Not Just the Tudors
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb talks about everything from the Aztecs to witches, Velázquez to Shakespeare, Mughal India to the Mayflower. Not, in other words, just the Tudors, but most definitely also the Tudors.Each episode Suzannah is joined by historians and experts to reveal incredible stories about one of the most fascinating periods in history, new releases every Wednesday and Sunday.A podcast by History Hit, the world's best history channel and creators of award-winning podcasts Dan Snow's History Hit, The Ancients, and Betwixt the Sheets.Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a n...
True Crime: Murder & the Popish Plot
Was a London magistrate, found dead in a ditch in 1678, the victim of a Catholic conspiracy, political convenience, or secrets too dangerous to survive? Why did Edmund Berry Godfrey's murder send England into hysteria?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Dr. Andrea McKenzie to reopen the case. Drawing on newly deciphered letters, secret correspondence and neglected archives, they uncover a murky world of espionage, faction, coded messages and lethal knowledge, where truth itself became dangerously unstable.
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Charles II: Restoration of the Monarchy
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Who Lit the French Revolution?
How did a kingdom of palaces, privilege and powdered wigs collapse into revolution? What turned hunger into uprising?
In this first episode of our series on the French Revolution, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Dr. Charles Walton discuss the slow-burning crisis that transformed frustration into revolt. Together they explore life in Paris in 1789, where soaring bread prices, royal debt and radical new ideas pushed ordinary people to imagine a different world.
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Montaigne: Philosopher of the French Renaissance
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Molière: S...
Bess of Hardwick: Elizabethan England's Richest Woman
How did a Derbyshire gentlewoman become England’s richest woman after Elizabeth I? Why does she still fascinate us as her 500th anniversary approaches?
From four marriages and vast wealth to Hardwick Hall, Chatsworth and the Cavendish dynasty, Bess of Hardwick turned survival into power.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Professor Lisa Hopkins to discover a gripping story of female ambition, marriage, captivity, betrayal and court politics.
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Bess's Hardwick Hall
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Mary, Queen of Scots: The Ma...
Edmund Halley & His Comet
How did our understanding of the universe begin in a London coffee house? How did a man who had a comet named after him change science forever?
From his youthful voyage to St Helena to chart the southern skies, to his pioneering studies of navigation, longitude, gravity, and the Earth’s atmosphere, Edmund Halley’s curiosity knew no bounds.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by David K. Love to explore the remarkable life of one of the great figures of the Scientific Revolution.
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Isaac Newton: The Man at the...
The Mayflower and its Pilgrims
Why did the Pilgrims risk everything in search of a new life and religious freedom? Why does their contested history still matter ahead of the 250th anniversary of American independence?
In 1620, the Mayflower carried English religious separatists, across the Atlantic to found Plymouth Colony.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb speaks with Professor John G. Turner about their dangerous Atlantic crossing, and the human stories behind the legendary Pilgrim Fathers.
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The Bible
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Walter Raleigh’s Quest for El Dorado
...Jamestown: From Colony to Cannibalism
**This episode contains graphic explorations of starvation and cannibalism**
What happens when a colony reaches the edge of survival?
In this third episode leading up to the 250th anniversary of American independence,
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Dr Rachel Winchcombe examine the so-called Starving Time of 1609-1610, when Jamestown settlers faced famine, desperation and cannibalism. Together they reveal the complex human story behind early colonial America’s most infamous crisis.
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Raleigh and the Lost Colony of Roanoke
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True Crime: Moll Cutpurse - London's Cross-Dressing Criminal
How did one woman scandalise sixteenth century London by refusing to live by its rules?
Mary Frith - aka Moll Cutpurse - rejected the expectations of respectable womanhood, wore men’s clothes, smoked a pipe, carried weapons, and frequented London’s taverns, theatres, prisons and courtrooms.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Dr. Holly Marsden explore the extraordinary life and afterlife of Moll - pickpocket, performer, and notorious Roaring Girl of Elizabethan and Jacobean England.
