History Hit Podcasts

Elizabethan Boy Actresses

Why were Shakespeare’s greatest heroines played by teenage boys? How did they learn their craft? On the Elizabethan stage, highly trained young...

The Commanders: The Best of the Rest

For the final episode in our 'Commanders' series, we've drawn on your suggestions to pay tribute to the commanders who didn’t make our main...

The Victorian Era's Wildest Murder

It was one of the most gruesome crimes of the Victorian era... and it ended up in David Attenborough's garden! Kate Webster, a servant, killed and...

Judas Iscariot

**Warning: This episode contains graphic descriptions of violence, including suicide**

What really happened to Judas Iscariot? From shifting...

What Are the Late Medieval Ages?

Matt Lewis and Dr. Eleanor Janega dive into the chaos of the late Middle Ages; from the Great Famine and the Little Ice Age to plague, peasant...

Inside the Brothels of New Orleans

Storyville was the red-light district in New Orleans, created in 1897.

What was it like in this neighbourhood, and inside the brothels...

What Is The Kennedy Curse?

Their name is synonymous with power, influence ... and tragedy. And with so much of the latter, many have taken to speculating - are the Kennedy...

Britain's First Dog

Fifteen thousand years ago, as the Ice Age loosened its grip on Northern Europe, humans returned to the previously inhospitable British Isles. But...

How and Why the Crusades Started

This is your guide to almost two centuries of holy war - from start to finish. We untangle faith, politics and myth, and reveal how the Crusades...

When the Spanish Armada Reached Ireland

What happens when a fleeing armada meets an unforgiving coast? Shipwreck, slaughter and survival collide as Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and...

The Real Outlander

The book and TV series "Outlander" has introduced millions of fans to Scottish history and the story of the Jacobites.

One of those fans is...

The Victorian Sex Trafficking Panic

Was there really a boom in sex trafficking at the end of the 19th century? What was 'white slavery'? And how often did the traffickers get...

The Women Who Ruled Medieval Burgundy, and Europe

What if the most powerful warlords in medieval Europe were women?

From wine country to empire, Burgundy’s Duchesses brokered marriages,...

The Trail of Tears | The Frontier

The Trail of Tears is one of the darkest chapters in American history: the forced removal of thousands of Native Americans from their ancestral...

The Soviet Marshal Georgy Zhukov

Marshal Georgy Zhukov was undoubtedly one of the Second World War's most formidable figures. Rising from humble peasant origins, Zhukov became the...

Saladin: The Third Crusade's Greatest General?

The original Assassin’s Creed game focuses on the Assassins' efforts to bring down the Templars during the Third Crusade from 1189-1192. He...

Henry Wotton: Outlaw and Royal Spy

Assassination plots, Venetian stand‑offs and a diplomat in disguise: how did one maverick change the course of history?

Professor Suzannah...

The Man Who Ate Everything

Listener warning: this episode contains a description of cruelty to animals

One of the strangest tales to emerge from Napoleonic France was...

The Roman Centurion

What did it take to become a Roman centurion? To command, to punish and to lead from the very front of Rome’s armies?

In this episode of...

The Truth about Charlie Chaplin

Charlie Chaplin had an extraordinary life: from the workhouses of Victorian London to the glamorous films sets of Hollywood's Golden Age.

He...

A Complete History of Medieval Ireland

What happens when a kidnapped teenager returns to the land of his captors to change it forever? Dr Eleanor Janega and James Hawes romp through...