Explore the notorious life of Tiberius Caesar, Rome’s second emperor, whose reclusive reign on Capri gave rise to enduring tales of sexual depravity, political paranoia and scandalous excess. Uncover the truth behind the myths with this deep dive into one of Rome’s most controversial rulers.

On 14 November 1959, the quiet Kansas town of Holcomb was shattered when Herb Clutter, his wife Bonnie, and their two teenage children were brutally murdered in their farmhouse. Richard Hickock and Perry Smith, ex-convicts chasing a rumour of hidden cash, left no witnesses. Truman Capote later immortalised the case in In Cold Blood, but his narrative blurred fact and fiction — leaving behind a legacy of controversy as well as tragedy.

When the world slid towards chaos in the late 1930s, there were individuals who, faced with impossible choices, quietly chose to do the...

It was a Thursday evening in November 1975, and anyone who wandered into the Common Room at Saint Martins School of Art on London's Charing Cross Road that night had no real reason to expect anything out of the ordinary. They'd paid about 50 pence to see a pub rock band called Bazooka Joe. What they got instead was the opening salvo of the British punk revolution, delivered by four scruffy young men who'd shown up without any equipment, borrowed everything they needed, and th

Imagine this: it’s a crisp Sunday morning in late 1973, and the usually bustling streets of Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and The Hague are eerily quiet. No cars, no traffic jams, just the sound of bicycles whizzing by, children playing in the streets, and the occasional bell from a passing tram. For three months in the autumn and early winter of that year, this peaceful scene became a weekly reality as the Dutch government implemented a ban on cars on Sundays. The reason? The ongoin

Black Bart, the gentleman bandit of California, robbed Wells Fargo stagecoaches politely and left poems—until a laundry mark exposed him in 1883.

Mary Surratt was an American boarding house owner executed in 1865 for her role in the conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln. She became the first woman executed by the U.S. government.

A calm and detailed look at Frank Sinatra’s final days in 1998. From his quiet final conversation to the family disagreements that followed and the personal items placed in his casket, this is the measured story of how the singer’s life came to a close.

Mata Hari was born on August 7, 1876 as Margaretha “Gretha” Geertruida Zelle in the Netherlands. Since her conviction as a double agent during WWI she has become a byword for the femme fatale. Productions like the 1931 film “Mata Hari” starring Greta Garbo, perpetuated the story of the glamorous courtesan and exotic dancer with a dangerous double life as a spy who was suddenly found out by the French, and executed in 1917. However the last few years has seen a revision of the

Six and a half months before Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Poland, an unsettling event took place in New York City’s Madison Square Garden...

Charles Osborne holds a singularly unique place in medical history as the man who hiccuped for an astonishing 68 years. His extraordinary affliction began in 1922 and only ceased in 1990, a span of time that would see dramatic changes in the world, but for Osborne, it was marked by the relentless rhythm of hiccups. The Onset of an Unending Hiccup The story begins in 1922, when Osborne, then a 28-year-old Iowan farmer, experienced the onset of his hiccups under peculiar circum

Yakov Dzhugashvili, Joseph Stalin’s eldest son, lived a life overshadowed by his father’s power. Captured during World War II, his death in a Nazi camp remains shrouded in controversy and tragedy.

Anita Berber shocked Weimar Berlin with nude dances drugs and radical self expression. Beneath the scandal was a pioneering performance artist whose life mirrored the freedoms and dangers of the 1920s.

A unverified picture of the gang When we conjure up images of crime gangs, our minds often drift to Italian mobsters or Japanese Yakuza members, maybe Mexican or Colombian Cartels. However, there have been numerous gangs throughout history that haven’t received the same level of recognition. Consider, for instance, the Forty Elephants. Named after their territory in Southwark, the Elephant and Castle area in London. The Elephant and Castle area of London, early 1900s. Operati

In 1915, Cecil Chubb went shopping for dining chairs and came home with Stonehenge. Discover how his impulse buy became a national treasure.

In August 1990, Playgirl Magazine advertised the chance to “Sleep with Donald Trump” on its cover to its predominantly female audience....

Some people juggle, some perform card tricks, and then there was Alfred Langevin—who could smoke a pipe through his eyes. A Man of Unique Talents Langevin was a resident of Detroit, Michigan, in the 1930s, a time when the world was reeling from the Great Depression and desperate for a bit of amusement. Enter Mr. Langevin, whose particular skill set was equal parts astounding and slightly unsettling. Not only could he inhale tobacco smoke through his mouth and exhale it throug

Sigmund Freud’s early career coincided with his enthusiastic promotion of cocaine as a medical wonder drug. This is how the substance shaped the origins of psychoanalysis in late nineteenth century Vienna.

Ernest Hemingway survived through anthrax, malaria, pneumonia, dysentery, skin cancer, hepatitis, anemia, diabetes, high blood pressure, two plane crashes, a ruptured kidney, a ruptured spleen, a ruptured liver, a crushed vertebra, a fractured skull, and more. But on July 2, 1961, the Nobel Prize-winning author, adventurer, war correspondent, bullfighter, drinker and all-round macho man, died on this day. His fourth wife, Mary, said that he killed himself accidentally while c

On a cold Saturday evening in December 1961, four young musicians from Liverpool walked into a ballroom in a Hampshire garrison town and set up their amplifiers with quiet confidence. They had driven nearly nine hours to get there. They believed London was within reach. They expected that industry figures might attend. Instead, they played to roughly eighteen people. The date was the 9th December, 1961. The venue was the Palais Ballroom in Aldershot. The band was the Beatles

In Irish mythology, Cuchulainn was a formidable leader and the main character in the "Ulster Cycle" of poems, which can be considered the Irish counterpart to England's Arthurian legends. One poem in this cycle is "Serglige Con Culaind & Oenét Emire," translated as "The Sick Bed of Cuchulainn" or "The Wasting Sickness of Cú Chulaind." In the story, Cuchulainn is taken ill when he is attacked in a dream by two women with horsewhips (he lay asleep in his sickbed for a year as

On 6 July 1957, a significant event occurred in the world of modern music: it was that date when John Lennon met Paul McCartney. It was on that day, the Quarrymen skiffle band performed at the garden fete of St Peter's Church in Woolton, Liverpool. The show unfolded on a stage located in a field behind the church, with Lennon on vocals and guitar, Eric Griffiths on guitar, Colin Hanton on drums, Rod Davies on banjo, Pete Shotton on washboard, and Len Garry on tea chest bass.

Paul McCartney’s song "Blackbird" on the Beatles' White Album is often compared to Lennon's "Julia" for its tender qualities, possibly making it one of the most delicate songs in the band's entire repertoire. Inspired by a Bach piece that McCartney and George Harrison had learned in their youth, the finger-picked acoustic guitar in "Blackbird" gives it a folk lullaby feel. However, the song's complex time signatures and delicate melody made it challenging to record, with Abb