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Murderous Women
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Pocahontas & the Virginian Venture
How did the Stuarts turn fragile American outposts into an empire? How did English settlers, Native peoples - including Pocahontas - and London investors shape 17th-century Virginia, and why do these early colonial encounters still matter as the 250th anniversary of American independence approaches?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined again by Distinguished Professor Peter C. Mancall to discuss Stuart America, the Virginia Company and the founding of Jamestown.
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Elizabethans in America
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Raleigh and the Lost Colony of...
How Guns Changed the World
How did the gun become a fashion item in Renaissance Italy? Why do debates over firearms, self-defence and public safety sound so familiar today?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and historian Catherine Fletcher trace the rise of guns from battlefield technology to coveted courtly accessory. Together they discover how firearms transformed warfare, society and empire-building, and why the history of gun regulation five centuries ago still echoes in modern politics today worldwide.
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Henry VIII's Brothers in Armour
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Elizabethans in America
How did two Indigenous men help shape Elizabethan England's dreams of empire? What do these early encounters tell us about the contested beginnings of colonial America?
In the 1580s, English explorers ventured west in search of land, influence and advantage. But this was not an inevitable march toward empire.
As the 250th anniversary of American independence approaches, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Distinguished Professor Peter C. Mancall explore a story of uncertainty, encounter and conflict.
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Raleigh and the Lost Colony of Roanoke
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Great Plague of London
What effect did the Great Plague have on Londoners, their society and the wider state?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Rebecca Rideal revisit the summer of 1665, as a few suspicious deaths grew into a crisis that swept through the city with devastating speed. Entire households vanished, fear curdled into suspicion, outsiders were written out of the official record - and Restoration England was reshaped forever.
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Great Fire of London
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Diary of Samuel Pepys
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<...Anne Boleyn: Ambition or Faith?
Was Anne Boleyn a seductress, a schemer, or something far more radical? What happens when we look at Anne not through the lens of sex and scandal, but through religion?
From Tudor observers to Six the Musical, Anne Boleyn has been labelled the woman who tempted, manipulated and overreached. But Professor Suzannah Lipscomb's guest Reverend Canon Martha Tatarnic, an Anglican priest, instead offers new insights into Anne’s faith, agency and historical significance.
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Anne Boleyn at Hever Castle
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Rise & Fall of James IV of Scotland
How did a teenage rebel become Scotland’s king, and rule a realm riven by feuds and shifting loyalties? James IV balanced chivalry, diplomacy, and danger, yet led his country to catastrophe.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Prof. Michael Brown explore how James transformed himself into the most remarkable Renaissance monarch.
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Henry VIII's Sister, Margaret Queen of Scots
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How to Kill a Scottish Witch
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Presented by Pr...
True Crime: Medici Murder at the Louvre
**Warning: Contains graphic description of the mutilation of corpses**
In April 1617, Concino Concini, Marshal of France, was shot dead as he entered the Louvre. But his murder was only the beginning of a terrifying chain of events.
How did the assassination of this hated royal favourite unleash mob violence, propaganda and a new political order? And what fate awaited the woman blamed for bending France to a foreigner’s will?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Dr Una McIlvenna explore scandal, misogyny and print culture in a moment when violence remade the French monarchy.
...The Tudors Abroad
What did it mean to be English when merchants, sailors, captives, diplomats, and migrants were constantly crossing borders?
Pirates, a Kentish man becoming a Samurai and a king on the warpath; Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Professor Nandini Das trace tales of reinvention, danger and belonging in this exciting, hugely changing world.
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England’s First Ambassador to India: Thomas Roe
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Giordano Bruno: Mystic, Heretic, Spy
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Royal Favourites: Hatton, Elizabeth I's Favourite
How did Sir Christopher Hatton became one of Elizabeth I’s favourites? How true were the rumours that they were lovers?
After catching the Queen's eye in 1561, Hatton was quickly promoted to the Privy Council, making a significant impact on Elizabeth's complex religious policy. Yet he has often been overshadowed by her other favourites like Dudley, Cecil and Walsingham.
