History Podcasts
The History Hit network gives you access to a growing range of podcasts presented by and featuring historians at the forefront of research and debate.
Scroll down to listen to the most recent episodes from our network.
Dan Snow’s History Hit explores the deep history behind today’s headlines – giving you the context to understand what is going on today. Everything has a history, every challenge made easier by understanding its nature, its genesis. In a world of fast opinions, we put historians into the debate, women and men who bring real knowledge built over careers spent researching.
The Ancients, hosted by historian Tristan Hughes, is dedicated to discussing our distant past. Historians and archaeologists join Tristan to discuss specific themes from antiquity, from Neolithic Britain to the Fall of Rome.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb presents Not Just the Tudors. Together with expert interviewees, she covers the sweeping range of the early modern period: everything from the Aztecs to witches, Velázquez to Shakespeare, Mughal India to the Mayflower.
Gone Medieval is hosted by historians Matt Lewis and Eleanor Janega, who shine a light on one of the most fascinating yet misunderstood periods of history: the Middle Ages. In each episode, experts lead listeners beneath the skin of captivating stories to uncover new insights.
In Betwixt the Sheets join historian, Kate Lister as she unashamedly roots around the topics which seem to have been skipped in history class. Everything from landmark LGBTQ+ court cases, to political scandal, to downright bizarre medieval cures for impotence.
In American History Hit, join Don Wildman twice a week for your hit of American history, as he explores the past to help us understand the United States of today. We’ll hear how codebreakers uncovered secret Japanese plans for the Battle of Midway, visit Chief Powhatan as he prepares for war with the British, see Walt Disney accuse his former colleagues of being communists, and uncover the dark history that lies beneath Central Park.
After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal joined History Hit’s award-winning podcast network in October 2023, hosted by actor, writer and historian Anthony Delaney and writer, broadcaster, historian Maddy Pelling. Together, the duo unpick history’s spookiest, strangest and most sinister stories – from the disappearance of HMS Terror to the origins of Halloween.
War historian and broadcaster James Rogers hosts our Warfare podcast, which opens up fascinating new perspectives on how conflict has shaped and changed our world. James teams up with fellow historians, veterans, and experts to reveal astonishing new histories of inspirational leadership, breakthrough technologies, and era defining battles.
Patented, hosted by Dallas Campbell, dives into stories of flukey discoveries, erased individuals and murky marketing ploys with the help of experts, scientists and historians.
Click on any of the listings below to listen to the most recent episodes from our network.
All Podcasts
23:55
The Sinking of the Lusitania
7 May 2021On 7 May 1915, the ocean liner RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German U-boat off the coast of Ireland with more than half the passengers and crew being...
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17:57
WW2: Hitler's Operation Basalt
7 May 2021In 1942 the British launched a 12 man raid and reconnaissance mission to the Channel Island of Sark. On the night of the 3 October, a cast of...
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39:46
Roman Prisoners of War
6 May 2021We know all about the battles of the Roman Empire: the opposing sides, their weapons and incentives. But if history is written by the winners, what...
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51:09
The Aztecs
6 May 2021What we know about the Aztecs of Mexico often comes from the accounts of their Spanish conquerors. But the Aztec culture was far more sophisticated...
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45:30
How Corinth Became Christian
6 May 2021Occupied since around 3000 BC, the Ancient city of Corinth is not unique in its transition from a Pagan, Greco-Roman state to a Christian one. What...
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25:10
A Scandalous Duchess
5 May 2021Elizabeth Chudleigh, Duchess of Kingston was a duchess who attracted scandal, a duchess who divided opinion, a duchess who refused to give up agency...
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32:30
Napoleon's Death
5 May 2021Six years of exile on a remote island blighted with unpleasant weather conditions, in lodgings far inferior to those enjoyed whilst leader of France,...
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28:28
Pre-historic Britain in Seven Burials with Alice Roberts
4 May 2021How much can a burial really tell us about our ancient past? Professor Alice Roberts is today's guest and, as her new book Ancestors demonstrates,...
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40:16
The Queer Shakespeare: John Lyly
3 May 2021John Lyly's name may not be so familiar. He was a playwright and poet writing at the same time as Shakespeare and, in his day, was more famous than...
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30:27
The Apollo Program with Kevin Fong
3 May 2021Getting to the moon was no easy feat, no matter how confident Kennedy may have sounded in his famous 1961 speech. NASA built a team from the ground...
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22:49
Napoleon
3 May 2021He is widely remembered as one of the most exceptional military commanders that the world has ever seen, a man whose influence was so pervasive that...
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44:16
The Truth About The Huns
2 May 2021The Huns! The name of this ancient people triggers a multiplicity of responses and evokes a number of images (nearly all of them negative). They...
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18:31
Amend: The Fight for America
2 May 2021Take a deep dive into the remaking of the American Constitution and the 14th amendment created in the wake of the American Civil War. The 14th...
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43:44
The Olympic Games
2 May 2021The most famous sporting event in the world is upon us, so it's only right that we consider what do we know about the ancient origins of the games...
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21:09
The Death of Hitler
1 May 2021Did Hitler shoot himself in the Führerbunker, or did he slip past the Soviets and escape to South America? There have been innumerable...
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23:16
Captain Cook: The Aboriginal Perspective
30 April 2021Captain Cook has been celebrated, wrongly, as the first European to discover Australia but many now believe it is time to reappraise his legacy...
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26:15
Operation Barbarossa
30 April 2021Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union on Sunday 22 June 1941 was one of the bloodiest military campaigns mankind has ever known. Now, BAFTA winning...
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41:44
Bridewell: The Palace that became a Prison
29 April 2021In the heart of Shakespeare's London, there was a palace that had become a prison: Bridewell. Professor Duncan Salkeld has explored the records of...
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32:14
Not Just the Tudors
29 April 2021When thinking about the 16th century the Tudor dynasty often comes to the fore, but the was so much more to this extraordinary period to be explored....
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49:59
Velazquez and the Spanish Court
29 April 2021Professor Suzannah Lipscomb talks to Laura Cumming - author and art critic for The Observer - about Velázquez, arguably the greatest genius of...
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43:14
Henry VIII's Billionaire Wardrobe
29 April 2021Venetian ambassador Sebastian Giustinian described Henry VIII as the 'best dressed sovereign in the world'. The King spent the equivalent of £2...
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