HistoryExtra podcast
Episodes
Digging up Roman London
31 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Archaeologist Dominic Perring discusses what we know about London’s Roman past with Emily Briffett, examining the city’s key turning points and ex...
Life in Cromwell’s Britain
30 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Anna Keay introduces Spencer Mizen to the dramatic decade between the execution of Charles I in 1649 and the restoration of the monarchy in 1660. She ...
1942: Churchill’s darkest hour
29 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Historian Taylor Downing chronicles the events of the year 1942, which he contends was Britain’s lowest moment in the Second World War. Speaking to ...
Rapa Nui’s island mysteries
28 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Archaeologist Cat Jarman delves into the mysteries and debates surrounding the history of Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island. In conversation with ...
The history of beauty: everything you wanted to know
27 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Health and beauty historian Lucy Jane Santos answers listener questions and popular online search queries about beauty throughout the ages. From early...
Bridgerton: behind the scenes of season 2
25 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Hannah Greig, a historical consultant to the hit series Bridgerton, takes us behind the scenes of season two. She speaks to Elinor Evans about the rea...
Suleyman the Magnificent: the 16th-century’s most powerful ruler?
24 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
When Suleyman the Magnificent became Sultan of the Ottoman empire in 1520, he was proclaimed the world’s most powerful man, who could use his armies...
Our Winston Churchill obsession
23 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Winston Churchill looms large in the modern imagination. Everyone from Fidel Castro to George W Bush have cited him as an exemplar in times of crisis....
Naked statues, naughty gods & bad wine
22 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Classicist and author Garrett Ryan talks to Kev Lochun about some of the biggest and most commonly asked questions surrounding ancient Greece and Rome...
The BBC at 100: the corporation at war
21 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the third episode of our monthly series marking the centenary of the BBC, media historian David Hendy tells Matt Elton how the BBC became an import...
The Napoleonic Wars: everything you wanted to know
20 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dr Mike Rapport tackles popular search queries and listener questions about the 19th-century conflicts that tore Europe apart and triggered seismic po...
Prohibition: busting myths about the ban on booze
18 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Mark Lawrence Schrad speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about his book Smashing the Liquor Machine, which busts commonly held myths about prohibition, revealin...
Stitching together the history of fabric
17 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The history of fabric is interwoven with the story of humanity, from the sackcloth shirts that tore open the skin of pious medieval saints to cotton’...
Carrot conspiracies & digging for victory: feeding Britain in WW2
16 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Professor John Martin speaks to Emily Briffett about Britain’s battle against starvation during the Second World War. From the invention of familiar...
Children of the Norman Conquest
15 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dr Eleanor Parker, author of Conquered: The Last Children of Anglo-Saxon England, talks to David Musgrove about the young people whose lives were upen...
Britain’s WW2 island internment camp
14 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
During the Second World War, the British government imprisoned thousands of German and Austrian-born residents – many of them refugees from Nazi opp...
Gladiators: everything you wanted to know
13 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Who became a gladiator? Were they really the superstars of their day? And was giving a thumbs down for a death sentence a real thing? In this Everythi...
Fredegund and Brunhild: a tale of two queens
11 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Shelley Puhak delves into the lives of queens Fredegund and Brunhild, famed for their bitter and bloody rivalry which wracked the Frankish empire in t...
Eugenics: a toxic history
10 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Adam Rutherford discusses the dark – and often surprising – history of the eugenics movement Geneticist Adam Rutherford speaks to Ellie Cawthor...
Gardens and the scientific revolution
09 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Clare Hickman explores how gardens were used as places of scientific experimentation in the 18th and 19th centuries During the scientific revolution...
Periods, fertility & childbirth: a pre-modern history
08 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Mary Fissell talks to Ellie Cawthorne about women’s reproductive health in early modern Europe and America. She discusses how women dealt with their...
Radical women
07 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Nan Sloane speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about her new book Uncontrollable Women, which charts the stories of now largely forgotten female activists who w...
The Franks: everything you wanted to know
06 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dr Christian Cooijmans answers listener questions on the medieval world of the Franks. Speaking to David Musgrove, he discusses long-lasting Frankish...
How museums are shaping the future
04 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Neil MacGregor talks to Matt Elton about his new BBC Radio 4 series, The Museums that Make Us, and the ways in which museums around the UK are adaptin...
Ukraine: the WW2 roots of today's conflict
03 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Keith Lowe talks to Matt Elton about the ways in which today’s conflict between Russia and Ukraine can be traced back to the Second World War and de...
Old English: a quick guide
02 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Hana Videen explores the Old English language and reveals what it can tell us about daily life at the time it was spoken The medieval language of Ol...
