Set like a stronghold south-west of the Caucasus mountains, Armenia is caught between East and West. Briefly a great empire in the first century BCE under King Tigranes the Great, Armenia was later incorporated first by the Sasanian and then the Byza...

W. Heath Robinson is best known for his hilarious drawings of outlandish contraptions, though his work ranged across a wide variety of topics covering many aspects of British life. Collections of his drawings became so popular as to transform Heath R...

At the turn of the fifteenth century, private devotionals became a speciality of the renowned Ghent-Bruges illuminators. Wealthy patrons who commissioned work from these artists often spared no expense in the presentation of their personal prayer boo...

"To keep children clean is something that should never be attempted. It cannot be done". "The mere provision of the vegetable is not sufficient; it must be actually eaten". "If there is room enough for somersaults, the child can be satisfied". Man...

"All over the snow plain the penguins begin to sing. The eggs are beginning to arrive". This is the story of the emperor penguins that live far away on the edge of a secret sea. During summer they are content with fishing, swimming and playing in th...

Acutely aware of the changes in English usage at the close of the Victorian era, the lexicographer James Redding Ware (1832-1909) decided to record for posterity new and archaic words and phrases from all walks of life, from the curses in common use...

"That is the way of the largest creature on earth. That is the whale's way". The humpback whales journey through polar seas, diving, spouting and leaping. As winter comes they swim through treacherous waters towards the warmer climate of the equator...

We're all familiar with "a flock of sheep" but what are the collective nouns for racehorses, pigs, zebras or giraffes? Drawing on a range of sources, from fifteenth-century hunting terms to more recent inventions that have now entered the language, t...

Here is a real treat for lovers of English – the very first dictionary in our language. Contrary to popular opinion, this honour goes not to Samuel Johnson, whose definitive tome appeared in 1755, but to Robert Cawdrey, who published his "Table Alpha...

Magna Carta is arguably the most famous document in world history. 2015 marks its 800th anniversary. Yet, until relatively recently, it was unknown how many versions of the document survive, the means by which they were distributed, or the relationsh...