Showing titles in 18th Century

This compelling book begins on the 2nd of August 1793, the day Marie Antoinette was torn from her family's arms and escorted from the Temple to the Conciergerie, a thick-walled fortress turned prison. It was also known as the "waiting room for the guillotine" because prisoners only spent a day or two here before their conviction and subsequent execution. The ex-queen surely knew her days were numbered, but she could never have known that two and a half months would pass before she would finally stand trial and be convicted.

Renowned as a printer, scientist, and diplomat, Benjamin Franklin also published more works on religious topics than any other 18th-century American layperson. Born to Boston Puritans, by his teenage years Franklin had abandoned the exclusive Christian faith of his family and embraced deism. But Franklin, as a man of faith, was far more complex than the "thorough deist" who emerges in his autobiography.

On November 4, 1791, a coalition of warriors determined to set the Ohio River as a permanent boundary between tribal lands and White settlements faced an army led by Arthur St. Clair—the resulting horrific struggle ended in the greatest defeat of an American army at the hands of Native Americans. The road to the battle of the Wabash began when Arthur St. Clair was appointed to lead an army into the heart of the Ohio Indian Confederacy while building a string of fortifications along the way. He would face difficulties in recruiting, training, feeding, and arming volunteer soldiers.

On November 29, 1781, Captain Collingwood of the British ship Zong commanded his crew to throw overboard one-third of his cargo: a shipment of Africans bound for slavery in America. The captain believed his ship was off course, and he feared there was not enough drinking water to last until landfall. This book is the first to examine in detail the deplorable killings on the Zong, the lawsuit that ensued, how the murder of 132 slaves affected debates about slavery, and the way we remember the infamous Zong today.

How do you solve a problem like James Madison? The fourth president is one of the most confounding figures in early American history; his political trajectory seems almost intentionally inconsistent. He was both for and against a strong federal government. He wrote about the dangers of political parties in the Federalist Papers and then helped to found the Republican Party just a few years later. This so-called Madison problem has occupied scholars for ages.

In this sweeping consideration of Britain in the 18th century, Jeremy Black explores the interconnected roles of power and geography in the creation of a global empire. Geography was at the heart of Britain’s expansion into India, its response to uprisings in Scotland and America, and its revolutionary development of railways.

In 1786, France's ancien régime was functioning as usual. Its alliance with the victorious American colonies had restored its diplomatic prestige, the economy seemed to be flourishing, and internal politics seemed quiet. But just a few short years later, the dynasty which had ruled France for over 800 years was swept away. What happened to cause such devastating change to the long-established political structure?

No one present at the Battle of Cape Lopez off the coast of West Africa in 1722 could have known that they were on the edge of history. This obscure yet fierce naval battle would have a monumental impact on British colonies and the future of slavery in America.

We are divided over the history of the United States, and one of the central dividing lines is the frontier. Was it a site of heroism? Or was it where the full force of an all-powerful empire was brought to bear on Native peoples? In this startlingly original work, historian Robert Parkinson presents a new account of ever-shifting encounters between white colonists and Native Americans.

Piracy and the Making of the Spanish Pacific World demonstrates that piracy is key to explaining the surprising longevity of Spain's Asian empire, which survived the Age of Revolutions and endured almost to the end of the nineteenth century. It offers important new insight into piracy's impact on the trajectory of globalization and European imperial expansion in maritime Asia.

Piecing together his family history through archival documents, Tyler LeBlanc tells the story of his ancestor Joseph LeBlanc and the LeBlanc family during the Great Expulsion. A unique biographical approach to the history of the Expulsion, Acadian Driftwood is a vivid insight into one family’s experience of this traumatic event.

The Age of Atlantic Revolution was a defining moment in western history. Our understanding of rights, of what makes the individual an individual, of how to define a citizen versus a subject, of what states should or should not do, of how labor, politics, and trade would be organized, of the relationship between the church and the state, and of our attachment to the nation all derive from this period (c. 1750-1850).

Renowned historian Phillip Thomas Ticker, PhD, recounts the little-known story of the Battle of Pell's Point and the heroism of Colonel John Glover with the care and attention-to-detail for which he is known.

What would become the Russian Empire began in the ninth century. In 1682, a new tsar took over the nation that had become known as Russia. Peter I, remembered as Peter the Great, transformed the country, and in 1721, he adopted the title of emperor. A series of powerful rulers, including Catherine the Great, built on the foundations that Peter had created to expand the territory controlled by the Russian Empire until it became one of the largest empires the world had ever seen. At its zenith, the Russian Empire controlled over one-sixth of the total landmass of the Earth

For centuries, raw and primal urges and principles had taken hold of conquerors, officials, and governments. But there was a light at the end of the tunnel. Humanity just needed to acknowledge knowledge. It needed to value the art of studying phenomena and learning, not just spiritual notions and religion. Welcome to the book about how this happened. Welcome to a glimmer of hope in humanity’s realization of what this world is and what lies in the elements yet to be discovered. Get ready for some enlightenment in your own life as you learn about the Age of Enlightenment.

The French Revolution was a period of considerable political and social change in France that started in 1789 with the starting of the Estates General and ended in the month of November 1799 with the development of the French Consulate. Tons of its ideas are now regarded important structures of liberal democracy, while terms like liberté, égalité, and fraternité resurfaced in following revolts, which includes the 1917 Russian Revolution, and stimulated efforts to eliminate oppression and attain universal suffrage.

Het tijdperk van de verlichting (ook wel het tijdperk van de factor of gewoon de verlichting genoemd) was een intellectuele en filosofische beweging in Europa in de 18e eeuw die de wereld van ideeën beheerste. De Verlichting promootte concepten als vrijheid, ontwikkeling, tolerantie, broederschap, constitutionele federale regering en scheiding van geloof en staat door zich te concentreren op het nastreven van vreugde, de soevereiniteit van de rede en het bewijs van de zintuigen als primaire bronnen van kennis.

The British Legion was one of the most remarkable regiments, not only of the American Revolution, but of any war. A corps made up of American Loyalists, it saw its first action in New York and then engaged in almost every battle in the Southern colonies. Relying on firsthand accounts - letters, diaries, and journals - War at Saber Point: Banastre Tarleton and the British Legion is the enthralling story of those forgotten Americans and the young Englishman who led them.

The Great Northern War was a war waged by Russia, Denmark-Norway, and Saxony-Poland-Lithuania against the Swedish Empire from 1700 to 1721. It also engaged several of the other great powers of Europe at the time, engulfing much of the continent and its colonies in more than two decades of war. It was part of a long and almost constant series of wars fought home and around the world by European nations over control of more land, resources, and wealth. By its end, Russia had firmly established its ascendency, while Sweden would no longer pose a threat as a major empire.

Pontiac’s War erupted in the Great Lakes region of North America just as the French and Indian War came to a close in 1763. The French, who had initially established a European presence there, were usurped by the British, whose relations with indigenous peoples were notoriously less diplomatic and more destructive. As a result, a Native American man named Pontiac helped lead a coalition against the British. The outcome of Pontiac’s War was not what either side intended, but it nevertheless helped shape the history of the region for decades to come.