Painting of a European marketplace

Europe

A Roman relief showing a market scene

A handbook to shopping in ancient Rome

Acropolis Museum Athens, combines modern and ancient

ExploreAthens: a city of ancient sites and modern visions

General History

The big questionWhy did the west dominate history for so long?

A silhouette in front of a fire.

History quiz – Vikings, mobile phones and the Varangian Guard

Martin Luther King (centre) rides the Montgomery bus with Rev Glenn Smiley of Texas. (Getty Images)

The LibraryWhat was history’s most dramatic year?

Canterbury pilgrims from John of Lydgate’s ‘Story of Thebes’ written c1420. (Photo by Photo 12/UIG via Getty Images)

The LibraryA city break in medieval Europe

First World War

What is the origin of the phrase 'to blow smoke up someone's arse'?

Photograph of Vladimir Lenin, 1901. (Photo by Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)

First World War

Books interview with Catherine Merridale: "This was the most important railway journey made in the 20th century"

Sky covered by smoke from the first H-Bomb explosion at Eniwetok Atoll in the Pacific, 1 April 1954. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

Winston Churchill: atomic warrior, nuclear peacemaker

Leopold II statue. (Getty Images)

My favourite place: the Belgian coast

Italian poet Francesco Petrarch

Q&AHow and when did the medieval period get its name?

Q&AQ&A: Why is Portugal known as Britain’s oldest ally?

Roman silver denarius coins AD 72 till 200 and were offered up at the beginning of the 4th century AD, from the Nydan Bog archaeological site. (Photo by Clare Rowan)

From bes to Bitcoin: alternative currencies in the ancient Roman world

A painting depicting the storming of the Tuileries. (Photo By DEA/G DAGLI ORTI/De Agostini/Getty Images)

Socialite, spy, saviour: Grace Dalrymple Elliott

Adolf Hitler (left) and his interpreter (centre) talking to Spanish leader Francisco Franco. (Photo by Time Life Pictures/US Army Signal Corps/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

The LibraryHitler’s fury, Franco’s guile and the bribe that saved the world

Former US president Ronald Reagan and president of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev during a meeting in Moscow, Russia, on 16 September 1990. (Photo by Wojtek Laski/Getty Images)

Transcending the Cold War

The London & North Western Railway locomotive Jeanie Deans picking up water at Bushey Troughs, 1899. (Photo by SSPL/Getty Images)

Europe’s century of peace and progress

Henry Cabot Lodge Jr (centre) at a UN Security Council meeting concerning the Suez crisis. (Photo by Lisa Larsen/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

Blood and sand: Suez, Hungary and the crisis that shook the world

Londoners read newspaper headlines about Britain's entry to the Common Market, January 1973. (Photo by © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images)

The reluctant Europeans

Johannes Vermeer's 'View of Delft’, 1661. (Photo by Buyenlarge/Getty Images)

My favourite place: Delft, Netherlands

Eleanor of Aquitaine.

History quiz – spacewalks, battles and Eleanor of Aquitaine

The medieval hilltop village of Vézelay in north central France enjoys a spectacular location. (Photo by Andia/UIG via Getty Images)

My favourite place: Vézelay, France

Emil Zátopek. (Photo by Universal/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images)

The running revolutionary

Passengers on board the Wilhelm Gustloff c1939 giving the Nazi salute shortly before leaving Tilbury Docks. (Photo by London Express/Getty Images)

The LibraryHolidays with Hitler

Yangguan Museum and a statue of Zhang Qian. (Getty Images)

Global encounters of the ancient kind

Singer Germaine Lubin in conversation with officer Hans Speidel at the German Embassy in Paris, 1941. (Photo by ullstein bild/ullstein bild via Getty Images)

Les Parisiennes: how the women of Paris lived, loved and died in the 1940s

Photo of pencils

Q&AHow old is the pencil?

British reserve troops waiting to move up to the forward area during the battle of the Somme, France, 1916. Photograph from the Daily Herald Archive. (Photo by Daily Herald Archive/SSPL/Getty Images)

The Somme: was it really a monstrous failure?

Adolf Hitler is welcomed by supporters at Nuremberg, 1933. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Enigma before Bletchley: the German spies who betrayed Hitler to steal codes

Bologna, Italy. (Getty Images)

My favourite place: Bologna, Italy