Butterfly Effect

A series of battles in France had an impact on modern day Europe and the fates of three countries down to our modern century. What might have happened if Richard the Lionheart had not been wounded? Or Philippe Auguste of France had fled the battlefield?

How did the events of his childhood shape the man who would become Genghis Khan? What impact did the Mongol invasions have on the history of Asia and on the psyche of Europe?

What if Alexander had not died at the age of 32? What if he had listened to advisors and returned to Macedonia instead of going on his worldwide conquest? How does the legacy of ideals and leadership left from Alexander's time resonate today?

The dramatic story of the defense of France against Hitler's invading army in order to enable the desperate evacuation of over 300K men of the British Expeditionary Force and Allied troops across the English Channel to safety in 1940.

The former Soviet Union collectivized many aspects of agricultural and industrial development in the 1950's. While some efforts were successful others like the cotton-growing around the Aral Sea have proven to be an ecological nightmare.

The Cuban Missile Crisis was one of the defining moments of the mid-twentieth century and of the presidency of John Kennedy. How did the two Cold War powers of the USSR and the USA come to the point of threatening nuclear war?

In May 1893 a man is thrown out of a train on the platforms of the train station of Pietermaritzburg a little city of South Africa for daring to sit in a first-class compartment. This young Indian lawyer is named Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.

While the Viking raids have come one after another in the Occident for almost a century in November 885 hundreds of Scandinavian boats sailing towards Burgundy present themselves before the walls of Paris and besiege the city.

In July 1799 during the French Campaign in Egypt and Syria the French soldiers of lieutenant Bouchard discover by chance at Rosetta a large black stone. It is in fact the fragment of a stele engraved in honor of King Ptolemy V including three writing systems: Greek Demotic and hieroglyphs.

Our distant ancestors were afraid of lightning. For a long time it was thought that lightning was sent by the gods. Nowadays electricity is part of our daily life. Without it we would feel lost...

Early in their history humans realized that they could affect nature. Controlling fire making tools and taming wild animals. What they were not given by nature they harnessed in other species.

From the mysterious megaliths in prehistory to the first hot air balloons and the construction of the Giza pyramid complex our ancestors have always observed and experimented gaining a better understanding of their World.