Dan Snow's History Hit

Car bombings, assassinations and a military takeover: these are just some of the things American TV producer Natasha Lance Rogoff and her team faced when trying to bring The Muppets to the former USSR in the 1990s.After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russia that emerged was a chaotic, sometimes violent free-for-all for western investors and oligarchs, swooping in to buy up businesses, natural resources and really anything they could. For regular Russians, they had to navigate a new, more free society and Natasha, a fluent speaker with experience in Russian TV, was drafted in to introduce The Muppets as the ambassadors to show children how to do that.An exercise in trying to introduce western values but also establish international relations with a former enemy, almost every aspect of the Russian Sesame Street- Uliza Sezam - was coloured by cultural clashes. Both nationalities had to learn to work together and better understand one another. What was created was a wholly Russian show, with new characters

For years we've understood that in the prehistoric hunter-gather world, the men did the hunting and the women did the gathering. Prehistoric man went on adventures, invented, created and drew, whereas prehistoric women stayed home, educated children and carried out domestic chores. Well, research now shows that this wasn't the case. Researchers are taking a closer look at our distant ancestors and breaking stereotypes about early women. Dan is joined by Thomas Cirotteau, co-author of the book Lady Sapiens: Breaking Stereotypes About Prehistoric Women to unearth a new understanding of our origins.Produced by Beth Donaldson and mixed by Dougal PatmoreIf you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dan Snow’s History Hit hits the road to Belgium and the Waterloo Battlefield to see the soldier’s bones found in an attic earlier this month. The Battle of Waterloo is often remembered for its great leaders; Napoleon, Wellington and Blücher. Or, for its sweeping strategic importance but what did the ordinary fighting men endure? We went to the Waterloo Battlefield to learn about the almost apocalyptic reality of the battle with thick quagmires of mud and the bodies of both soldiers and horses strewn about. French Historian Antoin Charpagne shares stories of the men on the ground, what they ate (or didn't), their relationships and how they suffered. The History Hit team then head to Universite de Liege Medical Institute to the morgue to see what bones from Prussian soldiers can tell us about the battle before finally heading on to the Brussels Museum of Natural Sciences where Dan helps Dr Caroline Laforest unpack the British bones that have just arrived.With great thanks to Mathilde Daumas, Dr Bernard Wil

Art and cultural historian Dr Janina Ramirez joins Dan on today's episode to tell the stories of three incredible medieval women: Aethelfled, a warrior queen who crushed the Vikings, Jadwiga, the first Queen Regent of Poland and Hildegard of Bingen, an 11th century polymath abbess who became a 20th century feminist icon and saint. They all ruled, influenced and changed history but are often left out of the narrative of the Middle Ages.Janina's new best-selling book 'Femina: A New History of the Middle Ages, Through the Women Written Out of It' is out now.Produced by Mariana Des Forges and mixed by Dougal PatmoreIf you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Content Warning This episode contains adult themes and language that may not be suitable for children.On this special network crossover episode we're calling 'History Hit in the Sheets', host of our chart-storming 'Betwixt the Sheets' podcast Kate Lister joins Dan to unravel the stories, adventures and troubled legacy of Casanova.Sex - lots of sex. That's what we think of when we think of Giacomo Casanova, Italy's most prolific lover and adventurer. But, there was much more to this Venetian womaniser than just romancing - he was a scam artist, outlaw, alchemist, spy and church cleric. He wrote satires, fought duels, and escaped from prison more than once. He even set up the French national lottery. We know so much about Casanova thanks to his mammoth three thousand page autobiography. It spoke of his incredible life in Europe, but is regarded as one of the most authentic sources of information about the customs and norms of European social life during the 18th century. He's often been painted as a rascal but

It's 1660 and General Edward Whalley and his son-in-law board a ship bound for the New World. They're on the run, wanted for the murder of King Charles I. His execution, the culmination of the English Civil War, sees control taken from the royalists by Oliver Cromwell and his parliamentarians for ten years. But, when the royalists return to power, an epic manhunt ensues for the fugitives hiding out in America.This is the plot of celebrated author Robert Harris' new historical novel Oblivions which takes a reader on a journey into the wilds of seventeenth-century New England. Robert joins Dan to talk about writing historical fiction, the history behind it and the unlikely way this story came to him.Produced by Mariana Des Forges and edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store

