IE History Files

I was doing backup (Win NT, long story).
It hit several files that were open, waited
for a bit, and skippe. One was INDEX.DAT.
Got curious and did DIR INDEX.DAT /S and found 760,000 or so bytes in 16 files, path is: C:\winnt\profiles\…\history.ie5\MSHist0120010818200.

By and large I don’t use IE (prefer Netscape). The directorie (MSHist*) date from 6/21/00 to 8/18/01 (today). There is a 212,000 file in a dir dated today.

I am assuming they are some form of IE history / backup.
1) Is there a way to delete/purge from IE?
2) Can I just delete them and the .DIR without causing problems?
3) Is there a way to prevent IE from creating (most likely not, MS Knows Best)?
4) Is there a way to limit the number (to 1-2)?

thx, lo