Political

Who should claim Scotland’s royal jewels? After the forced abdication of Mary, Queen of Scots, the answer was not clear cut.

The French Resistance sought liberation above all else. But what should the postwar nation look like? The question was as old as the Fall of France itself.

Tyrant and usurper: the last wills of Richard II and Henry IV give rare insight into the medieval monarchs who wore the crown.

In Catherine de’ Medici: The Life and Times of the Serpent Queen, Mary Hollingsworth helps the pragmatic queen escape her ‘black legend’.

Outposts of Diplomacy: A History of the Embassy by G.R. Berridge shows us that debates about the role of the ambassador are as old as the institution itself.

‘What is the most common misconception about my field? That the republic was an absolute failure and the Restoration inevitable.’

America’s southern states were once strongholds for the Democratic Party. In 1952, Eisenhower decided to win them over.

Hitler’s People: The Faces of the Third Reich by Richard Evans asks what manner of men made themselves the Führer’s ‘paladins’.

The unholy alliance between France and the Ottoman Empire in 1530 caused great concern but had little military success.

A bloody massacre in Stockholm’s city square set Sweden on a course for independence under the leadership of Gustav I Vasa. A master of the ethos of 16th-century monarchy, his legacy is complicated.