One summer evening in 335 BCE, Alexander the Great was resting by the Danube River when a band of strangers approached his camp. Alexander had never seen anything like these tall, fierce-looking warriors with huge golden neck rings and...

Tea is the second most consumed beverage in the world after water __ and from sugary Turkish Rize tea to salty Tibetan butter tea, there are almost as many ways of preparing the beverage as there are cultures on the globe. Where did this...

In 19th century Europe, with nation building well under way, thoughts turned outward, toward empire. This week, we're looking at how Europeans expanded into Africa, Asia, and Oceania during the 1800s. You'll learn about China and the...

In which John Green teaches you about founding father and third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson is a somewhat controversial figure in American history, largely because he, like pretty much all humans, was a...

Only a couple of decades after the end of the First World War--which was supposed to be the War that Ended All Wars--another, bigger, farther-flung, more destructive, and deadlier war began. Today, you'll learn about how the war in...

In which John Green teaches you about World War II, and some of the causes behind the war. In a lot of ways, WWII was about resources, and especially about food. The expansionist aggression of both Germany and Japan were in a lot of ways...

In which John Green teaches you about the post-World War II breakup of most of the European empires. As you'll remember from previous installments of Crash Course, Europeans spent several centuries sailing around the world creating...

After World War II, Europe was changing radically, and its place in the world was changing as well. European powers had colonized around the world in the 18th and 19th centuries, and in the 20th century, it all came crashing down. Of...

On August 13, 1961, construction workers began tearing up streets and erecting barriers in Berlin. This night marked the beginning of one of history's most infamous dividing lines: the Berlin Wall. Construction continued for a decade as...

Today, nearly 30% of all global ship traffic passes through the Suez Canal, totaling over 20,000 ships in 2021. The site of the canal had been of interest to rulers as far back as the second millennium BCE, but plans to construct a...

In which John Green wraps up revolutions month with what is arguably the most revolutionary of modern revolutions, the Industrial Revolution. While very few leaders were beheaded in the course of this one, it changed the lives of more...

In which John teaches you about the Seven Years War, which may have lasted nine years. Or as many as 23. It was a very confusing was. The Seven Years War was a global war, fought on five continents, which is kind of a lot. John focuses...

In which John Green teaches you about the American Revolution and the American Revolutionary War, which it turns out were two different things. John goes over the issues and events that precipitated rebellion in Britain's American...

We try not to get into too much great man history here at Crash Course, but we have to admit: Napoleon Bonaparte is a pretty big deal. Join us as we track the rise, further rise, fall, rise, fall, mortal fall, and posthumous rise of...

In which John Green wraps up revolutions month with what is arguably the most revolutionary of modern revolutions, the Industrial Revolution. While very few leaders were beheaded in the course of this one, it changed the lives of more...

In which John Green teaches you about the beginnings of the American Revolution in a video titled The Seven Years War. Confusing? Maybe. John argues that the Seven Years War, which is often called the French and Indian War in the US,...

European powers had a lot of wars in the 18th century, and they weren't confined to Europe. Conflict raged across the globe, in what might be called a World War...but we don't call it that, because we already have a couple of those...

Europe's system of alliances and centuries-old tensions erupted into war in August of 1914. This week on Crash Course Euro, we're talking about the military history of World War I, and taking a look at the broad strokes of how the war...

The English Civil War. We'll talk about England after Elizabeth, in which things didn't go that smoothly. We'll talk about James I, Charles I, Oliver Cromwell, Charles II, and James II, all of whom ruled England, (and tried to rule all...

King Arthur has risen again and again in our collective imagination, along with his retinue of knights, Guinevere, the Round Table, Camelot, and of course Excalibur. But where do these stories come from, and is there any truth to them?...

The public is losing faith in democracy, says British MP Rory Stewart. Iraq and Afghanistan’s new democracies are deeply corrupt; meanwhile, 84 percent of people in Britain say politics is broken. In this important talk, Stewart sounds a...

In which John Green teaches you about the post-World War II breakup of most of the European empires. As you'll remember from previous installments of Crash Course, Europeans spent several centuries sailing around the world creating...

In 1776, American colonists were taxed heavily for importing tea from Britain. The colonists, not fans of "taxation without representation", reacted by dumping tea into the Boston Harbor, a night now known as the Boston Tea Party. Ben...

In which John Green teaches you about the American Revolution and the American Revolutionary War, which it turns out were two different things. John goes over the issues and events that precipitated rebellion in Britain's American...