John McKendrick considers how Scotland’s wish to create a trading empire was dashed and made the Act of Union of 1707 almost inevitable.

Sean Connolly illustrates how Tudor dreams of a reformed Ireland were not realised – instead tensions between Irish magnates and the English Crown often erupted into violence.

Stunning archaeological discoveries have shed new light on the reign of Alfred the Great and his struggles with the Vikings, revealing the might of the Viking armies and the international connections of his kingdom.

The riches of surviving Anglo-Saxon manuscripts showcased in a fabulous new exhibition at the British Library emphasises the essential interconnections between England and the Continent.

Paula Kitching introduces a very remarkable First World War memorial to a specific group of Yorkshire workers.

Many fascinating individuals appear in the British Library’s Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition – Bede, Alfred, Canute, Emma, William the Conqueror – but one deserves to be much better known, especially in this her anniversary year: one of the most important women in British history, hers is a classic case of the...

Richard Broadhead provides a personal view on whether the mammoth task of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission can always be fulfilled, especially at a time of so many anniversaries.

Imperial ambitions during the First World War extended beyond the Middle East and Africa.  In this article Ben Markham looks at the territorial wrangling over Greenland. It is well known that the British Empire grew in size significantly in the wake of the First World War. In the course of...

This article examines the importance of understanding the experiences of the Indian Forces during the First World War and how that can affect young people today. One hundred and four years ago the British Empire was one of the largest global operations in existence. Roughly a quarter of the world’s population...

Travelling from the Western Front to fight former Allies in Russia is not the usual story of 1919 for a British ‘Tommy’.  Yet that was the story of some of those men still serving King and Country. On 9 January 1918 the supplement to The London Gazette, an official paper...

Dave Martin investigates why there is a war memorial for German soldiers, ‘buried in a foreign field’, in a Dorset churchyard.

Daniel Steinbach asks why the loss of the German colonies in Africa was perceived as a powerful symbol of Germany’s deliberate humiliation at the end of the First World War. Famously, Germany’s first and last shots of the First World War were fired in Africa. From its beginning to its...

Joe Wilkinson takes us on a tour of the island of Zanzibar, where the slave trade continued long after the British abolished it. Mention Zanzibar and most people will think of an Indian Ocean paradise, perfect for honeymooners, relaxing on the popular pristine white north-eastern beaches of Bwejuu and Paje,...

Guy de la Bédoyère considers whether the Roman Empire ever really fell or simply went through endless processes of change that makes it an integral presence in our lives today. The fall of the Roman Empire is like the end of the dinosaurs. It’s one of the vast dramatic crisis moments we love...

Amrita Shodhan explores the complex legacy of Partition in India and the difficulties faced by historians in unpicking these narratives. She re-evaluates the events of August 1947 through personal stories and popular memories. The Partition that we have inherited from 1947 has a complicated lineage. It was born out of...

Peter Stanley is working on the largely unexplored history of the thousands of British Territorial soldiers who served in India during the First World War using their letters and diaries. He is trying to discover what happened to these men when they returned to Britain. Did their service in India...

Jules Stewart gives us an insight into how the Germans attempted to destabilise the British strategic position in Afghanistan during the Great War. On a state visit to Berlin in 1928, the Emir of Afghanistan Amanullah Khan was shown a display of the latest in German technology, which included a...

This notable essay by Dr. Erich Eyck, the most distinguished Bismarckian scholar of the mid-twentieth century was written on the invitation of the HA to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Bismark's death. Dr. Eyck, a German Liberal of the school of Ludwig Bamberger, found his way to England in the...

Many myths surround David Livingstone and in this part of the world more myths about the man abound than perhaps anywhere else. We can only speculate on whether he fought off lions with his bare hands, shamed slave-traders into letting their slaves go with just a few words from the scriptures...

Adam Chapman debates the evidence for a Welsh presence among Henry V’s highly-successful force of archers at Agincourt in 1415. Michael Drayton, in his poem of 1627, The Bataille of Agincourt, described the Welsh presence in Henry V's army: ‘who no lesse honour ow'd To their own king, nor yet...