Stories of people/events - individuals or mass events
Queen Elizabeth I was one of the most successful and celebrated queens in British history. The daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, she came to the throne on November 17, 1558, following the death of her older half-sister, Mary I. While Elizabeth's reign is widely recognized for ushering in a golden age, she herself has also been remembered for her iconic fashion choices and style.
During the 19th century, Mary Anning (1799 to 1847) was an enigma. A self-taught fossil-hunter and paleontologist—during a time when science was most definitely a man’s world—in the 21st century Anning has finally started to get the attention she deserves for the role she played excavating glimpses into prehistory at the Jurassic coast near her home town of Lyme Regis in Dorset, England.
The idea of venturing into the unknown, facing danger, and discovering something new has captivated people for centuries. From the great sea voyages of the Age of Discovery to the exploration of the polar regions and beyond, the exploits of famous explorers have captured public imagination. For some people, the allure of exploration is so strong that they have decided to recreate the famous journeys of historical explorers themselves.
Zheng He (also known as Cheng Ho) is one of the most famous admirals in Chinese history and is best known for his treasure voyages. These voyages served to showcase the power and the wealth of the Ming Dynasty to the known world and were commissioned by the Ming Dynasty’s Yongle Emperor himself.
King Arthur is undoubtedly one of the most enduringly popular heroes to come out of the medieval era, and he has meant many things to many people for hundreds of years. Over time, the mythology of Arthur grew as new stories were added to the existing ones and his fame spread throughout Britain and beyond.
Joan of Arc was a young peasant woman who lived during the last phase of the Hundred Years’ War. This war was a series of military conflicts between France and England which began in 1337 due to an inheritance dispute over the French throne. It ended in 1453. The 116 years of the war saw the rise and fall of several kings and nobles, many of whom are noteworthy in their own right.
The Dahomey Amazons were an all-female Fon military regiment of the Kingdom of Dahomey, a West African kingdom which was located within present-day Benin. They were dubbed “Amazons” by Western historians who likened them to the mythical Amazons of ancient Anatolia and the Black Sea. In their homeland, they were known as Mino, or Minon, meaning “our mothers.”
Although many people today refer to the wives of ancient Egyptian kings and female Egyptian pharaohs as queens, in ancient Egypt all the people surrounding the king (pharaoh) were referred to by their relationship to him/her. This was not meant to diminish a woman’s role per se, it was simply because all royal titles emphasized the individual’s relationship to the powerful king.
These days we're starting to see a huge variety of books which bring women and girls to the fore, creating positive female role models to aspire to, rather than the never-ending tales which make it appear as if only men ever did anything of note. As a mother I now revel in the wide selection of books available for my reading time with the girls. We particularly enjoy reading about women throughout history who have achieved great things against all odds.
"Brewing", "herbs," "broomsticks," "woman." When one hears these words together, most often the assumption is that the person in question is a witch. Yet brewing has another meaning - one that revolves around the avarice of alcohol. Alewives were women in the Middle Ages through the early modern period who brewed and sold alcohol. Due to the alewives' skills in the kitchen, fashion sense, and the eventual rise of urban guilds, however, the alewife soon became a term synonymous with "witch."