Religion
The War of the World
According to historian Niall Ferguson, from the Russo-Japanese war of 1904/5 to the aftershocks of the Cold War, the 20th century was by far the bloodiest in history. In this website, Ferguson explains why this came about, and there is an extensive chronology of the events that made this the ‘age of hatred’.
The Celts
Who were the Celts – a people with a distinctive language and culture
whom the Romans gradually pushed to the western fringe of Europe, or something
more complicated and mysterious?
- Ancient Egyptians
An extract from Anton Gill's book, in which he discusses the Egyptians' religion and the rituals of their priests. - Athens: The truth about democracy
Examination of how the democratic Greeks were also slave owners and empire builders. Includes the article 'Who killed Socrates?' - Ayatollah Khomeini
Muslim religious leader who established a fundamentalist Islamic government in Iran. - Battle for the Holocaust
Jewish historians look at how understanding the Holocaust has changed since the end of World War II, and ask whose agenda is being served by the proliferation of museums, memorials and commemoration events. - Can You Believe It? Origins and history
Concise histories of the major religions of the world, plus a detailed timeline. - El Cid
Historian Jonathan Phillips reveals that this 1961 biopic of the medieval Spanish hero portrays a man and an age that modern scholarship has left behind. - Decoding Da Vinci
Using The Da Vinci Code as a starting point, this website investigates three controversial mysteries: secret societies, codes and symbols, and the sacred feminine. - The Girl with X-ray Eyes
The battle of beliefs and the appeal of visionaries throughout history, from Greek myths to the Cottingley fairies. - The Gunpowder Plot: Filling in the gaps
Historical novelist Christie Dickason shows how the story of the plot isn’t as straightforward as we might have been led to believe. - The Devil in Essex: Witch-hunting
in Old and New England
Dr Malcolm Gaskill reveals how witch-hunts in Cromwellian England led to similar atrocities in the New World. - England's Thousand Best Churches
An extract from Simon Jenkins's book, in which he ponders the problem of preserving these wonderful structures and their precious contents. - Haile Selassie
Ethiopia's last emperor and the Rastafarians’ messiah. - The Hajj
Website that shows all aspects of this pilgrimage to Mecca made by millions of Muslims every year. In 'Hajj History', there are articles on the Hajj, the Quran, Mecca, the Five Pillars and travel through the ages. - Herod the Great
Herod, king of the Jews, is said to have ordered the murder of thousands of babies – the ‘slaughter of the innocents’ – just to kill the infant Jesus. But there is much more to him than this infamous role. - The Holocaust
An umbrella website covering all aspects of the Holocaust of World War II, including a chronology (1923 to present) and information on victims and survivors, war crimes trials and later controversies. - How
Islam Kept Us Out of the 'Dark Ages'
It's time for the West to recognise its debt to the Islamic scientists of the past who forged ahead while Europe stagnated. - Howard Goodall’s Big Bangs
Goodall examines five momentous turning points in musical history and asks what they mean for us today (Channel 4 Learning). - Howard Goodall’s Great Dates
Goodall shows that great pieces of music are not freak accidents of genius but the direct products of their time, place, culture and politics (Channel 4 Learning). - Mahatma Gandhi
This Channel 4 Learning website examines Gandhi as a political campaigner and religious leader and the effects of his policies. - Malcolm X
African-American leader who turned from separatism to the brotherhood of Islam. - Medieval Realms: Stories in Stone
The roof carvings of Norwich Cathedral, a high point of medieval art, portray stories from the Old and New Testaments and the beliefs and narratives of the Middle Ages (Channel 4 Learning). - Muhammad Ali Jinnah
Muslim leader who pressed for partition but died just after Pakistani independence. - Pagans
Delve deep into the pagan past, find out whether the old religions were obsessed with sex, learn about modern followers of the faith, and discover how many traces of ancient paganism remain in 21st-century culture. - Pioneer
House
Modern-day colonists striving to make it in 1628 America. The website reveals why the original pioneers left England, how they set up the first colonies and coped with their demanding daily lives, and examines their troubled relations with the Native Americans. - Public and Private Tragedies: Voices of the Indian Mutiny
Historian William Dalrymple describes the discovery of previously unknown eyewitness accounts of the crisis, and draws startling parallels between the dying Mughal world and our own. - The Real Patron Saints
Patrick, Andrew, David and George – patron saints of Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England. Who really were they and what is their significance today? - Real
Wizards: The search for Harry's
ancestors
An investigation into the reality of magic, from its 40,000-year-old beginnings to the present-day, including Merlin, Druids and Shamanism. - The Road to 9/11
A chronology that investigates the ‘humiliation and disgrace’ that, according to Osama bin Laden, the Middle East suffered for ‘more than 80 years’ before the bombing of the World Trade Center. - Rome:
AD 1
An examination of how Rome became an empire, plus biographies of Vespasian and Cleopatra, a look at life in Pompeii, and a discussion of how paganism yielded to Christianity. - Saladin, Richard the Lionheart
and the Legacy of the Crusades
How Saladin and Richard I are being invoked by those involved in today's conflict in the Middle East. - The Scots Detective
This website challenges historical accounts of the Scottish wars of independence, the Reformation, the Act of Union, Scottish exile and the Irish in Scotland (Channel 4 Learning). - Secret
History: Search for the Struma
Brief account of the ill-fated ship torpedoed by the Soviets in 1941, killing almost 800 Jews, plus a chronology of anti-Semitism in Britain. - Secrets
of the Incas
The research by Dr William Sullivan into the sophisticated astronomical knowledge of the Incas and how they encrypted this in their myths. The orthodox view of why the Incas’ empire collapsed is also given, and there are pointers to finding out more. - Tit for tat
Acts of vengeance and their consequences – including such ‘triggers’ as the murder of Genghis Khan’s envoys in 1218, the murder of the Israeli athletes in Munich in 1972 and the storming of the Golden Temple of Amritsar in 1984, as well as other examples of retribution from Japan, Czechoslovakia and Korea. - Treason
The story of the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 and what might have happened if it had succeeded. - The War of the World
According to historian Niall Ferguson, from the Russo-Japanese war of 1904/5 to the aftershocks of the Cold War, the 20th century was by far the bloodiest in history. In this website, Ferguson explains why this came about, and there is an extensive chronology of the events that made this the ‘age of hatred’. - Witchfinder General
According to Malcolm Gaskill, this 1968 film set in Civil War England – a period-piece about love and loss, exploitation and vengeance – self-consciously manipulates the known facts.
