Such was George III’s passion for astronomy that he had an observatory built to observe the transit of Venus. Although his interest remains unrivalled, scientific curiosity gripped the Royal Family for centuries, as Matthew Dennison reveals

So Vincent van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo in October 1876, charting the latest instalment of the Holbein cult. He was renting a room in Isleworth, west London, still hoping for a religious career

With emerald hills here and sinuous rivers there, a Yorkshire farmer’s years spent surveying the land on horseback resulted in a lavish and surprisingly accurate atlas of Elizabeth I’s Britain, says Ben Lerwill

When William Caxton opened Britain’s first printing press 550 years ago, he helped the country form a shared language and literary culture, as a new exhibition reveals

5 COLOURFUL BOOKS These books are filled with ...

On 14 January 1878, Queen Victoria welcomed a special guest and his newest invention to Osborne House, her private retreat on the Isle of Wight. In fact, the encounter was significant enough to warran