The fall of the Aztec empire in the early 16th century appears to have been one of history’s clearest before-and-after moments. According to the myth, a handful of Spanish conquistadors quickly crushe

John Tolan Islam A new history from Muhammad to the present 304pp. Princeton University Press. £25 (US $29.95). James McDougall Worlds of Islam A global history 608pp. Allen Lane. £40. Elizabeth Drays

Picture the scene: a former NHS chef ‘Clem’ Clements is celebrating his 98th birthday, sitting in his front room surrounded by his medications, an oxygen mask and a discreet tape recorder. He is recal

In Caravaggio’s “St Matthew and the Angel” (1602), the Bible seems to arrive as a shock to those who wrote it. Matthew, bare-armed and dirty-toed, is a fisherman stranded on dry land. Everything about

There’s plenty to criticise about that ancient approach We wouldn’t recognise the system practised in ancient Athens as democracy in the sense we understand it today. Women did not have the vote, and

From voyages to battles, gods to monsters, heroics to cowardice, the Viking sagas explore all of these themes in magnificent detail