Royal women, with Professor Kate Williams

What made Elizabeth II such an enduring figure? In episode one of her HistoryExtra Academy series on royal women, historian Kate Williams explores the life of a queen who took on the crown in a new age of technology and progress

Cleopatra is remembered as a romantic figure, but she was one of the most formidable leaders of the ancient world. In episode two of her HistoryExtra Academy series on royal women, historian Kate Williams considers a life of power, risk and survival

Few historical figures have been as vilified – or as misunderstood – as Marie Antoinette. In episode three of her HistoryExtra Academy series on royal women, historian Kate Williams explains how the cards were stacked against this young queen

In the fourth episode of her HistoryExtra Academy series on royal women, Kate Williams explores the life and reign of Mary I, England’s first crowned queen regnant, whose rule has long been overshadowed by her reputation for religious persecution

Coming to the throne as a young and inexperienced royal, Queen Victoria faced a society that was both sceptical of women’s power and rigid in its expectations of gender roles. So how did she come to be a figurehead of imperial progress? In the fifth episode of this of her HistoryExtra Academy series, Professor Kate Williams explains more

How did three very different royal women set a new course for women in power? In the final episode of her HistoryExtra Academy series on royal women, Kate Williams shares the stories of Boudica of the Iceni, Queen Liliʻuokalani of Hawaii and Princess Grace of Monaco