The 'badass' icon

One of the problems with biography, if an author is not careful, is that it can quickly become hagiography.

THE GREAT WHEELBARROW CRAZE

In 1886, the nation was gripped by a bizarre trend that saw plucky Britons racing wheelbarrows across the country. David Musgrove takes up this strange-but-true story

SISTERS AT WAR

By the end of her reign, Mary I's relationship with her half-sister and successor, Elizabeth, was at an all-time low. But had the Tudor siblings always been such bitter enemies? Nicola Tallis reveals how the duo's bond was both broken and strengthened by events beyond their control

"Indigenous children were forcibly separated from their families"

HIDDEN HISTORIES... KAVITA PURI on the legacy of Canada's residential schools

"People like to tell themselves that the origins of American independence were non-violent.But it's not true"

The Boston Tea Party is often cited as a model of peaceful civil protest. But, as reveals, on the 250th anniversary of this milestone in America's foundational story, it occurred against a backdrop of bloodshed

A Christmas feast

serves up festive classic favourites that graced dining tables during three eras of British history

THE RACE ACROSS THE ATLANTIC

In 1969, everyone from Prince Michael of Kent to Billy Butlin competed in a dash between London and New York aboard tandems, sedan chairs and jump jets recalls a madcap forerunner of Race Across the World

It is one of the most fascinating shows that I have ever seen

I’VE JUST RETURNED FROM A TRIP TO NEW YORK.

How do intractable conflicts come to an end?

The Israel-Gaza war is dominating the news at the moment, but rather than exploring its roots, I wanted to discuss other examples of seemingly intractable conflicts and how they come to an end. What examples from your research would you like to highlight?

The long death of the Roman republic

Julius Caesar’s murder is often seen as the event that ushered in the age of emperors. Yet structural weaknesses had plagued Rome’s republic long before his death

Up to 100 million Chinese became refugees in their own country

IF IT HADN’T BEEN FOR A JAPANESE SOLDIER needing a toilet break in July 1937, things could have been so different.

Hard times: what centuries of cost-of-living crises reveal

As prices have soared in recent months, living costs have outstripped many incomes in the UK.

THE MANY FACES OF NAPOLEON

As a major new film explores the life of the French emperor, Matt Elton asks historians Laura O'Brien and David Andress how we can make sense of the diverse and contradictory aspects of Napoleon's character and career

The queen behind the veil

Matilda of Scotland, wife of Henry I, did perhaps more than any other figure to bridge the chasm between the Anglo-Saxons and their Norman conquerors.  So why, asks has she been written out of history?

Walter Cowan Britain's oldest commando

For some servicemen hardened by a long military career, death in battle is preferable to simply fading away in old age. Tells the story of one such man, a retired naval officer who leapt bravely back into the fray during the Second World War at the age of 70

"The Roman empire cannot have been governed by a series of psychopaths. It would not have survived"

MARY BEARD tells Matt Elton what life would have been like for Rome's - from the path to the top to the almost inevitable sticky end emperors

Spooks, spirits and psychiatry

ANNA MARIA BARRY recommends a new exploration of the interplay between science, faith and superstition in 19th-century attitudes to mental health

A fool's errand

The play Henry VIII, written by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher, opens with a warning. Those who have made their way to the Globe Theatre expecting to \"hear a merry bawdy play\" can expect disappointment, for they, the prologue puns, \"Will be deceived\". This play is serious, even tragic, portraying how \"mightiness meets misery\" where there is no room for merriness - and thus no room for the king's fool himself, Will Somer.

Tom Neil 1920-2018

Tom Neil served as an RAF flying ace during the Second World War, having joined the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve in 1938 at the age of 18. He flew in a Hurricane during the 1940 Battle of Britain, and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross later that year. He died in 2018 at the age of 97.

"The India Club briefly transported new arrivals back to their homeland"

BY THE TIME THIS ARTICLE IS PUBLISHED, London’s India Club will have closed. It’s been a well-kept secret for years. On the Strand, squeezed between a cafe and a newsagent, is a small door bearing the sign of the Hotel Strand Continental.

Are black histories still being overlooked?

The global protests of 2020 thrust the importance of understanding black history into the spotlight - but, three years on, has that focus been maintained? As the UK marks Black History Month, MATT ELTON gauges the views of three historians

"In sun-beaten Greece, I learned that the past is receding faster than ever"

ITS OBVIOUS, I KNOW, BUT CHANGE IN HISTORY moves at a different pace at different times and in different places.

Britain gets swinging

ALWYN TURNER investigates the latest volume in David Kynaston's epic history of modern Britain, as the author turns his attention to the heady days of the early 1960s

Forgotten heroes

PATRICIA FARA reviews a history of black TB nurses in the United States during the first half of the 20th century

EMPIRE ON THE BRINK

In September 1923, the British empire reached its maximum territorial extent. A staggering 460 million people lived within its borders. Yet just as the imperial project reached its apex, writes Matthew Parker, cracks were widening...

Broadcast views: Radio Times at 100

Since its launch in 1923 as the BBC's official listings guide, the magazine has charted enormous shifts in media and society alike. David Hendy explores how its pages reflected changes across Britain

The medieval Stalingrad

Edward III's siege of Calais was a pivotal moment in the Hundred Years' War. Here Dan Jones argues that it bears comparison with one of the most brutal clashes of the modern era

An Anglo-Saxon detective story

Why do the bones of luminaries such as King Cnut, Emma of Normandy and William II lie mixed up in six chests in Winchester Cathedral? And what do these remains tell us about the evolution of early England? Cat Jarman investigates

HELL IN ITALY

The Allied invasion of Italy in 1943 was envisaged as a swift push on Rome. Yet, as James Holland explains, by the end of the year, the campaign was stymied by German defences far from the capital

Anne Boleyn's fatal French connection

John Guy and Julia Fox reveal how international diplomacy supercharged the rise of Henry's VIII's second wife and hastened her fall