1500-1600
The Medici: A chronology
These Florentine bankers led a city-state, occupied the Vatican and married into many powerful European families. They also inspired and supported some of the greatest artists, thinkers and pioneers of the Renaissance.
The
monarchs we never had
The death of the heir to the throne has had important consequences
throughout British history – sometimes immediately, sometimes
obvious only in retrospect.
- Time Traveller's Guide
to Tudor England
Everything the adventurous traveller needs to journey to the time of Henry VIII, Bloody Mary and the Virgin Queen. - The Worst Jobs in History: Tudor jobs
The ordinary citizen, rather than the royal court, contributes most to national success, not least by filling some of the least desirable job vacancies in history. - Monarchy
Dynamic timeline charts how England evolved from a land of warlords to one where dynasties could be built. - The monarchs we never had
The death of the heir to the throne has had important consequences throughout British history – sometimes immediately, sometimes obvious only in retrospect. - Henry
VIII
Henry's real achievement was the creation of an England that, in terms of kingship and religion, endured for centuries after his death. - Six
Wives of Henry VIII
The key events and players in the life of each wife and a comparison of women then and now. - The Empire Pays Back
Should the companies and other institutions that profited from the slave trade apologise and pay reparations? - The Last Aztec
The downfall of the Aztecs ruled by the emperor Moctezuma II, who were defeated by a small force of Spaniards under Hernando Cortes. - Secrets
of the Incas
The research by Dr William Sullivan into the sophisticated astronomical knowledge of the Incas and how they encrypted this in their myths. The orthodox view of why the Incas’ empire collapsed is also given, and there are pointers to finding out more. - The Sultanate of Women
For more than a century, says Professor Leslie Peirce, power in the Ottoman empire was centred on the sultan's harem in Istanbul. - Bodies of Evidence
Investigation of forensic archaeology and the scientific methods of unravelling the mysteries of the past. Plus more than two dozen case studies, including mummies, left-handedness and Lenin's body. - The
Spell Binder
Discover the secrets of Elizabethan science and magic. - Elizabeth: Apprenticeship
An extract from Dr David Starkey's biography of the young Elizabeth. - Howard Goodall’s Great Dates
Goodall shows that great pieces of music are not freak accidents of genius but the direct products of their time, place, culture and politics (Channel 4 Learning). - Elizabeth's Pirates
How the Virgin Queen turned to her privateers to raise money and wage war. - Elizabeth's Pirates:
Interviews
Interviews with historians Bruce Lenman, Mark Nicholls and Mia J Rodriguez-Salgado. - Elizabeth I
The dilemmas involved in portraying such an extraordinary historical figure. - The British Slave Trade: A chronology
From the first British slave trader Sir John Hawkins to the Slavery Abolition Act and US Emancipation Proclamation. - The Search for the Northwest
Passage
From the 15th century, European mariners sought to find a seaway through the ice-bound Arctic to the Orient. This website examines attempts including the fatal Franklin expedition and Amundsen’s success. - The Scots Detective
This website challenges historical accounts of the Scottish wars of independence, the Reformation, the Act of Union, Scottish exile and the Irish in Scotland (Channel 4 Learning). - Matt's
Old Masters: Titian
The artistic giant who did more than any other painter to change the way the physical world was translated into paint on canvas. - The
Science of Secrecy: The Babington plot
How the life of Mary Queen of Scots hung on the strength of a substitution cipher. - Howard Goodall’s Big Bangs
Goodall examines five momentous turning points in musical history and asks what they mean for us today (Channel 4 Learning). - Masters
of Darkness: John Dee
Queen Elizabeth's astrologer, Dee caused uproar in 16th-century Europe with his 'angelic conversations', and inspired the character of Prospero in Shakespeare's Tempest.
