History Hit Podcasts

Private Members’ Clubs

Private Members’ Clubs are often the location of suspected scandal - from Oscar Wilde to Chris Pincher, what happens behind these elitist...

King Cnut & the End of the Viking Age

Dr. Cat Jarman concludes her month-long series about her favourite, specialist subject - the Vikings.

Cnut the Great became King of England...

A Short History of the Bank of England

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...

Hollywood Blacklist

After World War 2 ended, the Nazis defeated, America feared communist infiltration of its institutions, among them, Hollywood.

In November...

War Crimes

Warning: This episode contains content that some listeners may find upsetting

No matter the war being fought, it's a sad fact that war...

The Sinking of the Mary Rose

Exactly forty years ago, in a groundbreaking and spectacular piece of marine conservation that captured the imagination of the world, the Mary...

Agatha Christie with Lucy Worsley

Agatha Christie is the best-selling fiction writer of all time and her many detective novels, short stories and plays have gripped and entertained...

FORENSICS: Fingerprinting

We hear from London’s most inaccessible museum, the Met police’s Crime Museum, and take you back to India in the time of the British Raj. We...

Top Five Dinosaurs

They’re big. They’re fierce. And they’re extinct.

This is how today’s guest - palaeontologist, evolutionary biologist and Senior...

The Story of Castles


Castles have held a pivotal place in British life, many of them remaining today as powerful reminders of our history and sources of inspiration....

The Secret Lives of Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe. She's got to be one of the most famous people of all time, hasn't she?

But what happens when an investigative war reporter...

WW2: The Forgotten Blitz

When you think of the Blitz, you think of the Blitz on London. The two are synonymous, and not without reason. Over 57 consecutive nights and...

Eleanor of Aquitaine

From an age in which women’s lives were obscured and poorly recorded, one shines brightly from the darkness. Eleanor of Aquitaine - born...

Declaration of Independence

While the Revolutionary War was being fought in July 1776, the 13 British colonies in America came together to approve their Declaration of...

The Atomic Bomb & the Secret City

In 1939 Franklin D Roosevelt received a letter from Albert Einstein, warning him that the Nazis might be developing nuclear...

Karnak: Egypt's Greatest Temple

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...

Slavery and the Royal African Company

The Royal African Company was set up in 1660 - by the ruling Stuart family and City of London merchants - to exploit gold fields up the Gambia...

Suleyman the Magnificent

The Lion House is a riveting new book from journalist and historian Christopher De Bellaigue, written like a novel that tells the dramatic story...

Perfume

First Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel shocked the world’s eyeballs with her fashion designs. Then she shocked its nostrils with a new smell - Chanel...

The Man Wrongfully Hanged at Cardiff Prison

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...

Forbidden Books

What makes a book bad? Does it have to be nonsensical? Heretical? Libellous? Sexy?

Well for 500 years, a panel from the Roman Catholic...