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'Nuns Behaving Badly' by Karen Maitland
For centuries, many noble women in Europe were forced into nunneries by their families either to safeguard their virtue until they could be married off, or to protect family lands by preventing them...
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Romano-British Cloaks by Caroline Lawrence
Hooded cloak like my mother'sWhen I left California to study Classics at Cambridge, my mother gave me her fine hooded cloak of charcoal grey wool that she had bought in Chamonix on her honeymoon....
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Stand in line - Michelle Lovric
Here's an almost entirely gratuitous picture of Mark Rylance, the thinking History Girl’s posset. Just for your pleasure, and mine.Please excuse the slightly intoxicated tone of this blog. I’ve only...
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Time Out, by Laurie Graham
Today my theme is sanctuary, worth a blog post for the sheer pleasure of typing the name Dyfnwal, the Bald and Silent. Dyfnwal was an early Welsh king credited with inventing the concept of sanctuary....
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Sprouting Seeds by Tanya Landman
‘Where did the idea come from?’ Every author gets asked that, and it’s always a difficult question to answer because it’s rarely simple or straightforward. Sometimes the seed of an idea gets planted...
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THE TUDOR WOMEN'S POWER LIST – Elizabeth Fremantle
In the wake of the Radio 4 Woman's Hour power list for 2015 let's forget Nicola Sturgeon and Caitlyn Jenner for a moment to consider the female movers and shakers of the Tudor age.The second half of...
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In the Swim Catherine Johnson
Honestly I should be puffing my book but as there is a small amount of swimming in it perhaps that's how I can make the link. You may be relieved that this post isn't about a cause celebre of Regency...
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The Viking Faeroes
by Marie-Louise JensenFor a number of years, I had a bit of an obsession with the Faeroe Islands, dating from receiving a postcard from there aged 20. The islands looked so weird and wonderful,...
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Watch The Lady, by Elizabeth Fremantle: reviewed by Sue Purkiss
So what is it that makes the Tudor period so endlessly fascinating to writers? Well... passion, treachery, adventure, a turbulent political climate, beautiful (albeit probably uncomfortable) clothes,...
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HISTORY & GEOGRAPHY by Penny Dolan
I’m in that” trudging through a tangled story state” right now, so my mind isn’t up to too much precise history. Here’s today’s alternative:HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY?At school, at a certain point, I was...
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Shadow Boxes - Celia Rees
I've always been fascinated by Wunderkammer, Cabinets of Curiosities, things in boxes, the stranger the better, so I was delighted to hear about Joseph Cornell's Wanderlust Exhibition at the Royal...
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'Down the hatch' - a brief history of the cocktail by Christina Koning
It’s summer, it’s hot, and I’m up to my eyes in researching the next book… Happily, it doesn’t always have to be the heavy stuff. Today I’m looking into cocktails - specifically, those popular between...
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Ambroise Paré: The Gentle Surgeon - by Ann Swinfen
It’s astonishing what you discover when you are doing the research for a novel. In my first 17th century Fenland novel, Flood, Tom Bennington, brother of the narrator, Mercy Bennington, is injured...
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Notes on Notebooks by Imogen Robertson
To be clear, I don’t think I’d have a career as a writer at all if it weren’t for the invention of the word processor. I can’t spell, and I’m never going to be a ‘one perfect line at a time’ author. My...
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All that Glitters by Kate Lord Brown
Conjure an image of an Arabian Souq, and one thinks of maze-like alleys lined with shops selling incense, spices and gleaming displays of gold and silver jewellery. Now, many of the gold shops here may...
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Atticus Finch, by Leslie Wilson
So: it's out at last, the long-awaited 'sequel' (though it was actually the precursor) of the beloved 'To Kill a Mockingbird.' I can't have been the only one who, when she first read that 'Go Set a...
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THE MIDDLE AGES UNLOCKED: Elizabeth Chadwick interviews the authors.
About 15 years ago I met medievalist historian, lecturer, editor and author Gillian Polack on an online forum and over the years we gradually got to know each other. (she's also a History Girl!) I...
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A PARADISE FOR MARRIED WOMEN by Eleanor Updale
I have a good friend with a gift for finding the perfect book. A few weeks ago she appeared with a slim volume that had been languishing in a charity shop: Life Among the English, by Rose Macaulay.Yes...
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Scorched Earth, by Carol Drinkwater
A few days ago I headed north, driving from our home on the French Côte d’Azur to our home in the Brie, mid-centre between Paris and Reims, fifteen minutes from the Champagne district. I love these...
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Procrastination and Hedgerow Jelly by Janie Hampton
While thinking about my blog for History Girls, my mind wandered and I looked out of the window. What did I see? The view from my studyA reason to leave my desk - my vegetable bed was calling out to be...
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