News about Oliver Cromwell

It is being described in the Upper Chamber as 'the biggest purge of peers since Oliver Cromwell'. Stage one on the path to total abolition of the Lords is the plan to force members over 80 to retire and remove the few remaining hereditaries. In the short term, this requires the Prime Minister to create dozens of new Labour barons and baronesses in order to level numbers with the Tories , who currently dominate Sir Keir's party by 273 to 185 in an 800-strong chamber, before moving on to the wider constitutional overhaul. That, however, was before the 'freebies and cronies' row rocked Starmer's fledgling administration, centred on the mysterious figure of Lord Alli and the munificence he has dispensed in the form of free clothes and glasses to the PM, his wife and his most senior colleagues.

Every week, FEMAIL asks two singletons to report back from their blind date. This week, it was Tara and Jon's turn to wine and dine. Read on to find out what happened... Fancy a posh meal with an eligible single like you? Or would you like to play cupid for someone else? Email your - or their - details and a photo to blinddate@dailymail.co.uk

Much of my schooling involved learning things by heart. And that is where they still are, in my heart. Ask me what eight nines are and I can answer in a flash without thinking. Likewise, I know how many ounces there are in a pound and how many yards in a mile. And I can still recite quite a lot of Alfred, Lord Tennyson's great poem The Revenge: A Ballad Of The Fleet, to the dismay of anyone who has to listen, longing for me to stop. I have always been grateful. I still use my tables several times a day, which is more than I can say for most of the stuff I was taught at school. That great writer, Laurie Lee, author of Cider With Rosie, described his own village schooldays in Gloucestershire a century ago 'unhearing, unquestioning, we rocked to our chanting, hammering the gold nails home'. And so did my much later generation, in private and state schools, which in those days both believed that teachers taught and pupils learned. Now any such arrangement is said to be a threat to everybody's 'mental health'.

He was notorious for his hedonism and partying, but most of all his sexual appetite, which was infamously compared to that of a racehorse. Was he Britain's most sex-mad monarch? Join Robert and Kate as they explore the story of the King, his many mistresses - and ask what their stories reveal about the wider history of the period. Listen wherever you get your podcasts now.

Born at St James's Palace on this day in 1630 with his father on the throne, Charles II started his life quietly compared to what was to come. By the time he was 19, Charles I had been executed at the hands of Parliament and Oliver Cromwell was ruling with an iron fist after abolishing the monarchy. After trying and failing to continue his father's royalist battle in the English Civil War, Charles was forced to flee England. Following his triumphant return and ascension to the throne in 1660, Charles famously took blood-soaked revenge on the men who had put his father to death. He would go on to reign through the Great Fire of London and the major outbreak of the bubonic plague that preceded it. And, along the way, he was known for a particularly active love life that saw him take a string of mistresses and produce 12 illegitimate children - but no legitimate heir (inset, a 20th century painting of the King with three of his mistresses).

Like a stunned beast on a conveyor belt, Britain slowly trundles towards what everyone seems to think is the inevitable election of a Labour government. Many people behave as if this is in some way just and proper. The Government is tired and decrepit. So it has to go, and be replaced by whatever Sir Keir Starmer is offering us. This is dangerous thinking, just as it was in 1997.

One Antiques Roadshow visitor was shocked to discover that one of her most coveted pieces of jewelry was worth an eye-watering four-figure sum. After she revealed that the ring was a'very unusual' find, Joanna Hardy, who has more than 30 years in the Gemological Association, left one woman grinning like a Cheshire cat. The antiques expert inspecting the red and black box said that the wrapping provides her with a good idea of what's inside, adding: "The box itself is a work of art."

The gruesome family heirloom was worth a staggering five-figure sum, according to an Antiques Roadshow visitor. The repeat episode of Sefton Park in Liverpool on Sunday unearthed some shocking antiques, including a collection of items that had previously belonged to an executed Earl. Following the Battle of Worcester, James Stanley, the 7th Earl of Derby, came to a tragic conclusion. Despite the fact that the collection of items relating to the Earl's tragic conclusion was expected to be worth between £18,000 and £22,000, the owner believed selling the items would be a "travesty."

Following the uproar over Kate's 'edited' Mother's Day photo, this newspaper's postbag has piled up this week with letters and messages of sympathy for her. Many have made it clear that she has done a 'wonderful' job since marrying Prince William, and that she should take as long as she needs to recover from her abdominal surgery and ignore her detractors.

Headless children are incarcerated in caves. Reanimated bodies have been recovered. And the world's most popular cow. It's enough to make you rethink everything you've heard about Scotland. Over 36 illustrious tales in Scotland's 'Forgotten Past: A History of the Mislaid, 'Misplaced & Misunderstood, author and historian Alistair Moffat explores the ­curious, the mysterious, and the downright bizarre chapters of forgotten Scottish history.

They were one of his afternoon radio shows, snippets of trivia from around the world so bizarre that listeners were never quite sure if they were correct or false. These 'factoids' were such a hit feature that the legendary DJ, who died this week at the age of 69, that he wrote two books of his favorites, whether it was discovering the immense shoe size of a celebrity chef or revealing the name of the film with the first flushing toilet.

