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Mary, Queen of Scots and her ladies-in-waiting. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Mary, Queen of Scots: what happened to her ladies-in-waiting?

Now a protected species in many countries, the hedgehog was once also a health food. A German cookbook dating from the mid-15th century recommends the meat of a hedgehog as useful for leprosy and urinary retention. (Photo by Yuri SmityukTASS via Getty Images)

Hedgehogs, cannabis bread and horse placenta: 13 weird and wonderful health foods in history

Taxing the rich to feed the poor in the 17th century: the world's first welfare state

Q&A'God Save The Queen': how old is the British national anthem?

For our forebears, the secret to a good night's sleep lay in the contents of your gut. (Photo by Leemage/UIG via Getty Images)

6 sleeping tips and tricks from history

A portrait of 17th-century scholar John Wilkins

Ye final frontier: the 17th-century space race

Britain’s 7 most amazing stately homes

Illustrations by Ian Morris.

The Civil War cross-dressers: the women who swapped dresses for breeches

The ruins of Dunluce Castle, which sit on the coastal cliffs of North Antrim in Northern Ireland. They are thought to have been the inspiration for CS Lewis’s castle Cair Paravel in ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ (1950–56). (Photo by Andrea Ricordi/Contributor/Getty Images)

9 of Britain’s best castles. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Charles I. (Photo by World History Archive/Alamy)

King killers in America. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

9 eccentric monarchs through history

Men enjoying a drink and a chat in a coffee house, 1674. Coffee houses became known as ‘schools of the wise’, where people would gossip, argue and discuss the breaking news of the day. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

A drink for the devil: 8 facts about the history of coffee

A 16th-century woodcut by Albrecht Dürer entitled 'The true and false apostles of Christ'. As the Reformation recast Europe's spiritual landscape, many believers fretted that their religion no longer felt true to them. (Photo by Alamy)

The fury that fuelled the rise of atheism

Scottish nobles gathering in the 17th century

Scotland on the brink: the nation's final years of independence

Blenheim Palace in a c1880 print from ‘A Series of Picturesque Views of Seats of the Noblemen and Gentlemen of Great Britain and Ireland’, edited by Reverend FO Morris, Volume I, William Mackenzie, London. (Photo by The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images)

10 things you might not know about Blenheim Palace

A joint Franco-Native Indian raid left 56 residents of Deerfield, a small township in north-western Massachusetts, dead. (Alamy)

America: Brave new world or accident?

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.

A c1830 portrait of the scandalous but sublimely talented Lorenzo da Ponte. (Photo by Alamy)

My history hero: Katie Derham chooses Lorenzo Da Ponte. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Is it true that an angry mob of Dutchmen killed and ate their own prime minister in 1672? (Illustration by Glen McBeth)

Q&AIs it true that an angry mob of Dutchmen killed and ate their own prime minister in 1672?

Olivia Colman as Queen Anne in 'The Favourite'. (Photo by Twentieth Century Fox/Entertainment Pictures)

The Favourite: the real history behind the new Queen Anne film

The Pied Piper of Hamelin. Illustration by Kate Greenaway, 1888. (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

In pictures: fairytales through history

The regions of Britain in 1635, before the 1707 Acts of Union that united England and Scotland. (Photo by Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)

“The anglocentric view we have of British history is unsustainable,” says Misha Glenny. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

A British military post in a street in Dublin during the Easter Uprising, 1916. (Photo by ullstein picture via Getty Images)

The history of Ireland: 11 milestone moments

A portrait of Queen Victoria, who during her reign curbed the use of the title HRH (His or Her Royal Highness) by restricting it to children of a sovereign (of either gender) and grandchildren of a sovereign (in the male line). (Photo by Glasshouse Images/Alamy Stock Photo)

The rise and fall of ‘Royal Highness’: a brief history of royal titles

A painting depicting Oliver Cromwell gazing at the body of Charles I

Killers of the king: the men who dared to execute Charles I

Heck cows, the result of Nazi breeding experiments. Seven Heck cows had to be put down in January 2015 after they tried, on multiple occasions, to attack Devon farmer Derek Gow. (Photo by Jim Wileman/Alamy Stock Photo)

Nazi super-cows and defamed Gods: 7 strange and forgotten moments in history

Sir Godfrey Kneller's portrait of Anne Stuart. Following the 1707 Acts of Union, she would be queen of Great Britain and Ireland. (Photo by Getty Images)

"A charming, popular monarch": Tracy Borman on Queen Anne

Olivia Colman as Queen Anne in the film The Favourite, directed by Yorgos Lanthimos. (Photo by Alamy)

The true history of The Favourite. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

c60 AD, Queen Boudica of the Iceni holding a spear. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

8 things you may not know about British history

A 1646 engraving of John Lilburne behind bars. The outspoken critic of successive governments spent half his life imprisoned or in exile. (Photo by Rischgitz/Getty Images)

John Lilburne: the rebel they couldn’t gag