History Today

In a world of rapid growth in maritime trade, understanding the tides was vital. Yet it was a complex process, dependent on science, geography, mathematics, religion and ego, writes Hugh Aldersey-Williams.

Kate Wiles highlights the Ottoman cartographer Piri Re’is and his charts, which blend navigation and art.

Since the Iliad, war has inspired stories – mixing fact and fiction – which reveal as much, if not more, about the realities of conflict as academic studies. John E. Talbott examines writing about ‘the human condition at its most extreme’.

It is widely believed that the Crusades were a clash of civilisations. But a closer examination reveals a complexity that has eluded many historians.

Rather than being narcissistic, images of the self were used to represent a spiritual community.

In the intellectual community of Berlin, Saul Ascher was committed to the reform of Judaism.

Volunteer rationing in the First World War depended on patriotism, but that could only go so far.

Minoo Dinshaw is disappointed to discover that ignorance of the Middle Ages can found even among the most elevated company.

A major conflict in the Chilean War of Independence was fought on 12 February 1817.