The complete Historiansplaining catalogue, starting with the most recent episodes on top…
 | Interpreting Solomon’s Temple
The center of every sacred mystery, the Temple at Jerusalem is the most famous building on earth, even though it has not existed for almost 2000 years and no one knows precisely what it looked like. We join with Michael of the Xai, How Are You podcast to discuss Solomon’s Temple – both the real historical building as it can be reconstructed from ancient texts and archaeology, and the symbol that has been endlessly appropriated to represent humankind’s relationship to the cosmos, from Jewish mysticism, to Christian theology, to early Islam, to medieval magic, to Renaissance humanism, to the rituals of Freemasonry, to modern Jewish and evangelical fundamentalism. Quick Sample: |
 | Unlocked: Doorways in Time: The Great Archaeological Discoveries #4: The Library of Ashurbanipal
One moonlit night in 1853, an Iraqi excavator named Hormuzd Rassam and his team snuck into the hills outside of Mosul and began to uncover the massive palace of the last ancient Assyrian emperor, Ashurbanipal. Inside the palace was the largest trove of surviving documents from the ancient world that has ever been found. The massive library of over 30,000 tablets illuminated what had been the most mysterious empire of the Iron Age, brought to light the ancient masterpiece of the Epic of Gilgamesh, and provided the first window into the lost Near Eastern mythology that influenced the Biblical book of Genesis. While the discovery provided the greatest triumph of British imperial antiquarianism, in recent times Saddam Hussein and other Arab nationalists have attempted to reclaim its legacy by building a modern Library of Ashurbanipal. Quick Sample: |
 | Origins of the First World War, pt. 2 – Serbia
We consider the history and explosive politics of the often-forgotten Eastern European nation that set the events of the First World War in motion: Serbia. We examine the country’s emergence and brief flowering as an Eastern Orthodox kingdom in the high Middle Ages, its fall to the Ottoman advance, its many years of quiet resistance in religion and song, its re-emergence amidst the Napoleonic wars and the Ottoman breakdown, and finally, its long-frustrated quest to fulfill its purported destiny of reunifying the Southern Slavs, which led a militant and conspiratorial secret society to murder their own country’s king and to smuggle teenage assassins across the border to kill their rivals’ crown prince. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 22: Culture
What is “culture”? And how did a metaphor from gardening invade social-science discourse in 19th-century Germany and America and then take the world by storm? Am I doing “podcast culture” right now? Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details Also see: |
 | Origins of the First World War, pt. 1 – The Ottoman Empire
For over a century, scholars, politicians, and pundits have debated the supposed causes of the First World War, from German naval provocations to the rising global tide of nationalism. All of these explanations tend to ignore the simple fact that the war began in eastern Europe, triggered by regional feuding and violence in what had previously been the Ottoman provinces. Quick Sample: |
 | India – pt. 3: The Rise of the South & the Islamic Conquests
We follow the dramatic evolution of Indian civilization after the fall of the Gupta empire, tracing from the spectacular rise of trade, art, and new religious movements in the southern kingdoms, through the tumult and fragmentation of the northern statelets and the cataclysmic invasions of raiders from Central Asia, and finally to the creation of Islamic states in the subcontinent just in time for the arrival of the first European ships in Indian ports. Quick Sample: |
 | First Full-Video Lecture! A Survey of Western Architecture, part 1: Antiquity & the Early Middle Ages
Dr. Sam explores the methods that builders, from Egypt to Rome to medieval Europe, have used to create grand structures and to enclose beautiful spaces, whether by reaching outward across the landscape or upwards toward the sky, in order to enthrall the senses and to inspire emotions from terror to tranquility. Video Quick Sample: |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects #21: The Braddock/Washington Pistol
We consider the complex history and symbolism of an elaborately decorated sidearm weapon, originally made in Bristol, England, possibly intended as a dueling pistol, which came across the ocean to America with General Edward Braddock, witnessed the catastrophic events in the Ohio valley that sparked the Seven Years’ War, and which then became a prized possession of George Washington, symbolizing his relationship with the ill-starred general as well as America’s fraught relationship with Britain. Quick Sample: |
 | The Vikings, pt. 2 – Into Distant Realms
They rained terror and destruction on Christian lands across Europe as far as Spain and Constantinople, before turning their attention away from raiding towards permanent settlement and the founding of new societies, from Ukraine to Normandy to Greenland. There has never been an explosion of exploration and aggression quite like the Viking expansion of the early Middle Ages – we discuss the motives behind the expansion, which are rooted in the religious mismatch between Scandinavia and mainland Europe, the technologies that made it possible, the prizes and targets at which they aimed, the victories and setbacks that they encountered, the imprints that they left behind, and the winds of change that ultimately brought an end to the Viking adventure. Quick Sample: |