250 million years ago the armour-plated Placoderm fish invented the act of sex as we know it. Hubba Hubba. Dive into the historical sack as we go in search of the origins of nature’s greatest-ever invention.Dallas’s guest on this episode is Australian palaeontologist John Long, author of The Dawn of the Deed.Produced by Freddy Chick. The senior producer is Charlotte Long.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Stalingrad is one of the most titanic and totemic battles of the Second World War. Millions were killed, the city itself was utterly shattered by fighting and the seemingly unbeatable Wehrmacht suffered a catastrophic rout like never before. But what made the Soviet victory possible; what happened to the men from both sides who fought in the rubble and snow of Stalin's city; and what were the consequences, both on the Eastern Front and around the world, of this savage clash of arms?To find out Dan is joined by Jochen Hellbeck professor of history at Rutgers University and author of Stalingrad: The City that Defeated the Third Reich to discuss how the battle of Stalingrad ended and what came next.Produced by Mariana Des Forges and edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store.

Where can you find an Iron Age fort, Roman kilns, trees built for Nelson's navy and the hunting lodge of William the Conqueror? In the place that Dan calls home: the New Forest in the South of England. In this special episode of the podcast sponsored by BMW and National Park's Recharge in Nature project, Dan joins his good friend and local archaeologist Richard Reeves for an afternoon under the canopy and over the heathland to dig into the deep history of this ancient woodland so named at the Norman Conquest.  Among the gently falling rain, crunchy leaves and chirping birds, Dan and Richard retrace the many civilisations who have utilised the forest over the centuries for commoning, building ships, serving armies, hiding out and most of all, relaxing. Right through from the Norman gentry hunting deer to the Victorians who planted giant redwoods for scenic driveways, the New Forest has been a place of play and leisure for rich and poor, old and young.  The Recharge in Na

Fake moon landings, aliens and secret weapons; conspiracy theories about Area 51 abound but what exactly is it, and do we know anything about it with certainty? Dan is joined by Annie Jacobsen, investigative journalist and author of Area 51: An Uncensored History of America's Top Secret Military Base, to find out what really goes on in this mysterious Air Force installation. They discuss dirty bomb tests, nuclear explosions in space and soviet hoaxes.Produced by Mariana Des Forges and James Hickmann, and edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the withdrawal of American troops from Vietnam. It was one of the most costly conflicts that the U.S. has ever fought, causing immense loss of life on all sides. US intervention was defined by the strategy of 'pacification', but what exactly did this entail, and did it really work? Dan is joined by the expert on this subject, historian Robert Thompson, author of Clear, Hold, and Destroy, to learn about pacification in Vietnam's Phú Yên province. John Harrison, an American veteran who served with the 101st Airborne, will also be sharing his experiences about what pacification looked like on the ground.Produced by James Hickmann and mixed by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Anne Frank’s diary is one of the most famous accounts of the Jewish experience during the Second World War, giving us a deeply personal glimpse into the life-in-hiding of a prolific young writer. But on the 1st August 1944, the diary abruptly ends - the Franks, van Pelses and Fritz Pfeffer had been discovered by the Gestapo. In this episode, we’ll find out what happened to them between their arrest and Anne’s tragic death in 1945. Dan is joined by Bas von Benda-Beckmann, historian and co-author of After the Annex: Anne Frank, Auschwitz and Beyond, to reconstruct Anne’s life after her arrest.Produced by James Hickmann and edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Three Musketeers paints a picture of King Louis XIII of France as a rather weak monarch controlled by his powerful chief minister Cardinal Richelieu. Louis’ reign is generally thought of as being the beginning of the “age of absolutism” when ministers like Richelieu were in the ascendancy and the power of the court and courtiers declined. But was this really the case?In this episode of Not Just the Tudors, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb talks to Dr. Marc Jaffré, who believes it’s time to revise the conventional view of this significant period in French history.This episode was edited by Thomas Ntinas and produced by Rob Weinberg.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We think of archaeology as an exclusionary profession, one reserved for experts in the field. But why isn't the discipline more accessible to the public? Should the past not belong to everybody, and are there some basic skills that anyone can learn to help rediscover our past? The archaeologist and television presenter Chloe Duckworth joins us to give advice on how to become archaeologists in our own back gardens.Produced by Mariana Des Forges and edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Waterloo was one of the bloodiest battles in European history, yet until now only two bodies have ever been found on the battlefield. The remains of 10 British and Prussian soldiers who died in battle have just been discovered by the Belgian-German team Waterloo Uncovered; some skeletons had been resting in an attic for more than 40 years. The bones bare the brutality of the battle with marks from bladed weapons, one skull showing horrific damage caused by bayonet thrust or sword blow.Historian Rob Schaefer and Researcher Bernard Wilkin from the Belgian State Archive who made the discovery, both join Dan on the podcast to break the news of the astonishing find. Dan hatches a plan to get over to the lab in Belgium asap to see the bones for himself and what they can tell us about the grim, violent reality of the 50,000 men who were killed or injured on the battlefield on 18th of June 1815.Produced by Mariana Des Forges and edited by Dougal PatmoreIf you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history document

