The Rest Is History

The meeting of the controversial Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés and the formidable Emperor Montezuma in 1519 was one of the great hinge moments of world history, and the beginning of the end for the mightiest of the New World empires: the realm of the Aztecs.  The build-up to this extraordinary encounter is at once a thrilling adventure story and a tragic tale of violence, brutality and loss...

Within the turmoil of the French Revolution, Napoleon Bonaparte stands out to his military superiors, first by defeating the English at Toulon, then by putting down a royalist mob in Paris when outnumbered four to one, with a “whiff of grapeshot”. Having finally shaken off the humiliation of the failed invasion of Sardinia which began his career, he is made Commander of the Interior, and rewarded with command of the Army of Italy...

“I would plunge the avenging dagger, up to the hilt, in the breast of the tyrant!” Born in Corsica a year after the island was given to France by the Genoese, Napoleon Bonaparte grew up in a world of political and civil unrest. His father had close ties with the leader of the Corsican resistance movement, Pasquale Paoli, who would leave a lasting impression on young Napoleon...

Cook has been sent by the Royal Navy to the Pacific to track the transit of Venus from Tahiti, but also with a second, secret mission: once he’s reached Tahiti, he will go on to search for the great southern continent, Terra Australis. Encountering Tahitians, Maori and Aboriginal Australians, Cook and his crew develop relations with them which will often turn sour...

The greatest sea explorer of all time, James Cook was born to a humble Yorkshire family, and first stood out for his talents as a cartographer for the Royal Navy in Newfoundland. He would go on to lead three epic voyages to the Pacific during the 18th century, as part of history’s first ever scientific research team, accompanied by Joseph Banks, two cats, a dog and a goat...

The setting for so many of the Arabian Nights, like the stories of Sinbad the Sailor, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, or Aladdin, Baghdad during the Islamic Golden Age had a shimmering image, a dimension of mystery and wonder… Join Tom and Dominic in the final part of our series on the history of Baghdad, as they explore the tales of One Thousand and One Nights, and the city of Caliphs, Hadiths, thieves, and of course, pigeon racing!  *The Rest Is History Live Tour 2023*: Tom and Dominic are...

Baghdad was a place of fabulous sophistication and teeming multitudes, where terrible things could happen, but great wonders could also be found… During the Islamic Golden Age, it was the most global city the world had ever seen, a truly diverse cosmopolis, with silks and porcelains from China, spices from India, slaves from the frozen shores of the distant “North”, and ships coming and going from Vietnam, Indonesia, and the southern-most reaches of Africa...

“No city in the world will ever rival it for prosperity...“ Baghdad, originally a Christian village in Iraq, was chosen by the Abbasid Caliph Al-Mansur as the site for the new capital of his empire, and it would become a cosmopolis to rival Rome or Babylon. Its foundations were built in a perfect circle, with walls 90 feet tall, and at its heart, the monumental Palace of the Golden Gate...

A story of great myth and of huge historical significance, the foundation of Baghdad is a fundamental episode in the development of Islam. The Umayyad Caliphate, the first great Islamic empire, stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to the borders of China; no dynasty had ever presided over a greater array of conquests...

The Mitfords were the most glamorous aristocrats on the London scene in the 1920s, with at their head Diana, the most beautiful woman in London, who would eventually marry Oswald Mosley. However, her younger sister Unity would strike up a relationship with her own fascist leader: Adolf Hitler...