All articles in History
16th March, 2016 in History, Military, Society & Culture
How the Talking Book was born
Today, talking books reach hundreds of thousands of blind and partially sighted people. It all started over 80 years ago when the Royal National Institute of Blind people (RNIB) began providing books to war-blinded soldiers. What’s more, as part of their 80th anniversar…
18th February, 2016 in History, Women in History
Mary I: Tyrant or trailblazer?
500 years since her birth, Mary I is a monarch who continues to divide opinion. First, there’s the ‘bloody’ epithet to deal with, which has dominated accounts of her reign since. Known as a Catholic tyrant and branded a religious bigot for her ferocious persecution of Protestants…
17th February, 2016 in History, Women in History
Five little-known facts about Queen Mary I
Things you (probably) didn’t already know about ‘Bloody Mary’ 1. She was the first ever woman to be crowned Queen of England and rule the country in her own right Mary I was England’s first undisputed queen regnant, discounting Matilda centuries before, and Lady Jane Grey’s brief…
17th February, 2016 in History
Why is Shakespeare’s real life (and his death) so undebatable?
Author Simon Andrew Stirling discusses his biographical research and the challenges that arise when you question the ‘facts’ about England’s Bard. As I write this, I am about to send my second-year Screenwriting students out on their research missions. They all have a script to w…
12th February, 2016 in History, Natural World
Einstein’s Theory of Gravitational Relativity proven after 100 years
Gravitational Waves between two black holes were detected for the first time, proving Einstein’s theory from 1916. “The repercussions of Einstein’s scientific legacy continue to this day. One of the predictions of general relativity – one which has no counterpart in Newton’s theo…
10th February, 2016 in Biography & Memoir, History, Society & Culture
Nelson Mandela: Release and reconciliation
Mandela was released from prison on 11 February 1990. Despite elaborate planning, the event flirted with fiasco. A vast crowd thronged the sweltering Grand Parade in Cape Town, waiting for hours. An unruly fringe began to loot shop windows; police fired rubber bullets and shotgun…
5th February, 2016 in Biography & Memoir, History
The top ten longest-reigning British monarchs
On 9 September 2015, Queen Elizabeth II, having previously surpassed her great-great-grandmother Queen Victoria, in 2007, to become the longest-lived British monarch, became the longest-reigning British monarch. She can also lay claim to being the world’s oldest reigning monarch…
4th February, 2016 in History, Society & Culture
Reminiscences of the Queen’s Coronation
The 1950s saw a major shift in the lifestyles of many in Britain. The austerity that had dogged the 1940s after the end of the Second World War began to give way to better times. Employment levels rose to new heights, white consumer goods appeared in shop windows for the first ti…
5th January, 2016 in Biography & Memoir, History
The betrayal of Richard III
Scrape away the accumulated wealth of tainted evidence which has disfigured the memory of Richard III for the past 500 years and there is really very little that remains mysterious about the outlines of his story. In fact it can be summed up in one sentence: he accepted his dead…
4th January, 2016 in History
A guide to historic Tudor sites
Hampton Court Palace, the Tower of London and Hever Castle are well known as historic locations associated with Henry VIII and his wives. But were you aware that there are over 180 other sites which are connected to this controversial Tudor monarch and the tale of his marital dif…
4th January, 2016 in Folklore, History
Teenagers in Tudor times
The Tudor period was a time of turmoil with religious, political and social upheaval on a scale hardly witnessed before. Death and disease were never that far away and life was a struggle, especially for the poorer sort. The ruling classes also felt an uncertainty about the futur…
4th January, 2016 in Biography & Memoir, History
Thomas Cromwell and the ‘ungoodly’ executioner
Edward Hall, the Tudor historian, completes his account of the last moments of Thomas Cromwell, after his last speech and prayer, in this way: Cromwell ‘godly and lovingly exhorted them that were about him on the scaffold’ and committed his soul to God, then ‘patiently suffered t…