 | Doorways in Time: The Great Archaeological Discoveries #6: Early Audio Recordings
In the second half of the nineteenth century, many of the most brilliant and ambitious minds in both Europe and America were bent upon solving the problem of capturing sound waves from the air and playing them back. Most of their efforts, including the earliest “phonautograms” from more than a decade before Edison’s invention of the phonograph, were either forgotten or lost to decay and degradation. In the past fifteen years, however, scientists and engineers, including the First Sounds collective, have located the surviving remnants of early sound recordings and devised ways to optically scan them and reproduce the sounds that they captured, revealing much of the auditory world of the nineteenth century and the pathways by which the now-ubiquitous technology of audio recording came into being. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects #18: Jesuit Brass Medallion with Image of Ignatius Loyola
Unlocked after one year for Patrons only: Quick Sample: |
 | The Vikings, pt. 1 – In the Norsemen’s World
Unlocked after one year for patrons only: We have all seen images of axe-wielding Vikings raining destruction upon the shores of medieval Europe — but who were these berserking Norsemen and where did they come from? What society produced them? How did the Scandinavians of the Viking age understand the world and their place in it? We examine the Norsemen’s complex and mysterious cosmos described in the poems and prophesies of the Eddas, and compare it to the realities of survival, trade, kingship, politics, warfare, art, gender, and the family in Scandinavia from the eight to eleventh centuries, as reconstructed from surviving documents and the latest archaeology. Quick Sample: |
 | 2022 in Historical Context – How Do You Like Your New Gilded Age?
We consider some of the major events of this year in light of their historical roots, from the abortion ruling to the Ukraine war; in particular, we consider the Twitter controversy in light of the history of media monopolies beginning with the telegraph, and the crisis over railroad labor in light of the railways strike of 1922, exactly one century ago. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 21: The Old West
“Cowboys and Indians.” For most Americans, the words evoke a sinister game, representing a timeless enmity between the forces of civilization and savagery. In actual historical fact, cowboys and Indians were symbiotic trading partners, and many cowboys were Indians themselves; but the image of the cowboy as a conqueror and as the bearer of civilization into the “Wild West” has become central to the American national myth. We trace how the romantic self-image of the 19th-century buckaroos as modern-day knights gradually evolved into the iconography of gunslingers battling on the untamed frontier, from early dime novels to grand “horse operas” to Hollywood Westerns and science fiction, and finally to the new fable of the gay cowboy. Quick Sample: |
 | Monarchy, Honours, and the Molding of Modern Society – A Conversation with Tobias Harper
I speak with historian Tobias Harper about about the evolving and growing role of the British crown as the head of the voluntary sector in a neoliberal, atomizing, and celebrity-driven society. We examine both the “magic of the royal touch” and the hard-nosed bureaucratic calculations that it can serve to obscure, as captured in Toby’s book, “From Servants of the Empire to Everyday Heroes: The British Honours System in the Twentieth Century.” Quick Sample: |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 20: Silver Beaker with Devil & Pope Figures, 1750
A silver beaker engraved with figures of Satan, the Pope, and the “Young Pretender” (also known as “Bonnie Prince Charlie”) shows how French, Dutch, German, and English colonists in colonial New York united around fear of Catholicism and the Jacobite menace. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | Unlocked: Myth of the Month 18: Robin Hood – pt. 2: Capturing the Fugitive
Released to the public after one year for patrons only: What is the significance of Robin Hood as an outlaw — a person declared legally dead — who lives in the greenwood, where life is constantly renewed? Why does Shakespeare heavily allude to Robin in his Henry IV plays? And most significantly, was there a real Robin Hood, or is he a pure creation of myth and folklore? We consider the possibilities and scrutinize the evidence. Quick Sample: |
 | James II and the “Glorious Revolution” 1685-88
James II was Britain’s shortest-reigning monarch of the entire early modern age — yet his brief rule caused a dramatic rupture, which in turn opened the door to the transformation of the kingdom into the constitutional, commercial, imperial state that we know as modern Britain. Was it because of his Catholic faith? His resolute — or pig-headed — personality? His determination to rule absolutely, like his ally Louis XIV? Or, as some have argued, was James too far ahead of his time in his belief in freedom of conscience? Quick Sample: |
 | Doorways in Time: The Great Archaeological Finds #5: Gobekli Tepe
