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564. The Great Northern War: The Battle of the Baltic (Part 1)
How did the Great Northern War, which saw Sweden pitted against Peter the Great’s Russia and her allies, and would transform Europe forever, begin? Who was Charles XII, S...
· 1 hr 4 min 23 sec
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The USA's Central Intelligence Agency is a mysterious organisation which has used covert methods to assassinate enemies, influence governments and tip whole countries into revolution - or so countless...
· 57 min 4 sec
Elizabeth II. Henry V. William the Conqueror. All pretenders, according to our twitter poll to find England’s greatest monarch, which has been running over the last week. Dominic and Tom discuss those...
· 1 hr 3 min 41 sec
Oliver Cromwell. Queen Victoria. George V. All contenders for the title of England's greatest monarch, a poll for which took place on a twitter over the last week. We know that Athelstan went on to wi...
· 58 min 20 sec
After an intense tournament featuring sixteen of the finest Kings and Queens this island has to offer, the people have decided the greatest king of England also happens to be the first. The 10th centu...
· 59 min 35 sec
"Discovered this territory, 1770". So reads the inscription on a statue of Captain Cook in Hyde Park, Sydney. But did he really discover it? Tom and Dominic are joined by David Hunt to explore the lon...
· 54 min 25 sec
1973: Major oil-producing nations led by Saudi Arabia quadruple the price of oil overnight, sending the West (particularly the United Kingdom) into crisis. The face of 20th century geopolitics is perm...
· 1 hr 56 sec
Who's England's greatest monarch? Voting starts on Saturday 13th November, go to @TheRestHistory on Twitter to get involved.*The Rest Is History Live Tour 2023*:Tom and Dominic are back on tour this a...
· 44 min 17 sec
On the anniversary of the day the guns fell silent on the Western Front, we look at the last moments of the First World War – and how we remember them. How did Remembrance Day start? What are the stor...
· 58 min 43 sec
In the second part of our Alexander the Great special, we head to the limits of the known world, burning down palaces, storming mountain-top fortresses and battling elephants as we go. Might Alexander...
· 59 min 57 sec
Alexander the Great is the most charismatic conqueror in history. Tom and Dominic, in the first of a two part special, trace the course of his dazzling career from Macedonia to his mysterious journey...
· 59 min 18 sec
‘Remember, remember / the Fifth of November / Gunpowder, treason & plot.” But what is it exactly we are remembering on Bonfire Night? Tom & Dominic explore what - if it had succeeded - would h...
· 1 hr 1 min 0 sec
Like Merlin, who lived his life in reverse, we go backwards in time as we continue our two-part series on paganism. Renaissance philosophers; green men; a pagan city in the early caliphate; hooded god...
· 53 min 54 sec
In the first of a two part Hallowe’en special, Tom and Dominic are joined by Professor Ronald Hutton to explore the history of modern paganism: from Wicca to Druids, and from Himmler to the Glastonbur...
· 55 min 57 sec
The word ‘medieval’ is often used to mean backward, benighted, unscientific. But is this fair? Historian of science Seb Falk joins Tom and Dominic to explore how the Middle Ages shaped and influenced...
· 52 min 11 sec
Oh, to be Dutch in the seventeenth century. Or Roman in 150 AD. Or British in the 1990's. Tom and Dominic debate the merits of various "Golden Ages" in history, and ask whether we might have seen the...
· 57 min 56 sec
Curator and art historian Aparna Andhare gives Tom and Dominic her selection of the ten buildings that best illustrate India’s past 4,500 years. Ranging from Mohenjo-daro to Narendra Modi, all the Sub...
· 1 hr 24 sec
How did the existence of dinosaurs come to be discovered, & what role have they played in the popular imagination over the past 200 years? And what can humanity learn from the extinction of dinosa...
· 54 min 38 sec
Did the industrial revolution really improve people’s lives? And why was Britain first to industrialise? Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook are joined by Emma Griffin, professor of modern history and a...
· 1 hr 2 min 6 sec
Despite his overwhelming lead in the polls, President Richard Nixon’s paranoia leads to the criminal actions of the Watergate scandal. In this second part of our mini-series, Dominic Sandbrook and Tom...
· 53 min 44 sec
What led Richard Nixon into the greatest political scandal in American history? Dominic Sandbrook, acclaimed historian of the period, leads Tom Holland on an extraordinary journey from Nixon’s humble...
· 49 min 51 sec