My most recent article for Magna Carta 2015 Canada discusses the impact of the Magna Carta on the status of women. The Great Charter is one of the key documents to bridge the divide between the status of women in medieval England and the twenty-first century Western World. Although there were no women among the nobles who pressured King John to affix his seal to Magna Carta, various clauses in the document codified the marriage rights of noble heiresses and both the property and marriage rights of wealthy widows.
Click here to read the full article, “Women and Magna Carta” on the Magna Carta 2015 Canada website.
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The Moscow Kremlin is one of the world’s most recognizable landmarks. The imposing red brick walls and towers surrounding five cathedrals and four palaces appear to represent stability, enduring through Russia’s turbulent history. In 
, reveals that it is a miracle that the Kremlin is still standing in the twenty-first century.
The fortress endured a medieval Mongol invasion, a foreign occupation during the seventeenth century Time of Troubles, neglect after Peter the Great moved his court to St. Petersburg, a city wide fire following Napoleon’s invasion of Russia and bombardment during the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. Merridale’s exhaustive research, including visits to sections of the Kremlin rarely seen by the public, reveals that the how the Fortress and its significance has changed over the centuries. Whole buildings behind the walls have disappeared and other have been absorbed into new structures. With each new Russian ruler, the structure and symbolism of the Kremlin changed to reflect new ideas about the Kremlin’s place in Russian history and government.
Ivan the Great met his match in his second wife, Sophia, the niece of the last Byzantine Emperor. Members of Sophia’s household spread the rumour that “she nagged him twice a week” while an Italian poet described her as “a mountain of fat.” Sophia’s extensive knowledge of Renaissance European art and architecture transformed the Kremlin as she persuaded her husband to appoint Italian engineers, architects, cannon-founders and silversmiths to contribute to new buildings and defenses.
The founding of the Romanov dynasty in 1613 brought new Czars with new interests to the Kremlin. Peter the Great’s grandfather, Mikhail Romanov, the founder of the new dynasty may have been illiterate and dependent on his father in matters of state but he was fascinated by western technology such as mechanical clocks. Mikhail also commissioned the Terem Palace, which is now part of the official residence of the President of Russia. Peter the Great’s father, Aleksei I imported European science books for his library and installed a palace laboratory for science and alchemy experiments. Peter the Great himself had little use for the Kremlin as a seat of government but he recognized that it was the site of immense public interest, becoming the first Russian ruler to charge sightseers admission to tour the grounds.
Merridale’s narrative slows in the middle as the Imperial Russian court moved to St. Petersburg from 1713 to the abdication of Czar Nicholas II in 1917. During this period, Russia’s Czars were visitors to the Kremlin for major events such as coronations instead of permanent residents. When the capital returned to Moscow in 1918, the Kremlin was once again at the centre of events. Although Merridale does not draw direct comparisons between fifteenth and sixteenth century Muscovy and the twentieth century Soviet Union, readers will notice a number of parallels between the court of Ivan the Terrible and Stalin’s inner circle.
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Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, diaries and letters by the Imperial family and those who knew them well have been translated and published in volumes such as 
, 
and 
, gradually revising longstanding popular perceptions of the Romanovs. 
Olga was eighteen when the First World War broke out in 1914. In common with other young women of her generation, the Grand Duchess discovered leadership opportunities and personal fulfillment through war work. The diary describes her training as a nurse and duties at the Tsarskoe Selo hospital including organizing activities for the convalescents, assisting at operations and maintaining hospital equipment. The inclusion of the reminiscences of Olga’s colleagues at the hospital alongside her diary entries provide a sense of how the Grand Duchess and her war work were perceived by patients and fellow nurses alike. While the wounded men were honored to receive visits from the Czar’s children, they were confused by the sight of Grand Duchesses performing seemingly menial tasks such as sterilizing hospital equipment, wondering why they did not ask their attendants to do these tasks for them.
