Catherine de Medici ruled France during the Protestant Reformation What was the Reformation? By the time Francis I of France and Henry VIII of England both died in 1547 AD, attacks by the Ottoman Empire were less [...]
Napoleon in 1806 Right after the French Revolution, a lot of people in France were wondering, what sort of government did they really want? People wanted democracy, but on the other hand [...]
Philippe II d'Orleans, regent for Louis XV Philippe d'Orleans rules France When Louis XIV died in 1715 AD, his great-grandson Louis was only five years old. First his uncle Philippe, then his teacher [...]
King Louis XIV of France Louis XIV becomes king of France When Anne of Austria decided to retire, in 1661 AD, her son Louis XIV took over ruling France. Anne of Austria All [...]
Louis XVIII Louis the Eighteenth When the Allies defeated Napoleon in 1814 AD, France needed to figure out a new government. The first thing French people tried was putting a king back in [...]
Vasco da Gama and Columbus used ships like these During the 1500s AD, the people of Europe got much richer than they had been in the Middle Ages. With the collapse of [...]
Henry VIII of England Henry VIII rules England When Henry VII died in 1509, his son Henry VIII became king of England. He was only 18 years old, but he grabbed his power [...]
Hanoverian England: King George I of England Why did the Hanoverians come from Germany to rule England? Because Queen Anne had no children, and no Catholic could be king or queen, when [...]
Map of Europe after the Congress of Vienna (thanks to Wikipedia) What was the Congress of Vienna? An alliance of European armies finally defeated Napoleon in 1814. Then all the European countries [...]
French Revolution: French women revolutionaries march on the king's palace at Versailles Why did France want a revolution? All through the 1700s, Enlightenment philosophers in France had been figuring out new ways [...]
