Marcus Nevitt

In 1600 Muhammad al-Annuri arrived in England, as the Moroccan ambassador, to propose an Anglo-Moroccan alliance. Shakespeare probably started writing Othello six months later

Gloriana and the Sultan — England’s unlikely alliance

2 April 2016 9:00 am

The idea for a mechanical cock was never going to work. In 1595 the English ambassador to Constantinople, Edward Barton,…

Portrait of the Duke of Buckingham by Peter Paul Rubens

Was King James I murdered or merely poisoned in error?

5 December 2015 9:00 am

Beware hedonists bearing white powder. This, in part, was the message pressed in a short book about the excesses of…