You are one of the jurors at the trial of Socrates, who is accused of corruption and impiety. After the verdict, argument ensues about an appropriate punishment. You are arguing against the death penalty, but those around you seem determined to impose it. What happens next?

In Constantinople, the emperor Constantine decrees that Christians must cut all ties with their Jewish heritage or face execution. What does this mean for you and your family? How do you react to this new law? What do you choose to do?

You are walking out on the clifftop, and you see a fleet of Viking ships on the horizon. As you watch, you realise they are heading towards the coast. What happens next?

You are a member of Macbeth’s household. When King Duncan is killed, you realise that everything is changing around you. What do you do? Do you stay loyal to Macbeth, or do you leave and join those who oppose him?

You are on board the Mary Rose. It is your first voyage as a soldier for the king, and you are working alongside the gunners. As battle begins, what happens to you and to the ship? What can you see, hear and smell?  How do you and others react?

The Netherlands is rising up against Spanish rule, and the Catholic monasteries and churches are becoming targets. A crowd bursts into the church, pulling down statues of saints and defacing paintings. What do you do?

You are a student attending the first public dissection of a cadaver in the new anatomy theatre at the University of Leiden. Why are you there? What are you hoping to see and to learn? What do you feel when it starts? Who are you there with?

Twelve people from your village, near Pendle Hill, are facing trial on charges of witchcraft, and you are going to testify against them to the court.  What would you like to happen to them? Are you afraid – or angry? Do you believe they really are witches?

You are on board Captain Henry Powell’s ship as it lands in Barbados, bringing the first English settlers and enslaved Irish workers to the island. What do you see when you get there? Who are you with? What are your hopes or fears? What happens next?

You are a friend of Kandahari Begum, the first wife of Shah Jahan and mother of his first child. You see the newly completed Taj Mahal, Shah Jahan’s monument to his second wife, Mumtaz Mahal. How do you react? What do you do?

You are at the theatre in London, and Peg Hughes comes onto the stage. You have never seen a woman acting in a play before, the female roles previously having been played by young men. How does the audience react? How do you feel about this new development?

You’re living in London, near to St Paul’s Cathedral, when the Great Fire begins to take hold. As the sky fills with smoke and the streets fill with people fleeing the flames, what do you do? What do you take with you? Where do you go? What do the streets look and smell like?

You are in Boston Harbour and board a newly arrived ship. You and a group of like-minded friends begin throwing chests of tea from a shipment by the East India Company overboard into the sea. Why are you doing this? What happens next?

You are at a party, and a man called Franz Mesmer demonstrates something he calls ‘mesmerism’. What happens? How does the person behave? Do you volunteer to let him ‘mesmerise’ you? How does it make you feel?

You were in the crowd in Paris, watching the flight of the new invention of the Montgolfier brothers, the globe aérostatique – or hot air balloon. Now, a few short months later, you are making your own first trip in a balloon. What happens next?

You are on board one of the eleven ships in Captain Arthur Phillip’s fleet arriving in Sydney, ready to establish the first penal colony there. What is it like to go ashore after so long at sea? What can you see? How do you feel? What happens next?

You’re in Paris and part of the crowd gathered around the infamous Bastille prison shouting to be let in. What brought you to this point? Who are you with? When you see the white flag raised above the walls, what do you do next?

You are one of the hundreds of formerly enslaved people who had fought for the British in the American War arriving in Sierra Leone after a long and arduous sea voyage from Nova Scotia. What can you see? Who are you there with? What do you do next?

You are an Irish rebel, fighting for your life against loyalist forces at Vinegar Hill. What can you see around you? How are you feeling? What happens next? What are you prepared to do for your cause and your country?

Haiti is fighting to gain its independence from French colonisation. You are determined to fight alongside your fellow Haitians and to free yourself from foreign rule. What happens next?

You are a French soldier in Napoleon’s army marching across Russia. The weather is ferociously cold, the snow is deep, and you are a long way from home. Who are you with? How are you feeling? What will you do to survive?

Four hundred enslaved people, led by Bussa, are rising up to fight on Bailey’s plantation in Barbados. The call comes to join the rebellion. What do you do? How do you feel as the fighting begins? What do you hope will come of this?

You are working in the household of the Duchess of York when the Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Conyngham arrive to inform the young Victoria that she is now queen, following the death of William IV. What happens next? What are you asked to do?