The Earith Bulwark in Cambridgeshire Fens was built in 1643 to shield crossing points along the local rivers, including the River Great Ouse. The heavy rain helped to fill a moat around the earthworks, highlighting the 400-year-old fort, which was constructed by Oliver Cromwell's forces. Historic England has characterized the fort as 'among the most elaborate fortifications' from the Civil War,' which is only visible very rarely and after extreme floods.

The mystery surrounding who the Cerne Abbas (left) giant is supposed to be has baffled people for centuries. Some believed the iconic 180ft chalk figure in Dorset was supposed to be a lost British God, while others believed it to be a representation of Oliver Cromwell. Academics now have the answer to the hillside riddle, while historians claim that the monument may have been a key point for Anglo-Saxon troops, with the titan acting as a rallying symbol. According to a paper published in journal Speculum, the griff was adopted by Christians who said it represented their saint. The 'British god' belief, according to the journal, was also a myth that resulted from a mistranslation.

Imagining that Christmas would have been outlawed. No carols, no holly, no ivy, and certainly no pantos. If you start a Yuletide party, you'll also face arrest and prison time. Well, that's just what happened when King Charles I lost his throne in the 17th century. The rise of republicanism and led to the outbreak of civil war in 1642, with Catholic Charles' divine-right-to-rule attitude toward his leaders. Oliver Cromwell had won and Charles was jailed at Hampton Court by 1647.

According to English Heritage's study, the majority of carols have never had a "correct" melody, in many cases, with new melodic standards dating back to the 19th century. Many carols were anarchical in character and had no formal accompaniment, with congregations and soloists simply improvising the melody on the spot.

QUENTIN LETTS: When a polite technocrat loses his rag, it's something rather liberating. Rishi Sunak, a boy, was cross. The Prime Minister called an emergency Downing Street news conference to address the new Tory political scandals, which is normally tolerant to a fault. He is a genius at detecting him. Wasn't. Seething. This week, the intention was to build on Monday's historic legal migration crackdown with the 'toughest anti-illegal immigration bill ever's announced at the end of this week.' Robert Jenrick's resignation on Wednesday night put an almighty spanner in the works. Principled resignation by Mr Jenrick or treacherous attempt to scuttle the Government?It's difficult to say.

HITCHENS: The Covid lunacy, which caused permanent harm to the country and its citizens, was based on a little-known piece of public health legislation. It was evidently not intended for this purpose, and it was almost unintentionally chosen because it did not have to justify Parliament scrutiny that could be required by legitimate emergency legislation. More than one attempt was made to perplex the courts into finding that the whole thing was legal. They were unable to hear the allegations even though they were shocked. I repeat. They refused even to hear the lawsuit. These were the same courts that had rushed to make decisions about Alexander 'Boris' Johnson's attempts to get us out of the EU and also against his decision to delay Parliament for a brief period of time.

The National Trust was established in the aim of preserving Britain's endangered landscapes, coastline, and historic buildings, and it has achieved a stellar job at doing both of these things. However, it has lost its place in recent years, allowing some of its less resourceful trustees and employees to rewrite its very nature. Many see it as a lobbying group for modern liberal claptrap rather than being a body devoted to conserving the past.

MailOnline can exclusively reveal where the 2,000-year-old route began and ended after a cobbled road was discovered in a garden near Stirling (pictured left). Given the road's tactical significance for crossing the Forth and reaching the Highlands, as well as its proximity to Stirling, Scotland's former capital, many of the key historical figures of Scottish and wider British history would have used it for military campaigns. Experts suspect it was only a small part of a much larger network that stretched from Aberdeenshire to Dover in Kent (right).

In a garden near Stirling, an ancient Roman Road believed to have been used by prominent historical figures, including William the Conqueror, Oliver Cromwell, and every King and Queen of Scotland has been discovered. The cobbled road, which dates back nearly 2,000 years, was constructed by general Julius Agricola's Roman armies in the first century and would have connected to a ford through the River Forth.

Findmypast, a family history website, analyzed its extensive archive to determine which of the UK's 76 cities had the most ghost tales to tell. Researchers analyzed newspaper archives from 1710 to 2021 to find which city had the most popular ghost authors in articles about ghosts.

Sheep has been given the task of returning the Cerne Abbas Giant to its full glory by grazing the grass surrounding the naked chalk figure. Since his outline was covered by grass, the hillside man, who wields a large club and a prominent erection, was overgrown.

ROGER LEWIS: If Dry January wasn't depressing enough for thirsty chaps like myself, there's another one coming: Sober October. All correct, £789,000, at last count, has already been raised for Macmillan Cancer Support by members of the public, who have promised to avoid booze until Halloween - an abstinence that is helping to raise vital funds for people living with cancer.' So there's unquestionable merit in all these people spending a month on the water wagon.

In the dead of night, robbers took a large bronze statue of a horse from the grounds of a historic country estate. The crooks who took sculptor Marcia Astor's bronze sculpture of a stallion from the gardens of Forde Abbey near the village of Thorncombe in Dorset are being hunted by investigators. According to police, they are looking for a blue Ford Transit-style van, which is reported to have been seen close to the house.