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Virtual Branch Recording: The cultural world of Elizabethan England
Article
In this Virtual Branch talk Professor Emma Smith provides a preview of her current research, which explores the lives and cultural undercurrents of Elizabethan England. What was influencing their cultural tastes and how much of it was new, or had it all been seen before?
Emma Smith is Professor of Shakespeare...
Virtual Branch Recording: The cultural world of Elizabethan England
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What was Witchcraft in the Early Sixteenth Century?
Article
In this article, Dr Jonathan Durrant (Principal Lecturer in History, University of South Wales) argues that we know no more now than we did in the late 1980s about what witchcraft was as men and women of the early sixteenth century understood it. Dr Durrant looks at evidence from Henry VIII's Witchcraft Act of 1542 to explore British and European perceptions of witches...
What was Witchcraft in the Early Sixteenth Century?
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Virtual Branch Recording: The House of Dudley
Article
The Dudleys thrived at the court of Henry VII, but were sacrificed to the popularity of Henry VIII. Rising to prominence in the reign of Edward VI, the Dudleys lost it all by advancing Jane Grey to the throne over Mary I. That was until the reign of Elizabeth I,...
Virtual Branch Recording: The House of Dudley
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Membership Administrator Job Opportunity
Join the HA team
An exciting opportunity has recently arisen for a Membership Administrator to join the Historical Association's small and busy team to help deliver first-class services and support to our members.
The Historical Association (HA) is a registered charity incorporated by Royal Charter. Since 1906 we have brought together people who share an interest...
Membership Administrator Job Opportunity
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Show and Tell: three Branch book events
Historian article
When members of the Glasgow and West of Scotland Branch were invited to share their views on ‘Books that Changed History’, not all the contributions were as overtly revolutionary as Thomas Paine’s Common Sense nor as familiar as the King James Bible. Marie Davidson and Richard Binns tell us more....
Show and Tell: three Branch book events
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Terriers in India
Historian Article
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...
Terriers in India
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Film: Heligoland: Britain, Germany, and the Struggle for the North Sea
Article
Professor Jan Rüger joined the Virtual Branch on 9th February 2023 to talk about his book Heligoland: Britain, Germany, and the Struggle for the North Sea, tracing a rich history of contact and conflict from the Napoleonic Wars to the Cold War.
For generations this North Sea island expressed a German...
Film: Heligoland: Britain, Germany, and the Struggle for the North Sea
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Film: Building Anglo-Saxon England
Article
Building Anglo-Saxon England demonstrates how recent excavations enable us to grasp for the first time the diversity of the Anglo-Saxon built environment. The book explores how the natural landscape was modified for human activity, and how settlements were laid out with geometrical precision by specialist surveyors. It also shows how...
Film: Building Anglo-Saxon England
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Film: Rethinking the origins of the Cold War
Churchill's Great Game
In this HA Virtual Branch talk Professor Richard Toye explores Churchill’s response to the USSR and how his actions during the early Cold War years intersected with his views of traditional Anglo-Russian tensions and the legacy of the ‘Great Game’.
Richard Toye is Professor of Modern History at the University...
Film: Rethinking the origins of the Cold War
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War, Society and the State in Early Modern Europe
Podcast
Lecture from the 2012 HA Annual Conference
Frank Tallett: Fellow in History at the University of Reading and former Head of its School of Humanities
Until recently, military history has largely been concerned with ‘badges and buttons', an approach that stressed tactics, strategy and weapons. The so-called New Military History has sought...
War, Society and the State in Early Modern Europe
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The Irish historians' role and the place of history in Irish national life
Historian article
The debate on the nation and its history is new to England; and there is, perhaps, a tendency to assume that what is new in England is new everywhere. In Ireland, the debate has been going on since the 1970s, fuelled by what is called ‘revisionism’; or rather, by a...
The Irish historians' role and the place of history in Irish national life
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The Great Yarmouth Suspension Bridge Disaster of 1845
Historian article
Many communities have cataclysmic disasters which tend to dominate or define their local history. Gareth Davies reveals that the sudden collapse of the Great Yarmouth Suspension Bridge is a telling example of this trend.
Beside the waters of the River Bure in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk stands a shiny black memorial...
The Great Yarmouth Suspension Bridge Disaster of 1845
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Out and About in Wheathampstead
Historian feature
Dianne Payne examines the structural local history of Wheathampstead and provides a template for wider comparisons.
