James Gillray: life of the week

Born to an enslaved mother in the British Caribbean in the tumultuous, brutal world of the late 18th century, Henry Christoph's role in the Haitian Revolution saw him rise to prominence – and was just...

18 Sep 202552min

For most of the latter half of the 20th century, the world was frozen in a standoff. The Cold War era was defined by the ideological fissure between capitalism, led by the United States, and communism...

16 Sep 202547min

Climbing to the top of Gilded Age society in 19th-century America, socialite Alva Vanderbilt made headlines for being one of the first elite women to divorce on her terms, and she later turned her amb...

15 Sep 202540min

Across 12,000 years of history, prosperity has flourished in societies where women could fully participate – and faltered when they were pushed to the margins. That's what Dr Victoria Bateman argues i...

14 Sep 202546min

They gave us the alphabet, charted the seas by the Pole Star, and built Carthage – once Rome’s greatest rival. So why have the Phoenicians been forgotten? Speaking to Emily Briffett, historian Josephi...

13 Sep 202549min

Despite facing significant obstacles in their own lives, black women in the United States were at the forefront of campaigns for human rights at home and abroad. Historian Keisha N Blain tells the sto...

11 Sep 202538min

In the years following Stalin’s death in 1953, a new phenomenon emerged within the Soviet Union: so-called 'dissidents'. Preferring to think of themselves as 'rights defenders', these individuals advo...

9 Sep 202551min

The life of El Cid, the famed 11th-century Castilian warrior otherwise known as Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, is steeped in legend. Historian Nora Berend joins Danny Bird to examine his real-life exploits du...

8 Sep 202530min