New Year, for friends to send between presents or gifts, as the witnesses of their love and friendship, and ...

On Monday 25 May 1840, on a remote island 870 miles east of the Australian colony of New South Wales, 1,800 convicts celebrated the birthday of Queen Victoria. The party had been organised by the ...

Lower than the Angels: A History of Sex and Christianity by Diarmaid MacCulloch reminds us that when it comes to sexuality and gender, scripture is often contradictory. The Bible was always too ...