Culture UK

Architect Thomas Willson had great plans; he had an audacious scheme for a giant pyramid mortuary, 90 stories high and capable of holding up to five million dead, in 19th century London…

“There are fairies at the bottom of our garden,” announces the opening line of a poem by Rose Fyleman first published in 1917. Coincidentally, that was also the year two intelligent and talented young conspirators managed to convince some very well-known people that there really were fairies living near Cottingley Beck, the stream that ran past the foot of their garden.

The planning of the D Day landings was almost complete – what could possibly go wrong?…

It was a storyline worthy of the world’s most famous detective, Sherlock Holmes; and Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle, the creator of the great sleuth, was caught up in the plot…

Until the 19th century, the Tower of London played host to a whole menagerie of exotic animals…

Rudyard Kipling, poet and author, was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907 in recognition of his great body of work, including ‘The Jungle Book’, ‘Kim’ and the poem ‘If’.

The history of May Day celebrations in Britain

Taphophobia, the fear of being buried alive and waking up in one’s own grave, is the stuff of nightmares. Hannah Beswick had a pathological fear of premature burial, after her brother John was found to be still alive at his own funeral…