Web Animation / History Matters

History Matters, formerly Ten Minute History, is an animated YouTube webseries based in England that covers a wide variety of historical events and topics in a very brief but detailed and well-explained manner (with a hefty helping of dry humour and visual gags). The typical video format involves crudely-drawn animated visuals with historical figures depicted as blocky characters who communicate with each other via placards and a narrator explaining the history in question in voiceover.

Originally, when the channel was known as Ten Minute History, episodes would always run for 10 minutes, but subsequently they have now been reduced to around 3 to 4 minutes for easier accessibility to both viewers and the creator, allowing him to make 2 episodes per week rather than a month. The channel also contains a 20-long episode miniseries about the history of England and Britain from the Roman Period until the English Civil Wars.

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Fun fact - Tropes:

• Adipose Rex: King Henry VIII is not only portrayed with several large chins at the time of his death, but the corresponding "thud" is much louder and deeper than normal to emphasize just how fat he was. The fact that this is averted everywhere else makes this scene all the more notable.
• Ambiguous Situation: In Part 3 of the English and British History series, a title card representing dates for the Mercian Supremacy—the period where what is now known as England was dominated by the Kingdom of Mercia, between periods dominated by Northumbria before and Wessex after—is jumbled, as the exact timeframe is unknown. Earlier in the video, the narrator mentioned that information regarding England between 410 (when the Roman Empire abandoned Britannia) and 850 is greatly limited by a lack of contemporary sources.
• Anti-Climax: One can imagine all the amazing reasons of why certain historical events happened but, given the fact that we're dealing with actual history, the reasoning behind it is, more often than not, rather mundane.
  • The answer to "Why Didn't Rome Conquer Ireland" as the narrator says is that they weren't just that interested in it. Despite some occasional raiding and visits, Ireland simply wasn't worth Rome's attention at the time.
  • "How Did the Soviets React to the Moon Landings" can be considered this somewhat - Contrary to popular belief, the Soviets didn't even try to bury the story, they did report on it (but as secondary news) and showed it on television (but not many people saw it, since TV wasn't a luxury for everyone) so the public reaction was very muted. The Soviets did congratulate the Americans on their achievement since overall they weren't all that invested in the space race anymore (or at least that's what they said publicly).
  • "How Wild was the Wild West" reveals it wasn't really that wild and many of the stereotypes that people associate with the West were either exaggerated or based on myth. Most cowboys weren't outlaws or Gunslingers, they mostly worked as ranchers protecting cattle from predators and cattle thieves and getting into gunfights was discouraged as that would get them fired or worse, hunted by government authorities.
  • Most of the "Why did [x] attack [y]?" videos (e.g. "Why did Napoleon attack Russia?" or "Why did Japan attack Pearl Harbor?") are usually answered with: "Because [x] thought they could win".
  • The popular story about how Pepsi made a trade deal with the Soviet Union during the 1980s, where the company would continue supplying Pepsi to the country in exchange for a fleet of obsolete navy ships that could be sold for scrap metal, which meant Pepsi once had its own Navy, is false. It turns out the whole navy fleet thing was just a suggestion by the Soviet union which the press mistakenly thought was part of the trade deal, when in reality Pepsi got cargo ships they could have owned outright or leased.
  • "Why did the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies only have one Sicily" at one point King Charles I challenged King Peter of Aragon to a duel in English-held France with king Edward I as the referee to decide which one of them got Sicily. However, the fact that that event would have been amazing is the reason that it didn't happen. Instead, Edward was busy and the dispute was decided with wars.
• Artistic License – History: There are often brief asides clearing up popular media-driven misconceptions about the historical events being explained, and some videos are specifically dedicated to this such as “How ‘Wild’ was the Wild West?” and “How Bad was the Spanish Inquisition?”. However, the history videos themselves do occasionally make errors too;
  • In “Ten Minute History - Westward Expansion and the American Civil War”, Missouri is wrongly depicted on the 1845 map as a free state (it was a slave state), and James Buchanan is stated to have been elected in 1852 and be running for reelection in 1856 when in reality he was running for his first term in 1856.
  • In “Ten Minute History - Peter the Great and the Russian Empire”, it was not actually just Tsarevich Alexei who Peter had tortured to death - every single friend or confidant he was thought to have had and all of his servants suffered the same fate.
  • In the “Fall of the Ottoman Empire” video, Hatay is erroneously depicted as part of the newly created Republic of Türkiye in 1922. In reality, Hatay (then Alexandretta) was instead initially established as an autonomous province of French Syria as per the Ankara agreement, briefly gained independence in 1938, and then voted to join Türkiye in 1939 with a highly controversial referendum.
  • Several in “New Courland: When Latvia Built an Empire”, including the very premise. For starters, Latvia did not exist in the 17th century, which the video acknowledges, but the other Latvian homelands of Vidzeme, Latgale, and Selija were also not part of the Duchy of Courland, so the video title is a bit of a stretch already. Additionally, while the majority native peasant population of the Duchy did indeed speak Latvian, most of the Courlander colonists who went to Tobago were of the Baltic German upper and noble classes who settled in Latvia during the crusades of the 14th century, and so even if the colony survived, its descendants wouldn’t be Latvian speakers as the video suggests but more likely German or Dutch speaking. The only native Latvians brought along were indentured servants who either died in the collapse of the first settlement in 1639, were gradually assimilated into the Dutch or German majorities of the subsequent settlements, or on some rare occasions escaped to join Spanish and English buccaneers.
