What is a fact, an event? The question holds not only theoretical value, as it affects the very course of our existence. There are moments when we feel within us the crack of time, that which clearly separates before from after. Sometimes, however, things are more uncertain. The past seems to linger, and we must rely on memory to retrospectively shape the meaning of what happened.

Inspired by the documentary television series of the same name broadcasted by Arte channel, the book explores this issue starting from thirty historical moments that span all eras and the entire world. Each event, whether famous or more unexpected, always appears as an entryway into a story that seeks to be receptive to imagination, memory, and emotion.

These thirty historical moments are: The year 1000, the Crucifixion of Jesus in the year 33, the Hijra in 622 (year 1 of Islam), the mythological founding of Rome in -753, the Olympic Oath during the French Revolution of 1789, the release of Nelson Mandela in 1990, the pilgrimage of Mansa Musa to Mecca in 1324, the carving of the cave art in Lascaux in -16000, the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945, the destruction of Pompeii in the year 79, the Black Death of 1347, the fall of Angkor in 1431(?), the enthronement of Pharaoh Akhenaten in -1348(?), the massacre of the Algerians in Paris in 1961, the Battle of Alesia in -52, the assassination of Henry IV in 1610, the death of Louis IX in 1270 and the last(?) crusade, the death of Alexander the Great in -323, the Battle of Talas in 751, the Battle of Panipat in 1526, the Battle of Borodino/Moscow during Napoleon's campaign in Russia in 1812, the conquest of the South Pole in 1911, Christopher Columbus's voyage in 1492, the "Donation of Constantine" in 315, the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, the revolutions of 1848, the sacking of the Old Summer Palace in Beijing in 1860, the trial of Socrates in -399, the Declaration of Independence of the USA in 1776, the coup in Chile in 1973.

Patrick Boucheron was born in Paris in 1965. A graduate of the École normale supérieure, agrégé, and doctor of history, he is a professor of medieval history at Paris I (Panthéon-Sorbonne) and was elected professor at the Collège de France in 2015. He has particularly focused on the history of medieval Italy, as well as historiography. Under his supervision, the collective volume Histoire mondiale de la France was published, which achieved great editorial success and challenges the ethnocentric French historiography. His books What History Can Do. Introductory Course at the Collège de France (2017) and Leonardo and Machiavelli (2019) were also published by Éditions POLI, while his work Machiavelli: The Art of Teaching People What They Should Fear (2022) was published by Patakis Editions.