History Today

Four historians consider whether the traditional Whig history of Britain, as one of evolutionary political progress, has ever been challenged by events. 

The end of the affair of two legendary lovers sees a deadly destiny fulfilled.

At its founding, Pennsylvania had one of the most tolerant criminal law systems in the world, but by the middle of the 18th century its capital Philadelphia was a ‘hell of the officials and preachers’.

The ayah is a familiar figure of the Raj. While new research shows they were much less common than once thought, it has also shed fresh light on their lives and experiences.

Work was once deemed suitable for women only until they married. And it was not just men who thought that should be the case.

Camillo Agrippa, author of Trattato di scientia d’arme, died on 1 January 1600.

As we take stock of the past year, the most famous event in English history reminds us of our inability to foresee the future.

The fact that lobsters ‘walked’ on their claws puzzled even Aristotle. He had to employ all his deductive genius to explain why. 

Hunting in the archives for the ‘real’ Robin Hood.

I Embrace You With All My Revolutionary Fervor: Letters 1947-1967 by Che Guevara collects the deft epistolary prose of the self-styled prophet.