• Artistic License – Nuclear Physics: In "How did the USSR get its nukes?", it is erroneously mentioned that the Soviet Union had no access to weapons-grade uranium (which the US and Britain effectively had a monopoly on at that point) and thus had to "mine" plutonium in order to construct their nukes instead. In reality, Soviet Union did actually have access to uranium deposits within its borders, the issue was that they weren't able to enrich their uranium to weapons grade (a process requiring resources and money that the USSR was fresh out of because of the war) and thus converted it to plutonium in makeshift breeder reactors instead. Plutonium itself also cannot be "mined" as it is a byproduct of decaying uranium-238, meaning it only occurs naturally in extremely small concentrations.
  • A newspaper dated July 27th, 1945 in "Why was Churchill voted out of office after WW2?" has a headline "Bright flash in Nevada is 'Nothing, stop asking'", an obvious reference to the first atomic bomb test. While the vast majority of atomic bomb tests in the US did take place in Nevada, the Trinity Test was in New Mexico.
• Art Shift:
  • Starting in 2019, videos end with the credits having the background as a History Matters-style rendering of a famous work of art. Frequent ones include The Son of Man (regarded by fans to be the narrator's Author Avatar), American Gothic, and Napoleon Crossing the Alps. If it's about the USSR, and has mentions of Stalin, it might show a photograph getting airbrushed to remove someone standing with Stalin. In at least one video, the airbrush was replaced with the Rover from The Prisoner (1967).
  • 2023 saw HM throw more detail into their style without fundamentally changing it. A good comparison would be comparing figures from the English and British Series in 2017-18 to a video made in 2023 about Britain's continued ownership of the Channel Islands.
• The Artifact: After the Retool away from Ten Minute History, videos no longer have a specific time limit that every video sticks to. However, the channel's logo is still a sand timer in reference to the original concept.
• Awakening the Sleeping Giant: In "Why was the USA the first to deal with the Barbary Pirates?", its described how most European nations, particularly larger ones like Britain, France and Spain simply paid off the Barbary pirates since it was less costly than waging war against them. However, for the newly-formed United States, the Barbary pirates were attacking their shipping and the cost of paying them off was still too high, so they opted to wage war. The first war was a narrow victory for the US, who agreed to pay the Barbary States a large tribute in exchange for releasing American Prisoners and for safe passage for their ships. Of course, being pirates, the Barbary States later reneged on their agreement.^note  Mainly because during the War of 1812 the British convinced them to step-up their attacks on American shipping For the second war, the US decided to deal with the Barbary Pirates for good. This time, they sent even more ships and defeated the Barbary states so thoroughly that they had no choice but to agree to permanently stop all raids on American Shipping (in exchange for nothing except their capital not being burned).
  • Making matters worse for the Barbary States, the American Victory sent shockwaves across Europe. Seeing how a smaller, less-powerful state from the other side of the ocean managed to defeat the Barbary States so thoroughly made the larger European Naval powers realize that they no longer had to deal with the Barbary pirates, and thus launched their own campaigns against them. This ultimately led to the French Occupation of Algeria in the 1830s.
• Bait-and-Switch: Sometimes, HM likes to invoke this when describing historical events.
  • In the video discussing the Romanian Revolution of 1989, the narrator describes how a Kangaroo Court found Romanian Communist dictator Ceaușescu and his wife guilty, and they were to spend the rest of their lives in custody… which was literally just 5 minutes since the court sentenced them to be executed, carried out immediately.
  • In discussing the Nigerian Civil War, he describes how Britain aided the Nigerian government because since they previously controlled the region as a colony they were deeply concerned about their well being and-JUST KIDDING. Britain only cared for the nation’s oil and controlling it, which the government promised to them.
• Beat Panel: Used to great effect at the end Part 8 of the English and British history series which covered the Norman Conquest. A panel with just the number 1066—the year that William the Conqueror took control of England—holds for several seconds after the narration ends.
  "1066 is a date that will forever be burned into the English consciousness."
• Became Their Own Antithesis: The various Dutch Reformed Christian denominations were united against Spanish rule as they didn't like Spain's persecution against non-Catholics and their anti-Protestants laws as the various denominations were fine living side by side in peace. After driving out the Spanish from their country, the Dutch Calvinists ended up persecuting their Catholics brothers, including passing anti-Catholic laws, and even went to war with another Dutch Protestant group.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: In "Why did Britain lose Hanover?", it was noted that once the House of Hanover ascended to the British Crown in 1713, the Elector of Hanover at the time, George I, immediately moved to England. His successors would remain there as well—to the point where George III, despite being the ruler of both Britain and Hanover for nearly 60 years, never visited Hanover during his lifetime—leading to a growing alienation between Hanover and Britain. This was amplified after the Napoleonic Wars, when the re-established "Kingdom'' of Hanover made efforts to distance themselves from the British. When William IV died without an heir in 1837, this gave them an out: while Victoria became Queen of the United Kingdom, Salic law disallowed women from rule, so Hanover was taken over by her uncle, Ernest Augustus. But their status as an independent nation only lasted 29 years before they were absorbed by Prussia.
• Bilingual Bonus: The show occasionally makes use of foreign words depending on the subject's theme and it's mostly done when counting reasons.
• Bond Villain Stupidity: In "Why Didn't Britain Make Peace After the Fall of France?", it's noted that Britain's strategy in World War II was to hold out until Germany made a mistake, or something happened that would pull the United States into the fight. British code breakers already knew Hitler was keen on stabbing Stalin in the back, and they predicted this would happen by 1942. Fortunately for them, Germany opened a two-front war by invading the Soviet Union in July 1941, and Japan pulled the US into the fray by attacking Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in December 1941. Even so, the United States didn't join the European war until Germany declared war on the USA, despite their treaty with Japan including no obligation to do so.
