Podcasts

President Franklin Pierce: Tragedies & Trade-Offs

We're creeping closer and closer to the Civil War in our chronology of presidents, and this episode's focus did little to delay the division of...

Neanderthal Sex

What comes to mind when you think of a neanderthal? 

Probably a hunched, hairy, grunting version of a man who’s shuffling around his...

Tudor Conquest of Ireland

Henry VIII was termed "by the Grace of God, King of England, France and Ireland.”  Ireland was England’s oldest colony.  But what...

Geoffrey Chaucer: Father of English Literature

Geoffrey Chaucer is perhaps medieval England’s most famous writer and poet. Now a new exhibition at the Bodleian Library in Oxford is setting...

The First Dogs

For millennia dogs have been undoubtedly man’s best friend. But when did humans first start keeping dogs as pets? The fascinating story of...

The American Ripper

Who was the American Ripper? How many people died at his hands? What on earth is a 'murder castle'? Anthony and Maddy head down a rabbit hole on...

Prohibition

On 17 January 1920, the 18th Amendment came into effect in the United States. It made the manufacture, sale and transportation of 'intoxicating...

The 7 Wonders of the Ancient World

People have always looked to the wonders of the ancient world for awe and inspiration. In the Ancient era, people embarked on dangerous...

First Polynesians

In small wooden canoes and with just the stars for navigation, how did the first Polynesians conquer the largest ocean on earth? For centuries...

The Apache Wars

What were the Apache Wars? How did they begin? And how did the end of the Mexican-American War impact the indigenous people of that...

Sex in Ancient Rome

How sexually depraved were the Romans?

Whilst they were a civlised, stoic and innovative bunch, they were also a promiscuous bunch with very...

The Black Death

By the time the Black Death subsided, between 75 and 200 million people in Afro-Eurasia were dead, entire towns and cities had collapsed, and the...