Queen Victoria's secret love affair

He was barely a toddler when he was paraded as a captive in a Roman triumph in 46 BC, but young North African prince Juba went on to marry a daughter of Antony and Cleopatra, and rule an African kingdom. Andrew Kenrick, author of Rex Juba: 15 Glimpses of an African King, unravels ...  Show more

In 1665 the Portuguese Inquisition arrested Crispina Peres, a powerful slave trader in the west African port of Cacheu. The records of her case provide a remarkable window into everyday life in 17th-century west Africa, and form the basis of Toby Green's latest book, The Heretic ...  Show more

There have long been whispers of a romance between Queen Victoria and her Scottish servant John Brown, but nothing concrete to support them. This Long Read – written by historian Dr Fern Riddell, author of an explosive new book on the subject – reveals how she turned sleuth to tr ...  Show more

They’re famously thought of as a buttoned up prudish bunch, but we all know they loved to bump uglies as much as anyone today. Were the spanking punishments of boarding schools really the origins of flagellation brothels? Who were the pin-ups of Victorian women? And what did the ...  Show more

We've been fascinated by royalty for hundreds of years, but what do we know about their sex lives? Quite a lot, it turns out.Today we're revisiting an episode Kate recorded with bestselling author Eleanor Herman to find out about what it took to not just be a mistress of a royal, ...  Show more

Queen Victoria reigned for more than six decades, but her early years as ruler were peppered with a number of disastrous missteps. By participating in a horrible rumor campaign about her mother's lady-in-waiting, she ended up damaging her own reputation.