• Both Sides Have a Point: In "Was the Glorious Revolution a Dutch Conquest?", the English saw the Revolution as a coup to overthrow a tyrannical king and enthrone a constitutional monarch that would respect Parliament, while the Dutch saw it as a military conquest of the British Isles that made their leader, William of Orange, the new king of the region. The narrator concludes both sides were right as it was both a coup and conquest that benefited both sides.
• The Caligula:
  • Henry VIII certainly gives this vibe, ordering the decapitation of anyone who upsets him, from Thomas More (for refusing to forswear Catholicism and vow allegiance to Henry) to Anne Boleyn (for disagreeing with his religious persecutions) and Thomas Cromwell (for arranging a marriage with Anne of Cleves whom Henry despised).
  • "How Terrible was Ivan the Terrible?" assesses how much the Russian Tsar was deserving of his reputation. In conclusion, it was mostly due to his bullying of his nobility and the occasional psychotic freak out like plundering Novgorod or murdering his son. Other than that, he was not really that different from his contemporaries, especially Henry VIII.
• Catchphrase:
  • "Which raises the question: Why?"
  • "To put it mildly..."
  • "..and died." *thud*
  • "But Fun fact: No."
  • "...these lands."
  • "Unsurprisingly, War."
• Closest Thing We Got: When Belgium won independence from the Dutch, the people hope the European powers would give them a Catholic Belgian who wasn't a tyrant as their new king. Instead, they got Leopold the 1st, a German Protestant and a tyrant, which the narrator snarkily reply "Zero out of Three" ain't that bad.
• Comically Cross-Eyed: When a country is doing something stupid, their leader is sometimes depicted as having these.
• Cut Short: The English and British History series was originally planned to span 42 episodes, but ultimately ended after 20 due to low viewing numbers.
• Deadpan Snarker: The narrator. In fact, a lot of the comedy besides the visual gags comes from his typical British sarcasm in describing the situation.
• Didn't Think This Through: The Stasi never once thought that the reason many East Germans joined the Communist party wasn't that they liked communism, but to get a better chance of getting a job. So the Stasi were caught off guard and dumbfounded when they learned many East Germans hated the Communist Government and wanted their country to reunite with West Germany.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Whenever a character dies, it's typically portrayed as them falling down with a thud, giving the effect of this trope.
  • For Henry VIII in Part 17 of his English and British History series, Henry VIII's thud is considerably louder than the earlier one for his father Henry VII, to punctuate that he had become morbidly obese in his later years.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Some of the very early episodes had some stylistic differences than what would come later.
  • New characters would be introduced with their cartoon representations standing alongside a historical portrait or photograph of the real person. Alongside this, early episodes also made much greater use of photographs of historical events and artifacts in general, which was phased out until the episodes are virtually entirely animated.
  • Some early episodes also featured text-based factoids to explain details not mentioned in the narration, which too was soon cut.
  • The series was created as an Edutainment Show aimed at British GCSE and A-Level students, and as such the early episodes largely focus on areas of history that are in the school curriculum and have a level of detail that is relevant for helping students revise. The videos are still age-appropriate for that audience, but the series' subject matter has grown to be much more open-ended since then.
• Epic Fail: "What Happened When Kamikaze Pilots Failed or Wimped Out?" begins this way, as a kamikaze pilot buzzes, but does not collide with, an aircraft carrier.
  "You had one job."
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: In "Why did Britain lose Hanover?", when they mention the death of King George III, he’s only seen briefly before he goes *thud* for his 1820 death. So you have to press pause quickly to see the derpy look on his face since he was crazy his last nine years, similar to the look given King Henry VI for his bouts of madness during the Wars of the Roses.^note The face for Henry VI doesn't count for this, as it's seen frequently throughout that episode, including on an info card detailing his mental breaks.
  • Often when a newspaper appears on screen, it's filled with silly articles along with the main headline.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Bartholomew Roberts was just some Welshman who wasn't really well known until he became a pirate captain by chance after his predecessor died and became the scourge of the Atlantic, sacking everything on his path and becoming infamous for his inclination to random cruelty.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: "Why Did Japan Join the Axis?" explains that one of the key reasons Imperial Japan sided with Germany and Italy was a fear of an Anglo-American hegemony in the event of inaction. Needless to say, not only did this prove to the USA that Japan was a hostile nation, but it ended up bringing out the outcome they wished to avoid.
• Gratuitous Foreign Language: Sometimes done with signs and other markers saying "No". This included "Non" for French, "Нет" (latinization: Nyet) for Russian, and "No (in Spanish)" and "No (in Italian)" since it's the same word in Spanish and Italian.
• Hero of Another Story: Sigurd from "The Norwegian Crusade" episode. When people think about famous crusaders, few think of him even though he was the very first monarch to embark on a crusade before Richard the Lionheart and had a very successful campaign managing to make it home with lots of prestige. And while he is relatively obscure today, his deeds made him very famous during his own lifetime.
• Hoist by His Own Petard:
  • Wealthy landowners in the Scottish Highlands began evicting their tenants and resettling them near the coast in the 18th and the 19th centuries as part of what came to be known as the "Highland Clearances". The landowners quickly established massive sheep farms on the cleared land, which eventually ended up as a commercial failure due to the fact that many of the displaced tenants travelled to New Zealand and established sheep farms of their own; the competition between the two ended badly for the landowners.
  • The Protestant King William I of Netherlands mistreated his Catholic subjects in the South due to their religion and heavily tax them, which led the Catholics to rebel, eventually breaking off from the Netherlands to become the Kingdom of Belgium.
• Honor Before Reason:
  • During the English and British History series, it is noted that both King Stephen during the Anarchy, and the Duke of York in The Wars of the Roses, got captured/killed because they charged into battle too fast.
