For men, history had its highs and lows

Rather than growing ever taller, males suffered a dip in the industrial age

If you fought the Spanish Armada in 1588 you were probably healthier than if you fought the Germans in 1916. If you were around to see the Roman Empire fall in Britain, the chances are you were taller than those who saw the British Empire surpass it.

And if you were an adult when Harold Macmillan declared “You never had it so good”, you were arguably the first generation in 300 years for whom that was actually true.

Scientists have analysed the height of skeletons over the past 2,000 years in an attempt to map health and wellbeing. They found that in the centuries after the Black Death, Englishmen grew taller than at any point in the preceding years. This trend continued until the average