Witch hunters: cynical persecutors or misguided zealots?
01 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Marion Gibson discusses the motivations and methods of “witch finders” who sought out supernatural wrongdoing in Stuart Britain. Speaking to Ellie...
Fascism in Britain
28 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Nigel Copsey discusses the British Union of Fascists and its leader, Oswald Mosley Nigel Copsey speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about the British Union of...
The American Revolutionary War: everything you wanted to know
27 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Benjamin Carp tackles listener questions and popular search queries on the conflict that saw colonists in North America rise up and declare independen...
The BBC at 100: establishment values in the 1930s
26 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the second instalment of our new monthly series marking the centenary of the BBC, media historian David Hendy speaks to Matt Elton about the ways i...
Vikings: Valhalla’s real inspirations
25 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Screenwriter Jeb Stuart discusses the real history that inspired his new Netflix show Vikings: Valhalla Screenwriter Jeb Stuart speaks to Kev Loch...
Nixon in China: the trip that changed the Cold War
23 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Fifty years ago this month, US president Richard Nixon embarked on a trip to China – a visit that marked a key moment in the thawing of relations be...
In defence of Neville Chamberlain
22 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Walter Reid tells Spencer Mizen that, far from going down in history as the bloodless author of appeasement, Neville Chamberlain should be remembered ...
Spies in show business
21 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Professor Christopher Andrew talks to Elinor Evans about his book Stars and Spies, co-written with Julius Green. He reveals the many historical links ...
Stonehenge: everything you wanted to know (part two)
20 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the second episode of this two-part special on Stonehenge, archaeologist and author Mike Pitts answers more listener questions on the most famous p...
The secret WW2 mission to save Britain’s art collections
19 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Caroline Shenton tells the story of the colourful cast of curators, museum directors and civil servants who embarked on a top-secret mission to protec...
The Normans: beyond 1066
18 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Judith Green reveals how there is much more to the Norman story than the events of the 1066 Conquest We all know the story of the Norman Conquest, ...
British identity in 50 documents
16 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dominic Selwood chronicles Britain’s past through a diverse – and sometimes unexpected – selection of historical documents, from birthday invite...
Medieval masterclass 4: Revolution 1348-1527
15 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this fourth and final episode, Dan Jones reveals how the Middle Ages came to a close, starting off with a global pandemic that ripped across the wo...
Shakespearean deaths: swordfights, snakebites & poison
14 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From poison and fatal snakebites to dying from a broken heart, more than 250 named characters die in Shakespeare’s plays. Speaking with Ellie Cawtho...
Stonehenge: everything you wanted to know (part one)
13 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the first episode of a two-part special, archaeologist Mike Pitts answers listener questions on the most famous prehistoric site in Britain. Speaki...
Britain’s only war crimes trial
12 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Mike Anderson and Neil Hanson discuss the 1999 prosecution of a former Nazi collaborator – Britain’s only war crimes trial Mike Anderson and Nei...
Extinct animals of medieval Britain
11 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From beavers to whales, Lee Raye discusses wildlife found across medieval Britain that has since gone extinct from the region In conversation with D...
Mexico’s ill-fated Austrian emperor
09 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Edward Shawcross speaks to Elinor Evans about a little-known and disastrous attempt to install a Habsburg archduke, Ferdinand Maximilian, as emperor o...
Medieval masterclass 3: Rebirth 1216-1347
08 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dan Jones charts the rise of the Mongols in the twelfth century – a sharp and hideously brutal episode, in which an eastern empire achieved fleeting...
Georgian Britain: the highs and lows of a transformative age
07 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Penelope J Corfield discusses the highs and lows of the Georgian era, from the abolition movement to the gin craze The long 18th century saw Britai...
Vichy France: everything you wanted to know
06 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Shannon Fogg answers listener questions on the collaborationist regime created following France’s defeat by Nazi Germany In the latest episode in ...
Berlin’s tumultuous history
05 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Barney White-Spunner discusses the extraordinary, absorbing and often tragic history of Germany’s capital Barney White-Spunner tells Spencer Mizen...
Three female civil rights pioneers
04 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Pamela Roberts discusses her research on Mary Church Terrell, Rosetta Lawson and Josephine Wilson Bruce – three women activists of Washington’s ‘...
America’s Cold War culture boom
02 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
From artistic experimentation to an explosion in pop music, Louis Menand speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about American art, culture and ideas between 1945-...
Medieval masterclass 2: Domination 750-1215
01 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dan Jones and David Musgrove delve into the age of the Franks, who revived a Christian, pseudo-Roman empire in the west. They trace the rise of the dy...
