The Book of Common Prayer
The successive 1549, 1552, 1559, 1604 and 1662 editions of The Book of Common Prayer illustrate the struggle…
The Whips
In 1742 Lord Guernsey (1715-77) compared huntsmen’s assistants ‘whipping-in’ straying hounds back into the pack with Parliamentary…
Drugs
Many different drugs can be prescribed by doctors in the UK, except for substances that have no…
The Kilt
The kilt has its roots in the Scottish Highlands, where a long tunic of thick plaid (not…
Christmas Crackers
Christmas table settings customarily include a pretty Christmas cracker next to each plate, to be pulled apart…
Tribes of pre-Roman Britain
Our knowledge of the tribes of pre-Roman Britain comes from archaeological finds and scholars of the Roman Empire.…
The Hebrides, Orkney and Shetland Islands
There are hundreds of islands, reefs, sea-stacks and islets around the Scottish coastline. Some have a long…
Jasper Carrott
Robert Norman Davis (1945-) from Birmingham acquired the nickname ‘Jasper‘ as a boy, added ‘Carrott‘ in his…
Roget’s Thesaurus
Stuck for a word? Since 1852 we have been turning to the amazing lexicon (“dictionary, vocabulary, index,…
Latent Heat and the Joule
Joseph Black (1728-99) was educated in Belfast, Glasgow and Edinburgh and worked in the latter two universities.…
The I-SPY book series
When children are travelling on a long car journey, a popular game to pass the time is“I…
Women’s League of Health & Beauty
Founded in London in 1930 by Irish emigrée Mary/’Mollie’ Bagot Stack (1883-1935), the Women’s League of Health…