Liberty Leading the People by Eugene Delacroix

France

Illustration of King Louis IX.

A king of fire and light: Louis IX's tangled legacy

A depiction of the French and Indian War, with George Washington on horseback

A guide to the Seven Years’ War

Turning points1916: The long march to modernity

Photo of members of the Versailles Conference

First World War

Your guide to the Treaty of Versailles

Josephine Baker lounges on a tiger skin around the time she starred in La Revue Nègre

Singer, siren, activist, spy: the incredible life of Josephine Baker

A family history of France

The Bal des Ardents (the 'Ball of the Burning Men'), from 'The Chronicler of European Chivalry' by GG Coulton (London, 1930). The 1393 tragedy claimed the lives of four people. (Photo by The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images)

Q&AWhat was the ‘Ball of the Burning Men’?

Women carrying flags and scythes or beating drums - one has a child on her shoulders - march on the Palace of Versailles to protest to the king

General Early Modern

Women in the French Revolution: fighting for equality

Illustration of the man in the iron mask standing by the window of his cell and guarded by two musketeers

Unmasking the 'man in the iron mask': do we know the identity of the famous prisoner?

Politicians in suits discuss the Paris Peace Treaty inside the Palace of Versailles

The Paris Peace Conference: everything you wanted to know

Soldiers disembark a landing craft with a battle on the beach beyond

How to win a 20th-century battle

In partnership with Gaijin War Thunder

Vikings and Franks

Robespierre’s brutal downfall

A runner is helped across a finish line

21 key moments in the history of the modern Olympics

The Persian ambassador bows before Louis XIV in the Palace of Versailles

King of the world: how Louis XIV turned France into a global power

Belgium and the Netherlands compete in a tug of war at the Antwerp Olympic

Olympic oddballs: 5 unusual Olympic sports from the past

French Revolution Quiz – test your knowledge with our history quiz

QuizHow much do you know about the French Revolution?

Claude-Joseph Rouget de Lisle

Q&AWho wrote the French national anthem?

Napoleon portrait by Jacques-Louis David shows is perhaps the most famous painting of the French emperor with one hand tucked out of sight

Why do Napoleon’s portraits often show him with one hand inside his shirt? The story of the French emperor’s missing hand…

Jean-Jacques-François Le Barbier’s painting portrays the Declaration of the Rights of Man

How progressive was the French Revolution?

Robespierre is guillotined on 28 July 1794. Had he died two years earlier, his name would now be associated with liberty and equality, argues Marisa Linton. (Universal History Archive/Getty Images)

Robespierre: man of terror

French Revolution podcast episodes

A late 18th-century painting depicting the execution of Marie Antoinette in 1793. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

The smile revolution against the Reign of Terror

An illustration of the head of Louis XVI

Guillotined in the French Revolution: the bloody story through 7 severed heads

Camille and Lucile Desmoulins

How the architects of the 'Terror' after the French Revolution ended up among its victims

The vanquishers of the Bastille before the Hôtel de Ville, 14 July 1789. Found in the Collection of Petit Palais, Musée des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

What triggered the French Revolution?

The decapitation machine now known as the guillotine was not a French invention and wasn't invented by Joseph Guillotin. (Image by Getty Images)

Q&ADid the French invent the guillotine?

A contemporary illustration of the Storming of the Bastille, 14 July 1789 – an event that helped create the idea of 'revolution' as we know it today. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

Fighting for freedom: the storming of the Bastille and the French Revolution

5 things you (probably) didn’t know about the Plantagenets

Eleanor of Aquitaine depicted in a 12th-century prayer book

The real Eleanor of Aquitaine: 5 myths about the medieval queen