  • Many clans in the Scottish Highlands remained loyal to the House of Stuart even after it was replaced by the House of Orange and then the House of Hanover. Their refusal to abandon their allegiance to the House of Stuart led to repeated government persecution from the 1690's until the 1740's, culminating in bloody reprisals after the failure of the Jacobite rising of 1745.
  • Even though Spain knew they couldn't defeat the United States during the Spanish-American War, they still fought to maintain their country's honor and to keep Cuba and the Philippines in their control since those countries were still the last remnants of the Spanish Empire.
• I'm a Humanitarian: "The Time When the Dutch Ate their Prime Minister" covers the infamous and surreal incident where Dutch prime minister Johan de Witt was executed by an angry mob, who proceeded to devour him on the spot. Despite the shocking nature of his death, the Dutch considered his death justified and went to great lengths to minimize the cannibalism's severity by stating that it was quite "civilized".
• Insufferable Genius:
  • "Why Did Napoleon Invade Russia?" can be answered by the simple fact Napoleon was so convinced of his own genius, and the belief the Russians were all paper tigers that would break upon confrontation, that he severely underestimated Russia, and as a result he didn't anticipate the invasion would go as poorly as it did.
  • Dutch Prime Minister Johan de Witt tried to strip the House of Orange from power to ensure his country would remain a republic and not a kingdom again ended up angering half the country who still supported the former royal family. When France invaded and easily defeated the Netherlands, many people blamed de Witt since he spent most of their military budget on the Navy. This would eventually lead to de Witt and his brother being captured, executed and eaten by an Angry Mob.
• Interrupted by the End: "How did Europe React to a second Emperor Napoleon?" ended abruptly after noting the UK deciding to pretend to be friends with France so they could guide Napoleon III to act against the other great powers of Europe at the time. Fans initially deduced this as a metaphor for the abrupt end to Napoleon III's rule at the hands of the Prussians. But since the video was afterward deleted, it was likely due to an error on the Creator's part.
• It Makes Sense in Context:
  • In Part 16 of the English and British History series, when the "Love Day"—an attempt by King Henry VI to cool tensions between the Houses of Lancaster and York in 1458—is mentioned, King Henry holds a sign saying "Peace in our time", which references Neville Chamberlain's quote^note or rather, the popular mondegreen of the real quote, "peace for our time" after his appeasement of Adolf Hitler prior to World War II.
    • That sign was earlier held by Roman Emperor Septimius Severus in the beginning of Part 2 of the same series, after the Roman Year of the Five Emperors.
  • When it's mentioned in "Why didn't Spain join World War One?" that Spain's rapid industrialization while supplying combatants on both sides led to rapid increases in its gold reserves, a graph visualization of that increase catches the attention of Josef Stalin. During the Spanish Civil War, the Spanish Republican government sent their gold reserves to the Soviet Union for "safe-keeping", eventually bought weapons from them, and Spain never got their gold reserves back since the Fascist Francisco Franco won.
• Kangaroo Court: Pops up on occasion. For example, he explained that the trial of Nicolae Ceaușescu at the fall of Communist Romania was really only a means to justify his and his wife's execution.
  "Now this trial didn't have time for silly little things like evidence or lawyers, and was frankly little more than a sham."
  • Averted in the case of the witchcraft trials under King James I in Part 19 of the English and British History series, as it’s noted that courts tended to be sceptical of witchcraft allegations, and convictions were actually uncommon.
  • The same can be said about the Spanish Inquisition. It's noted in "How Bad was the Spanish Inquisition?" that the Inquisition was also sceptical of claims of witchcraft, and those trials also more often than not ended in acquittal, with proven false claims being punished frequently. Only 2% of all trials raised before the Spanish Inquisitions ended in execution. While there was indeed corruption involved, they weren't any less fair than other forms of jurisprudence of the time. (And contrary to modern belief, everyone expected the Spanish Inquisition, as those who were accused were typically given one month's notice prior to prosecution.)
• Last-Second Word Swap: In "How and why did Switzerland become Neutral?" the narrator quickly stops himself from saying Nazi Germany stole the gold they were selling to neutral Switzerland during World War II. The picture for it shows a gold tooth removed from a freshly-executed dissident, emphasizing the true nature of the gold being trafficked by Nazi Germany.
• Left Hanging: The early 2019 transition of the channel from Ten Minute History to the shorter History Matters format appears to have halted a series on English and British History at Part 20 on the English Civil War of the mid-17th century. Thumbnails for two parts of the series that have not yet been produced have been seen:
  • The end of Part 20 has a thumbnail for Part 21, which would cover the Glorious Revolution. The Glorious Revolution would see coverage in September 2019 in "Was the Glorious Revolution a Dutch Conquest?"
  • An even later segment on the "Age of Reform" (covering the first half of the 19th century after the Napoleonic Wars) has a thumbnail seen in Part 8.
• Let No Crisis Go to Waste: The majority of Europe was neutral during the American Civil War or at the very least gave their verbal support to the Union for its anti-slavery stance. However, some nations decided to take advantage of the war in various ways, such as France invading Mexico unopposed since the USA couldn't enforce the Monroe Doctrine while fighting a civil war, and the Ottomans getting rich supplying Europe with cotton due to the Confederacy being unable to export any of theirs as a result of the Union Blockade.
• Loophole Abuse:
  • When the newly formed Italian Royal Army laid siege to the Vatican, the Pope tried to prevent the army from attacking the city by threatening to excommunicate the officer in charge of the Siege if he ordered an attack since most of the army were Catholics. The Italian Army got around this by assigning a Jewish officer to lead the attack, making the Pope's threat useless.
