Feature

Was the conquest of Tenochtitlan the result of an Aztec civil war or Spanish invasion? The events in the capital are in desperate need of reappraisal.

The recently discovered chronicle of an opinionated, elderly aristocrat provides a vivid portrayal of Paris during the most febrile days of the French Revolution.

Two heroes of the 1821 Greek Revolution found themselves cast out of the national pantheon because of their gender. In the centuries that followed, their legends would be used to justify a range of nationalist causes.

The visitors’ books of 19th-century hotels, pubs and inns show Victorians on holiday, revealing them to be irreverent pleasure seekers, capable of highfalutin pomposity and touristic wrath.

It is often claimed that press censorship came to an end in England at the close of the 17th century. But it persisted, thanks to an unsavoury network of government spies.

Thailand’s monarchy is today one of the world’s wealthiest and most powerful, but the king has faced a constant struggle for survival. 

A symbol of female power in an age of patriarchy became a tool of propaganda for two prominent queens.

The image of Roman Bath was the creation of 18th- and 19th-century archaeologists. Only now are new perspectives revealing a more complex and accurate history of the city. 

Wedged between Russia, Prussia and Austria, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth faced extinction in the 18th century.