9 h 3 minAudiobook18 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 9 h 3 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What happens when the records disagree—and a good guess begins to pass for fact?
In Historical Mysteries, Andrew Lang opens the files on puzzles from the past. These separate essays follow records that contradict one another, fall silent, or point toward rival explanations. Lang asks who makes each claim, when they make it, and what reason they might have for telling the story that way.
The subjects include conspiracy, vanishing, and intrigue, but the evidence matters as much as the mystery. Lang explores gaps in surviving papers, weighs competing theories, and watches legends grow around what nobody can establish. His dry wit keeps the inquiry lively. He offers the explanation that fits best—or leaves the question open when certainty goes too far.
What you’ll discover
- History as a case file Follow Lang as he tests claims against documents rather than accepting a persuasive story.
- Where the records fall silent Explore the gaps that leave important events uncertain and invite rival accounts.
- Theories put to the test Weigh explanations with an investigator who does not insist that every puzzle has an answer.
- The making of a legend See how an unchecked guess can harden into something people accept as fact.
- Learning with a light touch Enjoy a witty, sceptical guide who makes room for doubt without losing curiosity.
Who will love it
Readers who enjoy true crime, courtroom puzzles, Jacobite intrigue and royal scandal, and who like a witty guide that weighs the evidence and says what it thinks. Fans of Thackeray and Stevenson will feel at home.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A girl's strange tale divides London
- A king orders a murder and hesitates
- Hanged without proof of any victim
- A Highland murder and a hidden second man
- A swindler ruins a queen's name
- A boy from nowhere, or a clever pretender
- Who plotted at Gowrie House in Perth
- Marvels in drawing rooms, never exposed
- Hidden hands behind kings and churches
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- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
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- Large print hardcover
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Read and hear Mystères historiques in 25 languages and switch at any time. Or read two side by side, paragraph by paragraph: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
Mystères historiques
by Andrew Lang · 1904
A starved girl, a missing steward, a deathless count and a stolen necklace: Andrew Lang weighs fourteen puzzles.
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In short
Historical Mysteries is a collection of fourteen essays by the Scottish writer Andrew Lang, who died in 1912 and wrote these pieces in the early 1900s. Each takes a real case that baffled its own age: a vanished servant girl, a murdered secretary, a steward who walks out of his village, a diamond necklace, a boy who appears from nowhere.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A girl's strange tale divides London
Lang opens with a modern echo. A Cheshire governess goes skating alone, vanishes for days, and is found starving with a fractured skull and a story of a kidnapper nobody can trace. Then he turns to January 1753 and Elizabeth Canning, a seventeen-year-old carpenter's daughter from Aldermanbury. Her employers, the publican Wintlebury and the carpenter Lyon, praise her honesty. A small kindness over a farthing and a mince pie wins Lang to her side.
On New Year's Day she visits her aunt near the London Dock and sets out for home after nine at night. She never arrives. Her widowed mother advertises in the newspapers, has prayers said in several churches, and consults a cheap wise man. On January 29, just as her mother kneels to pray, Elizabeth knocks at the door, bleeding, ragged and close to death.
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What is Historical Mysteries by Andrew Lang about?
It is a collection of fourteen essays, each on a real puzzle from history, such as the case of Elizabeth Canning, the murder of Escovedo, the Gowrie conspiracy and the Diamond Necklace. Lang weighs the evidence and gives his own verdict.
Are the cases in Historical Mysteries true stories?
Yes, they are real events drawn from trials, letters and memoirs, ranging from the 1500s to the early 1900s. Lang names his sources and says when he is guessing, so you can follow his reasoning.
Which mysteries does Lang cover in this book?
They include Elizabeth Canning, Escovedo, the Campden steward, Allan Breck, the Cardinal's necklace, Kaspar Hauser, the Gowrie plot, D. D. Home, Captain Green, the Oglethorpe sisters, the Chevalier d'Éon, Saint-Germain, the Scottish Kirks and Jeanne de la Motte.
The author
Andrew Lang
1844–1912 · Scottish poet and folklorist
Andrew Lang was a Scottish writer born in Selkirk in 1844. He lived in London and died in Banchory in 1912. He wrote poetry, novels, literary criticism, and works on folklore. He edited The Blue Fairy Book, published in 1889, and other fairy-book collections, including The Violet Fairy Book in 1901.
More by Andrew Lang
All 16 booksMore like this
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