History

Rhodes, Columbus and the next heritage battle

17 October 2021 5:31 pm

On 12 October this year, Columbus Day, a statue of the Italian in Belgrave Square was vandalised by activists from…

What James Bond and Aristophanes have in common

9 October 2021 9:00 am

So James Bond is back, doing exactly what he always does, inviting the audience into a fantasy world for the…

No, America couldn’t have been Canada

29 September 2021 4:56 am

What if William Howe, the dithering British commander, hadn’t let the American army escape in the Battle of Long Island…

Most people who call themselves Caucasian know nothing about the Caucasus

11 September 2021 9:00 am

A magnificent new history of the Caucasus earns Peter Frankopan’s highest praise

How the ancients showed their true colours

4 September 2021 9:00 am

In the 18th century, art historians’ admiration for the beauty of white-ish ancient Greek marble statuary led people to draw…

My roots burnt with Greece

14 August 2021 11:30 pm

On 11 March this year my father passed away from prostate cancer after several weeks in a hospital in central…

Our need to get drunk in company may be innate

24 July 2021 9:00 am

It was once a favourite theory of optimistic drunkards that a suitably ‘moderate’ level of alcohol consumption provided covert health…

The disgraceful decision to remove Liverpool’s heritage status

23 July 2021 12:07 am

Unesco has cancelled the ‘World Heritage Status’ of the Necropolis at Memphis and the Giza Pyramid because a Radisson Blu…

How the ancients kept people behaving responsibly

17 July 2021 9:00 am

The Prime Minister is urging citizens not to throw caution to the winds when lockdown ends on 19 July but…

Tacitus and the hypocrisy of cancel culture

3 July 2021 9:00 am

The delicious hypocrisy at the heart of today’s cancel fraternity is that it is strongly opposed to censorship. Romans grappled…

Not so dryasdust: how 18th-century antiquarians proved the first ‘modern’ historians

3 July 2021 9:00 am

Antiquaries have had a bad press. If mentioned at all today, they are often derided as reclusive pedants poring over…

Journey to the end of the world: the full horror of the Belgica’s Antarctic expedition

3 July 2021 9:00 am

The epic story of the Antarctic voyage of the Belgica (1897-9) has all the ingredients of a truly glorious misadventure:…

What the EU could learn from the Athenian Empire

26 June 2021 9:00 am

The EU has regularly been likened to the Roman Empire. But its current direction suggests that the Athenian Empire (478-404…

What Dominic Cummings could learn from Xenophon

12 June 2021 9:00 am

On the subject of leadership, the Athenian soldier, historian, biographer and essayist Xenophon (c. 430-354 BC) had much to say,…

An orange or an egg? Determining the shape of the world

29 May 2021 9:00 am

Simon Winchester follows the volatile French mission to Ecuador in 1735 to determine the shape of the Earth

Animal sentience law has finally caught up with Plutarch’s thinking

22 May 2021 9:00 am

Almost no ancients cared whether animals felt pain or not. The classical Stoic belief that man’s reasoning capacity elevated him…

Virgil understood the great power of nature

15 May 2021 9:00 am

‘Georgics’ are an ancient form of poetry about agriculture and the land. The term derives from Greek gê ‘land’ +…

Studying history isn't what it used to be

12 May 2021 5:30 pm

Is history in danger of becoming a thing of the past on campus? In recent weeks, Aston in Birmingham announced a consultation on…

What should we put in our time capsule of the plague year?

8 May 2021 9:00 am

What to include in a memory box of the plague year?

Do spelling and grammar still matter?

1 May 2021 9:00 am

Some universities have announced that spelling and grammar (i.e. morphology and syntax) are not all that important, but quality of…

Models of obedience: how to make people obey the law

10 April 2021 9:00 am

Protests are being staged against the proposed bill to change the laws on protest. But there is a bigger issue…

University challenge: conservatives are now the radicals on campus

3 April 2021 9:00 am

Conservatives are now the radicals on campus

The ancient Greek approach to mediation

3 April 2021 9:00 am

Divorcing couples are being given vouchers worth £500 to settle their problems by mediation rather than going to court. It…

Malice and back-stabbing behind Vogue’s glossy exterior

20 March 2021 9:00 am

‘What job do you want here?’ asked the editor of Vogue, interviewing a young hopeful. From behind her black sunglasses…

Is it farewell to the handshake?

20 March 2021 9:00 am

Ella Al-Shamahi is a Brummie, born to a Yemeni Arab family. From a strict Muslim upbringing she transitioned (evidently con…