History
Anything to do with History
Allene
@Allene -
about 10 hours ago
My Back Pages | History Today
‘People who keep journals have life twice’, claimed the writer Jessamyn West – though it’s hard to imagine that anyone who has kept a diary over the last 12 months will be keen to relive it anytime soon. Diarists of 2020 will, however, be providing a service to historians...continued
2 minutes read
Jimmy
@Jimmy -
about 10 hours ago
Beowulf the Bro | History Today
In the introduction to his 1952 translation of Beowulf, the Scottish poet Edwin Morgan ventured that in translation ‘communication must take place; the nerves must sometimes tingle and the skin flush, as with original poetry’. Morgan’s aim was to ‘interest and at times to...continued
5 minutes read
Elvie
@Elvie -
1 day ago
Through a Glass Darkly | History Today
Over the years Hugh Johnson has had a crack at just about everything when it comes to wine writing and in most cases he got there first. His was the first small-format annual guide, his was the first atlas. He is certainly not the first person to write a history of wine –...continued
5 minutes read
Elian
@Elian -
2 days ago
Stakhanovite Shopping | History Today
On 3 August 1935 Aleksei Stakhanov mined a record-breaking 102 tonnes of coal in six hours. He became an overnight celebrity. Towns were renamed in his honour, his face graced the covers of international magazines, including Time, and a movement was created in his name: S...continued
6 minutes read
Angus
@Angus -
3 days ago
The Black Death: A New Culprit?
When it comes to the Black Death, rats are usually cast as the villains of the piece – and with good reason. After all, it was most likely thanks to them that the plague (Yersinia pestis) was reintroduced to Europe. Though there has been some debate about how and where th...continued
10 minutes read
Moises
@Moises -
4 days ago
Discovery of the Periodic Table
It came to him in a dream, Dmitri Mendeleev told a friend. He hadn’t slept for three days worrying how to classify the elements. Exhausted, he fell asleep and the answer came.Sadly, this may not be true. To begin with, Mendeleev – born in Siberia in 1834 – had been think...continued
2 minutes read
George
@George -
4 days ago
Prometheus | History Today
Peter Paul Rubens opened his studio in Antwerp in 1610 and Prometheus Bound was one of his first works to be produced there – though the eagle was painted by Frans Snyders, a colleague renowned for his depictions of the natural world. The scene is that of the Titan Promet...continued
2 minutes read
Erik
@Erik -
4 days ago
Writ in Water | History Today
Europe’s longest river weaves through what has come to be seen as Russia’s heartland, from the Valdai Hills north-west of Moscow to its delta near Astrakhan where it empties into the Caspian Sea. The Volga also links numerous peoples, including Bashkirs, Mari, Tatars, Udm...continued
4 minutes read
George
@George -
7 days ago
Zombies, Cannibals and Werewolves | History Today
Over the centuries, claims of cannibalism have been used repeatedly to justify slavery and imperialism. Indigenous Americans and enslaved Africans, it was said, were uncivilised and un-Christian people, whose savagery could be curbed only by European control.After the Atl...continued
6 minutes read
Alexie
@Alexie -
7 days ago
The Edict of Thessalonica | History Today
Emperor Constantine the Great authorised Christianity across the Roman Empire in 313, but it was Theodosius I, half a century later, who put the brute force of the imperial state behind the faith.Policy had vacillated through the fourth century. The emperor Julian had bee...continued
2 minutes read
Sandrine
@Sandrine -
9 days ago
Protest, Power, Play | History Today
To continue reading this article you will need to purchase access to the online archive.Buy Online Access Buy Print & Archive SubscriptionIf you have already purchased access, or are a print & archive subscriber, please ensure you are logged in.Please email digit...continued
1 minute read
Felicita
@Felicita -
10 days ago
1771: The Year Britain Lost America?
