History Hit Podcasts

The Astors, The Gilded Age & The Building of New York

From fur traders to rulers of the New York social scene - how did the Astors rise to the top? What did it mean to be 'Old Money' in the Gilded...

Anne Boleyn at Hever Castle

What was Anne Boleyn like before she became the most controversial queen in English history? Can the rooms and gardens at her childhood home...

The Assassination of Trotsky

This is the true story of the plot to kill Stalin's greatest enemy. It involves ice axe, a bloody study in Mexico City, and a betrayal years in...

Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand

On a summer day in Sarajevo in 1914, a young man fired two rounds of his pistol in the middle of the street, killing a Royal couple... He didn't...

The First Tools

What if the first technology was just a stone?

Tristan Hughes and Dr. Emma Finestone, - Curator and the Robert J. and Linnet E. Fritz...

Who was the first 'Lesbian'?

Was Sappho queer? Or was this Ancient Greek poet just really really good friends with women?

Today on Betwixt the Sheets, Kate is joined by...

Challenging the Pope: The Avignon Papacy

Who would pick a fight with the Pope?? Matt Lewis and Dr. Eleanor Janega dive into the explosive clash between Pope Boniface VIII and Philip IV of...

Shays' Rebellion: An Honorable Rebellion?

Shays’ Rebellion has long been taught as a dangerous uprising, one that risked shaking the newly founded United States of America. But by...

Titanic's Biggest Myths Debunked

Is it true that third-class passengers were locked below decks? Or that more lifeboats would have saved more lives? Did the band really play as...

Maria Theresa, Habsburg Empress

How did a woman rise to power, and keep it, in the fiercely male-dominated Habsburg Empire?

From her distrust of the Enlightenment to her...

Churchill's Secret Army

Trap doors under toilets, hidden radio rooms in the back of wardrobes, secret bases behind waterfalls....Dan investigates an extraordinary network...

Athens vs Persia: The Legend of Themistocles

A legend of the great Greek city of Athens, Themistocles rose from obscurity to save ancient Greece and helped shape one of the greatest naval...

Sex Work in the American Revolution

Where the American War of Independence raged, the camp followers...followed.

Among them were sex workers, for both the American and British...

Legends of Richard the Lionheart

Was Richard the Lionheart really England’s greatest medieval hero? Or is he one of history’s most successful myths, more heroic in legend than...

Elizabethans in India

How did England’s earliest travellers to India try to win favour in a Mughal golden age that scarcely noticed them?

Professor Suzannah...

The Murder that Shook Mary Queen of Scots

On the night of Saturday the 9th of March, 1566, a pregnant Mary Queen of Scots was having a dinner party.

It was a night that ended in the...

The Hittites

What made the Hittites one of the great Bronze Age powers, and how did their empire survive on war, diplomacy and faith? Tristan Hughes is joined...

The Siege of Acre: The Last Battle of the Crusades

The desperate, violent last stand that ended two centuries of crusading in the Holy Land. We hear how, outnumbered, divided and desperate, the...

How to Escape Alcatraz

What was it like to live on Alcatraz? And was it possible to escape? In this episode, Don speaks to a historian with the unique experience of...

How To Do Celtic Magic

What's the best cure for a hangover? What's the most effective way to curse your enemies? How do you keep demonic powers at bay?

The...

The Depravity of the Marquis De Sade

Sadism - the derivation of pleasure from inflicting pain, suffering and humiliation on others - is named after this man. So what exactly did he...