Historical Period

Stonehenge: Trying to Understand the Mystery

Stonehenge is a famous, but little understood, stone circle just outside Amesbury in Wiltshire. It is also more than just a stone circle, with a ritual landscape spreading out from it in every direction. Within this landscape, there are a number of…

Stone Age

A Brief History of Climate Change

Climate changed dramatically during the Stone Age, from warmer than today to much colder. There were a number of ice ages, where glaciers expanded down from the north and sometimes covered much of Britain, making it impossible to live there.

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Fact of the Day

A cuckolded man in classical Athens could get his revenge by shoving a large radish or a spiked scorpion fish up his wife's lover's anus.

Quote of the Day

"I have offended God and mankind in not having laboured at my art as I ought to have done "

~ Leonardo da Vinci, speaking during his final illness to Francis I

On This Day

1579 Thomas Gresham, merchant, financier, and founder of the Royal Exchange, died suddenly, apparently of apoplexy. He bequeathed his estate, after the death of his wife, to the Corporation of London and the Mercers' Company to set up a college to provide free lectures to the public; Gresham College thus became London's first institution of higher education.

1916 The hospital ship Britannic, sister-ship of Titanic, hit a mine and sank, killing 30.

1918 Ten days after the Armistice, the German navy surrendered to the British in the Firth of Forth.

1920 The assassinations of British intelligence officers ordered by Michael Collins in the Irish War of Independence led to thirty-one dead (from both sides) in what became known as 'Bloody Sunday'.

1974 21 people were killed and 182 injured when bombs exploded in two Birmingham pubs. The IRA was probably responsible, but the real culprits have never been found. The Birmingham Six, originally convicted of the bombings, were released because of dodgy police practices.

1981 The proceedings of the House of Commons were televised live for the first time.