Running after foreign gods - Richard Stoneman explains how Rome's Syrian rival, the city of Palmyra, and her formidable queen Zenobia influenced the religion and mores of the later Empire - and brought us in the process Christmas Day.
Tom Nairn looks at the role of the monarchy and its impact on British national identity.
Simon Esmonde Cleary considers a little-known anniversary - the death in 388 of an imperial usurper who became a link-man between the factual eclipse of Roman Britain and the legendary world of King Arthur.
Peter Clarke looks at the memory of the influential economist
Ann Hills discusses publications by the Ordnance Survey
Richard Cavendish looks at the impact of soap king Lord Leverhulme on the foundation of Port Sunlight.
Andrew Roach explores the Romanian struggle for nationhood
George Watson examines the changing meaning of the term from Machiavelli to Lenin.
Robert Thorne investigates the nineteenth-century passion for views that has inspired the exhibition about to open at London's Barbican Art Gallery.
Brian Holden Reid opens our two-headed debate on the American Civil War by arguing that the South failed to use revolutionary methods to full advantage.