In the final episode of our series on Royal Favourites, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb finds out more about Hatton’s rise from minor gentry to Elizabeth I's closest aide from Dr. Neil Younger.
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Battle of the Eras: Medieval v. Early Modern
What if the medieval world did not end with a bang, but with a messy argument over who gets to define history itself? Professor Suzannah Lipscomb spars with Gone Medieval's host Matt Lewis over Gutenberg, the Reformation, witchcraft, plague, the Renaissance, and the Wars of the Roses to ask where medieval ends and early modern begins. The result is a lively, surprising fight over power, change, and the making of the modern world.
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Mother of All Tudors: Margaret Beaufort
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Royal Favourites: Queen Anne & Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough
How did Sarah Churchill become the most powerful woman in Queen Anne’s court? What happens when a royal friendship turns into a political battlefield? How did one absent set of jewels signal the beginning of the end?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb continues her series on royal favourites with biographer Ophelia Field. Together they explore the extraordinary story of Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough — the intimate friend, political operator and fierce chronicler whose influence shaped Queen Anne’s reign and who refused to go quietly.
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Queen Anne: The Last Stuart Monarch
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Louis XIV: Sun King and Propagandist
How did Louis XIV use his day-to-day life, especially his marriage, to help create the mythology of the Sun King as semi-divine, radiant and unrivalled?
In 17th-century France, monarchy was performed, witnessed, and widely circulated. Using portraits, medals, sculptures and official pamphlets, Louis XIV meticulously constructed his own image, appearing as Apollo, Jupiter, Hercules, Neptune, a Roman emperor, and even as the sun itself. Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Dr. Abby Zanger explore the Sun King's carefully staged world.
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Marie Antoinette
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<...Royal Favourites: James I and George Villiers
How did a relatively humble gentleman become the most powerful man in Stuart England?
Few figures embodied the glamour and instability of the Jacobean court more completely than George Villiers, who rose to become one of the most influential men in England. To some he was charismatic, brilliant, and irresistible; to others, he was reckless, arrogant, and dangerously powerful.
In the second episode of our series on Royal Favourites, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb explores the extraordinary rise and dramatic fall of George Villiers with his biographer Lucy Hughes-Hallett.
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Hoaxes and Lies in the Enlightenment
How did a ghost story bring London to a standstill? Was it a haunting, a fraud, or something even more revealing about Georgian society? Why did rational, educated people fall for elaborate hoaxes?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Dr.Madeleine Pelling, co-host of History Hit’s After Dark podcast, to uncover the darker side of the Age of Enlightenment. Why was this period remembered for science, reason, and progress, also fascinated by hoaxes, imposters, fake identities, ghost stories, sensational crime and public spectacle?
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Murderous Women
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...Royal Favourites: Robert Dudley, Elizabeth I's Forbidden Love
Passion, scandal, and power collided in the tumultuous relationship between Elizabeth I and Robert Dudley. Rumours of secret trysts between them set the court ablaze, but their love was doomed from the start.
In the first of four episodes looking at royal favourites in the Tudor and Stuart courts, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Dr. Joanne Paul unravel the complex tapestry of Robert Dudley's life, Elizabeth's devotion and the decades of political intrigue and personal heartbreak.
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Tudor True Crime: Murder of Amy Dudley
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Anne of Cleves: New Discoveries
What if Henry VIII’s “discarded bride” actually showed real promise as queen?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Dr James Taffe to discuss new discoveries about Anne of Cleves’ surviving account book, a rare 200-page record of every pound, shilling and penny that reveals Anne’s queenship through spending, patronage and household life.
They discuss the “shadow” household retained after Jane Seymour, what the accounts do (and don’t) show about roles and wages, and the striking discovery that many servants were paid by the king—raising questions of loyalty once Henry turned against Anne.
MO...
Francisco de Cuéllar: Spanish Armada Captain
How did a condemned Spanish Armada captain survive shipwreck, betrayal, and war to leave behind one of the most extraordinary first-person accounts of the 16th century?
