Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.
© Nchatzitou, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.
Eurystheus pits his cousin against a son of Ares and some man-eating horses.
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© Mujaddara, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.
King Saul’s jealousies drove those who loved him away, but David was a very different kind of leader.
© Wolfgang Pehlemann, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.
A Danish soldier in the seventeenth century imposes the severest sentence he can think of.
© Fumihiko Ueno. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
In a translation from the Authorized Version of the Bible, published in 1611, St Mark recounts the discovery of Christ’s empty tomb.
From the British Library, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
A 9th century Irish monk scribbled some verses about a beloved cat into his copy book.
© Gerard Barrau, Wikimedia Commons Licence: CC-BY-SA 3.0.
The Nazi-collaborating Vichy government in France paid Rugby League the supreme compliment: they banned it.