Dan Snow's History Hit
Episodes
Modern Medicine
13 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The American Civil War saw a transformation in medical provision on the battlefield. A loose grouping of medical practitioners was reshaped into a bur...
Stalingrad
12 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Battle of Stalingrad was the deadliest battle of the Second World War, and one of the bloodiest in the history of warfare. Infamous for its atroci...
The Last Dambuster: Johnny Johnson
09 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Of all the air raids carried out during World War Two, none are as enduringly famous as the attack by Lancaster Bombers against the dams of Germany’...
Zeus: King of the Gods
08 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Zeus, the chief deity in Greek mythology, is the Olympian god of sky and thunder and is king of all other gods and men.His tale is one of overthrowing...
SAS Rogue Heroes: Paddy Mayne with Ben Macintyre
07 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Lieutenant-Colonel 'Paddy' Mayne is a legendary figure in the history of the British Special Forces. Valiant but volatile, confident yet conflicted, P...
The Rise of China
06 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
How has China become the economic superpower that it is today? The decades since the death of Chairman Mao Zedong have seen an unprecedented economic ...
Sportswashing and the Nazi Olympics
05 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
With the 2022 FIFA World Cup well underway, the phenomenon of sportswashing is once again in everybody's minds. Autocracies and democracies alike have...
Life in Tudor England
02 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What was life really like in Tudor England? This was a society where monarchy was under strain, the church was in crisis and contending with war, rebe...
A Short History of The World
01 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
How can you condense the history of the world into a book? Well-celebrated historian Simon Sebag Montefiore does just that in his new epic. He takes D...
Atlantis: Deciphering The Truth
30 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Atlantis is one of the most compelling legends - an advanced, mythical civilisation, wiped out by an unknown phenomenon. The allure of this civilisati...
Owain Glyndwr and The Welsh Revolt
29 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
England plays Wales in the World Cup today so it only makes sense that Dan looks back at what's often called Wales' last war of Independence against t...
The Legacy of Rome
28 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Rome has attracted aspiring conquerors and leaders for millennia, not just as a great metropolis, but as an idea. It has long been a symbol of militar...
Plagues
25 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From a plague in Athens during the Peloponnesian War in 430 BCE, to another in 540 that wiped out half the population of the Roman empire, down throug...
A Short History of Scotland and England's Union
24 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Yesterday the UK Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the Scottish government is not allowed to hold a second independence referendum without Westmins...
Kings and Queens: Villains, Heroes and Rulers
23 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dan teams up with his parents and esteemed journalists Peter Snow and Ann MacMillan to explore the lives, loves, triumphs and disasters of a monarchy ...
Central Park: What Lies Beneath
22 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Central Park is an oasis of nature in New York City, amidst the countless skyscrapers and gridded streets of Manhattan. Over 800 acres of sweeping fie...
Rogue Heroes: Veteran of the SAS
21 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Mike Sadler is the last surviving original member of the SAS and is featured in the new television series SAS Rogue Heroes as a dashing young man and ...
Medieval Pubs
18 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
For centuries, the pub has played a central role in our lives and communities. Throughout Britain, there are many pubs saying that they are the oldest...
The Budget: Britain's Financial Crisis Explained
17 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Rising interest, cost of living crisis, energy prices at an all-time high- is Britain's precarious financial situation the fault of policymakers or gl...
Band of Brothers: A New Discovery
16 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In part 2 of this series on Easy Company and the American 101st Airborne Division, we are back in the village of Aldbourne, following in the steps of ...
Band of Brothers: Yanks in Britain
15 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the first of this 2-part series dedicated to the legacy of Easy Company and the American 101st Airborne Division, Dan visits the idyllic country vi...
Sunken Swedish Warship Discovered!
14 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In December 2021, marine archaeologists working alongside the Swedish Navy came across the wreck of a 17th-century warship in the Stockholm archipelag...
Lost Recordings from the Front Line
11 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Often faster than letters sent by ship, WWII soldiers stationed in South East Asia would send heartfelt and humorous video messages to their loved one...
The Crown: A Short History of British Monarchy
10 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
For at least 1,500 years, since the mists swirling around the Dark Ages began to clear, the British Isles have had monarchical rulers. For hundreds of...
Fall of the Berlin Wall
09 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On November 9th, 1989, 33 years ago to the day, the Berlin Wall that had symbolised the ideological and physical division of Europe came crumbling dow...
Origins of Modern Iran
08 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As protests continued across Iran, a number of Iranian-made kamikaze drones were fired by Russian forces at targets thousands of miles away in Kyiv, U...