  • Due to the Catholic Church banning the practice of Usury (borrowing money from someone and paying them back with interest) which they consider sinful, Medieval banks got around this rule while still making a profit in two ways: 1. Charging their client with late fees if they didn't pay back in the time (and banning anyone who did as subtle warning to their other clients to play along with their scheme) and 2. have their clients pay them in another foreign currency whose exchange rate was much higher from the original payments.
• Might Makes Right: Why did Japan end up under the USA's sole dominion rather than divided between the allies like Germany or Austria? The US was the largest contributor of the Pacific campaign and also the only one who have nuclear weapons.
• Money, Dear Boy: It's noted in "Why were the sides in the Nigerian Civil War so weird?" that the UK supported the Nigerian government because they were still invested in the oil reserves in Biafra, and France supported Biafra because they sought to get their hands in those oil reserves.invoked
• Motor Mouth: The narrator tends to speak very fast depending on how quickly he can conclude a subject.
• My Friends... and Zoidberg: Whenever the Treaty of Versailles is mentioned, the treaty always says "The Winners (and Belgium)."
• N-Word Privileges: When explaining the origins of the word "Guinea" in "Why are so many countries called Guinea?", he refers to the European name for the land in Africa between Barbary and Guinea as "Another Term". That term in reality was "Negroland", which wasn't directly mentioned in the video for obvious reasons.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished:
  • "Why Did Bulgaria Join the Axis?" shows Tsar Boris III and the Eastern Orthodox Church refused to implement the Nazis' anti-Jewish laws and deport its Jewish citizens out of Bulgaria. This didn't stop Bulgaria from being invaded and occupied by the Soviets.
  • Paying back your loan in time before you get charged with late fees by the Medieval banks will get you ban since the banks can't make profit.
  • Those clans in the Scottish Highlands who remained loyal to the deposed House of Stuart and taking part in the Jacobite rebellions were punished by the Hanoverian government by having elements of their culture such as kilts and Highland weapons banned for decades.
• No, You: Like his frequent use of Your Mom, he also occasionally has historical figures respond to requests this way.
• Non-Indicative Name:
  • The Angevin Empire was actually never called like that since it was a later designation by historians.
  • The Hundred Years War didn't last exactly a century, but actually 116 years since there were long periods of peace due to widespread disease and lack of money to fund military campaigns.
  • The Spanish Flu is actually not Spanish and its origin is heavily speculated (it could have originated in World War I's battlefield, the USA or China). The reason why it's called like that was that the media labeled Spain, a neutral country during the war, as the origin in order to not ruin the war effort.
  • He starts his video about the Kingdom of the two Sicilies clarifying that it only had one Sicily. The main reason is that the Norman kingdom of Sicily included not only the island but also southern Italy, and both parts kept that name after being partitioned.
• Non-Standard Character Design: The H1N1 Influenza is represented as a character of its own right, drawn like a pathogen using speech tables and wearing a Spanish hat in contrast to all blocky characters in the series.
• "Not Making This Up" Disclaimer:
  • In "Why Are Purple Flags So Rare", the narrator explains that the Royal French flag really was all white and not a mean joke about the French infamous reputation to always surrender.
  • In "Peter the Great and the Russian Empire", he pulls this one when Peter banishes lawyers from court because they talk too much.
• No Swastikas:
  • In later videos that mention Nazis in any way, the creator avoids referring to them directly or display any associated symbols in order to avoid flagging by Youtube's system. This includes calling Hitler as "Mr. Mustache" instead. However, Hitler does wear an armband with half a swastika visible.
  • Outside of YouTube, the show has a small line of merchandise themed after their borders at their largest. "Peak Germany" features the borders of the Kaiserreich. Actual "Peak Germany" would be Nazi Germany circa 1940-1942, which for obvious reasons isn't suitable for light-heartedly celebrating on a piece of merch.
• Not Me This Time: The reaction of the USSR to the JFK assassination. They go so far as to cooperate with the United States in their investigation and release all the information they had on Lee Harvey Oswald in hopes to avert a nuclear war.
• Oddly Named Sequel 2: Electric Boogaloo: In the video on the Cod Wars between the United Kingdom and Iceland, Cod War II is subtitled "Electric Boogaloo".
• Only Six Faces: All characters have square faces with only two eyes and a mouth as universal features. Any distinctive features that make them stand out from each other are either beards, clothing, ethnicity or other accessories (and in the case of King Henry VIII, multiple chins to symbolize him getting fat later in life). The reason why is because the creator can't draw and he can only use Paint program.
• Please Select New City Name: A couple of episodes cover the name origins and renames of certain countries.
  • The United States of America had other options besides the first name such as Colombia (named after Christopher Colombus) and Fredonia. The former was considered for some time, but the opportunity was taken away forever when Simon Bolivar formed Gran Colombia, and one of the succeeding states took the name for themselves. Fredonia actually gained some traction, but it was eventually turned down because it was considered too corny, ultimately becoming a joke about people viewed as too patriotic.
  • Despite being known for most of its history as Persia, the country's actual name is Iran and they always called it as such. The misnaming come from the Greeks who named it after their elite class the Farsis, and the name practically stuck. It wouldn't be until the 20th Century when the Shah of Iran requested the world community to refer to their country as Iran rather than Persia and pretty much everyone accepted... with the exception of Britain because old habits die hard.
  • The Russian enclave of Kaliningrad was originally titled Konigsburg since it was originally part of Prussia and later Germany, but it was annexed and remained by the Soviet Union following World War II and remained as such until its disintegration and became a Russian territory since then, since none of their neighbors (Poland, Lithuania and Germany) wanted it.
