Turquoise mosaic of a double-headed serpent

South America

Panorama of Machu Picchu

The last days of the Incas. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Great Pyramid of Giza. Egypt. (Photo by Olgakostenko | Dreamstime.com)

10 of the most surprising numbers in history. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

In only two years, Hernán Cortés brought about the downfall of an efficient military civilisation through a combination of diplomacy, warfare, tactics, luck and sheer force of personality, writes Caroline Dodds. (Photo by Ann Ronan Pictures/Print Collector/Getty Images)

Cortés and Montezuma: the conquering of Tenochtitlan

Max Adams. (Photo by Kona Macphee/Royal Literary Fund)

Remarkable women through history. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

A poverty-stricken migrant mother with three young children by Dorothea Lange, colourised by Marina Amaral. (Photo courtesy of Head of Zeus)

History in colour. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Rags and riches: Enslaved people wash diamonds in Brazil, guarded by armed overseers, in a German engraving of 1828. Diamonds were discovered in Minas Gerais state in the late 17th century. (Picture by Alamy)

Brazil: a society shaped by slavery. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Plaza de Armas in historic center of Cusco, Peru

ExploreCusco, Peru: Navel of the Incan world. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Brazil's oldest museum was gutted by a fire that destroyed most of the 20 million artefacts it housed. (Photo by Buda Mendes/Getty Images)

Brazil's National Museum fire in context

The World Cup story. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Living with the oceans. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Violeta Parra and the birth of ‘New Song’

An indigenous Aymara woman selling herbs at La Paz's Witches' Market

ExploreLa Paz, Bolivia: the history of the turbulent city of peace. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Percy Fawcett and the lost city of Z: The history behind the film. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Monument to Alexander von Humboldt

Books interview with Andrea Wulf: "Alexander von Humboldt is the forgotten father of environmentalism". This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Cuban photographer Alberto Korda

Q&AWhere did the famous portrait of Che Guevara come from?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Photo of pipe and tobacco

Q&ADid people smoke anything before tobacco was discovered?

Historic San Felipe de Barajas castle is one of the main attractions in Cartagena, Colombia. (Image: Thinkstock by Getty Images)

General prehistory

My favourite place: Cartagena de Indias, Colombia

My favourite place: Miranda Kaufmann

Photo of Uruguay football players celebrating victory

Q&AWho won the first FIFA World Cup?

Brazil: where sport and politics have always mixed. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Ye olde travel guide: Caracas 1783. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Ye olde travel guide: Rio de Janeiro 1820. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

British prime minister Margaret Thatcher is portrayed as pirate in an Argentine newspaper from 30 April 1982.(Photo by Alain Nogues/Sygma via Getty Images)

Sir Max Hastings: Witness to the Falklands War. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

In the 16,000 years after the end of the last Ice Age, societies in Eurasia and the Americas followed radically different trajectories. Here, an Aztec priest offers the heart taken from a living person to the god of war, Huitzilopochtli. (Photo12/UIG via Getty Images)

The old world and the new. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Britain’s slaves in Latin America. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Latin American slavery and historical hair. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Two women from South America. Six centuries ago South American civilisations matched the west in some respects. (Getty Images)

The wonder of the west

Evening light sweeps over the ruins of the Jesuit mission church at Trinidad de Paraná, Paraguay, where the bell tower of the site's first of two churches stands. Scores of Jesuit missions in the area where Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil meet were built in the 17th century and were abandoned when the Jesuits were expelled in the 18th century. (Photo by Kevin Moloney via Getty Images)

Jesuit missionaries: “a masterpiece of humanity”. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Ancient Greece in the 4th-century BC and the Spanish in Mexico. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Ernesto 'Che' Guevara

Walking with Che Guevara. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.