Francisco de Cuéllar was a career officer shaped by the harsh realities of early modern warfare, surviving looting, imprisonment, betrayal, and a brutal overland escape through a hostile landscape. Cuéllar's journey became one of the most gripping survival stories to emerge from the Spanish Armada shipwrecks.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Cuéllar's biographer Francis Kelly to explore a story of survival, imperial warfare, and one man...
Anne Boleyn at Hever Castle
What was Anne Boleyn like before she became the most controversial queen in English history? Can the rooms and gardens at her childhood home reveal more about the world that shaped her?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Dr. Owen Emmerson to find out more about the magical place where Anne Boleyn grew up, how Hever shaped her early life, education, language skills, and future role at the courts of Europe and England.
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Cromwell, Boleyn & Aragon: A New Discovery
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Maria Theresa, Habsburg Empress
How did a woman rise to power, and keep it, in the fiercely male-dominated Habsburg Empire?
From her distrust of the Enlightenment to her religious intolerance, and from family strategy to imperial power, Maria Theresa was a remarkable ruler driven by discipline, faith, dynastic ambition, and political will.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Professor Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger to discover how Maria Theresa held together a fractured empire, confronted war and court politics, and reshaped Europe.
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Habsburg Women: Matriarchs of Power
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Elizabethans in India
How did England’s earliest travellers to India try to win favour in a Mughal golden age that scarcely noticed them?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb speaks with Dr Lubaaba Al-Azami about Tudor and early Stuart England’s turn to global trade after Elizabeth I’s break with Catholic Europe, and why Mughal India—vast, wealthy, and pragmatically governed—had little need for English wool or broadcloth.
They trace the first arrivals: from a Catholic refugee to an Englishman's Mughal courtly success and marriage, as well as the first English 'walking tourist'.
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Lady Jane Grey
What if becoming queen was the worst thing that could happen to you? What if the crown became your death sentence?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb explores the tragic story of Lady Jane Grey, the brilliant, devout teenager, who was proclaimed queen of England against her will, reigned for less than two weeks, and was executed before her 17th birthday.
Drawing on insights from her new two-part History Hit documentary series, Suzannah is joined by Professor Anna Whitelock, Dr Joanne Paul, Verity Babbs, and Dr Nicola Tallis to uncover the story of a young girl caught in...
Grace O'Malley, Ireland's Pirate Queen
She cut off her hair to sail the seas. She divorced her husband by locking him out of his own castle. And when her son was killed by the occupying English, she sailed straight up the Thames to plead for help from Elizabeth I. Or did she?
Gráinne Ní Mháille, or Grace O'Malley, the legendary "Pirate Queen" of Ireland, was the head of a seafaring dynasty, while the Tudors tightened their grip, she commanded fleets, forged alliances, waged war, survived imprisonment, and outwitted some of the most ruthless men of her age.
Professor Suz...
Elizabethan Boy Actresses
Why were Shakespeare’s greatest heroines played by teenage boys? How did they learn their craft? On the Elizabethan stage, highly trained young men progressed from minor parts to play some of the Bard's most famous heroines, including Juliet and Cleopatra.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Professor Roberta Barker to uncover how these cross-dressing apprentices brought some of the Renaissance theatre's most memorable characters to life.
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Shakespeare's First Playhouse
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Girls on Stage and Page in the Elizabethan Ag...
When the Spanish Armada Reached Ireland
What happens when a fleeing armada meets an unforgiving coast? Shipwreck, slaughter and survival collide as Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Michael B. Barry uncover the untold Irish chapter of the Spanish Armada. From shattered galleons and mass executions to lost princes and lingering myths on wild Atlantic shores, this is a storm‑lashed saga where the real battle begins after the guns fall silent.
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The Spanish Armada
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Mary Rose and the Battle of The Solent
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...Henry Wotton: Outlaw and Royal Spy
Assassination plots, Venetian stand‑offs and a diplomat in disguise: how did one maverick change the course of history?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Professor Carol Chillington Rutter uncovers the spy‑thriller life of Henry Wotton, the “honest man sent to lie abroad” for his country. From foiling an attempt on King James VI’s life to pulling Europe back from the brink of war during a showdown between Venice and the papacy, they discover how this scoundrel‑ambassador helped invent modern diplomacy.