Margery Kempe: medieval mystic
31 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Anthony Bale discusses the sensational life of medieval mystic Margery Kempe, charting a story of unusual visions, spiritual revelations, turbulent em...
Greek myths: everything you wanted to know
30 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the latest episode in our series on history’s biggest topics, classicist Natalie Haynes tackles listener questions on Greek myths. Speaking to Ra...
Bloody Sunday: 50 years on
29 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
To mark the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, Diarmaid Ferriter speaks about the event and its tangled legacy today To mark the 50th anniversary of B...
The BBC at 100: audio adventures in the 1920s
28 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the first episode of our new monthly series marking the centenary of the BBC, media historian David Hendy speaks to Matt Elton about the institutio...
Elitism in cricket: a history
26 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Duncan Stone argues that classism and racism have held back England’s summer sport for decades Duncan Stone talks to Spencer Mizen about cricket’...
Medieval masterclass 1: Imperium 410-750
25 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dan Jones takes listeners on a journey through early medieval Europe, beginning with the Roman empire in a state of collapse, rocked by a changing cli...
Cold war mind games
24 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Martin Sixsmith speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about his book The War of Nerves, which explores the role of psychology in the Cold War, from propaganda and...
America’s “Roaring Twenties”: everything you wanted to know
23 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Were the twenties really “roaring”? If so, who actually experienced the best of the era? And were the parties really as debauched as popular cultu...
Escaping slavery in the American South
22 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
How can we reconstruct the experiences of enslaved people? Historian Shaun Wallace speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about his work on the Fugitive Slave Data...
Munich: the real history behind the new film
21 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Author Robert Harris speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about Munich: The Edge of War, the new Netflix film adapted from his 2017 historical novel Munich. They...
The Gothic: from Dracula to The Shining
19 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Roger Luckhurst speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about how the idea of the Gothic has evolved and mutated over time, from medieval-inspired architecture an...
Women of the Rothschild dynasty
18 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Historian Natalie Livingstone chronicles the unexplored lives of the women who shaped the famous Rothschild banking dynasty. She speaks to Elinor Evan...
Queen Victoria’s spy network
17 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Richard J Aldrich and Rory Cormac discuss Queen Victoria’s love of espionage and her network of royal intelligence agents Historians Richard J Al...
Mao’s Cultural Revolution: everything you wanted to know
16 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the latest episode in our series on history’s biggest topics, Professor Rana Mitter answers your questions about one of the defining events of mo...
How the Beatles were in tune with 60s Britain
15 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Dominic Sandbrook explains how the Beatles reflected 1960s Britain, from the globalisation of pop culture to a fascination with mysticism The 196...
Shining new light on medieval Europe
14 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Matthew Gabriele and David M Perry speak to David Musgrove about their book The Bright Ages, which tackles the big themes of the Middle Ages and chal...
A murder mystery in 19th-century Dublin
12 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Thomas Morris speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about his book The Dublin Railway Murder, which reconstructs a strange historical cold case from 1856, revo...
Trading and crusading in the Middle Ages
11 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Mike Carr speaks to David Musgrove about Muslim-Christian relations in the medieval era, revealing how Papal-sanctioned trade was going on despite the...
The Demerara slave uprising
10 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Thomas Harding discusses a little-known uprising by enslaved people in the British colony of Demerara in 1823 Thomas Harding speaks to Ellie Cawtho...
The Age of Sail: everything you wanted to know
09 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Naval historian Kate Jamieson tackles listener questions on the Age of Sail, when sailing ships dominated global trade and warfare In the latest epi...
Ancient Greek scientific thinking
08 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Curator Jane Desborough talks to Ellie Cawthorne about a new Science Museum exhibition, Ancient Greeks: Science and Wisdom, which explores the ways in...
Hells, heavens and afterworlds: a traveller’s guide
07 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Edward Brooke-Hitching explores the many heavens, hells and lands of the dead from civilisations across global history Edward Brooke-Hitching speaks...
Women who served in WW2
05 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In commemoration of the 80th anniversary of conscription for women, historian Tessa Dunlop has written a new book capturing the remarkable lives of th...
A forgotten witch hunt in New England
04 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Malcolm Gaskill speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about his book The Ruin of All Witches, which chronicles a little-known 1651 witchcraft case from Springfiel...
Goods & globalisation: merchants in Tudor & Stuart England
03 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Between 1550 and 1650, English trade flourished as thousands of merchants sought out trading ventures across the globe. In conversation with Emily Bri...
The Jacobites: everything you wanted to know
02 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Murray Pittock answers listener questions about the Jacobites, and their attempts to restore the Stuart dynasty to the throne. Speaking to Emma Slatte...