The Birth of the CIA
07 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
American intelligence services like the CIA are commonly thought of as global behemoths of international surveillance and covert operations, responsib...
4. Tutankhamun: Inside the Tomb
04 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
4/4. Dan descends the very same stone steps into Tutankhamun's tomb that Carter did, 100 years earlier. From within the chamber, Dan and Egyptologist ...
3. Tutankhamun: The Life of a Boy Pharaoh
03 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
3/4. How much do we know about Tutankhamun, his short life and even shorter reign? Dan unravels the complicated legacy of Tutankhamun's predecessor Ak...
2. Tutankhamun: The Discovery of a Lifetime
02 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
2/4. Dan dives into Carter’s obsession with Tutankhamun and the trials and idiosyncrasies that made him the right man for the discovery. Dan visits ...
Tutankhamun: The Valley of the Kings
01 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
1/4. On the West Bank of the Nile in Luxor lie the burial chambers of some of Ancient Egypt's greatest pharaohs - Ramses II, Seti I and Tutankhamun. F...
Smugglers of Jamaica Inn
31 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Stories of shipwrecks, smugglers and ghosts. Built in the mid-18th century, over the years many of the Jamaica Inn's patrons have been less respectabl...
A Short History of Seances
27 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From their origins in necromancy to their ritualisation in the religion of Spiritualism, seances have long been a staple in the occultist's toolbelt. ...
Elizabeth Báthory: The Vampire of Hungary
26 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The inspiration behind countless gothic novels, Countess Elizabeth Báthory is said to be one of the most prolific serial killers of all time, accused...
Rasputin: Myth & Manhood
25 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Was Rasputin really Russia’s greatest love machine? Did he have any healing powers? And why might his penis be pickling in a jar?In this episode, we...
The Extraordinary Life of James Harley
24 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
James Arthur Stanley Harley was a scholar, reverend, politician, and perhaps aristocrat. Born in a poor village in the Caribbean island of Antigua, he...
TUTANKHAMUN: Mini-Series Coming Soon!
24 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On the 1st of November comes an immersive mini-series telling the story of one of the great discoveries of all time: the tomb of Tutankhamun. For more...
Battle of El Alamein Explained
23 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Fought in the second half of 1942, the Battles of El Alamein were a series of climactic confrontations in Egypt between British Imperial and Commonwea...
The Battle of Trafalgar
20 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On 21 October 1805, A British fleet commanded by Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson met the combined might of the French and Spanish fleets off the coast of ...
FORENSICS: The Beginning
19 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Death by tiger bites. Death by prodding. Death from sexual excess. Deaths from over-eating and over-drinking. The opening of graves.These are a few of...
Mary Seacole: Doctress of the Crimean War
18 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Born Mary Jane Grant in the colony of Kingston, Jamaica, in November 1805, Mary would later become a businesswoman, traveller and healer. Posthumously...
Britain's Worst Prime Minister
17 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Could Liz Truss be Britain's worst Prime Minister? As the political scene in the UK hurtles into further disarray, Dan gets together historians Tim Ba...
The Cuban Missile Crisis
16 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In October 1962 the world came very close to annihilation during the Cuban Missile Crisis. During the autumn of 1962, a U2 reconnaissance aircraft pro...
The Long History of African and Caribbean People in Britain
13 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
There remains a tendency to reduce the history of African and Caribbean people in Britain to a simple story: it is one that begins in 1948 with the ar...
Russia Falters in Ukraine: Parallels with WW1
12 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Russia's current conflict in Ukraine was supposed to be a showcase of military prowess, a quick war that solidified her status as a great power. Inste...
The US and The Holocaust
11 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
After Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in 1933, thousands of German Jews facing systematic persecution wanted to flee the Third Reich but found few coun...
Karnak: Egypt's Greatest Temple
10 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Located on the banks of the River Nile in Luxor, Egypt, the Karnak Temple complex is one of the largest buildings ever constructed for religious purpo...
The Romanovs
09 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Romanov family were the first imperial dynasty to rule Russia, reigning from the early seventeenth century until the Russian Revolution of 1917. I...
Outlaws, Cattle Rustling and Bootlegging: The Life of Josie Bassett
06 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Josie Bassett Morris' life epitomised the Wild West. She grew up on a homestead in the late 18th century, in Northern Utah, USA. Their home was situat...
