The Price of Beauty: A History of Dangerous Cosmetics
From lead-laced face powder to jawline-shattering surgery, the lengths people have gone to look beautiful…
The Price of Beauty: A History of Dangerous Cosmetics
From lead-laced face powder to jawline-shattering surgery, the lengths people have gone to look beautiful have often been lethal. We are still prepared to use dangerous cosmetics and dubious medical procedures to look amazing. Our ancestors made the same mistake. Here is the full, unflinching story. Beauty has always come at a price. Sometimes that…
Blood, Fire, and the Otherworld: The Irish Myths My Grandmother Told Me
My grandmother – ‘granny’ to me – was an Irish woman who had been a school teacher before retirement, but in her last years, liked nothing better than to fill my young head with tales from Irish mythology. Norma McMahon (born McEnhill), 1909-1975, was a fiery product of Ulster (Omagh, county Tyrone to be exact)….
Blood, Sand, and Glory: The True Lives of Roman Gladiators
They were the rockstars of the ancient world — enslaved, brutalised, and adored. The life of a Roman gladiator was far stranger, and far more human, than the movies suggest. First, let’s start with a little video clip of the Colosseum, scene of so much gladiatorial combat, from my last visit in 2025. Who Were…
Ten Creepiest Facts About Adolf Hitler That History Rarely Discusses
Adolf Hitler remains one of history’s most studied and reviled figures — yet beyond the textbook horror of the Holocaust and World War II lies a more unsettling portrait. The personal psychology, the obsessions, the blind spots, and the bizarre contradictions of the man who dragged the world into catastrophe are, in many ways, more…
Divorced, Beheaded, Died: Henry VIII and His Six Wives
Henry VIII is one of history’s most recognisable monarchs — not for his military genius or philosophical writings, but largely because he went through wives at a rate that would give a modern divorce lawyer palpitations. Six marriages, two beheadings, two divorces, one death in childbirth, and one queen who had the good sense to…
Corruption in the Roman Catholic church – a history
Whether you’re a lapsed Catholic (me) or a practising Catholic (along with 1.4bn others on the planet), the history of corruption in the Roman Catholic church is gripping stuff. When I was a news producer at the BBC many years ago, the job of Vatican correspondent was coveted. The opportunity to investigate papal secrets, wealth,…
Top Ten Vatican Conspiracy Theories
Was Pope John Paul I murdered in 1978? Does the Vatican have evidence that Jesus was not the son of God? Is the Holy See monitoring the skies for extraterrestrials? With its secrecy and power, the Vatican has long attracted conspiracy theories. So, let’s have a look at the Top Ten Vatican Conspiracy Theories. Starting…
Trump administration releases new UFO files
On May 8 2026, the Trump administration released the first batch of formerly classified UFO/UAP files as part of a new transparency initiative called the Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters (PURSUE). Highlights of what was published: Here is an example of what has been released. President Trump directed federal agencies back in…
Kamikaze suicide missions explained
What led young men with their whole future ahead of them to board a plane and crash it into an enemy ship with total certainty of death? In the closing stages of the Second World War, Kamikaze pilots chose suicide in the service of the Japanese emperor. Let’s try to understand why this happened. By…
Shogun – the truth behind the fiction
Shogun has been a hugely popular streamed series on FX and Hulu telling the story of an English navigator stranded in early 17th century Japan – caught up in violent conflicts between rival warlords – but eventually finding a way to become part of that strange society. But is it truth or fiction when it…
