I’m incredibly lucky to have received a copy of Annie Whitehead’s new book Women of Power in Anglo-Saxon England. The Anglo-Saxon period is not unfamiliar to me, but definitely not my everyday focus. It was wonderful to re-familiarise myself with…
Oliver Cromwell and his exceptional timing
Historians have it easy when it comes to one important figure in British History: Oliver Cromwell has exceptional timing! The soldier and statesman who is remembered as leading the parliamentary forces in the English Civil Wars has four significant dates…
Heather Ale: The original fairy drink?
Heather Ale: A Galloway Legend by Robert Louis Stevenson Stevenson’s ‘Heather Ale’ is the ballad of a mysterious beer that was brewed by the Picts who inhabited Scotland during the late Iron Age and Early Medieval period. In Robertson’s poem,…
The Symbolism of Roses
Rosa x Damascena, or the Damask Rose is a pink-coloured flower. It is thought to have been bought to England in the sixteenth century by Thomas Linacre, a classical scholar, physician of Henry VIII and tutor to Erasmus and Queen…
The incredible life of the infamous Jack Sheppard
Jack Sheppard, born 1702, was one of England’s most infamous criminals. Although he committed crimes of thievery and burglary, Sheppard is most well-known for capturing the imagination of Londoners through his four audacious escapes from prison before his final arrest…