Charles Ignatius Sancho: From Slavery to High Society
06 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Please note that this episode contains discussion of racist language.Charles Ignatius Sancho was born on a slave ship crossing the Atlantic Ocean, in ...
The Troubles Begin
04 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This episode will establish the century-long roots of sectarian tensions, paint a picture of the political atmosphere in Northern Ireland as the decad...
Remembering Hilary Mantel
03 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dame Hilary Mantel died on 22 September 2022 at the age of 70. Her acclaimed Wolf Hall trilogy - which brought the life of Thomas Cromwell so viv...
The Energy Crisis: 2022 vs 1973
02 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A long dark, cold winter looms with soaring energy prices. Some of the advice we've heard recently includes buying a new kettle or taking a flannel ba...
The Evolution of Warfare with Sir Lawrence Freedman
29 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From the stone age to current day, from sticks and rocks to drones and artillery - the nature of warfare has changed drastically throughout history. O...
The Atomic Bomb & the Secret City
28 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In 1939 Franklin D Roosevelt received a letter from Albert Einstein, warning him that the Nazis might be developing nuclear weapons. Am...
What Could Labour Learn From Harold Wilson?
27 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the week of the Labour Party when polls indicate that the party is likely to form the next government, it seems an opportune moment to examine what...
A Short History of the Bank of England
26 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As the UK's bond market has suffered its biggest fall in decades and the pound has reached its lowest ever price against the US dollar, Dan talks to D...
Agatha Christie with Lucy Worsley
25 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Agatha Christie is the best-selling fiction writer of all time and her many detective novels, short stories and plays have gripped and entertained mil...
Eleanor of Aquitaine
22 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From an age in which women’s lives were obscured and poorly recorded, one shines brightly from the darkness. Eleanor of Aquitaine - born 900 ye...
Suleyman the Magnificent
21 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Lion House is a riveting new book from journalist and historian Christopher De Bellaigue, written like a novel that tells the dramatic story of Su...
The Man Wrongfully Hanged at Cardiff Prison
20 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In September 1952 Mahmood Hussein Mattan became the last to be executed at Cardiff Prison, but Mahmood had in fact been framed by the police and 70 ye...
Scottish Clans
19 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
It is believed clans started to emerge in Scotland around 1100AD and were originally the descendants of kings – if not of demigods from Irish mythol...
The Mayflower Sets Sail
15 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On the 16th of September 1620, The Mayflower set sail from Southampton to the New World. Aboard were 102 passengers determined to reach a new land, es...
Queen Victoria's Funeral
14 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Queen's body has been taken to Westminster Hall in London, where she will lie in state for the public to visit and pay their respects. Over the pa...
9/11: New York City in the Aftermath
13 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Ray Victor is a lifelong New Yorker and tour guide from Queens. He remembers 11th of September 2001 vividly, when hijacked planes were flown into the ...
Malta: 'The Unsinkable Aircraft Carrier' of WWII
12 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Malta is located in the Mediterranean sea just beyond Sicily, between Europe and Africa; its warm climate and beautiful islands make it a perfect holi...
Elizabeth II: A Princess At War
11 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As a mark of respect and remembrance to the late Queen Elizabeth II, we've chosen to focus on Her Majesty's personal history as a veteran of the Secon...
Elizabeth II: The Making of the Queen
08 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Queen Elizabeth II has died after 70 years on the British throne. Born in April 1926, Elizabeth Windsor became heir apparent, aged 10, when her uncle ...
Not Just the Tudors Lates: Elizabeth I on Screen - The Historians’ Verdict
07 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What do you get when you bring together five top historians in a room with bottles of Prosecco to debate Elizabeth I on screen? History with the glove...
A Short History of Humans
06 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Why are humans the only species to have escaped – only very recently – the subsistence trap, allowing us to enjoy a standard of living that vastly...
Atoms and X-rays: Experiments That Changed History
05 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
For millennia, people have obsessed over questions about the nature of matter in our universe. Then, by the turn of the twentieth century, we believed...
The Man Who Rebuilt the Faces of WW1
04 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The mechanised warfare of the First World War brought unprecedented new levels of firepower and destruction to the battlefield and with it horrific ne...
Taiwan: China's Ukraine?
31 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Located just 100 miles off the coast of mainland China, the nation of Taiwan sits in the so-called 'first island chain' - a group of US-friendly terri...
Robin Hood
30 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Robin Hood is one of the most famous legends of British history, but did he exist and if so who was he? Gareth Morgan, Learning Development Officer at...
