Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.
By Apollinary Vasnetsov (1856–1933), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
Timur, Muslim lord of Samarkand, threw his weight behind the Golden Horde’s subjugation of Christian Russia, with unexpected results.
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© Richard Croft, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
On a visit to England in 1599, Swiss doctor Thomas Platter found time to pop across the Thames and take in a show.
© Joseph Mischyshyn, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.
Three years before the Great War, Rudyard Kipling recalled how one English king simply paid his bullying neighbours to stay at home.
By Henri-Paul Motte (1846–1922), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
As Rome’s grip on Gaul tightened, one man still dared to defy them.
© BazzaDaRambler, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
After an accident at a level crossing, the bosses of the Leicester and Swannington Railway acknowledged that drivers needed more than lung power.
© Nick Allen, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.
The British Empire may be said to have started when Elizabethan importers got into a fight with the Dutch over the price of pepper.