Entirely Unofficial Rest is History Catalogue and Interrogator

Enlightenment & Age of Revolutions

103 Episodes 20 Series 129 Figures 79 Events 281 Books 209 Authors

Spanning the late 17th through the early 19th centuries, this era covers Enlightenment ideas, political revolutions, imperial expansion and early industrialization. Content includes multi-episode series on the American Revolution (colonial prosperity, protest and war), the 1805 Battle of Trafalgar (naval strategy, geopolitics), Captain Cook (Pacific voyages and encounters), London Week (from Roman Londinium to later landmarks and personalities), and a four-part life-and-legacy study of Lord Byron. Sample episodes address the Industrial Revolution (interview with Emma Griffin), Henry Fielding (London: People Ep. 3), Nelson-era extras on Emma Hamilton, and the summer 1792 crisis in the French Revolution. Figures, events and books discussed include Louis XVIII, Sir John Jervis, Charles Cornwallis, Le Chapelier Law (1791), Glorious First of June (1794), Jacobite Rising (1745), the Industrial Revolution, Gulliver’s Travels, and An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States.

Timeline Subway

Episodes Series Figures Events Books Authors

Episodes by year

Showing 12 of 103

2024

12 episodes

Nelson: God of War (Part 3)

Nelson (S1) · Part 3

Hosts Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook recount Horatio Nelson's rise to national fame at the Battle of Cape St. Vincen…

Nelson: The Battle of the Nile (Part 5)

Nelson (S1) · Part 5

Hosts Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook discuss the Battle of the Nile (1 August 1798) and Horatio Nelson’s audacious t…

Nelson: Attack the French! (Part 2)

Nelson (S1) · Part 2

This episode of The Rest Is History (hosts Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook) follows Horatio Nelson's early Mediterran…

Nelson: The Hunt for Napoleon (Part 4)

Nelson (S1) · Part 4

This episode (the end of part one) focuses on Admiral Horatio Nelson's elevation from a wounded, private man to a natio…

RIHC: The Roman Conquest of Britain EXTRA

This bonus episode reunites Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook to answer a listener’s question about how people across t…

The French Revolution: The Marseillaise, Song of War (Part 5)

The French Revolution - Season 3 (October 2024) · Part 5

This episode of The Rest Is History (season two of the French Revolution series) focuses on the origins and cultural im…

The French Revolution: Massacre at the Palace (Part 4)

The French Revolution - Season 3 (October 2024) · Part 4

This episode traces the critical summer of 1792 when military reverses, political panic and popular mobilisation transf…

The French Revolution: Bloodbath in Paris (Part 1)

The French Revolution - Season 3 (October 2024) · Part 1

This episode (season two, part one) continues The Rest Is History's detailed treatment of the French Revolution, pickin…

The French Revolution: War to the Death (Part 2)

The French Revolution - Season 3 (October 2024) · Part 2

This episode traces the move from constitutional experiment to war in late 1791–early 1792. Holland and Sandbrook intro…

The French Revolution: The Shadow of the Guillotine (Part 3)

The French Revolution - Season 3 (October 2024) · Part 3

Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook examine the guillotine as the defining symbol of the French Revolution, tracing its o…

RIHC: Roman Legions vs. Norman Invaders, The Killing Fields of Agincourt, and American Aristocracy

This is a Rest Is History bonus episode in which Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook catch up, outline forthcoming series…

RIHC: British Inventions, Ronald Reagan, and Roman Conquests

This bonus episode features Dominic Sandbrook hosting with producer Theo Young-Smith filling in for Tom Holland. They d…

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Series in this era

20 series

The French Revolution - Season 2 (July 2024)

9 episodes Aired: 2024-07-28 – 2024-08-14

Nelson (S2)

8 episodes Aired: 2025-10-08 – 2025-11-05

Nelson (S1)

5 episodes Aired: 2024-11-18

The French Revolution - Season 3 (October 2024)

5 episodes Aired: 2024-10-13 – 2024-10-14

American Revolution

4 episodes Aired: 2023-07-03

The French Revolution - Season 1 (March 2024)

4 episodes Aired: 2025-03-03

The Great Northern War

4 episodes Aired: 2025-05-11

Battle of Trafalgar

3 episodes Aired: 2022-10-17

Lord Byron

3 episodes Aired: 2024-04-14

Captain Cook

2 episodes Aired: 2023-10-22

Historical figures

129 tagged

Napoleon Bonaparte (Napoleon I of the French)

41 episodes

Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson

32 episodes

Marie Antoinette (born Maria Antonia of Austria)

27 episodes

Louis XVI of France

25 episodes

Maximilien Robespierre

20 episodes

Emma (Lady) Hamilton

18 episodes

George Gordon Byron (Lord Byron)

18 episodes

William Pitt (The Younger)

18 episodes

Benjamin Franklin

13 episodes

Edmund Burke

13 episodes

Historical events

79 tagged

French Revolution (1789–1799)

35 episodes

Seven Years' War

22 episodes

Napoleonic era (c. 1799–1815)

21 episodes

Battle of Trafalgar (1805)

19 episodes

Storming of the Bastille (14 July 1789)

19 episodes

American Revolutionary War (American War of Independence, 1775–1783)

17 episodes

Battle of the Nile (1798)

16 episodes

Flight to Varennes (1791, Varennes)

13 episodes

Reign of Terror (1793–1794, France)

13 episodes

Industrial Revolution

10 episodes

Books

281 tagged

Adventures in Time: Nelson, a Hero of the Seas

Author: Dominic Sandbrook

9 episodes

Dominion

Author: Tom Holland

7 episodes

Citizens

Author: Simon Sharma

6 episodes

A Tale of Two Cities

Author: Charles Dickens

4 episodes

Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

Author: National Constituent Assembly (France)

4 episodes

Pride and Prejudice

Author: Jane Austen

4 episodes

Reflections on the Revolution in France

Author: Edmund Burke

4 episodes

Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic

Author: Tom Holland

4 episodes

The Revolutionary Temper

Author: Robert Danton

4 episodes

A Place of Greater Safety

Author: Hilary Mantel

3 episodes

Authors

209 tagged

Dominic Sandbrook

12 episodes

Tom Holland

10 episodes

Simon Sharma

8 episodes

Charles Dickens

5 episodes

Jane Austen

5 episodes

Thomas Paine

5 episodes

Edmund Burke

4 episodes

Hilary Mantel

4 episodes

National Constituent Assembly (France)

4 episodes

Robert Danton

4 episodes