• Plot Twist: The reveal of Henry Bolingbroke as the son of John of Gaunt is treated this way in Part 14 of the English and British History series, as he's not revealed to be Gaunt's son until Gaunt goes *thud* in 1399. This goes right into the events that led to Henry Bolingbroke becoming King as King Henry IV.
  Henry Bolingbroke: Surprise! I'm his son
• Purple Is Powerful: And expensive in ''Why are Purples Flags So Rare?", which explains purple dye could only be afforded to privileged classes like nobility or the high ranks of clergy due to its costs, and couldn't simply be applied to heraldry since they'd spend more money on wars. The best they could do is mix red and blue dyes which often didn't look very good. By the time synthetic purple dye was created, the color had bad reputation among republics that broke away from empires and monarchies due to its use by the royalty and clergy.
• Quintessential British Gentleman: That's certainly how the narrator is voiced. Fans generally regard his Author Avatar to be a depiction of The Son of Man, a 1964 Belgian painting of a man in a bowler hat with his face covered by a green apple.
• A Rare Sentence:
  • His episode on the cannibalisation of a dutch prime minister opens with the seldom-heard "Historically speaking, prime ministers aren't food"
  • In his "Why was Singapore kicked out of Malaysia?" video we got: "The Singaporean Representatives reluctantly declared independence".
• Retool: From Ten Minute History (covering a broad period of time in ten minutes) to History Matters (covering a specific historical question in around three to five minutes).
• Running Gag
  • Frequently seen signs for certain fates:
    • Torture: "thumb screw time"
    • Execution: "Bad luck"
    • Imprisonment: "Have fun!"
  • Someone's death causing problems mostly for the person who died due to the whole "being dead" thing.
  • Anytime a King of France is introduced, the King's name is always Louis. And when that King's name isn't Louis, the narrator will be surprised.
  • It's the year X, and "character", is dead. *thud*
  • Whenever the narrator said things got better, he admits he lied and actually reveals things got worse.
  • "You'd think people would act in a more rational manner but Fun Fact, No".
  • Anyone who's planning to attack another in the future will hold a sign saying "Soon" while squinting at them.
  • Someone running around with joy on a field of flowers.
  • Confrontations taking place in a countryside field. This is lampshaded in Part 14 of the English and British History series where Richard II fires his chancellor, Michael de la Pole (then Earl of Suffolk), on command of Parliament, representing the first ever English impeachment:
    Richard II: You're fired
    Michael de la Pole: Why are we in a field?
  • If someone makes a bad decision, there's a good chance that another character will invade their personal space holding a sign saying "Silly man".
  • Whenever the Narrator uses the word "well" a picture of a water well will appear on the screen. Also whenever he uses the word "see" a picture of the letter C on top of sea water will appear
  • When the Narrator explains how one side provoked the other into open hostilities, the provoker will hold a sign reading "Fight me nerd!"
  • Recently whenever he briefly talks about something, there will be a sign saying "[Insert topic], yo".
  • When he mentions that a certain person was chosen for a given thing, the chooser will normally appear with a sign reading "You will do."
    • This has one subversion in Part 9 of the English and British History series: William the Conqueror's youngest son, Henry Beauclerc, got "a wad of cash and no land" for his inheritance,^note £5,000, to be exact, which was enormous for the time. His eldest brother, Robert Curthose, became Duke of Normandy; the surviving middle brother, William Rufus, became King of England as William II. This would result in some major infighting between the two older brothers initially. and it says "it'll do" on the screen as Henry runs through a field of flowers. He'd go on to eventually inherit both his surviving brothers' lands, taking England from William II Rufus upon his death, and getting Normandy by beating his eldest brother, Robert Curthose, in battle. This was actually what William I thought would ultimately happen.
  • Whenever he talks about how the situation should be changed/reformed/improved one of the characters will hold a sign simply saying "Be better".
  • Any scene in the United Nations simplifies its flag as a pair of laurels framing text which reads "Insert Earth here".
  • Scenes depicting an ideal political map of Europe from France's perspective always completely erase the United Kingdom from existence.
  • Military operations going incredibly well... for the opposing side.
  • Someone or a nation doing something surprisingly reasonable in reaction to an event Just Kidding! they did the opposite.
  • So many of the issues of European geopolitics being traced back to Napoleon.
• Shout-Out:
  • There are at least two videos in which "there was one exception" is represented by a picture of Genghis Khan, in reference to a running gag in Crash Course World History about the Mongols being the exception to every rule.
  • A chalkboard in Part 8 of the English and British History series that appears at the beginning of the final summation of the Norman Conquest reads "1066 and all that".
  • In Part 19 of the English and British History series, a scene depicting a witchcraft trial shows an accuser with a sign saying "She turned me into a newt."
  • The "Thirty Years War" episode contains some Sabaton references to its "Lion From the North" song; not only does Gustavus Adolphus hold a sign saying "Libera et impera" at one point, but the lead vocalist Joakim Bróden is among the Swedish soldiers charging their enemies.
  • In "The Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany", the scene of Hitler's suicide in the bunker features a blackboard in the background with a notice stating "No Parodies Allowed".
  • Zarya appears among the retreating Russian soldiers fleeing from Napoleon during the "French Revolution and Napoleon" episode.
  • Obi-Wan Kenobi literally appears in the "Norman Conquest" episode during the Battle of Hastings when the English and the Normans are about to clash and Harold Godwinson warning Norman that he has the high ground, with Ben appearing next to complete it with "don't try it".
  • The gag is repeated again in "How Did Mexico React to the Zimmerman Telegram" when Venustiano Carranza and Woodrow Wilson re-enact Anakin and Obi-Wan's duel respectively and the latter says "Don't try it" to deter Mexico from joining the Central Powers.
