In the summer of 1916, the Brusilov Offensive was to prove Russia’s greatest triumph of the war, and had momentous consequences. The Austro-Hungarian army suffered huge losses and was, effectively, a spent force, and its success persuaded an opportunistic Romania to enter the war on the Allied side, forcing Germany... More
In July 1943 there was a build-up of huge armies on either side of the eastern front around Kursk in preparation for a German assault to wipe out the Russian salient that had formed in the area. The Soviets recruited over 300,000 civilians to build defensive fortifications within the salient... More
Following the Third Battle of Kharkov, the situation on the Eastern front briefly turned in the favour of the Germans as they recaptured minimal ground to the east of the city. The feat of Marshal von Manstein’s triumph against his enemies’ westward momentum on the eastern front is widely regarded... More
Throughout the High Middle Ages, the British population was overwhelmingly agricultural. At the outset, that population was organized within the feudal manorial system, with villeins (freeholders) and cottars (tenants) contributing a proportion of their produce to both the feudal magnate and the clergy. Over the period, the number of freemen... More
Andrew Carnegie was the epitome of the American rags-to-riches dream. Arriving in America at 13, the son of a migrant Scottish handloom weaver, by his late 30s he had already amassed a fortune from oil and railroads, before deciding to move into the steel industry. His first plant was named... More
By 1880, exactly half the states outside the old South had introduced compulsory education legislation, the first being Massachusetts (1852). The primary driver was the assimilation of migrant populations (and an attendant suspicion of religious school alternatives); General Richard Henry Pratt championed the extension of education (to achieve assimilation) to... More
In 1287 Edward I exploited Scotland’s succession crisis, following the death of King Alexander III, to impose his suzerainty; when the Scots demurred, Edward’s riposte was ruthless. Marching north in 1296, he brutally sacked Berwick, routed the Scots at Dunbar and returned to England with the Stone of Scone, the... More
Power ebbed from the Egyptian monarchy after a succession of weak kings. It is also possible that the nomarchs (governors of the nomes) and other vested interests compounded this by imposing a rotational system of succession to undermine centralized control. Consequently, the fortification and policing of northern and southern borders,... More
Napoleon saw himself as a successor to Alexander the Great, who conquered Egypt and much of the middle East. He was also at war with Great Britain and an occupied Egypt meant he could obstruct British trade routes to its Indian possessions. After capturing Alexandria, Napoleon advanced towards Cairo. After... More
The power vacuum created by the decline of Assyrian power appeared to offer opportunity for expansion to the Saite pharaohs. First, Psamtek I, and then Neko II, launched campaigns with a northward reach to the borders of Asia Minor in a bid to emulate the New Kingdom. However, there was... More
By 1882, increasingly hostile internal opposition towards Egypt’s Khedive Tewfiq had forced him into retreat in Alexandria. Britain and France both had interests in Egypt and the Suez Canal, with many British politicians having personal investments. A combined British and French fleet was sent to Alexandria to monitor the situation,... More
After several short-lived successors to the founder of the 9th Dynasty, Kheti I, the balance of power began to shift from Herakleopolis to Thebes. Inyotef united all the southern nomes as far as the first cataract under Theban rule and wrested the burial site of kings at Abydos from his... More