To continue reading this article you will need to purchase access to the online archive.Buy Online Access Buy Print & Archive SubscriptionIf you have already purchased access, or are a print & archive subscriber, please ensure you are logged in.Please email digit...continued
1 minute read
Garnet
@Garnet -
11 days ago
On the Road Again | History Today
There is growing opinion that, in the global car industry, now facing a period of extraordinary change, history will repeat itself. The electric revolution appears poised on the brink of transforming the world of mobility. Yet, while companies such as Elon Musk’s US-based...continued
8 minutes read
Joe
@Joe -
14 days ago
Publication of the Futurist Manifesto
‘In my own village’, the film-maker Luis Buñuel said of his birthplace in rural Spain, ‘the Middle Ages lasted until the First World War.’ Buñuel would escape the dead hand of the past through surrealism. But the Italian writer Filippo Tommaso Marinetti went one better: h...continued
2 minutes read
Alvah
@Alvah -
14 days ago
All By Myself | History Today
In modern western society, time for oneself, alone and in private, is taken for granted. Since the late 19th century, access to solitude has been central to understandings of privacy, which was defined in an influential article from the 1890 Harvard Law Review as ‘the rig...continued
5 minutes read
Jessika
@Jessika -
15 days ago
The Venner Rebellion | History Today
To continue reading this article you will need to purchase access to the online archive.Buy Online Access Buy Print & Archive SubscriptionIf you have already purchased access, or are a print & archive subscriber, please ensure you are logged in.Please email digit...continued
1 minute read
Jimmy
@Jimmy -
16 days ago
Madam Butterfly and the Forging of Japanese Identity
Rosina Storchio in the first production of Madam Butterfly at La Scala, Milan, 1904 © Lebrecht Music & Arts/Bridgeman Images.The broad outlines of Japan’s historical encounters with western culture are well known. They began with the arrival of Jesuit priests from Por...continued
1 minute read
Kari
@Kari -
17 days ago
Litigious Lives | History Today
To continue reading this article you will need to purchase access to the online archive.Buy Online Access Buy Print & Archive SubscriptionIf you have already purchased access, or are a print & archive subscriber, please ensure you are logged in.Please email digit...continued
1 minute read
George
@George -
18 days ago
On the Defensive | History Today
We all know, or think we do, that Russians have ‘empire’ lodged deep in their genes. The Russian Empire is said to have expanded faster and further than any other in history. Russia today may occupy an area smaller than at any time since the 17th century, but many believe...continued
4 minutes read
Rose
@Rose -
21 days ago
The Politics of Pancakes | History Today
On Shrove Tuesday 1270, the monks of Beaulieu Abbey in the New Forest rewarded their lay manorial workers with pancakes, with the youngest employees also receiving a feast of beef, cheese and ale in the great hall of the abbey’s infirmary. This is the earliest known evide...continued
5 minutes read
Jarod
@Jarod -
23 days ago
The Romantic Reputation of John Keats
Two hundred years ago, on 23 February 1821, John Keats died. He had suffered from tuberculosis since early 1820 and, after months of distress and pain, finally succumbed to the disease at the age of just 25. Keats was a failed medical student, who had swapped operations f...continued
6 minutes read
Maureen
@Maureen -
23 days ago
Dead Ends | History Today
London’s terminus stations were to be the final, crowning, pieces in the capital’s railway system. But they took their time to arrive. In 1836, passengers coming into Spa Road from Deptford on the London and Greenwich line, clambered down a rickety stair off the viaduct, ...continued
4 minutes read
Marlon
@Marlon -
24 days ago
Tutankhamun’s Ostriches | History Today
The ostrich feather fan (c.1370-52 BC) found in the tomb of Tutankhamun. Alamy.It was not until several months after the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922 that Howard Carter spotted it. By then, the antechamber had been largely cleared, the burial chamber had been o...continued
10 minutes read
Mariano
@Mariano -
25 days ago
On the Spot: Priya Satia
Why are you a historian of the British Empire?It shaped my family’s history and so much of the world, and I felt I could contribute – and correct influential myths – from the United States.What’s the most important lesson history has taught you? That struggles matter in a...continued
2 minutes read
Colin
@Colin -
28 days ago
Venus and Mars | History Today
Sir William Boxall, Director of the National Gallery in London, was accompanied by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Benjamin Disraeli, to a sale at Christie’s auction house in June 1874. The collection of the dealer Alexander Barker was up for sale and Disraeli wanted to ...continued
3 minutes read