Explore Through Time

From the standing stones of prehistoric Britain to the urban legends of the present day — browse the archive by the historical period each legend is associated with.

Prehistoric Britain0 legendsThe millennia before written record in Britain and Ireland, from the first hunter-gatherers after the last Ice Age through the Neolithic… Bronze Age0 legendsRoughly 2500 to 800 BC, the period of Britain and Ireland's first metalworking, extensive trade networks and monuments such as Stonehenge's… Iron Age0 legendsFrom around 800 BC to the Roman conquest, when Britain and Ireland were home to Celtic-speaking tribal societies, hillforts and a rich,… Roman Britain0 legends43 to around 410 AD, when Britain (though not Ireland) was a Roman province. Roman-British folklore often blends native and imported… Sub-Roman Britain1 legendThe two centuries or so after Roman withdrawal, before Anglo-Saxon kingdoms were firmly established — a poorly documented era from which… Anglo-Saxon England0 legendsFrom the 5th century settlement of Germanic peoples through to the Norman Conquest of 1066. This period gave English folklore much of its… Viking Age0 legendsRoughly 793 to 1066, when Norse raiders, traders and settlers reshaped much of Britain and Ireland, especially the north and east of… Norman Britain0 legendsFrom the 1066 conquest through the 12th century, when a French-speaking aristocracy reorganised land, law and the church across England… Medieval Britain0 legendsThe broad high and late medieval period, roughly the 12th through 15th centuries — an age of castles, cathedrals, chivalric romance and the… Tudor Britain1 legend1485 to 1603, spanning the Reformation, the dissolution of the monasteries and the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. Religious upheaval… Stuart Britain0 legends1603 to 1714, encompassing the Civil Wars, the Restoration and the height of the British witch trials. This is the period of Matthew… Georgian Britain0 legends1714 to 1837, the era of the Enlightenment, the agricultural and early industrial revolutions, and a golden age of smuggling along Britain… Victorian Britain0 legends1837 to 1901, the height of industrialisation and empire, and also the great age of folklore collecting as a formal discipline — the word… Edwardian Britain0 legends1901 to 1914 (sometimes extended to 1910 or to the First World War), a brief but distinct era bridging Victorian certainty and the… Modern Folklore0 legendsFrom the First World War to the present — a period often assumed to be free of folklore, but which has in fact produced its own rich seam…
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