Outlander’s main time traveler, Claire (Caitriona Balfe) is a historical chameleon of sorts, equally comfortable in traditional Highland dress as she is in a Parisian Rococo gown, a smart 1940s suit, or a Jackie Kennedy bouffant. In the series’ earlier seasons, viewers saw Claire, a World War II veteran nurse visiting Scotland just after the war, mysteriously travel 200 years into the past. She later journeyed with her new husband, Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan), to several different countries; and also returned back to the future as well. In later seasons, her daughter Brianna (Sophie Skelton) and Brianna’s husband, Roger (Richard Rankin), likewise traveled through time, as well as a few other characters we met along the way. Once you get the hang of Outlander-style time travel, it’s easy to jump back and forth through all the different times and places the characters go. So, as we wait to see where Season 6 will take us, let’s take a look at everywhere we’ve been so far with our refresher on the Outlander timeline.
Outlander timeline
Scotland, 1945
Outlander begins in post-war Inverness, Scotland, where Claire and her husband, Frank Randall (Tobias Menzies), are trying to reconnect after being apart during World War II. But Claire finds some mysterious Bronze-Age standing stones, and when she touches them she vanishes into the past. Frank, still in 1945, tries to figure out what has happened to her.
Scotland, 1743-1746
When Claire travels back in time, she’s still in the same location: The Scottish Highlands near Inverness, where she meets Jamie, with whom she travels to clan MacKenzie’s seat of Castle Leoch, Jamie’s home of Lallybroch, and other locations around the Highlands. At the end of Season 1, Jamie and Claire flee to France (we’ll get to that in a second); but return soon after and spend the second half of Season 2 back home in Scotland, where they mount an army with Bonnie Prince Charlie (Andrew Gower) to fight the British. Their movements around Scotland include the real-life battles of Prestonpans, near Edinburgh, and Culloden, near Inverness, the latter of which we see in the first episode of Season 3. We also return to Scotland 1746 later in Season 5, as we get a flashback of Jamie’s Aunt Jocasta (Maria Doyle Kennedy) and her traumatic experience after Culloden, when her daughter is tragically killed.
Paris, 1744
In Season 2 in the middle of Claire’s Scottish journey, she and Jamie travel to France, where they trade their woolen Highland garb for the fancy dress of the Parisian court, complete with silks, lace and jewels galore, in order to get close to the exiled Scottish prince, Charles Stuart, aka Bonnie Prince Charlie. The couple even visits the royal palace of Versailles outside Paris, hob-knobs with elite society, and meets the real-life French King Louis XV. Viewers learn that despite the Frasers’ rustic life back in Scotland, some of the family is actually quite wealthy, as Claire and Jamie stay in Jamie’s father’s cousin’s tony townhome in Paris. Jamie himself had been educated at university in Paris previously, and speaks fluent French.
Allied front, France, 1944
After a brief glimpse at Victory in Europe Day in the very first episode, we see more of Claire’s past as a nurse during World War II in an unexpected flashback in the Season 2 episode “Je Suis Prest.” While the Scottish troops including Jamie and his clan work on military training, Claire is reminded of her experiences at the Allied front in France after D-Day (which is, technically, the future; although for Claire it has already happened). There, she met two American servicemen separated from their units, who she began to form a friendship with; until they are promptly killed while she hides in a ditch. Although it’s a brief reminder of her life before she traveled back in time, it helps us to understand the trauma she went through—and reveals the origin of her signature curse phrase, “Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ.”
Scotland, 1948
At the end of Season 2, just before the Battle of Culloden on April 16, 1746, a pregnant Claire says goodbye to Jamie, who expects to perish in the fight, and goes back through the standing stones approximately 200 years in the future to the Scotland of 1948. Three years have passed there, just as three years had passed for Claire in the 18th century. Claire has learned that in Outlander’s rules of time travel, you can’t change major events of the past; she and Jamie couldn’t prevent Culloden, and everything that happened there has “already” occurred in the same way. After reuniting with Frank, who agrees to raise her and Jamie’s child as his own, they decide to move across the pond to leave the memories of the past behind.
