On 9 March 1522 the Swiss Reformation began with an ‘ostentatious eating of sausages.’ T he Reformation in Switzerland began ...

On 5 March 1936 the prototype Spitfire made its maiden flight. Its creator R.J. Mitchell would not live to see its finest ...

Lockwood’s This Land of Promise examines the memoirs and biographies of a selection of prominent refugees from the 16th to ...

Less famous than its 1215 predecessor, the Magna Carta of 1225 held the true power. ‘The Hundred Years War Vol 5’ by Jonathan Sumption review The Hundred Years War Vol 5: Triumph and Illusion by ...

A quiet, shy man, the unfortunate John Byng was no coward – he faced his death with cool courage – but he seems to have been too cautious, passive and defeatist for command in the British navy. He ...

The Songhay Empire would not be the first military power to set too much store by its cavalry. Founded in 1464 out of the ruins of the Malian Empire, Songhay was the largest of the indigenous empires ...

The famous story about Pope Gregory I, before he became pope, seeing some fair-haired English boys in a slave-market in Rome and saying, ‘Not Angles, but angels’ appeared in the first biography of him ...

The purchase of firearms is largely unregulated in the US and it is unlikely that Congress will act to change this any time soon. President Obama has tried and failed to introduce stricter gun control ...

On 5 March 1936 the prototype Spitfire made its maiden flight. Its creator R.J. Mitchell would not live to see its finest hour. On 16 January 1926, the BBC broke the news that a murderous mob was ...

On 5 March 1936 the prototype Spitfire made its maiden flight. Its creator R.J. Mitchell would not live to see its finest hour. On 16 January 1926, the BBC broke the news that a murderous mob was ...