BBC - Civilisation (1969) Part 10 The Smile of Reason

In 1966 BBC Television embarked on its most ambitious documentary series to date. The eminent art historian Lord Clark was commissioned to write and present an epic examination of Western European culture, defining what he considered to be the crucial phases of its development. Civilisation A Personal View by Lord Clark would be more than two years in the making, with filming in over 100 locations across 13 countries. The lavish series was hailed as a masterpiece when it was first transmitted in 1969.

From the fall of the Roman Empire to the Industrial Revolution and beyond, Clark's compelling narrative is accompanied by breathtaking colour photography of Europe's greatest landmarks. This 'history of ideas as illustrated by art and music' remains the benchmark for the numerous programmes it inspired.

Part 10 The Smile of Reason

The sensible, sophisticated men and women who met in the salons of 18th-century Paris wanted to change society. In the end they got more of a change than they bargained for. The polite tete-a-tete in those elegant salons was the precursor of revolutionary politics. Kenneth Clark's theme takes him from the palaces of Versailles and Blenheim, to Edinburgh and to the hills of Virginia, where Thomas Jefferson made his home in the 1760s.

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