For two hundred years historians have viewed England's Glorious Revolution of 1688-1689 as an un-revolutionary revolution – bloodless, consensual, aristocratic, and above all, sensible. In this brilliant new interpretation Steve Pincus refutes this t...

Long before they came as occupiers, the British were drawn to the Middle East by the fabled riches of its trade and the enlightened tolerance of its people. The Pashas, merchants and travellers from Europe, discovered an Islamic world that was alluri...

In "Civilization and Its Discontents", Sigmund Freud claimed that Rome must be comprehended as "not a human dwelling place but a mental entity", in which the palaces of the Caesars still stand alongside modern apartment buildings in layers of brick,...

What induced the British to adopt foreign coffee-drinking customs in the seventeenth century? Why did an entirely new social institution, the coffeehouse, emerge as the primary place for consumption of this new drink? In this lively book, Brian Cowan...

A nation's standards of private cleanliness reveal much about its ideals of civilization, fears of disease, and expectations for public life, says Kathleen Brown in this unusual cultural history. Starting with the shake-up of European practices that...

In 1775, Thomas Jeremiah was one of fewer than 500 'Free Negros' in South Carolina and, with an estimated worth of GBP 1000 (about $200,000), possibly the richest person of African descent in British North America. A slave owner himself, Jeremiah was...

William the Conqueror's victory in 1066 was the beginning of a period of major transformation for medieval English aristocrats. In this groundbreaking book, David Crouch examines for the first time the fate of the English aristocracy between the reig...

Sixty-five years after the conclusion of World War II, its consequences are still with us. In this probing book, the acclaimed historian John Lukacs raises perplexing questions about World War II that have yet to be explored. In a work that brilliant...

Each year, more than two million visitors line up near Philadelphia's Independence Hall and wait to gaze upon a flawed mass of metal forged more than two and a half centuries ago. Since its original casting in England in 1751, the Liberty Bell has su...

For more than a thousand years, Greeks in all walks of life consulted oracles for guidance received directly from the gods. This colourful and wide-ranging survey encompasses the entire history of Greek oracles and focuses fresh attention on philosop...