Latest Episodes
Most Recent
The Rest Is History Club
Join The Rest Is History Club:
- Exclusive bonus episodes
- Ad-free listening
- Early access to full series
- Presale tickets for live shows
- Members' newsletter
- Discount book deals
- Members' chat community on Discord
More Episodes
Who was the Rector of Stiffkey, Harold Davidson - the "Prostitutes' Padre" - and why was he Britain’s most notorious curate? Was it his unnerving infatuation with girls that saw him put on trial and d...
· 59 min 35 sec
Why was a boy grotesquely and mysteriously murdered in a wood in Norwich in the 12th century? Who was his killer? Was it a ritual child sacrifice? Why was the murder blamed on Norwich's Jewish communi...
· 1 hr 2 min 54 sec
After the assassination of Sir Henry Wilson and the signing of the polarising Anglo-Irish Treaty, how did the bombastic Battle of the Four Courts break out in Dublin? With British guns opening fire on...
· 47 min 22 sec
Who was Sir Henry Wilson, and how was he shockingly murdered in 1922? Who ordered it? What was his attitude to the question of Irish Home Rule? Why has death been compared to the assassination of Arch...
· 49 min 32 sec
What were the terms of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, signed in December 1921, following negotiations between the UK and Sinn FĂ©in? How was it received by the Irish people? What was the process by which it w...
· 1 hr 7 min 7 sec
What occurred on Bloody Sunday on 21 November 1920 - a turning point in the Irish War of Independence and one of the bloodiest and most brutal moments in Irish history? How many British Army Officers...
· 59 min 46 sec
What was Sinn Féin’s totemic first move after winning a majority seat in 1917? Were the IRA’s methods during this early stages of the war as violent as they are commonly believed to have been? How sec...
· 1 hr 4 min 37 sec
What are the origins of the Irish War of Independence? What impact did the First World War have on Irish efforts for Home Rule? What was the mood in Ireland following the bloody Easter Rising of 1916?...
· 1 hr 11 min 58 sec
Following the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent, who was his Medici successor? Could he overcome the political turmoil and religious fervour in Florence, and rebuff the storm clouds of war gathering ov...
· 1 hr 11 min 9 sec
Did Lorenzo de’Medici’s rule in Florence incur prosperity, or was it a corrupt and autocratic regime, rife with torture, that would spell the doom of the former Republic? While building an edifice of...
· 1 hr 1 min 33 sec
Who was Lorenzo the Magnificent, the most glamorous, glittering, and blood-soaked of all the Medici, who became his family’s formidable but compulsive “Godfather” from the age of only twenty one? What...
· 1 hr 58 sec
What are the origins of one of history’s most glittering, and for a time, most powerful families in Europe; the Medici? How were they able to seize supreme power in the Republic of Florence , one of...
· 1 hr 5 min 45 sec
How did the Battle of Cannae - one of the most important battles of all time for Ancient Rome, with a whole Empire at stake, and a reputation that had reverberated across the centuries - in 216 BC, un...
· 1 hr 26 sec
How did Hannibal achieve the remarkable feat of crossing the Alps with his army, and elephants? How many of his men survived the treacherous journey? Was it worth sacrificing so much of his army in or...
· 58 min 0 sec
Why did Hannibal choose to cross the Alps with his elephants in 218 BC, when invading Rome? Was it a brilliant stratagem or a military disaster? What was the secret to the Roman Republic’s growing mil...
· 1 hr 28 sec
Who was Hannibal, the flawed but brilliant Carthaginian general? What makes Rome vs Carthage in the third century BC one of the most totemic ancient rivalries of all time? How did Hamilcar, father of...
· 57 min 36 sec
What were the consequences of Peter the Great’s mighty victory over Sweden at the Battle of Poltova in 1707? How great was the impact of his reign upon Russia overall, and was he responsible for turni...
· 1 hr 7 min 18 sec
Why was the greatest and most climactic battle of the Great Northern War, the Battle of Poltova, one of the most important in all European history? What drove Charles XII of Sweden to invade Russia in...
· 1 hr 3 min 36 sec
After establishing the city of St Petersburg, what was Peter the Great’s next step in his titanic struggle against Charles XII of Sweden, for mastery of northern and eastern Europe? What drastic, brut...
· 1 hr 9 min 5 sec