16th C Archives - Aspects of History

The World’s Reformation: How Protestantism Became a Global Religion, by Alec Ryrie

A nuanced and globe-spanning examination of how Protestantism’s often chaotic missionary efforts helped shape the early modern world.

Zeb Baker-Smith

In a secular age, religious history can feel slightly tangential and recondite, particularly when set against the commercial and colonial designs of fledgling empires in the early modern age. Very well, except that is missing the point. Reformation Europe remains a...

The World’s Reformation

An exploration of the forgotten global ambitions of Protestantism, showing how missionaries sought to spread their faith far and wide, their patchy success an indication of the imaginative limits of early modern Europeans.

Alec Ryrie

In April 1521, three famous subjects of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V were risking their lives on three different continents. Martin Luther was standing before the emperor in person at the Diet of Worms, where he defied all the powers of Europe in the name of...

Episode 268

Building Britannia: A History of Britain in 25 Buildings, by Steven Parissien

British history is traced through 25 iconic buildings – from Maiden Castle to 30 St Mary Axe – in this blend of architectural perusal and cultural insight.

Paul Strathern

Dr. Steven Parissien’s latest retelling of history through architecture, Building Britannia: A History of Britain in Twenty-Five Buildings, begins with Maiden Castle in Dorset, which dates from around 600 BC. In the words of John Cooper Powys, this resembles ‘the...

Building Britannia: A Conversation with Steven Parissien

The historian explains his use of architecture and landmarks in telling the story of Britain’s social and political history to author Paul Strathern.

Steven Parissien

Welcome, Steven, to Aspects of History. What was it that first led you into the study of architecture and cultural history? Which came first? I was always fascinated by British history and British architecture from my earliest years, though I’m not sure why: no-one in...

Shadow of a Queen, by Peter Tonkin

Robert Poley returns amid the intrigue surrounding Mary, Queen of Scots’s captivity in another of Peter Tonkin's depiction of plots and political tension in Elizabethan England.

Steven Veerapen

Peter Tonkin continues his deep dive into the sometimes grim and sometimes fabulously opulent world of sixteenth-century Europe as he returns to spymaster Robert Poley’s adventures. In this novel, spanning Paris, London, Eyemouth, Sheffield, and more, he brings to...

Willie, Willie, Harry, Stee, by Charlie Higson

A lively survey of English and British monarchs that combines humour with a broadly informative narrative of the nation’s past.

Richard Foreman

Whether you are interested in being introduced to British history, or you are familiar with it, Willie, Willie, Harry, Stee, will prove to be a find. Borne out of a successful podcast of the same name, Charlie Higson has written a book which entertains and educates in...

The Last Knight of Christendom; the First Man of the Modern World

A Venetian military engineer, who trained in the new science of war, risked exile, ruin and death to defend Rhodes against Suleiman the Magnificent, embodies Europe in transition.

Edoardo Albert

For 14 years, Gabriele Tadino had faithfully served the Republic of Venice. One of the new breed of soldier, the military engineers, Tadino had done well in service of the Republic. The son of a doctor from Martinengo, a small town that was part of Venice’s Stato da...

Mickey Mayhew

Mickey Mayhew is a disabled author and historian from London, working mainly on Mary Queen of Scots, Anne Boleyn, and the Romanovs; his PhD covered the contentious online ‘cults’ surrounding both Mary and Anne. He wrote The Little Book of Mary Queen of Scots (The History Press) in 2014 and then I Love The Tudors (Pitkin Publishing) in 2016. House of Tudor – A Grisly History and Imprisoning Mary Queen of Scots – The Men Who Kept the Stuart Queen were released by Pen & Sword Books in 2022. Rasputin and his Russian Queen – The True Story of Grigory and Alexandra was released in March 2023, with the highly controversial The Anne Boleyn Bible following in November, both again courtesy of Pen & Sword Books.

Mickey Mayhew

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Hugh O’Neill and The History Behind City of the Damned

A new short story, City of the Damned, follows Ireland’s most formidable rebel from the battlefield to Rome, tracing the life of a man who came close to breaking English rule.

Jim Loughran

My short story City of the Damned traces the years of Hugh O’Neill's life from his defeat at the Battle of Kinsale in 1601 to his exile in Rome surrounded by spies, plots, and the threat of poison. This is the man who came closest to ending English rule in Ireland and...