Boston, 1948-1968
Claire and Frank, who has scored a professorship at Harvard, move to a spacious Boston row house in Season 3, where Claire tries to readapt to the 20th century. But missing the past, she finds herself out of place in Boston—she even cooks over her fireplace because she can’t get the modern stove lit. She just doesn’t fit the role of mid-century housewife, and never really seems at home here. Even after she begins medical school when her daughter, Brianna, is young, and later becomes a self-assured doctor, Claire still seems unhappy, largely due to what has become a sham marriage to Frank (as one character tells her, they’re no Ozzie and Harriet). For Claire, the Boston years were probably the loneliest of her life. We were digging her gray-streaked bouffant, though. In later seasons, we also briefly return to this time period in flashback. In Season 4, Brianna remembers her father, Frank; and in Season 5 we also get an unexpected memory of Claire’s time as a 1960s doctor, when she treated a patient who reminded her of Jamie.
Scotland, 1968
The funeral of the Reverend Wakefield provides Claire, now a widow, an excuse to return to Scotland with her 20-year-old daughter, Brianna. While Brianna and Roger, the reverend’s adopted son, delve into research about her parents’ previous time in Scotland, Claire also takes a trip down memory lane. She visits the now-abandoned castle of Lallybroch, the Culloden battlefield, and eventually, the standing stones. Viewers also see a familiar character, and the first other time traveler the series has introduced us to: Geillis Duncan (Lotte Verbeek), who in 1968 Scotland goes by Gillian Edgars. After she and Claire were arrested for witchcraft in the 18th century, Geillis had revealed her smallpox vaccine scar and pointedly told Claire, “1968.” The meaning of this secret message? In Geillis’ timeline, she had “already” met Claire in that year, just before Geillis/Gillian went back in time. In Claire’s timeline, though, she “first” met Geillis/Gillian in the 1740s, and “later” sees her in 1968—so although Gillian doesn’t recognize Claire in 1968, Claire knows Gillian.
Scotland, 1766
In Season 3, Claire (with the help of Roger and Brianna) devises a plan for her to travel back in time again to find Jamie—who, it turns out, did not die at Culloden. When she returns to the past, it’s 1766, and Jamie has been living a lonely life in Scotland for the past 20 years as a fugitive, prisoner, indentured servant, and finally, an Edinburgh print shop owner and smuggler. After reuniting, the couple returns to Lallybroch, and makes a fateful trip to Silkies Island off the coast to look for a lost treasure Jamie heard about in prison. Unfortunately, pirates are also after the treasure, and kidnap Jamie’s nephew, Young Ian (John Bell), along with the booty, setting Jamie and Claire on a transatlantic trip to rescue him.
Atlantic Crossing, 1766-67
Claire and Jamie’s sail across the Atlantic during Season 3 is a seafaring adventure with shades of Master and Commander, Moby Dick and even Pirates of the Caribbean. Aboard the sloop the Artemis, Claire and Jamie chase after the pirate ship, the Bruja, that took Young Ian. But Claire is soon stolen herself for her healing skills by the British man-o-war named the Porpoise whose crew has fallen ill with a mysterious disease. When eventually close to land, Claire jumps overboard and swims to an unknown shore.
Saint Domingue and Jamaica, 1767
Claire’s “Castaway” episode in Season 3 occurs after she washes up on what seems to be a deserted island in the Caribbean. Turns out she’s in Saint Domingue on the island of Hispaniola (which today contains the countries of Haiti and the Dominican Republic), where she meets a reclusive priest named Father Fogden who helps her recover until Jamie’s arrival. Jamie and Claire’s adopted son Fergus (César Domboy) and Jamie’s stepdaughter Marsali (Lauren Lyle), who were also aboard the Artemis, decide to have a wedding ceremony on the island, presided over by Father Fogden. But the joyful moment doesn’t last long, because the Fraser crew still has a job to do: rescuing Young Ian from a strange woman called the Bakra, who owns a vast plantation on Jamaica. So back to sea they go for the short journey. Once on the second island, Claire and Jamie attend a fancy ball (which reminds us of Paris—Jamie even tells Claire she could be back at Versailles) for the governor, who turns out to be Jamie’s friend Lord John Grey (David Berry). The couple also runs into Geillis Duncan—the Bakra—who Claire now knows is a time traveler. She’s the one who had Young Ian kidnapped, and is definitely up to no good.
