Social

During the nineteenth century French taste reflected the social and political trends of the period; but it was also much influenced, writes Brian Reade,  by the work of English craftsmen.

Outside the London of Shakespeare's time, writes Anthony Dent, coaches were few and most travellers were horse-borne.

Henry Kamen describes the apotheosis of emancipated Russian womanhood.

From 1774 to 1827, writes Adrian Bury, the ordinary Englishman and woman were drawn from life by Rowlandson with incomparable industry and vigour.

The inward movement of European peoples and the southward migration of Bantu tribes supply the key to South African history and, write Edna and Frank Bradlow, to the problems that confront the country today.

Impressment for Naval Service of seamen in British ports dates back to the reign of Edward I; Christopher Lloyd describes the practice and how it ceased in the mid-nineteenth century.

The achievements of the Meiji regime in transforming Japan into one of the most powerful of modern states are regarded as among the most remarkable events in history. But the restoration of the Emperor and the fall of the Shogun was brought about at the cost of a fierce domestic struggle.

In the 1860s a group of the younger Samurai launched the Meiji revolution in the Emperor's name. This event, writes Henry McAleavy, helped convert Japan into a modern country, with Western fashions and techniques imposed upon the national habits of centuries.

On August 20th, 1914, writes John Terraine, the British public was startled to read the first authentic newspaper accounts of “heavy losses” and “broken regiments” during the fierce fighting in Belgium.

British Malaya since 1786 has become the home of many different races, whose harmonious union, writes C. Northcote Parkinson, would offer an example from which the rest of the world might profit.