the Roman Empire

The horrors of dining with a Roman emperor

16 December 2023 9:00 am

Elagabalus’s suffocating party tricks may have been exaggerated, but Domitian’s sinister, death-themed feasts could be seen as a dictator’s flamboyant threat

Papal plots

26 August 2023 9:00 am

The power of the medieval papacy resembled that of the Holy Roman Emperor – and like the first Roman emperors, popes attracted envy, scandal and violent retribution

You eat what you see

10 September 2022 9:00 am

Farmer, restaurateur, critic, foodie activist, traveller (he’s worked in Zimbabwe as well as South Africa), cookery book writer, longtime TV…

Nero and Agrippina by Antonio Rizzi

Foaming with much blood

12 September 2015 9:00 am

According to Francis Bacon, the House of York was ‘a race often dipped in its own blood’. That being so,…