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
25:39
WWI Lifesavers and Body Snatchers
20 January 2023The brutal nature of the First World War presented frontline medical personnel with an array of horrific and debilitating wounds, inflicted on a...
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33:20
Ellis Island
19 January 2023From the 1880s to the 1920s the United States experienced a huge wave of immigration. People fleeing poverty and political instability in Europe,...
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45:10
The Parthenon
19 January 2023The unofficial 8th wonder the Ancient World, the Parthenon is still standing today. Located on the Acropolis in Athens, towering above a busy,...
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37:43
Swords in Elizabethan England
19 January 2023In Elizabethan England, swords were everywhere. Hanging on girdles, used in plays and depicted in paintings, they were an important marker of...
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28:30
Zheng He: The Ming Dynasty Explorer
19 January 2023The Ming Dynasty emerged in the second half of the 14th century, having achieved a hard-won victory over the declining Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty....
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30:04
Sawing Someone in Half Trick
18 January 2023When this trick was first performed, ushers poured buckets of blood down the gutter outside the theatre to entice people into the macabre...
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23:28
North America's French Indian War
18 January 2023As the British and French colonies in North America expanded in the middle of the 18th century, they inevitably clashed. Fighting between the two...
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34:33
Ireland's First Convicted Witch
17 January 2023In 1324, Alice Kyteler became the first woman in Britain and Ireland to be tried for witchcraft. Married to four different husbands - all of whom...
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32:26
The Blues
17 January 2023So much of today’s music takes inspiration from the Blues, but where did Blues music itself come from?
Kate is joined by Lamont Jack...
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29:03
Hitler and Mussolini
17 January 2023Just over 100 years ago, in October 1922, Mussolini and 30,000 Blackshirts marched on Rome. It was a mass demonstration that would see his...
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34:51
Dr Martin Luther King Jr
16 January 2023Dr Martin Luther King Jr was one of the figureheads of the civil rights movement in America. On 28th August 1963, he made one of the greatest...
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44:23
Spitfires of the Sea
16 January 2023After the fall of France during the Second World War, Britain became an isolated nation - dependent on the strength of it's coastal forces to keep...
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57:52
Demonic Possession in 17th-Century Canada
16 January 2023When strange signs appeared in the sky over Quebec in 1660, the French settlers started to worry about evil forces in their midst. Then, a...
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20:40
Churchill's Surprising Career in Scotland
16 January 2023Winston Churchill is possibly the most famous politician in British history. Throughout his career, he would hold numerous positions in...
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28:05
Levi's Jeans
15 January 2023150 years ago a patent was lodged for the first ever pair of jeans (what we’d think of as jeans today at least). There were two names on it. One...
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54:11
Orkney: Centre of the Stone Age
15 January 2023Orkney, a group of islands off Britain’s north coast, famed for their stunning, rural scenery. But 5,000 years ago, during the Neolithic Period...
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27:09
The Prester John Myth
14 January 2023Matt Lewis continues his Mystery Month on Gone Medieval with another tantalising enigma of the Middle Ages - the legendary figure of Prester...
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47:01
J. Edgar Hoover & The FBI
13 January 2023Known today as one of the most powerful law enforcement agencies in the world - the Federal Bureau of Investigation, more colloquially known as...
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55:44
Royal Sibling Rifts
13 January 2023Just in case you haven’t heard, a certain prince has released a memoir recently detailing a challenging relationship between him and his...
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34:40
The Mongol Empire
13 January 2023The Crusades are well-known but only part of the complex history of the medieval Near East. During the same era, the region was completely remade...
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39:39
Charles Dickens in America
12 January 2023One of the most famous writers ever to have lived, Charles Dickens travelled twice to the US, in 1842 and 1867. This made him one of the first...
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