The Peterloo Massacre was a critical moment in the reform movement at the start of the 19th century. Thousands of people gathered at St Peter's Fields near Manchester to protest for an expansion of the franchise. The local magistrates summoned yeomanry to dispel what they saw as a riot, but as th...

Dan talks to Professor Jon T Coleman to discuss Hugh Glass and the real story that formed the basis for the 2015 film, 'The Revenant.'Jon T. Coleman is a professor of history at the University of Notre Dame. His books and teaching span colonial and contemporary America and integrate social, cultu...

10 years after the expulsion of the British, leading US figures including Washington, Hamilton and Jefferson came together to draw up plans for governing the world's newest country. But what should the role of a President be and how should American politics function? I was thrilled to be joined b...

The House of Romanov was the second dynasty, after the Rurik dynasty, to rule over Russia, which reigned from 1613 until the abdication of Czar Nicholas II on March 15, 1917, as a result of the February Revolution. British historian Simon Jonathan Sebag Montefiore joins Dan to chat about this Rus...

Priya Atwal joined me on the pod to discuss the Sikh Empire, which stretched throughout northwestern India into Afghanistan and Tibet. We discuss the story of this empire’s spectacular rise and fall.

Dan and Tim Minchin discuss the value of argument, history, and how approaches to history are changing in Australia at the moment.

Afua Hirsch is a writer, broadcaster, barrister and human rights development worker. She has previously worked as Social Affairs and Education Editor for Sky News and was also a correspondent for The Guardian.

Sudhir Hazareesingh joined me to discuss the life of Toussaint Louverture, a revolutionary leader who confronted the forces of slavery, settler colonialism, imperialism and racial hierarchy. The Haitian Revolution began in the French Caribbean colony of Saint-Domingue with a slave revolt in Augus...

Two weeks before the 2020 U.S. presidential election, Richard Brookhiser joined me on the podcast to discuss Trump and presidential history.

Graham Faiella talks to Dan about legends and true tales from the Age of Sail. Cannibalism, pirates and mutiny.

For the 214th anniversary of Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson's decisive victory at Trafalgar Andrew Baines, curator of HMS Victory, talks Dan through the events of 21 October 1805: the ship, the man, the battle.

With the release of At Eternity's Gate starring Willem Dafoe as Vincent Van Gogh, Dan set off to find someone who knows about Vincent Van Gogh. He found Martin Bailey, co-curator of the new Van Gogh museum at the Tate, which is devoted to Van Gogh's relationship with England. They chat about Van ...

205 years ago today, 60,000 men were slaughtered in the Battle of Waterloo. Napoleon Bonaparte's French army was finally defeated by an almighty coalition of troops from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Hanover, Brunswick and Nassau, led by the Duke of Wellington, and the Prussian army under ...

Victor Hugo was exiled to Guernsey by the regime of Napoleon III, and so wrote many of his most famous works on the island, like “Les Miserables”, in the only house he ever owned. Dan gets a tour of Hauteville House, where he wrote from Cédric Bail the assistant curator of the museum. You can fin...