You are a student at Harvard when the college admits Beverly Garnett Williams, the first Black student in its history. What conversations do you hear or take part in around campus? How do you feel when he walks into your classroom? How do the white professors and students react?

You are a Quaker, living in Maryland. One night, a woman and her child knock on your door, begging for your help as they flee their slave-holding state on the ‘underground railroad’. What do you do? How do you react? What are the implications for you and your family?

You are a new soldier, facing your first battle at Bull Run in Virginia. Why are you there? What made you become a soldier? What are you fighting for? Who are you with? What can you see, hear and smell? What happens as the battle gets underway?

You’re at Ford’s Theatre in Washington DC, watching a performance of An American Cousin, and you’re excited to see that President Abraham Lincoln is seated with his wife in one of the boxes. A shot rings out. What happens next?

You are a sailor aboard the Battleship Potemkin. News reaches you of the uprisings in St Petersburg and the events of ‘Bloody Sunday’. What will you do next? What are your fellow sailors talking about and planning? Does everyone agree, or are there arguments?

You are spending a day at the races, watching the Epsom Derby, when a woman with a banner in suffrage colours is trampled by the king’s horse. What happens around you? What are other people saying? How do you feel? What do you do next?

You are a nurse at a medical station behind the lines in northern France when casualties start arriving from the fighting along the Somme River. What is it like as the number of injured rises and rises? What do you do? How do you feel? What does the station look and smell like?

You are in Yokohama when the tremendous Great Kantō Earthquake shakes the city, followed by rapidly spreading fires. What can you see, hear and smell? Who are you with? Where can you go? What do you do next?

You are one of the twenty appointed witnesses to the opening of the tomb of Tutankhamen. What can you see? How are you feeling? Are you concerned about the talk of a curse? What are you expecting once the tomb is opened?

Marchers arrive in your village, led by Mahatma Gandhi, on their way to the coast. What do you hear and see that makes you join the march? What conversations are going on around you? Is anyone else coming with you? What happens next?

You are living in Berlin above the shop you own. You are woken in the night by the sound of shouting and shattering glass. What do you do? What happens next? How do you try to stop the destruction of everything you’ve worked for? How can you protect your family?

You have just arrived in Glasgow, ready to start your army training at the Maryhill Barracks. You’re 18, and it’s the first time you’ve been away from the farm where you grew up. Who do you meet when you get there? What happens next?

Midnight, and the border between India and West Pakistan comes into force. Which side of the line are you on? Is it the ‘right’ side for you? Where is your family? What do you do next? What can you see and hear? Where will you go?

You arrive at a refugee camp, having fled your village in Palestine during the ‘Nakba’. What can you see and hear around you? What did you have to leave behind? Who are you with? What are your hopes for the future? What happens next?

You are a soldier in the South Korean army. Forces from the North are crossing the border, and the promised American forces are yet to arrive. What happens next? Have you had to fight before? What do you do? What do you see and hear as the fighting starts?

You are taking the bus home from work in Montgomery, Alabama, when a Black woman refuses to give up her seat for a white man. What happens? How does he react? How do the other passengers react? How do you feel? What do you do next?

You are in the crowd gathered outside the Sharpeville police station to protest the apartheid pass laws. You can hear the police threatening to break up the protest, telling the people there to go home. What do you feel when the shots start? What happens next?

You are working on the Soviet space programme and are waiting for Yuri Gagarin to return to Earth from the first manned space flight. What are you and your colleagues feeling? What are you talking about while you wait? How certain are you that the landing will go as planned?

You wake up to learn that your city, Berlin, has been divided, with streets torn up and barbed-wire barricades manned by the military. What do you do? What can you see? Who do you look for? How are you feeling about this new reality in your city? What happens next?

You are living in Biafra when the federal Nigerian government imposes a blockade on the ports. Food is running low, and there are reports of starvation from nearby towns. What happens next? What do you do?

You are sitting at the bar of the Stonewall Inn, having a drink with a friend. Suddenly, there is shouting and screaming, and you realise that there are police officers pushing through the doors. What happens next? What do you do? Who is there with you?

You are a young, unmarried man living in rural America and receive your call-up papers for the Vietnam War in the first round of the draft lottery. What do you do? What does your family want you to do? What happens next?