The March on Washington
29 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On August 28, 1963, some 200,000 people gathered in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. to protest the continuing inequalities faced by ...
Storytime with the Snows: 1066
28 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
1066 is one of the most critical and dramatic years in British history. In the space of one year, the country had three kings, three major battles and...
Richard III: How to find a Lost King
25 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In August 1485, King Richard III was killed at the Battle of Bosworth. In 2012, having been lost for over 500 years, the remains of King Richard III w...
Witches
24 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What comes to your mind when you think of a witch? Broomsticks? Black cats? Warts?Early modern witchcraft expert, John Callow, is Betwixt the Sheets w...
The Revolution of The Chinese Script
23 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What does it take to reinvent the world's oldest living language? China today is one of the world's most powerful nations, yet just a century ago it w...
The Voyage That Kickstarted Globalisation
22 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In February 1882 the SS Dunedin departed New Zealand on a voyage that would revolutionise the way we eat and kickstart the globalisation of the world'...
100 Years of British Political Nightmares
21 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Over Britain’s first century of mass democracy, from the Great Depression to the pandemic, politics has lurched from crisis to crisis. How does this...
Warships
18 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Today we are talking warships: from the revolutionary Tudor ships to modern aircraft carriers, and all the innovations along the way.In this episode o...
What happened to the bones of the Waterloo battlefield?
17 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In June 1815 the French army under the command of Napoleon was decisively beaten by an allied army led by Britain and Prussia at Waterloo in what is n...
Walter Purdy: The Traitor of Colditz
16 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the Second World War, the Germans liked to boast that there was 'no escape' from the infamous fortress and POW camp Colditz. However, the elite Bri...
The Tiananmen Square Massacre
15 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In 1989, Beijing's Tiananmen Square became the focus of large-scale demonstrations as mostly young students crowded into central Beijing to protest fo...
Mutiny on The Bounty
14 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Numerous novels, TV shows and as many as 5 movies- including the Hollywood classic starring Clarke Gable and Marlon Brando - have immortalised the sto...
300 Years of British Prime Ministers Part 2
12 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
2/2. It's a big summer for British politics with Boris Johnson's resignation and the race between conservative hopefuls Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss to t...
300 Years of British Prime Ministers Part 1
10 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
1/2. It's a big summer for British politics with Boris Johnson's resignation and the race between conservative hopefuls Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss to t...
Unrest in Parliament: The Hot Summer of 1911
09 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The summer of 1911 was a hot one. Massive strikes took place across the country, including seamen, railwaymen, coal miners, women working in food proc...
The Origins of Rome
08 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Known as the Eternal City, ancient Rome was one of the greatest civilisations in human history, but how did it come about?With a turbulent history of ...
The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb
07 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On August 6 and 9, 1945, US B-29 bombers, dropped their nuclear bombs on the two cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing hundreds of thousands and c...
Anne Frank's Step Sister: 'How I Survived the Holocaust' Part 2
04 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
2/2. Eva Schloss remembers her days as a girl in Amsterdam playing in the street with the other children including Anne Frank who, for a time, took a ...
Anne Frank's Step Sister: 'How I Survived the Holocaust' Part 1
03 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
1/2. On the morning of the 4th of August 1944, exactly 78 years ago today, the Frank family cowered behind a bookshelf in Amsterdam, listening to heav...
Thor: The God behind the Superhero
02 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Few early medieval gods are as well-known and as popular as Thor. He’s currently thrilling moviegoers worldwide with his new outing for the Mar...
When Football Banned Women
01 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
England’s historic Euro 2022 victory on Sunday night was the most watched TV programme of the year. It feels like it's the first time women's footba...
The Defeat of the Spanish Armada
31 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In July 1588 the Spanish Armada sailed from Corunna to conquer England. Three weeks later an English fireship attack in the Channel—and then a fierc...
The Long Death of Slavery
28 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We celebrate abolition - in Haiti after the revolution, in the British Empire in 1833, and in the United States during the Civil War. Yet, over the ap...
Anne of Cleves
27 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Anne of Cleves was the ‘last woman standing’ of Henry VIII’s wives and the only one buried in Westminster Abbey. How did she manage it? Was she ...
A Short History of the Ottoman Empire
26 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Ottoman Empire was gigantic; at one point it reached the walls of Vienna to the Persian Gulf and beyond. It was established at the end of the 13th...
The Biggest Prison Breakout of WW2
25 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
During World War II, in the town of Cowra in central New South Wales, thousands of Japanese prisoners of war were held in a POW camp. On the icy night...