History, Travel, Arts, Science, People, Places. A New View of the Battle of Gallipoli, One of the Bloodiest Conflicts of World War I.
Miss The Monty Python Live Shows? Here Are The Highlights - Including The Spanish Inquisition. Victorian strangeness: The man who was covered in bees. 11 April 2014Last updated at 20:00 ET A beekeeper in China made headlines this week by creating a living coat of bees.
But as author Jeremy Clay writes, he was beaten to the stunt by more than a century - by a man who wasn't even trying. If he'd stopped to count his blessings, the anxious man moving gingerly along the streets of central London would have found plenty of reasons to be cheerful. It was a fine summer's day, for a start. He was strolling through one of the greatest cities on earth. As it was, he had more pressing matters on his mind. It happened on a Saturday morning in July 1885, when, for want of anything better to do, a swarm of bees swooped suddenly upon the unfortunate man as he walked down Regent Street. Startled, no doubt, by this unexpected plot twist in the story of his day, he stayed true to the Victorian stereotype, and tried to continue on his way without needless fuss.
In this aim, he was thwarted. Victorian strangeness: The tale of the lion and the spa break. 18 April 2014Last updated at 21:34 ET Magazine Monitor A collection of cultural artefacts Saturday, as you'll surely need no reminding, is International Circus Day.
Author Jeremy Clay delves into the Victorian newspaper archives to unearth a tale of a travelling menagerie, an escaped lion, and a Welsh holidaymaker on a spa stay that proved rather less than stress-free. In the drawing room of a hotel in sedate Llandrindod Wells, Mr TJ Osborne is preparing to head home from a pick-me-up break in the Welsh spa town. It's a June afternoon. In the lively few minutes that follow, Mr Osborne gets a crash-course in lion-taming and later becomes the hero of a pithy write-up in the newspapers. Perhaps they'd just grown weary of printing variations on a well-worn theme. In Nottingham, a tiger was found lurking in an orchard. Victorian strangeness: The man who fired a torpedo down a High Street. 16 May 2014Last updated at 19:16 ET By Magazine Monitor A collection of cultural artefacts Europe goes to the polls next week, but election fever sometimes seems in short supply.
Maybe that's not such a bad thing. Victorian strangeness: The man killed by an automaton. 23 May 2014Last updated at 19:27 ET By Magazine Monitor A collection of cultural artefacts Author Jeremy Clay tells the grisly story of the Victorian man killed by a bell-chiming automaton.
There was no need for Sherlock. The killer didn't flee the scene. He stood his ground over the lifeless body of his victim, his hand still gripping the bloody weapon, his face betraying no emotion. Victorian Strangeness: The monks who stole fancy dresses from graves. 30 May 2014Last updated at 21:06 ET By Magazine Monitor A collection of cultural artefacts Author Jeremy Clay tells the macabre story of the grave-robbing monks.
From the moment he saw her, he was utterly transfixed. But it wasn't love at first sight that sent the widower's heart racing, and nor was it lust. He couldn't care less for the stranger's looks. And the longer he stared, the more certain he became. He'd know that silk dress anywhere; his poor wife had adored it, which is precisely why she'd worn it to the grave a few weeks before.
With distress mixed with disbelief, the still-grieving soldier demanded to know how the peasant woman came to be parading around in a robe which was a) fancier than she could afford and, more pressingly, b) supposed to be six feet under the ground, adorning a corpse. Victorian Strangeness: The skeletons who fought to the death. 6 June 2014Last updated at 19:20 ET Magazine Monitor A collection of cultural artefacts Some rather dramatic things happen at the theatre, but here author Jeremy Clay tells the singular story of the fighting skeletons trapped in a sealed chamber.
It had all the ingredients of a hit melodrama. An atmospheric setting. A terrible secret. But although this tale seems tailor-made for the stage, it actually played out right above it. Victorian Strangeness: A gruesome end to an argument. 13 June 2014Last updated at 20:44 ET Magazine Monitor A collection of cultural artefacts Author Jeremy Clay tells the story of the woman who cut off her leg to spite her husband.
He wouldn't take no for an answer, that much was clear. The man had turned up unannounced at the London home of The Lancet with a mysterious package under his arm and an urgent look in his eyes. It was late. And so he was led to the editor's office, where events immediately took an unexpected turn. Victorian Strangeness: The cyclist chased by a lion. 27 June 2014Last updated at 20:08 ET By Magazine Monitor A collection of cultural artefacts Next weekend, elite cyclists from around the world will race in Yorkshire in the Grand Depart of the Tour de France.
No matter how hard they strain, it's doubtful any will put in more effort on a bike than Mr Robertson, of Galashiels. Victorian Strangeness: The tale of the women who turned vigilante. 11 July 2014Last updated at 18:30 ET.
Victorian Strangeness: The bizarre tale of the ladies who limped. 29 Images That Will Change How You Picture History.