Top History Podcasts

Whoever said history was boring obviously wasn’t paying attention. Each week, join Katie Charlwood, history harlot and reader of books, as she delves into the people, places and events that make history a bit more interesting!

Part of the Inflection network

The Vikings terrified the medieval world. Yet they beguile us today. Who were they really?

Native people have been written out of the American story, but without us you don’t know what happened. This summer the United States will celebrate the 250-year anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. When you read the Declaration, you realize it is a list of complaints. The last entry, the climax in our founders’ reasons for rebellion against the Crown, is this: “He has excited… the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.”

We have been told the Revolution was fought over taxation and representation. But what the founders were most angry about in our country’s most famous document was Indian affairs. How did generations of Americans miss this?

The first armed rebellion against the Crown was an attack on British forts that traded with tribes. When colonists threw tea into the Boston harbor, they dressed up like members of the Mohawk tribe—not for disguise, but because pretending to be Indian symbolized freedom and rebellion. The founding fathers’ first government failed because Indigenous nations were too powerful; war and diplomacy with Native people is why we have a central federal government.

Hosted and reported by Rebecca Nagle and  featuring leading Native historians,  First America unveils  how the founders’ treatment of Indigenous nations—and their resistance—shaped US democracy. The show  does not simply add another blemish to the image of the founding fathers, it reveals the real story of why the colonists rebelled, what kind of government they created, and, crucially, how our current political moment was 250 years in the making.

Join Helen and Lloyd as they travel back in time (metaphorically… it’s a podcast) to explore the real history of the people, places and events of the Old Testament, New Testament and everything in between.

As Christians, we have a 2,000-year history filled with stories to tell and lessons to learn. Church History for Everyone highlights key events from AD 70 to 1415 through 20 engaging profiles and historical accounts. By focusing on one person per episode, we will explore the broader themes, ideas, and movements from the Middle Ages up to the cusp of the Reformation. We will cover topics such as St. Patrick and the barbarian conversion, Charlemagne and the beginnings of Europe, and Richard the Lionheart and the Crusades, as well as key figures like Aquinas, Wycliffe, and Hus.

NEW from the BBC’s space podcast: A revolutionary telescope and the tiny flaw that almost destroyed the dream. Hubble transformed our understanding of the universe. Maggie Aderin tells the dramatic story of one of the most ambitious scientific instruments ever built - and how it almost ended in disaster.

Already delayed by years and millions of dollars over budget, the Hubble Space Telescope is finally ready to launch and change history. It has been heralded as a window on the universe, and promises to answer the most fundamental questions ever asked: How did it all begin? Where are we going? Are we alone? But little does Nasa know that the curvature of one of its mirrors is off by the equivalent of one-fiftieth of the width of a human hair. The result? Blurry images. It will need to be repaired – in space!

Theme music by Hans Zimmer and Christian Lundberg and produced by Russell Emanuel, for Bleeding Fingers Music.

13 Minutes is the space podcast from the BBC World Service, telling epic space stories. It’s produced by the BBC Audio Science Unit.

Previous seasons:

Season 1: 13 Minutes to the Moon. The first Moon landing. In the final dramatic 13-minute descent to the Moon, the Apollo 11 mission came close to going badly wrong. Communication was breaking down, technology was failing and fuel was running out. This is the story of how the first Moon landing was saved. Presented by Kevin Fong.

Season 2: Apollo 13. Apollo 13 should have been the third Moon landing, but after an explosion, it almost ended in tragedy. Told by the people who flew it and saved it. Presented by Kevin Fong.

Season 3: The Space Shuttle. A sci-fi dream that changed spaceflight forever. From the boldest test flight in history to one of Nasa’s darkest days – the Challenger disaster. Space scientist Maggie Aderin tells the awe-inspiring story of the programme that brought triumph and tragedy.

Season 4: Artemis II. Artemis and the return to the Moon. As Nasa returned to the Moon for the first time in more than half a century, we followed the mission with a new episode every day. Four astronauts – on a spacecraft called Orion - looped around the Moon. They went further from Earth than any human in history. The story of Artemis II is told by space scientist Maggie Aderin, British astronaut Tim Peake, and US space journalist Kristin Fisher.