North Carolina, 1767-1772
After rescuing Young Ian and putting an end to Geillis in a cave (in an earlier episode, we saw 1960s doctor Claire examining bones found in a cave—which we now know were Geillis’), the gang sets off again for Scotland. But in the Season 3 finale, they hit a storm and are shipwrecked on the coast of Georgia. In Season 4, Claire, Jamie, Fergus, Marsali, and Young Ian make their way to North Carolina, where Jamie’s Aunt Jocasta owns a plantation called River Run on the Cape Fear River. The Fraser family decides to stay in America, and builds a home on land Jamie is granted from the governor, which they name Fraser’s Ridge. Outlander plays a little fast and loose with North Carolina geography, as Fraser’s Ridge is located in the Blue Ridge Mountains, some 200 miles from River Run and 300 miles from the port town of Wilmington, which they seemingly visit frequently. In any case, the colony is the setting for the majority of Seasons 4 and 5; with the exception of the approximately 700 miles Claire, Jamie and Young Ian travel to briefly visit a Mohawk village in New York State. Later, Brianna and Roger will join her parents in this time period.
Boston and North Carolina, 1970-71
Although Claire and Jamie are settled in North Carolina, Season 4 jumps around a bit as the younger generation makes several trips from America to the UK in the early 1970s. In 1970, Roger flies to Boston to reconnect with Brianna, and the two take a road trip to a Scottish festival, appropriately enough taking place in North Carolina. Viewers are treated to a lot of fun 1970s clothes and cars—although Bree and Roger also have their first fight. Later, in 1971, we see Brianna and her roommate, Gail, in a few quick scenes in their Boston apartment, before Bree makes the startling decision to follow her mother to the 18th century.
Oxford and Scotland, 1969-71
More random scenes from this time period pop up in Seasons 4 and 5, showing us Roger and Bree’s experiences in the UK before they go back in time. In Season 4, viewers briefly see Roger at his office in Oxford, where he is a history professor, trying to mend his relationship with Brianna in 1971; in Season 5, we see him a couple of years prior to that, in 1969, teaching a history class in Oxford on “famous last words.” In Season 4, Roger also visits to Inverness to see his friend Fiona and her husband, who move into the Reverend’s old manse. Then in 1971, he discovers Brianna is actually in Scotland as well—and planning to “visit her mother,” which he knows means she’s planning to go back through the standing stones—and he follows her, with Fiona’s help.
Scotland, 1769
Brianna becomes Outlander’s newest time traveler in Season 4, going back through the stones to Scotland circa 1769. She is taken in by Laoghaire (Nell Hudson), Claire’s romantic rival for Jamie’s affections from Season 1 and Jamie’s wife when he and Claire were apart. Brianna also meets Jamie’s brother-in-law, Ian (Steven Cree), at Lallybroch. Later, Roger follows Brianna through the stones as well, before both he and Brianna make separate crossings to North Carolina, where the whole Fraser family is reunited.
Scotland, 1729
Although Season 5 doesn’t have much actual time traveling, we get to visit a few different time periods through flashback, including the aforementioned remembrances from Claire and Roger. In addition, in the opening episode of Season 5, we see Jamie’s godfather, Murtagh (Duncan Lacroix), in the fields outside Lallybroch after Jamie’s mother has died in childbirth. Murtagh pledges to a young Jamie that he will always be there for him. Although it’s a brief scene, we’re always happy to revisit Scotland.
North Carolina, 1968
In the Season 5 finale, Claire imagines her whole family celebrating Thanksgiving in the late 1960s. Although the exact time and location is unspecified, viewers got an Easter egg clue back in the episode 5 title card, when a 20th-century Claire picks up a magazine called Modern Building Review from April 1968—and on the cover is “The Most Fabulous House in North Carolina," which bears a striking resemblance to the mid-century modern home of her vision. Claire’s dreamscape allows viewers to see the non-time traveling Frasers in the groovy clothing and hairstyles of the era, set to The Association’s 1967 song, “Never My Love,” which is also the title of the episode. Where (and when) will Season 6 take viewers? Stay tuned to find out when Outlander returns Sunday, March 6 on Starz. Next, check out the latest sneak peek from Season 6 of Outlander and find out which cast member calls it his favorite season yet!
