72. The Russian Empire and the Great Game

Ionia has revolted and so Darius turns his gaze away from India and towards Greece. He crushes the rebellion, quelling all resistance. He then looks to take much of the Greek mainland and many city st...

21 Nov 202344min

The Persian Empire that Darius took control of was already mighty and powerful; his predecessor, Cambyses, had conquered Egypt, further expanding its territory. But it was under Darius it reached its ...

16 Nov 202351min

Born the son of a khan, a tribal chieftain, Cyrus would go on to be a titanic figure of world history. He took Persia from being a minor regional power to the first superpower the world has ever seen....

14 Nov 202354min

Persia was the first great superpower. The empire built by Cyrus, Darius, Xerxes and the rest of the Achaemenids stretched from India in the east to the Mediterranean in the west, from Russia in the n...

9 Nov 20237min

Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine on 24th February 2022, but how did we get to this point? After the brutality of the Second World War, Ukraine was completely under the control of Moscow. Then in the 198...

7 Nov 202353min

Ladies and gentlemen, we give you the Empire Club. Do you want bonus episodes? Do you want discounts on the books mentioned in the weeks podcast? Do you want reading lists? Do you want ad-free listeni...

6 Nov 202311min

The history of Russia and Ukraine has been irrevocably entwined for centuries. When the Bolsheviks took over and Civil War erupted across the Russian Empire, Ukraine was one of the bloodiest centres o...

2 Nov 202351min

Dawn breaks on 16th July 1918. For Nicholas, Alexandra, and the rest of the Romanov family this is just another day in exile. They sit down for breakfast - today it is eggs - and then go about their u...

31 Okt 202346min