The Great Courses

One of On the Tudor Trail’s readers has recently brought ‘The Great Courses‘ to my attention. But what exactly is it?

“The Great Courses brings engaging professors into your home or car through courses on DVD, audio CD, and other formats. Since 1990, great teachers from the Ivy League, Stanford, Georgetown, and other leading colleges and universities have crafted over 350 courses for lifelong learners. We provide the adventure of learning, without the homework or exams.”

They offer a variety of comprehensive courses in History and many other subject areas. Of particular interest are the following two courses:

Age of Henry VIII

Taught By Professor Dale Hoak, Ph.D., University of Cambridge, The College of William and Mary.

This course is made up of 24 30 minute lectures covering the following:

1. Henry VIII—Kingship and Revolution
2. The Wars of the Roses and Henry VII
3. Majesty and Regality—The Cult of Monarchy
4. Chivalry and War—The Accession of Henry VIII
5. King and Cardinal—England Under Wolsey
6. Magnificence, War, and Diplomacy, 1519-29
7. Anne Boleyn and the King’s “Great Matter”
8. King, Church, and Clergy
9. Church and People—Heresy and Popular Religion
10. Rex Est Imperator—The Break With Rome
11. Parliament, Law, and the Nation
12. The Trial and Execution of Thomas More
13. Humanism and Piety
14. Wealth, Class, and Status
15. More’s Utopia
16. The Dissolution of the Monasteries
17. Rebellion—The Pilgrimage of Grace
18. A Renaissance Court
19. Queen Anne Boleyn
20. Two Queens—Jane Seymour and Anne of Cleves
21. Politics, Sex, and Religion—Catherine Howard
22. Queen Katherine Parr
23. Endgame—Politics and War, 1542-47
24. Retrospect—Henry VIII: The King and His Age

The course is offered in three different formats: DVD, Audio CD and Audio download.

For more detailed information visit The Great Courses here.

History of England from the Tudors to the Stuarts

Taught By Professor Robert Bucholz, D.Phil., Oxford University,
Loyola University Chicago.

This course is made up of 48 30 minute lectures covering the following:

1. England 1485–1714, the First Modern Country (info)
2. The Land and Its People in 1485—I (info)
3. The Land and Its People in 1485—II (info)
4. The Land and Its People in 1485—III (info)
5. Medieval Prelude—1377–1455 (info)
6. Medieval Prelude—1455–85 (info)
7. Establishing the Tudor Dynasty—1485–97 (info)
8. Establishing the Tudor Dynasty—1497–1509 (info)
9. Young King Hal—1509–27 (info)
10. The King’s Great Matter—1527–30 (info)
11. The Break from Rome—1529–36 (info)
12. A Tudor Revolution—1536-47 (info)
13. The Last Years of Henry VIII—1540–47 (info)
14. Edward VI—1547-53 (info)
15. Mary I—1553-58 (info)
16. Young Elizabeth—1558 (info)
17. The Elizabethan Settlement—1558–68 (info)
18. Set in a Dangerous World—1568–88 (info)
19. Heart and Stomach of a Queen—1588–1603 (info)
20. The Land and Its People in 1603 (info)
21. Private Life—The Elite (info)
22. Private Life—The Commoners (info)
23. The Ties that Bound (info)
24. Order and Disorder (info)
25. Towns, Trade, and Colonization (info)
26. London (info)
27. The Elizabethan and Jacobean Age (info)
28. Establishing the Stuart Dynasty—1603–25 (info)
29. The Ascendancy of Buckingham—1614–28 (info)
30. Religion and Local Control—1628–37 (info)
31. Crisis of the Three Kingdoms—1637–42 (info)
32. The Civil Wars—1642–49 (info)
33. The Search for a Settlement—1649–53 (info)
34. Cromwellian England—1653–60 (info)
35. The Restoration Settlement—1660–70 (info)
36. The Failure of the Restoration—1670–78 (info)
37. The Popish Plot and Exclusion—1678–85 (info)
38. A Catholic Restoration? 1685–88 (info)
39. The Glorious Revolution—1688–89 (info)
40. King William’s War—1689–92 (info)
41. King William’s War—1692–1702 (info)
42. Queen Anne and the Rage of Party—1702 (info)
43. Queen Anne’s War—1702–10 (info)
44. Queen Anne’s Peace—1710–14 (info)
45. Hanoverian Epilogue—1714–30 (info)
46. The Land and Its People in 1714—I (info)
47. The Land and Its People in 1714—II (info)
48. The Meaning of English History—1485–1714 (info)

The course is offered in three different formats: DVD, Audio CD and Audio download.

For more detailed information visit The Great Courses here.

Although they are not cheap, these courses have excellent reviews and are of very high quality. Harvard Magazine calls them “Pure intellectual stimulation that can be popped into the anytime.”