- Article
- Article
Shakespeare’s cholerics were the real drama queens
In Shakespeare’s times, people’s personalities were categorised by four temperaments. The choleric temperament was hot-tempered and active.
- In pictures
- In pictures
From female impersonation to drag
How did drag develop from light-hearted female impersonation to a world-dominating art form?
- In pictures
- In pictures
How chloroform shaped the murder mystery
Find out how a sweet-smelling liquid anaesthetic captured the public’s imagination and changed pop culture for ever.
- In pictures
- In pictures
Fraught fertility and making royal babies
Producing a male heir has been seen for centuries as a queen’s most important role. Here Estelle Paranque explores the lives of four queens whose route to royal motherhood was far from smooth.
- Article
- Article
Uncovering experiences of dementia
Focusing on three 19th-century women’s case notes, Millie van der Byl Williams explores how our definition of dementia has changed.
- Article
- Article
There’s more to gingerbread than ginger
‘Bake-Off’ finalist Mary-Anne Boermans treats us to the warm and enticing pleasures of gingerbread over centuries.
- Article
- Article
Our endless quest for eternal youth
From poisonous 16th-century cosmetics to the latest “vampire facelift”, discover the fashions in unsavoury methods for improving our appearance.
- Article
- Article
Diagnosed bipolar, prescribed lithium
In the first part of a series looking into lithium, Laura Grace Simpkins recounts the beginning of her troubled relationship with this mysterious drug.
- Article
- Article
Would you like to buy a unicorn?
The story behind why somebody tried to sell Henry Wellcome a unicorn head in 1928.
- Article
- Article
Finding consolation in social isolation
Feeling isolated and anxious during the lockdowns of the last year, Tanya Perdikou found solace in reconnecting to her past and reaching out to neighbours in the present.
- In pictures
- In pictures
Dark Matter responds to ‘Epidemic threats and racist legacies’
Animated-collage artist Dark Matter brings his unique combination of live footage and archive imagery to respond to a text suggesting that the field of epidemiology emerged in the 19th century imbued with the doctrine of Western imperialism.
- Article
- Article
Eels and feels
For Georgian Londoners, the allure of electric animals was both intellectual and sensual.
- Article
- Article
The soul in the stomach
A 17th-century physician’s controversial theory about the link between the emotions and the stomach reminds us that we shouldn’t ignore our ‘gut feelings’.
- Article
- Article
When contemporary dance meets dyspraxia
Discover why a rare neurological condition meant an enthusiastic club-night dancer struggled with formal dance classes. And how persisting with those classes paid off.
- Article
- Article
Getting around the rules of sex education
What should we and shouldn’t we teach our teens about sex, inside and outside of the classroom?
- Article
- Article
In the tracks of Derek Jarman’s tears
Researcher E K Myerson shares her moving encounters with the personal papers of artist and filmmaker Derek Jarman.
- Article
- Article
Life before assistive technology
When an inherited condition caused Alex Lee’s vision to deteriorate, he began to discover the technologies that would help him navigate the world around him. Here he describes how his life began to change.
- Article
- Article
When monarchs healed the sick
Our current Queen fortunately doesn’t have to spend hours laying hands on the sick to cure them. But it was a different story for monarchs of the early modern era, whose touch was a sought-after treatment for scrofula.
- Article
- Article
Coleridge’s hypochondria
An intense focus on his own bodily sensations led poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge to self-medicate with narcotics. But this fascination also put Coleridge ahead of the medical sensibilities of his day.
- Article
- Article
Adapting to life as a thalidomide survivor
Growing up as a thalidomide survivor meant coping with all the usual challenges of childhood and adolescence, while having to fit into a world designed for the able-bodied.
- Article
- Article
Building a dream in the garden suburbs
In the late 19th century a ‘garden suburb’ promised a retreat from London’s dirt and crowds. See how this new concept was developed to appeal to the health concerns of the literary classes.
- Article
- Article
The cures and demons of sleep paralysis
Discover the murky past of sleep paralysis, the terrifying disorder once associated with demonic possession
- Article
- Article
Born in the NHS
Despite underfunding, strikes and scandals, the first two decades of the 2000s has seen the British people’s love of and loyalty to the NHS soar.
- Book extract
- Book extract
You, a thousand years ago
Jack Hartnell argues that, if we were transported into the medieval past, we’d find ourselves somewhere different yet strangely familiar.
- Article
- Article
The work of wet-nursing
Many of us know that in the past, babies were sometimes nourished by wet-nurses. But, perhaps surprisingly, the practice continues today – and the milk recipients are not only babies.