History’s greatest mysteries: what caused the medieval ‘dancing plague’?
01 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On several occasions from the 14th to 16th centuries, hundreds of people in central Europe began moving their bodies in a strange uncontrollable fashi...
History’s greatest mysteries: why did Mao’s chosen successor flee China?
31 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Fifty years ago, in September 1971, Lin Biao boarded a flight out of the country, only to crash in the Mongolian desert shortly afterwards. Was this t...
History’s greatest mysteries: was the Trojan War fact or fiction?
29 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Thanks largely to Homer’s Iliad, the Trojan War is one of the most famous events in Greek mythology. But how much – if any – of the legend is ac...
History’s greatest mysteries: what happened to the Roman Ninth Legion?
28 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The Ninth Legion of the Roman army was last recorded in York in around AD 107. After that it simply vanished from history. To this day no-one knows wh...
History’s greatest mysteries: Agatha Christie disappears
27 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In December 1926, crime writer Agatha Christie left her home and vanished without a trace. When she was discovered 11 days later, Christie claimed to ...
The state of history in 2021
26 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Anna Whitelock looks back on some key moments and trends that made the historical headlines in 2021. Speaking to Ellie Cawthorne, she covers topics in...
Christmas feasts: WW2 rationing & postwar absurdity
24 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Annie Gray looks back on festive food in the 20th century – from suspect dishes made under WW2 rationing to joyful postwar creations pickled in aspi...
Thomas Kendrick: MI6 spymaster who helped win WW2
22 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Helen Fry speaks to Jon Bauckham about the remarkable life and career of Thomas Kendrick, an elusive MI6 intelligence officer who helped thousands of ...
Pearl Harbor episode 5: Chaos unleashed
21 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In the final episode in our new series on the raid on Pearl Harbor, Ellie Cawthorne speaks to Robert Lyman about the attack’s immediate aftermath an...
The Stuart princess who could have deposed Charles I
20 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Elizabeth Stuart was beloved by Protestants and Catholics, English and Scots alike. Many clamoured for her to replace her brother, Charles I, on the t...
Fascism: everything you wanted to know
19 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Richard Bosworth answers listener questions on the authoritarian ideology that emerged in Italy a century ago How was Mussolini able to seize contro...
Yugoslavia: the beginning of the end
18 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Dejan Djokic reflects on the brief 1991 war that saw Slovenia secure independence and helped set in motion the bloody collapse of Yugoslavia. In con...
Christmas feasts: Victorian merrymaking
17 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
From Twelfth cakes to creepy greetings cards and booze-soaked desserts, Annie Gray guides us through festive feasting in the Victorian era. Speaking t...
Triumph against the odds: the 1821 Greek Revolution
15 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Historian Mark Mazower explains how the Greeks secured an unlikely victory against the Ottoman empire in their 1820s fight for freedom. Speaking to...
Pearl Harbor episode 4: The day of the attack
14 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In the latest episode in our new series on the raid on Pearl Harbor, Ellie Cawthorne and Gavin Mortimer chart how the attack unfolded on 7 December 19...
England’s last witches
13 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
John Callow discusses the tragic case of the Bideford witches, the last women in England to be executed for the crime of witchcraft In 1682, three wom...
Hadrian’s Wall: everything you wanted to know
12 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As we approach the 1900th anniversary of the building of Hadrian’s Wall, Rob Collins answers listener questions on Britain’s most famous Roman for...
Animals in space: from Laika to jellyfish & tortoises
11 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Stephen Walker tells Rhiannon Davies about the history of animals in space, from fruit flies and monkeys to Laika the Soviet space dog Thousands of ...
Christmas feasts: Georgian elegance
10 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Taking in glamorous dinner parties and decadent “wine-chocolate”, Annie Graytransports us back to a festive feast from the Georgian era. Speakin...
How US-Russian relations fractured in the 1990s
08 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Mary Sarotte tells Spencer Mizen about her new book Not One Inch, which reveals how diplomatic missteps after the fall of the Berlin Wall soured US-...
Pearl Harbor episode 3: Countdown to the raid
07 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In the latest episode in our new series on the raid on Pearl Harbor, Steve Twomey speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about the immediate run-up to the attack, ...
Pearl Harbor episode 2: America on the eve of war
07 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In the latest episode in our new series on the raid on Pearl Harbor, Dayna Barnes speaks to Ellie Cawthorne about the United States in the years and m...
Sex lives of medieval people
06 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Were medieval attitudes to sex really that different from our own? Historian Katherine Harvey speaks to Elinor Evans about the sex lives of ordinary p...