History Extra

BBC History Magazine aims to shed new light on the past to help you make more sense of the world today. Fascinating stories from contributors are the leading experts in their fields, so whether they're exploring Ancient Egypt, Tudor England or the Second World War, you'll be reading the latest, most thought-provoking historical research. BBC History Magazine brings history to life with informative, lively and entertaining features written by the world's leading historians and journalists and is a captivating read for anyone who's interested in the past.

WELCOME AUGUST 2026

THREE THINGS THAT CAUGHT MY EYE

THIS ISSUE’S CONTRIBUTORS

ANNIVERSARIES • DANNY BIRD highlights events that took place in August in history

Should we still use the F-word? • Fascism is a word thrown around increasingly frequently in today’s politics, but how do contemporary far-right movements compare to the original fascism of the 20th century? Six historians consider the global parallels

“He plugged into the electric current of history, and spoke for everyone”

WHAT WE’VE LEARNED THIS MONTH • JAMES OSBORNE highlights insights shared by experts on our HistoryExtra podcasts

“Operation Fish was the largest transfer of physical wealth in history” • KAVITA PURI on a remarkable Second World War feat

LETTERS

History Extra

THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE ODYSSEY • Featuring Cyclopes, Lotus-Eaters and goddesses that turn men into pigs, the Odyssey reads like a fantastical adventure story. Yet, writes Daisy Dunn, Homer’s epic poem – now a Hollywood blockbuster – offers a fascinating lens onto the reality of life in Bronze Age Greece

THE ODYSSEY IN A NUTSHELL THE PLOT OF HOMER’S EPIC

The ballad of BESS THE BAWD • Among the Stuart-era ‘stews’ of London’s seedy Southwark district, one “house of obscenitie” became renowned as the most luxurious - and notorious. Jacky Colliss Harvey charts the rise and ignominious fall of Bess Holland’s brothel

What is history’s biggest unsolved mystery? • Our team of historians, broadcasters and authors ponder the most puzzling conundrums from the past

Ireland’s secret shame • In Ireland, many thousands condemned as ‘fallen women’ were detained indefinitely in Magdalene laundries, forced to toil in harsh conditions. Louise Brangan reveals how church and state colluded to cast a shroud of silence over traumas inflicted behind closed doors in the 20th century

Fanny Bullock Workman Trailblazer in the Himalayas • Mountaineering was still in its infancy when Fanny Bullock Workman took to the peaks of Europe and Asia. DANIEL LIGHT salutes a pioneer who was also a groundbreaking geographer and one of the first women to lecture at the Sorbonne in Paris

WHEN BRITAIN FELT THE HEAT • In 1976, the UK was plunged into the worst heatwave it had experienced for decades. Fifty years on, Eugene Byrne recalls a summer in which Britons shared baths, tempers frayed and ladybirds took to the skies in their billions

WHIFFY KIPPERS AND A FATE WORSE THAN DEATH • Tales from the front line of a long, hot summer

Q&A • A selection of historical conundrums answered by experts

Why you haven’t seen it all before • It’s human nature to believe that history repeats itself. But attempts to draw parallels with the past can be misguided - even dangerous

BOOKS

“The process of Romanisation, which the Britons learned to call civilisation, was in reality just a part of their servitude” • FERDINAND ADDIS speaks to Charlotte Vosper about his new book, which traces the complex and fascinating story of the Roman conquest of Britain

Transatlantic transformations • KERRY APPS is impressed by an exploration of the impacts of English settlement in the Americas on both Indigenous...