  • When Ceaușescu is giving his speech in front of an angry crowd in the Romanian Revolution video, one person's protest sign reads "Go commit die".
  • Batman and Robin appear a few times, most notably in the Knights going on Quests video when the narrator says "Name a more iconic duo".
  • In "Why is there an electoral college?" Video Karl Franz appears to summon the Electors.
  • In one video featuring the end card where someone standing next to Stalin is airbrushed out, the eraser is instead the Rover from The Prisoner (1967).
  • During the intro of his "Why does Belarus Exist?" The Narrator mentioned one of the questions who keep us up at night to be: "Why are we here?"
  • In "Why didn't the Tsar Flee Russia During the Russian Revolution", when it mentions that King George V of the UK didn't want to abandon his cousin, Tsar Nicholas II, it shows him pushing his frozen corpse off a wooden raft.
  • In "Why did Sweden and Norway Break Up?", when partisans confront the Swedish government about their resistance to Norway's independence in 1905, the Swedish Chef joins them.
    YouTube Commenter: It's nice to see the Swedish Chef taking an active role in his country's politics.
  • In "Why are there so many countries called Guinea?", when he mentions that explorers who explored Papua named the island "New Guinea", he included a screen in the style of The Office where someone says "They're the same people."^note This is based on a meme in which Pam tries to fool a manager into finding differences in identical copies of the same picture.
  • Over the end credits of episodes about East Germany (including "Who opposed German Reunification?" and "What did the Stasi do?"), the Berlin Wall is shown with a man in a leather jacket and a microphone is being lifted by a bucket crane, a reference to David Hasselhoff's memetic performance of "Looking For Freedom" at the Berlin Wall.
  • In "Why is Antarctica Divided?" MacReady, Nauls and Garry briefly appear when the narrator mentions that the 1959 Antarctic treaty made the continent a haven of scientific research.
  • When mentioning in "What Happened to Prussia?" episode how in 1932 the German Chancellor Franz von Papen dissolved the Prussian state government and took direct control of the state, there's a shot of von Papen floating through the air with glowing yellow eyes.
  • "Why wasn't France carved up when Napoleon was defeated?" references the victorious coalition splitting into two 'camps' i.e. those who wanted France to lose territory and those who didn't. A literal camp is shown, with Jason Voorhees standing up in the background.
  • The video on the Anglo-German Naval Arms Race shows Admiral Jackie Fisher holding a sign reading "More dakka."
  • In "Why was Kazakhstan the last to leave the USSR?" the Byelorussian flag has an alien from Space Invaders within the decorative pattern along one edge.
  • "How did Europe React to the Fall of Constantinople" describes the Pope calling for a crusade by showing Nicholas V in a sleeveless dress in front of the Wheel of Fortune board displaying D_US _ULT.
• Shown Their Work: Despite the basic art style, there's a good amount of effort put into making sure every historical character, and even many generic ones, have the correct fashion and equipment choices for the time period being depicted.
  • "Why didn't the Tsar Flee Russia During the Russian Revolution?" features a shot lasting less than a second of Nicholas II in prison, where he has a dragon tattoo on his right arm. This tattoo was real, having got it while on a visit to Japan, but remains a little-known detail.
  • "Hiroshima: After the Bomb" features a Catholic priest as a generic character throughout the video. This is a nod to how southern Japan is a key region for Christianity in the country; Nagasaki in-particular is a city that has had a large Christian population ever since its founding as a port for Portuguese traders.
  • In "Who decided how Germany would be divided after WW2?", the White House under Harry Truman is depicted with a visibly damaged wall. This is a reference to how, by the mid to late 1940's, the White House was legitimately structurally unsound and in a dilapidated state. The Truman Reconstruction as it came to be known from 1949 to 1952 practically rebuilt the entire White House from scratch, keeping only its outdoor façade.
  • "Why is the Vatican an Independent Country?" shows Benito Mussolini running through the street past a building with a big grey face surrounded by the word SI repeated numerous times. Yes, that was a real building, and serves at the page image for Fascist Italy.
  • Most of the character models are distinguished by clothing, hairstyle, and facial hair (for men). Lord Halifax is further distinguished by a left hand that is black, rather than matching his flesh tone, because he was born without a left hand and used a mechanical prosthetic with a black glove.
• Sophisticated as Hell: "Rampjaar" is translated as, "a year, which in retrospect, can safely be described as being pants." It actually translates as simply, "disaster year."
  • Done with a lot of the on-screen text in contrast to the narration. For example, in the video "How and why did Switzerland become Neutral?"
    "Keeping this peace wasn't out of any desire to maintain their neutrality, but for two reasons. The first was that the states around them were much larger and getting invaded by them sucked. The second was the Protestant Reformation." *Animation of man in priest's cassock holding hammer walking away from church door to which he has affixed paper reading "Y'all dumb. Love, Martin Luther."*
• Sound-Only Death:
  • Suicide by major players is occasionally done this way, with the suicides of Adolf Hitler in "Ten Minute History - The Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany" and an unnamed leader of the August Coup^note Likely Soviet Interior Minister Boris Pugo. in "The Last Ditch Attempt to Save the USSR" depicted as the sound of single gunshot blasts from behind closed doors.
  • The execution of Nicolae and Elena Ceaușescu is handled this way, as they are led out of a courtroom, and we hear machine gun fire the moment they go off-screen.
• Spanner in the Works: With the Great War ending, Woodrow Wilson was planning to have the United States make a peace treaty with Germany by joining the League of Nations. However, the Democratic Party just lost the Midterm elections to the Republican Party, who wanted a new peace treaty with Germany without joining the League of Nations.
