In the last decades of the 12th century, the townsfolk of Annan in the Scottish borders were terrified by a sinister nocturnal revenant that stalked the dark byways. “Each night his corpse, driven by

The normal diet of gladiators was vegetarian, but not through choice or principle. The rations in their barracks consisted of sagina, which literally translates as ‘stuffing’. It was a barley and bean

Why this great empire believed bloody rites and cannibalism brought order to the cosmos

In 1494, the high castle walls that had dominated the Middle Ages came tumbling down in clouds of gunpowder smoke. It was the start of a new age

The article on the battle against U-boats in the Second World War in the November issue omitted perhaps the most important episode. That was the part played by the late Joe Baker-Cresswell of Bamburgh

In this extract from Peter Wise’s new book, an angler is fishing an ice-age lake where the coffin containing an evil monk who was reputed to have come back from the dead was once dumped. But the past is coming back to haunt him…