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HistoryExtra Academy

Welcome to our HistoryExtra Academy Regency course

In this four-week short course, you'll discover everything you need to know about the Regency period, guided by 18th and 19th-century expert Dr Lizzie Rogers. 

We've worked with Dr Rogers to compile a host of podcasts, articles, quizzes and more that you can enjoy in your own time, including four video lectures by Dr Rogers, each exploring a specific area of Regency history.

Simply scroll down the page to get started.

Course syllabus:

  • Week One: Introduction to the Regency period
  • Week Two: Regency culture
  • Week Three: War and conflict 
  • Week Four: Slavery and abolition
  • End-of-course video masterclass

Once you've completed the course learning, you can download your course completion certificate.
Download your end of course certificate here

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Meet the expert

Dr Lizzie Rogers is a writer and historian of the 18th and early 19th centuries, specialising in women’s history and historic houses, alongside their portrayal on screen, and Jane Austen

Dr Lizzie Rogers
 

Week one - Introduction to the Regency

Dr Lizzie Rogers: "The Regency period is often viewed through the pages of Jane Austen – a time of country house visits, balls and strict social etiquette. Yet, beneath its genteel exterior lurks an era of war and revolution, change and upheaval. This week, we look at the background to the Regency and meet one of its most colourful characters – the Prince Regent"
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Introduction to the Regency, with Dr Lizzie Rogers
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Video Introduction to the Regency . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Regency quiz - week one
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Quiz Introduction to the Regency . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Author Jane Austen and the Prince Regent
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Regency timeline the key dates you need to know . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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King George III
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The illness and decline of King George III . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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An ink drawing of a London 'rag fair' where old clothes and textiles were traded, c1800
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Regency inequality: the gap between rich and poor in Georgian Britain . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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A portrait and a cartoon of George III
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The two sides of George IV: is his wretched reputation deserved? . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Week two - Regency culture

Dr Lizzie Rogers: "This week, we'll be exploring a theme for which the Regency is often remembered: its culture. As you'll discover, this was the era of Romanticism, an artistic movement which emphasised emotions over reason, in art and literature at least. And of course, we'll meet some of the big names of the period – from Jane Austen to Mary Shelley"
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HEXA Regency Week 2
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Video Regency culture . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Regency quiz - week 2
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Quiz Regency culture . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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A Regency gentleman greets a row of ladies
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Everything you wanted to know about Jane Austen's England . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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A Regency parson officiates at a wedding ceremony in a country church, 1820
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How to survive a Regency marriage . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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The Royal Pavilion in Brighton
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Visiting Brighton Royal Pavilion, the Prince Regent’s decadent getaway . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Pod Daisy Hay WL
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The Romantics: everything you wanted to know . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Week two continued...

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Jane Austen, c1790
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Becoming Jane Austen . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Actor Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's Monster in James Whale's classic 1931 film
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Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein: the birth of a gothic monster

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Jane Austen’s England: everything you wanted to know . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Week three - War and Conflict

Dr Lizzie Rogers: "As I outlined in my introductory week one video lecture, the Regency wasn't the calm, genteel period it's so often imagined to have been. Behind the bonnets and balls was an era of war and unrest, both at home and abroad. This week, we'll be exploring some the conflicts and events that shaped Regency life – from the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812, to the Peterloo Massacre"
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HEXA Regency Week 3
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Video War and conflict . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

HEXAcademy Regency QUIZ WK3
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Regency quiz – week three . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Cavalry charge into a crowd of protesters at St Peter's Field, Manchester, as depicted in an 1819 engraving. What followed was the worst violence ever to occur at a political meeting in Britain. (Picture by Alamy)
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The Peterloo Massacre: what did it achieve?

George III at the end of his reign. He
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Uncertainty and unrest: the madness of the Regency period

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General Andrew Jackson (on horseback) led US forces to victory over the British at the battle of New Orleans on 8 January 1815 (Photo by Pierce Archive LLC/Buyenlarge via Getty Images)
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Regency Britain: An age of war and revolution . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Pod Mike Rapport WL
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The Napoleonic Wars: everything you wanted to know . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Week three continued...

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Our illustration shows a woman struggling through wind and snow in 1816 (Illustration by Zara Picken)
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1816: the year without summer . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Peterloo Massacre, Manchester, England, 16 August 1819. (Photo by Ann Ronan Picture Library / Heritage Images)
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Peterloo: the story of a massacre . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Employees operate power looms at a cotton mill in Lancashire (Photo by SSPL/Getty Images)
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Reading between the lines: the real-life events that inspired Jane Austen . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Week four – Slavery and abolition

Dr Lizzie Rogers: "For our final week, we're going to be looking at the late 18th and early 19th-century campaign to end slavery, and the long road to abolition. We'll explore how enslaved people in Haiti rose up against French colonial rule, as well as the tactics employed by British people to demonstrate their opposition to the trade in enslaved people – from petitions to sugar boycotts"
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HEXA Regency Week 4
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Video Slavery and abolition . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Regency Leads Quiz WK4
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Regency quiz – week four . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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A boy signs a petition against slavery (bottom left) in an 1826 satirical cartoon originally titled 'John Bull Taking a Clear View on the Negro Slavery Question', by R Cruikshank (Photo by VCG Wilson/Corbis via Getty Images)
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The children who fought for the abolition of slavery . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Portrait of King George III (Photo by Stock Montage/Getty Images)
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Did George III support the slave trade? . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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American abolitionist and writer Frederick Douglass, c 1866. (Photo by Shutterstock)
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African American abolitionists in Britain . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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The title page and frontispiece of Olaudah Equiano’s Interesting Narrative, a first-hand account of his experience in slavery and how he seized his freedom. (Image by Getty Images)
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David Olusoga on the extraordinary story of Olaudah Equiano . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Week four continued...

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A depiction of the Haiti Rebellion. From 1791-1804, the Caribbean isle of Hispaniola burned and convulsed as enslaved Africans rose up in rebellion after rebellion – finally emerging as independent Haiti. (Image by Getty Images)
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The Haitian Revolution: the enslaved Africans who rose up against France . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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An illustration titled ‘The petition for abolishing the slave trade’, from Amelia Opie’s ’The Black Man's Lament; or How to Make Sugar’, London, 1826. “Come, listen to my plaintive ditty,/Ye tender hearts, and children dear!/And, should it move your souls to pity,/Oh! try to end the griefs you hear.” (Photo by Photo 12/UIG via Getty Images)
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9 key places connected to the abolition of the British slave trade . This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

In late 1781, the crew of the slave ship Zong, facing a shortage of water, threw overboard much of their ‘cargo’. The massacre of 133 African people and resulting law case – not for murder, but insurance – focusses attention to the treatment of enslaved people. (Image by Alamy)
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The Zong Massacre: what the dark episode meant for the British slave trade and abolition

Watch: Regency Masterclass

Dr Lizzie Rogers and Charlotte Hodgman explore some of the key learnings from the recent HistoryExtra Academy Regency course, and answer your burning questions. Click here to watch