1492 marked the beginning of the Colombian Exchange - the transfer of people, goods, ideas and commodities across the Atlantic between Europe and the Americas. We hear a lot about the conquistadors, the settlers, Jesuit priests and colonisers from Spain, Portugal and Britain whose success in the 'New World' was built on the help and enslavement of indigenous people. But what of the indigenous peoples who made the journey in the opposite direction? Many travelled to Europe, some as slaves, others as courtiers, diplomats and even tourists.Author and Britain's only Aztec historian Caroline Dodds Pennock joins Dan to tell the stories of the Maya who first brought chocolate to the court of Isabella and Ferdinand, the Algonquin diplomats who travelled with Walter Raleigh and took residence in Elizabethan London and the Brazilian King who stopped by Hampton Court palace to see Henry VIII.Caroline's new book is called 'On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered Europe'Produced by Mariana Des Forges and edi

The brutal nature of the First World War presented frontline medical personnel with an array of horrific and debilitating wounds, inflicted on a previously unimaginable scale. From gas attacks and bayonet wounds to rifle fire and artillery barrages, day-to-day life on the frontlines posed a serious risk to life and limb. The doctors and nurses responsible for medical care rose to the challenge, and the First World War saw a dramatic transformation in the provision of frontline medicine. Many more lives would be saved than lost due to the efforts of these 'lifesavers'. Focusing on the Canadian experience, Tim Cook, author of Lifesavers and Body Snatchers, explains just how important and innovative the work of frontline medical staff was, and reveals the more sinister side of how these advances were achieved.Produced by James Hickmann and edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit toda

The Ming Dynasty emerged in the second half of the 14th century, having achieved a hard-won victory over the declining Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. Admiral Zheng He, a Muslim of Mongol descent, was born into this turmoil in a far-flung, frontier province of the Ming empire. Yet by the early 15th century, he had been made the commander-in-chief of some of the most extravagant and far-reaching naval voyages in history. How did a Muslim eunuch ascend to a position of such power in the Ming court? Where did these vast voyages take him, and how is he considered in China today? Dan is joined by Craig Clunas, Professor of the History of Art at the University of Oxford and an expert on the Ming Dynasty, to answer these questions, and more.Produced by James Hickmann. Edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit a

As the British and French colonies in North America expanded in the middle of the 18th century, they inevitably clashed. Fighting between the two sides and their respective Native American allies began in Ohio Country (now western Pennsylvania) in 1754. Dan Snow tells Don how the fighting began in 1754 in Ohio country (now western Pennsylvania) and spread, over almost a decade, across the disputed territory in the Great Lakes region and into New France (modern-day Canada). As a result of the Treaty of Paris, which ended the war, France's presence in North America was all but ended. They were left only with the small islands of St Pierre and Miquelon, off Newfoundland.Produced by Benjie Guy. Mixed by Aidan Lonergan. Senior Producer: Charlotte Long.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted o

Just over 100 years ago, in October 1922, Mussolini and 30,000 Blackshirts marched on Rome. It was a mass demonstration that would see his National Fascist Party take power in the Kingdom of Italy. However, the advent of Italian fascism has always been overshadowed by that of its infamous German counterpart, the Nazi Party. But what actually happened during Mussolini’s time in power? And why do we remember Mussolini’s dictatorship on more forgiving terms than that of Hitler? Dan is joined by Christian Goeschel, historian of modern European history and author of Mussolini and Hitler: The Forging of the Fascist Alliance, to lay bare the realities of Mussolini’s Italy.Produced by James Hickmann. Edited by Dougal Patmore.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe to History Hit today!Download the History Hit app from the Google Play store.Download the History Hit app from the Apple Store. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/pr