The rural village of Wheathampstead in Hertfordshire, situated about four miles from St Albans, lies on the River Lea. The village and surrounding land has a long history and in ancient times was owned by the...
Out and About in Wheathampstead
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The Legacy of the Z Special Unit in World War II
Historian article
The Spirit of Normandy Trust Essay Competition is aimed at young historians and organised by the Historical Association (as part of the annual Young Historian Awards). The 2023 winner in the Key Stage 3 (lower secondary school) category is Ayan Sinha, a pupil at Queen Elizabeth Grammar School in Wakefield. In this abridged...
The Legacy of the Z Special Unit in World War II
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An interview with Professor James Daybell
Article
We are delighted to announce that the new President of the HA from this summer will be Professor James Daybell of Plymouth University. James has a long history as an historian of the Early modern period but has also written extensively on other areas of history and related subjects. He...
An interview with Professor James Daybell
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Do historical anniversaries matter? Case study: Arnhem 1944
Historian feature
2019 has been quite a year for historical anniversaries – Peterloo 200, D-Day 75, Monte Cassino 75, Women MPs 100 years, Apollo Moon Landings 50 years and all following on the tail of four years of the First World War centenary – and that is not counting the anniversaries that...
Do historical anniversaries matter? Case study: Arnhem 1944
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Recorded Webinar: ‘Drawing the Line’: the 1947 Partition of India
Article
August 2022 marks 75 years since British India was divided at independence into two separate states: India and Pakistan (the latter including today’s Bangladesh). As with the 70th commemoration in 2017, this anniversary will trigger a great deal of collective remembering in Britain just as in South Asia itself.
Freedom from...
Recorded Webinar: ‘Drawing the Line’: the 1947 Partition of India
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Out and About: The castles of Castle Cary
Historian feature
In this article, Chris Culpin explores the surprising story behind Castle Cary’s long-vanished castles. Through conquest, rebellion, siege, and demolition, Castle Cary’s forgotten castles reveal a dramatic chapter of local and national history...
Out and About: The castles of Castle Cary
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Podcast: The doctor’s garden
Annual Conference Podcast 2019
The late Georgian British garden was a place of botanic and agricultural enquiry as much as a place of pleasure and leisure. This talk will highlight this use of gardens by medical practitioners. As a group of men who had access to botanical training and, for those at the top...
Podcast: The doctor’s garden
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Virtual Branch Recording: Women and the Reformations
Article
The Reformations, both Protestant and Catholic, have long been told as stories of men. But women were central to the transformations that took place in Europe and beyond. What was life like for them in this turbulent period? How did their actions and ideas shape Christianity and influence societies around the world? ...
Virtual Branch Recording: Women and the Reformations
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Shadow states and armed struggle
Historian article
How did groups resisting the creation of new borders after 1947 use shadow state structures? Luke Rimmo Lego, Abigail Tamang and Sneha Singh with Laishram Bullion and Chinglai Ngamba Moirangthem explore the history of these structures and their development over the past half century.
Shadow states and armed struggle
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Virtual Branch: A Life Revealed in Letters: Catalina Micaela
Article
What was life really like for a Spanish royal woman? Catalina Micaela, the younger daughter of Philip II of Spain, wrote extensively to her husband Carlo Emanrele I of Savoy giving fascinating insights into the events at court and the pressures on the families, providing a glimpse into sixteenth-century Spain and...
Virtual Branch: A Life Revealed in Letters: Catalina Micaela
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Art and ecology
Historian article
Artworks and objects from the past provide us with a compelling record of human interaction with the natural world. In this article, art historians Carla Benzan and Samuel Shaw explain how they are using collections from galleries and museums to bring environmental history to new audiences and to increase awareness...
Art and ecology
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Glacier Tours in the Northern Playground
Historian article
Glaciers are on the frontier of the climate crisis. Their ongoing disappearance is one of its most visible effects. In this article, Christian Drury explores how tourists in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries viewed and understood glaciers, and what they contributed to the history of environmental thought...
Glacier Tours in the Northern Playground
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The Chinese National Anthem
Historian article
The history of the Chinese national anthem gives Derek Ying a new perspective on society and culture from the era of the Qing dynasty to the People’s Republic of China. It reveals the strengths and weaknesses of different regimes, and the power of song to unite and divide...
The Chinese National Anthem