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Private Life of King James VI & I
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The Rise and Fall of Pirate Captain Kidd
Was Captain William Kidd a ruthless pirate or a pawn in a royal gamble gone wrong? Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Debbie Kilroy trace his meteoric rise from privateer to pariah, backed by a secret syndicate of powerful men, including the king. Mutiny, murder, and betrayal follow as power and politics turn Kidd’s royal commission into one of history’s most dramatic downfalls.
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Women Pirates of the Caribbean
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Pirates of the Pacific & the Spanish Empire
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Plantagenet vs. Tudor: Who was the Rightful King?
Who had a stronger claim to the English throne than Henry VII? When Henry Tudor took the crown on the battlefield at Bosworth, his hereditary claim was fragile. Eighteen Plantagenet descendants had a more legitimate right to rule, while pretenders Lambert Simnel and Perkin Warbeck kept the Tudor court under constant threat.
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Gone Medieval host Matt Lewis to unravel one of the great mysteries of history: if not Henry VII, then who was the rightful king of England?
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Henry VII: Reign of Jeopardy
<...Tudor True Crime: The First Female Serial Killer?
Was there really a 17th century Italian woman who helped hundreds of wives murder their husbands, or is her story a myth born of fear and gossip?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb investigates the legend of Giulia Tofana, the so-called criminal mastermind behind a secret poison network. With historical novelist Cathryn Kemp, she uncovers the blurred line between truth and terror, reveals how the Pope hunted down a group of women who were not only independent businesswomen but who were striking back at abusive husbands across Italy.
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Tudor True Crime: Murder in Renaissance...
Plots against Elizabeth I
Who wanted Elizabeth I dead, and how close did they come to removing her? Who were the conspirators and rebels who plotted to put Mary, Queen of Scots on the throne?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Professor Jonathan McGovern to unravel the Northern Rebellion, the Ridolfi and Throckmorton conspiracies, the chilling Babington Plot, and the shadowy intrigues of spies, traitors, and foreign powers who tried to topple the Tudor queen.
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Tudor True Crime: Who Murdered Lord Darnley?
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Colonial Women of the Americas
Warning: This episode contains references to sexual abuse
What became of the women whose worlds collapsed when the Spanish arrived in Mesoamerica? Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Mexican author Sofia Robleda to uncover the lives of the women who navigated conquest, faith, and colonial law with resilience and strategy.
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The Caribbean, Colonisers & Christianity
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Cortés and the Aztecs
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Presented by Professor Suzannah Lipscomb. T...
Regime Change: From Stuart to Hanover
Who would rule Britain after the childless Queen Anne died in 1714? Why was a distant German Protestant dynasty chosen over closer claimants to the throne?
In the final part of our series on the Restoration monarchs, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Dr. Brent Sirota, to explore what the Hanoverian succession settled and what it left unresolved, defining modern Britain beyond just the crown.
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Queen Mary II & the Glorious Revolution
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James II: The Restoration's Last Catholic KIng
<...Henry VII: Reign of Jeopardy
Was Henry Tudor a tyrant obsessed with control, or a visionary who created peace and prosperity? How did a penniless exile with a tenuous claim to the crown found a dynasty that reshaped the nation? How did he fight off pretenders to the throne?
Professor Suzannah Lipscomb is joined by Dr. Sean Cunningham to explore how Henry VII, from unlikely beginnings, stabilized a kingdom torn apart by decades of civil war and laid the foundations of the Tudor age.
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The Last Plantagenets in Tudor England
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<...Queen Anne: The Last Stuart Monarch
Has history been unfair to Queen Anne, the last Stuart monarch? Was she weak and easily led, or one of Britain’s most determined and underestimated monarchs?
In this episode of our Restoration series, Professor Suzannah Lipscomb and Queen Anne's biographer Lady Anne Somerset examine a queen whose reputation has long been shaped by caricature.
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Sister Queens: Mary II and Anne
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How to Run a Stuart Household
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