BBC History UK
How life returned to the streets of Pompeii
With a new BBC TV series about Pompeii in the offing, Sophie Hay looks back 100 years to a dig that transformed our understanding of daily life on the city's streets
7 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
Eleanor Glanville The butterfly collector
Today, insects are seen as a vital part of our ecosystem, but in the late 17th century, they were often overlooked by science. PATRICIA FARA tells the story of a groundbreaking lepidopterist whose research provided solace from a turbulent personal life
5 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
WHEN PIRATES RULED ASIA'S WAVES
Pirates didn't only spread chaos in Caribbean and Atlantic waters. Adam Clulow reveals how east Asian raiders terrorised China's shores from the 16th century
10 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
Voices from the picket line
LUCY ROBINSON enjoys a new history of the 1984-85 Miners' Strike that puts first-hand accounts from those involved front and centre
4 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
Golden boy
Over the past 200 years, Dick Whittington has become one of Britain's best-loved pantomime heroes. Yet, as Michael McCarthy tells Jon Bauckham, the real-life story that inspired Dick's rags to riches tale is even more remarkable than the fiction
8 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
HATE MAIL
The 19th and early 20th centuries saw an explosion of malicious letters penned by anonymous authors. As Emily Cockayne reveals via six cases, these messages often reflected the fears and prejudices that stalked Britain
9 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
"My historical research shows that much higher levels of inclusion are possible for people labelled disabled"
A new study by historian LUCY DELAP suggests we need to rethink the experiences of people with learning disabilities in the 20th century. Here she explains how many thrived in work and wider society
4 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
MY HUNT FOR JOSEF MENGELE
In 1949 the notorious Nazi doctor fled to South America. Three decades later, Gerald Posner (left) set out to track him down. Here the former lawyer tells us about his mission to catch the 'Angel of Death'
10+ min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
Have nations always used sport to launder their reputations?
As countries with questionable human rights records buy overseas teams and vie to host global tournaments, MATT MCDOWELL speaks to Matt Elton about the rise of 'sportswashing' - and whether sport and power have always gone hand in hand
6 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
Renaissance beauty tips
From snail-slime face cream to poisonous makeup, our podcast editor ELLIE CAWTHORNE discusses a recent episode on creative 16th-century beauty regimes
1 min |
October 2023
BBC History UK
Follow the money
JANE HUMPHRIES reviews a wide-ranging but very readable study of the changing tides of global economics from the Great Depression to the present day
2 min |
October 2023
The Light
15 minute cities: 30 years in the making
UN's climate narrative reveals disturbing goals
4 min |
Issue 36: August 2023
BBC History UK
Did they really have to fight to the finish?
From 1914, powerful voices called for the First World War to end in a negotiated compromise. Why were they ignored?
8 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
Narrative thread
CHRISTIENNA FRYAR is enthralled by the story of three enslaved women told by one simple artefact
2 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
How bias begins
ALEXANDER WATSON commends a powerful examination of the portrayals of Roma people in Europe through the centuries
2 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
Dead reckoning
JAMES LIN is impressed by a scholarly but readable look at what the tombs of ancient Chinese people reveal about past and contemporary beliefs and culture
2 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
ΚΕΕΡ CALM AND IGNORE THE ARMADA
What did English merchants and mariners do when a Spanish invasion fleet menaced the south coast in 1588? As Robert Blackmore reveals, they boarded their ships and carried on trading
5 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
Scotland's greatest victory
The image of plucky warriors sending a cocksure English army into flight has secured Bannockburn's status in the annals of Scottish history. Helen Carr chronicles the 1314 clash that transformed the balance of power between two warring nations
8 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
NORTHERN POWERHOUSE
During its turbulent four-century history, the kingdom of Northumbria clashed with Pictish warriors, Welsh kings and Viking raiders. Fiona Edmonds tells the story of an ambitious realm that changed the face of early medieval Britain
8 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
France in the dock
RICHARD J EVANS applauds a vivid account of the final days of the collaborationist French Vichy regime, and of the trial of its leader, Marshal Philippe Pétain
4 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
Walter Tull 1888-1918
MY HISTORY HERO
2 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
TOKYO IN RUINS
In 1923, a violent earthquake razed Japan's bustling imperial capital and killed more than 100,000 people. Christopher Harding explores the aftermath of the disaster - and its pivotal cultural and physical legacy
10 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
"In an inclusive public culture, Blake's is a great, passionate human voice"
PUTTING AWAY THE CAMPING GEAR AFTER THIS year's Glastonbury Festival, I found myself reflecting on the idea of alternative cultures. Since its origins, Glastonbury has always been political, and hosts a huge number of side discussions, concerts and seminars. It still gives money to Greenpeace, WaterAid and Oxfam, in addition to a host of local charities. As a festival of music and arts, it plays an important part in public discourse in these deeply polarised times - when, for instance, a journalist from The Times recently argued that the humanities are a waste of effort.
3 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
"Britain's first black editor achieved so much in such a short life"
WHEN I RECENTLY CAME ACROSS THE MAN considered Britain's first black editor, I was surprised that I had never before heard his name. Samuel Jules Celestine Edwards was born in Dominica, the youngest of 10 children, near the end of the 1850s. In 1870 he travelled to North America and then, some seven years later, to Edinburgh, where he worked as a labourer. He later spent time in Sunderland, where he reconnected with his Christian faith, practising as a Methodist, and became a vocal proponent of temperance.
2 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
Is history under threat at the UK's universities?
Universities around Britain have announced staffing cuts to history departments in recent months, citing falling admissions and funding shortages. President of the Royal Historical Society EMMA GRIFFIN spoke to Matt Elton about the causes of the crisis
5 min |
September 2023
BBC History UK
"The idea that political projects such as nation-making can ever be totally successful is a misconception"
Joya Chatterji talks to Matt Elton about her book charting the tumultuous course of south Asia's 20th-century, including the violence that followed the creation of three new countries after the withdrawal of the British empire
10+ min |
August 2023
BBC History UK
Best defence
JON WILSON is swept up by a look at how diverse peoples worldwide reacted to British efforts to trade with, conquer, colonise and dominate their homelands
5 min |
August 2023
BBC History UK
PEACE! (AT THE POINT OF A SWORD)
Pax Romana brought stability and prosperity to Rome's vast empire. Yet, writes Tom Holland, behind the dazzling new cities and teeming sea lanes lay the threat of lethal, irresistible violence
9 min |
August 2023
BBC History UK
THE KING OF FOLLY
In 1323, Roger Mortimer pulled off an audacious escape from the Tower of London before ejecting Edward II from the English throne. But, writes Paul Dryburgh, the rebel baron's designs on power were undone by his own big head
8 min |
August 2023
BBC History UK
Sidi Mubarak Bombay Unsung African adventurer
Stolen from his village as a boy, enslaved and trafficked to a distant land, the intrepid and big-hearted Sidi Mubarak Bombay returned to travel across his home continent on pioneering expeditions. CANDICE MILLARD introduces a little-known but exceptional explorer
5 min |