Faisal Of Iraq

Middle East

The African who transformed Anglo-Saxon England

Illustration by Joey Guidone

The big question: has terrorism ever achieved its aims?

Illustration for BBC History Magazine.

How potatoes conquered the world

Exclusive podcastDan Jones on the human stories of the crusades. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Selim I

The extraordinary life of Sultan Selim I. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The tomb of Pharaoh Djoser, built at Saqqara

Timeline: the evolution of ancient empires

Colourised print of the Lighthouse of Alexandria as imagined in the 18th century

General ancient history

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World: what were they, and what happened to them?

A 16th-century painting of the Tower of Babel

General ancient history

Your guide to...the ancient city of Babylon

A replica of Jesus' tomb. (Photo by Alamy)

History’s greatest mysteriesThe fate of Jesus's body. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

BlogMedieval(ish) matters #15: What's lurking in the background of medieval maps? And what did medieval people really know about the wider world?

Egyptian ships sunk at the entrance of the Suez Canal at Port Said

Your guide to...the Suez Crisis

The Suez canal

How significant was the Suez Crisis?

The capture of Jerusalem in 1099

How the First Crusade captured Jerusalem in 1099

Taking of Jerusalem by the Crusaders, Painting by Emile Signol (1804–1892), (Photo by Leemage/Corbis via Getty Images)

BlogMedieval(ish) matters 11: Did women fight in the crusades? And why did people follow a goose to the Holy Land?

Women and the crusades. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Illustration from Dante's ‘Inferno', depicting thieves tormented in hell by serpents.

General ancient history

A brief history of the afterlife

A mushroom cloud produced by the explosion of a hydrogen bomb during Operation Ivy, an American nuclear test that took place in 1952. (SSPL/Getty Images)

How have nuclear weapons shaped global politics? 10 key moments in the post-war atomic world

c1190 A scene from the Third Crusade depicting the surrender of Acre to the armies of King Richard I of England and Philippe Auguste of France. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

What were the crusades? Your top questions answered

The crusades: everything you wanted to know. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Rutger Bregman. (Rutger Bregman (Photo by Maartje ter Horst)

Rutger Bregman’s optimistic history of the world. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Hungarian Jews arrive at Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in 1944

Editor’s pick9 top articles from the BBC World Histories archive to read right now

Tomb of Cyrus the Great, Shiraz, Iran

From conqueror to youth icon: who was Cyrus the Great?

Christ appearing to Mary Magdalene

Mary Magdalene: why do people want to believe she was a sinner and prostitute?

Our composite image shows Henry II framed by an Arabic arch. Henry claimed he "would sooner accept the errors of Nur-al-Din" than suffer Thomas Becket remaining as archbishop. (Image by Bridgeman/Getty Images)

King Henry II: the Muslim monarch of medieval England?

Illustration of Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19). (Photo by Alamy)

Coronavirus: what might we learn from pandemics in the past?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Illustration of Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19). (Photo by Alamy)

Coronavirus: a historical perspective. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

6 lesser-known facts about the Ottoman Empire

American president Warren G Harding and his wife, First Lady Florence Harding.

Tension in the Middle East and populist presidents: what the world was like 100 years ago

Ayatollah Khomeini

General ancient history

A brief history of Iran

Crowds protest in Tehran

Opinion: is Iran a nation at war with itself?