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Nationalist troops escort captured Republican militia during the Spanish Civil War. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

The Spanish Civil War: an avoidable tragedy

A young visitor looks at a painting depicting the Amritsar Massacre

Amritsar: day of shame

A French print by the Thierry bothers depicting the appearance of the landscape and inhabitants of the Moon

How to carry off a great hoax

Perkin Warbeck, an imposter and pretender to the English throne, being humiliated in the stocks before his execution in 1499. Warbeck was used by Henry VII’s Yorkist enemies in an unsuccessful plot to threaten the new Tudor dynasty. (Getty Images)

Imposters in history: 16 famous con-artists and pretenders

A Royal Air Force fighter squadron 'scrambles' after receiving the signal to engage the enemy during the Battle of Britain. (Photo by William Vandivert/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

A brief history of the Royal Air Force

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Third Crusade: The city of Ptolemais (Acre) given to Philip Augustus and Richard the Lionheart. Painting by Merry Joseph Blondel, 1840. (Photo by Leemage/Corbis via Getty Images)

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

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This 16th-century woodcut depicts King James VI at the North Berwick witch trials, the case that first sparked his obsession with hunting. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

James VI and I: the king who hunted witches . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Scottish soldier and Field Marshal Douglas Haig (1861 - 1928) visiting the troops during the First World War. (Central Press/Getty Images)

First World War

Field Marshal Haig: a man much misunderstood?

An ancient Roman relief shows a midwife delivering a baby. Many midwives had other occupations, and undertook the task as a contribution to their community. (Wellcome Images)

Call the (Roman) midwife

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

Towards the end of the third century BC, the First Emperor of China sought to make his new state immortal by shielding it with what would be the earliest predecessor to the Great Wall. (Photo by Jean-Luc PETIT/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)

A brief history of border walls – from 2,000 BC to Trump’s Mexico wall

Passengers reading a newspaper while waiting to disembark from the 'Empire Windrush' at Tilbury, having sailed from Jamaica, taken by an unknown photographer for the Daily Herald newspaper, 21 June 1948.

Do we need to decolonise history? And if so, how?

An illustration depicting the procession to the House of Commons to deliver People's Charter to government in 1842. (Photo by Mansell/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

A brief history of Chartism

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Hallie Rubenhold. (Photo by Fran Monks)

The women killed by Jack the Ripper . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Chris Pine as Robert the Bruce in 'Outlaw King'. (Photo by Netfix / David Eustace)

Robert the Bruce: what do we know?