Isaac Newton investigating light

Science and technology

Q&A: Samuel Morse invented the Morse code, but how did he do it, how long did it take, and how long before it was accepted?

Pathologist Thomas Harvey holds the brain of Albert Einstein in a jar, Kansas, 1994. Harvey, the on-duty pathologist during the eminent physicist's autopsy, removed Einstein’s brain and kept most of it stored in two glass jars, refrigerated inside a beer cooler, for more than 20 years. (Photo by Michael Brennan/Getty Images)

Q&AWhat happened to Einstein's brain?

Austrian physicist Lise Meitner

6 women in science history you (probably) didn’t know about

Science and suffrage. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Earth Seen from Space Shuttle Discovery 1990

Earth from space: How pioneering photos changed our view of the planet

6 trivial decisions that changed British history

Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin stands beside an American flag, soon after landing on the Moon as part of the Apollo 11 mission. (Photo by NASA/Liaison)

OpinionWas the Moon landing really a great leap for mankind?

In pictures: a history of the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures

Portrait depicting Mary, Queen of Scots.

History quiz - surgeons and Mary, Queen of Scots. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

BBC History Magazine

In pictures: The photographs of William Henry Fox Talbot

The Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, which carries the Llangollen Canal over the valley of the River Dee, near Wrexham, North Wales. The aqueduct was built by Thomas Telford. (Photo by SSPL/Getty Images)

Thomas Telford: the man who built modern Britain

A silhouette in front of a fire.

History quiz – Vikings, mobile phones and the Varangian Guard. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Sheet music.

History quiz – songs, space stations and capital cities. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Eleanor of Aquitaine.

History quiz – spacewalks, battles and Eleanor of Aquitaine. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Forgotten science: 7 of the strangest scientific theories in history

Photo of pencils

Q&AHow old is the pencil?

Illustration of electric chair

Q&AWho invented the electric chair?

A giant leap for mankind: William Harvey reveals the circulation of the blood

A brave new world: the 1980s home computer boom

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.

Q&AWhy do we say ‘in the limelight’?

Photo of female cyclist in 1885

Q&AWere there health scares caused by new technology in the past?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Cover of the Voyages Extraordinaires series by the French science fiction writer Jules Verne.

The phantom menace: 10 milestones in science fiction

BBC History Magazine

Spitting Blood: The History of Tuberculosis

BBC History Magazine

Time's Anvil: England, Archaeology and the Imagination

Vintage Astro lava lamp from the 1960s

50 years of the lava lamp

John Linnell's 1816 portrait of Cornish engineer Richard Trevithick. His high-pressure steam engine "was the invention that unleashed power on this planet," says Michael Mosley. (Universal History Archive/Getty Images)

My history hero: Richard Trevithick (1771-1833). This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Richard Buckminster standing next to his draft of a house of the 21st century. (Ullstein picture via Getty Images)

My History Hero: Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983). This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

BBC History Magazine

Circulation: William Harvey’s Revolutionary Idea

A monument to Nicolaus Copernicus in Poland.

Q&AWas Copernicus the first to demonstrate that the earth goes around the sun?