BBC History Magazine - February 2011

As, curator of the exhibition now running at the London Foundling Hospital, explains, the heartbroken parents giving up their children often left keepsakes in an effort to express their emotions. explains how the celebrated Elizabethan polymath Walter Ralegh fell foul of King James and ended up on the executioner’s block. , author of a new biography of Jerusalem, speaks to Rob Attar about how the city became so special and why it has been beset by violence for thousands of years. 200 years ago this month, Prince George became the Regent in place of his insane father George III. looks beyond the high society Regency world of Jane Austen novels and finds a time of unrest and uncertainty. This month’s Six Nations Rugby competition will once more pit Wales against England. reflects on a century and a half of Anglo-Welsh relations, and considers how the sporting clashes between the two countries have helped shape the story. , author of a new book on the disastrous 1915 campaign, offers his explanations for the Allies’ failure at Gallipoli. Captured by Barbary corsairs on the Icelandic coast, Ólafur Egilsson escaped from a life of north African slavery and returned to tell the tale. who recently translated Egilsson’s memoirs, describes his adventures. spoke to Professor Mark Ormrod about nine places significant to the Black Death, one of the greatest human tragedies Britain has ever seen.