Year 8: Tudors; French Revolution; Empire & Slavery

'Early in the morning of 10 February 1567, Kirk o' Field house in Edinburgh was destroyed by an explosion. The partially clothed bodies of Lord Darnley, the second husband of Mary, Queen of Scots, and his servant were found in a nearby orchard, apparently strangled but unharmed by the explosion.'

"I see the birds have flown." Charles I enters the House of Commons. 

'The walls of the Great Hall at Hampton Court Palace are hung with Henry VIII's most splendid tapestries, the Story of Abraham. Discover more about the work of our Conservation team as they re-hang the tapestries in this short film.'

In just two years, Oliver Cromwell made the journey from little-known MP with no experience of armed combat to brilliant, battle-winning leader. Martyn Bennett, author of Cromwell at War: The Lord General and His Military Revolution reveals how a military novice became one of British history's greatest warriors...

Henry VIII's kitchens at Hampton Court.

'Two centuries after the battle of Waterloo, says writer Stephen Clarke, the French are still in denial. As soon as the cannons stopped firing in June 1815, French historians began rewriting history, diminishing the Anglo-Prussian victory and naming Napoleon the moral victor …'

'The Stuart dynasty immediately succeeded the Tudors, and reigned over some of the most monumentally changeable times in British history – civil war, rebellion, the beheading of a king, plague outbreaks, the Great Fire of London and a successful foreign invasion. But how much do you know about the seven Stuart monarchs?'

Flight to Varennes. 

'The 17th century saw a vicious attack on the king’s prerogatives, and to understand why that happened, we need to look at several different factors.'

'The Venetian Ambassador needs help spying on the Court of Henry VIII for the Doge of Venice. Spying can be very dangerous so be careful!'

1665 Great Plague - gory make-up by the bucketful. 

'The French Revolution of 1789 ushered in over half a century of civil insurrection in Europe and around the world, culminating in a second great year of revolutions in 1848. David  Andress and Mike  Rapport, who have written books on these respective years, chart the course of the uprisings and explain what the fight was for.'

'The witch hunts that swept across Europe between 1450 and 1750 are one of the most controversial and terrifying phenomena in history, resulting in the trial of around 100,000 people (most of them women), a little under half of whom were put to death. Here, Tracy Borman explores the most notorious royal witch-hunter of all time: James VI and I ...'