The charge of the light, battle illustration

Military history

The Trojan Horse – seen in the 2004 film Troy

How much of the legend of Troy is real?

German writer Hans Fallada (1893–1947), pictured in 1934 with his son Uli in a carriage in Carwitz, Mecklenburg. (Photo by Getty Images)

Germans who resisted the Nazis. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Boys playing conkers in 1926. Horse chestnuts played an unlikely role in the war effort just a few years earlier. (Photo by Fox Photos/Getty Images)

Did conkers help win the First World War?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Second World War

'Real life battleships': the secret game that countered German U-boat attacks during WW2

An allegory of France in 1870

Franco-Prussian War: the conflict that plunged Europe into a nightmare. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

War and society: a tangled relationship. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

From the British Isles to Italy and Spain: how the Normans reshaped Europe. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Queen Elizabeth II at Falkland Islands remembrance service 2007

Was the Queen opposed to the Falklands War?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

When Bergen-Belsen was liberated, huts designed to house about 30 people were found to be crammed with as many as 500. (Photo by Getty Images)

Second World War

Your guide to the Holocaust

The story of the Dambusters. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

From the first Remembrance Day to remembrance today. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Poland 1939: The invasion that sparked WW2. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The Falklands War in the air. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Stephen Bourne on Black soldiers in WW2

Black Britons in WW2. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Image depicting Roman general Germanicus oversing the burial of the bones of Romans killed in the battle of Teutoburg Forest

What was the Roman Empire's greatest defeat? It might be Teutoburg Forest in AD 9

The Varangian Guard as depicted in the illuminated 12th-century manuscript known as the Madrid Skylitzes. These Viking warriors became the Byzantine emperors' personal bodyguard

What was the Varangian Guard? A brief history of the Viking warriors of the Byzantine empire

Illustration shows James IV ceding his crown following defeat at the battle of Flodden. (Picture by Pictorial Press Ltd / Alamy Stock Photo)

Your guide to the battle of Flodden 1513

A section of the Bayeux Tapestry depicting Harold Godwinson being crowned king of England. Harold was the last Anglo-Saxon king of England and was killed by William, Duke of Normandy at the battle of Hastings in 1066. (Photo by Universal History Archive/Getty Images)

1066: eight days that rocked England

Edward the Confessor seated at a banquet

Edward the Confessor: England’s holy hardman. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Margaret MacMillanWhy are there wars?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

ever before,” says Margaret MacMillan. (Photo by Popperfoto/Getty Images)

"We’ve come to think that peace is normal, but that's not the reality": Margaret MacMillan on humanity's compulsion to go to war. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Sparta. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

In 802 Charlemagne took delivery of an elephant, sent to him by Harun al-Rashid, the caliph in Baghdad. Here, a manuscript illumination from a late 12th century English Latin bestiary. (Image by Alamy)

8 turning points in medieval European history. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The storming of Beziers

Medieval turning points. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The rise and fall of the Sikh empire. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Arnhem: the Battle for the Bridges, 1944. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Empire builder Maharajah Ranjit Singh sits astride a horse as an attendant holds a parasol over him. Singh is historically credited with growing his ancestral warrior-clan, the Sukerchakia misl, into a grand imperial dynasty. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images via Getty Images)

A Sikh tragedy: the Indian kingdom that fell foul of the British empire

Simon de Montfort and England’s First Revolution. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The bloody rise of Augustus

Napoleon watches on as the fighting at Waterloo unfolds in this 1843 painting

What if…Napoleon had won the Battle of Waterloo. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.