• Speech Impediment: In "Edward VIII and the Abdication Crisis", the signs held by Prince Albert/King George VI included a repeated letter, since he was known to have a stutter.
  Prince Albert: (to King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson) You've s-shamed us all
• The Stinger: Sometimes used in videos. For instance "Did Pepsi Really Own the Sixth Largest Navy in the World?" (about an Urban Legend that the USSR paid Pepsi in decommissioned warships because the Ruble couldn't be converted to foreign currency) ends with "It's all fun and games until Coke gets an aircraft carrier".
• Suicide by Cop: In the video on why no one duels anymore, the narrator reveals Churches supported banning the practice since suicidal people were using duels to honorably get themselves killed.
• Suspiciously Specific Denial:
  • In Part 9 of the English and British series, he says that King William II's hunting accident death was described as "an arrow-related accident which in no way, shape, or form looked suspicious." He then said William's little brother Henry (soon crowned King Henry I) seized the royal treasury "before William's body was cold".^note Contemporary accounts showed no sympathy for William Rufus. Later historiographical analysis suggests that if Henry had plans to seize the throne in this manner, it would've been easier for him to wait until a seemingly-inevitable war between William Rufus and their older brother—Robert, the Duke of Normandy, who was returning from the First Crusade—before assassinating the victor.
  • "Edward VIII and the Abdication Crisis" notes how King George V's death was hastened by an injection of morphine and cocaine so his death could be announced in the morning papers instead of the seedier evening papers, and the byline on the Morning News says "'He totally wasn't murdered,' says Palace".
• Take That!: France is frequently ragged on for having so many kings named "Louis".
  • In "Why doesn't France own the Channel Islands?", he refers to King John as "King John the Only".
• Talking with Signs: Everyone except The Narrator do this.
• Tempting Fate: George Orwell gets shot in the throat while holding a sign that says "My neck feels great".
• Unfortunate Names: During the English and British History series, the narrator notes the bad kings named "John": King John "Lackland" of England, King John Balliol of Scotland (who was deposed during the First War or Scottish Independence), and King John II of France (who was imprisoned by England during the Hundred Years War and spent the last eight years of his life in prison).
• Unusual Euphemism: HM comes up with a variety of strange euphemisms for death. Like saying Henry VII "continued the long tradition of English monarchs" by dying, Josef Stalin opting "to follow in Lenin's footsteps and die", Archduke Franz Ferdinand having "tried his hand at being assassinated", or Queen Anne having "opted out of living".
• Visual Pun:
  • The above mentioned extra letter in Prince Albert/George VI's speech
  • In the Australian Constitutional Crisis video, one Whitlam supporter holds a sign "More like cur, am I right?" referring to Governor-General Kerr. This is, in fact, a pun that Whitlam himself made in the aftermath of the crisis.
  • In fact, the series tends to have a lot of history in-jokes that only appear in the visual art itself. Perhaps a subtle nod to those who actually are familiar with the topic being covered. Many things which appear either random jokes or artistic choices turn out to be actually directly relevant to aspects of the historical event.
• War Is Hell: While warfare is a near-universal component of most featured topics, special attention is paid certain examples like the Thirty Years War and World War I for their negative effects on the populace.
• We ARE Struggling Together:
  • Despite the Dutch fighting to free themselves from Spanish rule, the various Christian factions were also fighting amongst themselves over denomination differences like the Calvinists and the Catholics.
  • During the French Wars of Religion, the monarchy and the Catholic League were technically on the same side against the Protestants by virtue of both being Catholics, but due to the former's moderate stance and tendency to appease their enemies was abhorred by the more radical and fundamentalist league, they turned on each other which led to their downfall and the Protestants' eventual victory.
  • The answer to "Why Didn't The Arab World Unite?" boils down to one simple question: "Who is going to be in charge?" The public support was there and Arab leaders were genuine about uniting their countries, but they never got far because no one could agree on who would lead them.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: “Why was Napoleon exiled instead of being executed?” went into detail about how the various Coalition powers wanted to deal with Napoleon, and why. Many saw executing Napoleon as a bad idea, since his rule was initially legitimized by the blessing of the Pope. Additionally, some, particularly the United Kingdom, figured that executing him would make him a martyr, and destabilize the restored Bourbon monarchy.
• Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing: In "Why did Denmark gain land after WWI despite being neutral?", it is noted that Denmark got Northern Schleswig from Germany after World War I solely because of the desires of the Entente to punish Germany as much as possible. England and France wanted Denmark to take all of Schleswig-Holstein—which all previously belonged to Denmark, but was conquered by Prussia in the 1860s—but Denmark only agreed to hold referenda for Northern and Central Schleswig, seeing Holstein as too Germanized to credibly rule as part of Denmark. Northern Schleswig overwhelmingly agreed to join Denmark, and Central Schleswig chose to stay with Germany, so Denmark only annexed Northern Schleswig (now part of Syddanmark).
• You Will Be Spared:
  • Even though former Chinese Emperor Puyi was an Axis collaborator and a puppet to Imperial Japan, Mao Zedong decided to let him live (unlike Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-Shek, who wanted to execute Puyi). Mao had observed the Soviet execution of Tsar Nicholas II as a stain on their regime, and wanted to show how Chinese communism was superior to Soviet communism by converting their former monarch to their ideology. So Mao imprisoned Puyi and indoctrinated him as a Communist.
  • Despite many people, including Stalin, wanting Emperor Hirohito deposed, arrested and tried, the United States chose to keep him in power. The reasoning was that it would make it easier for them to maintain control in Japan, and make the Japanese people accept American Occupation. Furthermore, the United States did not want to risk Japan falling to Communism.
• Your Mom: Several of the videos show one side holding up a sign with some variant of this toward the other.