Olga also engaged in considerable charitable fundraising during wartime and sat on the boards of committees. Since Nicholas II spent much of the war at military headquarters and Alexandra was consumed by her own war work, political activities and ill health, Olga developed an active social life that revolved around her war work instead of her parents. Studies of the extended Imperial family, such as 
In her diary, Olga describes spending time with her great-uncle Grand Duke Paul’s morganatic second wife, Olga Paley and enjoying poetry written by Pavel’s and Olga Paley’s son, Vladimir. There are teas with Grand Duchess Victoria, who Olga called “Aunt Ducky.” Victoria was the former wife of Alexandra’s brother Grand Duke Ernst of Hesse who remarried Nicholas II’s cousin, Grand Duke Kyrill against the wishes of the Imperial couple. Only after the murder of Grigori Rasputin by Prince Felix Yussupov, the husband of Olga’s cousin Irina, and Czar Nicholas’s cousin, Grand Duke Dmitri, in December, 1916 is there a marked decrease in visits between Olga and members of her extended family.
2014 marks the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War. There have been numerous books published about the causes of this cataclysmic event sharing a common theme: conflict was inevitable considering the circumstances of early 20th century Europe including the arms race between the Great Powers and the rise of militant nationalism. In 
, focuses instead on the key individuals who made the decision to go to war. Early 20th century Europe experienced numerous crises that made a general war appear inevitable but the eventual outbreak of hostilities occurred because Heads of State, government ministers and military strategists made choices that gradually ended a century of comparative peace in Europe.
In the shadow of the Kaiser’s overbearing and counterproductive attempts at “diplomacy,” MacMillan brings comparatively obscure figures out of the shadows and takes a fresh look at those considered most responsible for the failure of peace. For example, while studies of the outbreak of war on the Eastern front usually focus on Czar Nicholas II, MacMillan looks at the key figures who influenced him in the years and months prior to the outbreak of war. Foreign Minister Sergei Sazonov emerges as a key figure who believed that Russia’s historic mission was to protect the Balkan nations. A chapter devoted to war planning including the notorious Schlieffen plan reveals that the blame for Germany’s offensive military strategy should not rest on the shoulders of Alfred von Schlieffen alone. Instead, there was a larger pattern of civilian leaders leaving military planning up to “the experts” and not coordinating diplomatic and military initiatives.
The final chapters detailing the final weeks of peace reveal just how significant chance factors were to the outbreak of hostilities. Key figures who had argued for peace during previous crises were dead or incapacitated by 1914. MacMIllan observes that the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand removed one of the most prominent advocates for peace in the Austro-Hungarian empire in addition to precipitating a larger crisis. In Russia, faith healer Grigori Rasputin was recovering from assassination attempt in Siberia and was only able to communicate his pleas for peace to the Czar through letters. The 1914 crisis also occurred when governments were out of session and leaders on summer holidays. British foreign secretary Edward Grey was on a bird watching trip at the time of Franz Ferdinand’s assassination and French president Poincaire was aboard a ship in the Baltic sea for part of July, 1914. These circumstances contributed to the breakdown of peace in Europe in 1914
There is an entire sub-genre of Tudor themed historical fiction that centers around conflict between two “Boleyn Girls” at the Tudor court. All these novels present two female archetypes and place them in conflict. The most famous of these novels is of course Philippa Gregory’s 
, which imagined Henry VIII’s mistress Mary Boleyn as “the good sister” devoted to her home and children, and his second wife, Anne Boleyn as “the unscrupulous sister” determined to become and stay Queen at any cost after the end of her betrothal to the future Earl of Northumberland. In 
, Jean Plaidy contrasted the lives of two “beautiful cousins,” Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard who both married Henry VIII and were both ultimately beheaded.
Not every novel about Boleyn women includes Anne. In 
, 
and 
, reveals the true story of eight generations of Boleyn women, placing the famous Anne Boleyn and Queen Elizabeth I within the fascinating context of their Boleyn extended family.
The wife of Anne Boleyn’s brother George, Jane Parker, came from a family that sympathized with Mary’s cause and another one of Anne’s aunts, Anne Tempest Boleyn, was expected to report her nieces conversations during her last days in the Tower of London. Norton’s book reveals that there were divided loyalties within the supposedly united “Boleyn faction” and that a number of Anne’s aunts and cousins in addition to her sister-in-law remained at court after the famous Queen’s execution.
Since Norton reveals fresh details about the lives and divided loyalties of so many obscure Boleyn women, the least compelling chapters of 
by Alison Weir will skim through the sections on the famous Boleyns to learn more about their little known aunts and cousins.