BBC History Magazine

BBC History Magazine aims to shed new light on the past to help you make more sense of the world today. Fascinating stories from contributors are the leading experts in their fields, so whether they're exploring Ancient Egypt, Tudor England or the Second World War, you'll be reading the latest, most thought-provoking historical research. BBC History Magazine brings history to life with informative, lively and entertaining features written by the world's leading historians and journalists and is a captivating read for anyone who's interested in the past.

WELCOME FEBRUARY 2023

THIS ISSUE’S CONTRIBUTORS

ANNIVERSARIES • HELEN CARR highlights events that took place in February in history

Britain's century of strike action • Recent months have seen thousands of workers - including nurses, railway employees and postal staff go on strike around the United Kingdom. RICHARD TOYE explores the nation’s history of industrial action, and the extent to which it has been driven by political ideology or practical concerns

MICHAEL WOOD ON… • THE HISTORY OF SOCIAL HOUSING

The long fight over abortion rights in the United States • Fifty years ago, the US Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v Wade ruling guaranteed access to abortion throughout the United States - a decision that was reversed last summer. ALLISON MCKIBBAN charts the complex, often contradictory currents that have shaped women’s reproductive rights in America

HISTORY NEWS IN BRIEF

HIDDEN HISTORIES • KAVITA PURI explores lesser-known stories from our past

LETTERS

BBC History Magazine

The age of transformation • Those who write off the Middle Ages as an unchanging backwater are overlooking the seismic advances - in everything from scientific knowledge to self-awareness - that redefined what it meant to be human, argues Ian Mortimer

THE DEVELOPING WORLD • Ten great leaps forward in the medieval era

LIFE IN THE FASTER LANE • Maximum travel speeds increased from the 14th century, with dramatic consequences for medieval societies

From clowns to kayaks: a history of fear and loathing • The past is studded with incidents when seemingly innocuous objects and situations have sparked repulsion in unfortunate sufferers. Kate Summerscale explores what the history of five phobias reveals about the mental states of people through the centuries

The voice of a female golden age • The 14th century was a time of great change in England - not least for women, who enjoyed more autonomy, work opportunities and wealth. Marion Turner explains what Chaucer’s outspoken Wife of Bath reveals about their lives and thoughts

Q&A • A selection of historical conundrums answered by experts

DID YOU KNOW…?

The Holocaust • Today, the Nazi persecution of Jewish people is widely viewed through the prism of the death camps: places such as Treblinka, Sobibor and Auschwitz.Yet before Auschwitz was even conceived as a centre of mass murder, more than a million people had been killed across eastern Europe.This is the story of the early stages of the Holocaust, when a campaign of appalling abuse and brutality became an explicit policy of annihilation.

THE POET, THE GARDENER AND THE WITCH: FORGOTTEN VOICES OF TUDOR ENGLAND • The exploits of monarchs, bishops and explorers have filled volumes, but they don’t tell the full story of life 500 years ago. Lucy Wooding introduces eight people whose experiences shine a light on the hopes and fears of ordinary people in the 16th century

How people power fuelled England’s century of chaos • Charles I’s clashes with parliament may dominate the history books, but behind the turmoil of the 17th century lay something deeper: a political awakening of the people

“Indigenous Americans who travelled across the Atlantic...