We examine the so-called “zero point of history,” the “first temple,” the “world’s oldest building,” the massive and deeply ancient complex of stone-age megalithic monuments on a hilltop in Turkey, which since being uncovered in the 1990s, has dramatically overturned received ideas about the beginnings of civilization. Quick Sample: |
 | Fortresses on Sand: The History of Florida – pt. 6
In the final lecture on Florida, we examine how the tropical state, thanks to innovations like DDT, orange-juice concentrate, and air conditioning, was able to boom at an unimaginable pace, rocketing into the top five biggest states in the union, with massive scientific and artistic communities, a diverse immigrant mosaic, and after the Civil Rights movement, exceptionally volatile and unpredictable politics. We consider the importance of the last great expression of Florida utopianism — namely, Disney World — and the shift into a perceived playground of anarchy and American dreams gone mad, as personified in the notorious “Florida Man.” Quick Sample: |
 | Latin America Inverts the World Map: A Conversation With Margarita Fajardo
Sam interviews historian Margarita Fajardo, a professor of history at Sarah Lawrence College, about her new book, “The World That Latin America Created,” which traces how a movement of scholars and statesmen centering around CEPAL, a UN economic commission based in Santiago, Chile, formulated a new world-view and far-reaching agenda to foster unity and development in Latin America; the so-called “Capalinos” rose to dominance and set the policy agenda in Brazil and other countries in the 1950s and ‘60s and then set the stage for dependency theory, which took the world by storm in the 1970s. We also discuss how the travails of the Cepalinos might shed light on the transformations currently happening in Chile, Colombia, and other Latin American nations and the horizons that they might open up. Quick Sample: |
 | China, pt. 2 – Water and Music: Early Chinese Philosophy
We consider how the crisis of legitimacy and breakdown of order following the downfall of the Zhou dynasty spurred on a flowering of philosophy, as various scholars and sages sought new principles to guide life and achieve harmony, giving rise to the enduring teachings of Taoism and Confucianism, as well as other long-forgotten sects ranging from draconian legalists to humanitarian pacifists. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 20: Conspiracy Theories
Where do conspiracy theories come from? Why do people believe them? What do they mean? Did the CIA drug people with LSD against their will? Is Queen Elizabeth a reptilian? We consider the merits and pitfalls of conspiracy theories, trace the history and evolution of the conspiratorial tradition from rumors about lepers in the 1300s to Alex Jones and Q-Anon, and examine the biases and double standards built into the very concept of “conspiracy theories.” This is it: the most thorough, fair, and impartial examination of conspiracy theories that you will ever find anywhere. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | Unlocked: Doorways in Time:The Great Archaeological Finds #2: The Nag Hammadi Library and the Gnostic Gospels
Unlocked after one year for patrons only: The secretive Gnostic stream of Christianity, which taught a radically different metaphysics and spiritual cosmology from “orthodox” doctrine in the first four hundred years of the church, was largely lost to history, until 1945, when a camel-herder in a remote part of Egypt stumbled upon an old ceramic jar with 13 massive books containing 52 ancient Gnostic texts. We consider what the so-called “Nag Hammadi Library,” which may have been hidden in the desert to protect it from destruction, reveals about the origins and importance of the Gnostics’ secret teachings. Quick Sample: |
| Fortresses on Sand: The History of Florida – pt. 5
We follow the southward-racing juggernaut of modern Florida, from statehood in 1845 to the 1930s – the insatiable quest of visionaries and megalomaniacs, from Jewish utopians, to slave-driving planters, to evangelical missionaries, to black politicians, to hotel magnates, to messianic cult leaders, to women’s suffragists, to Cuban revolutionaries, to bohemian poets, to impose a sense of order upon the chaotic and unruly wilderness of tropical Florida. Though ignored in our national mythology and dismissed as a southern backwater, the state was the site of the first confrontation of the Civil War, and of the longest-lasting and most aggressive Reconstruction regime, which created the first universal public school system in the South and fostered the first booming tourist economy in America, spearheaded by none other than Harriet Beecher Stowe. We conclude our journey through Florida with an examination of Florida literature, ending with an analysis of Wallace Stevens’ ode to Florida, “The Idea of Order at Key West.” |
 | China, pt. 1 – Making the Middle Kingdom
We follow the long struggle to build power, wealth, and lasting harmony on the rich but harsh and unforgiving landscape of China – from early farming villages, to the quasi-legendary early emperors, through dynasties obsessed with ritual and divination, the age of fragmentation and warring states, and finally, the dramatic quest for unification by the ruthless emperor that gave China its name. We learn the causes and contexts for the creation of the first Great Wall, the invention of wet rice farming and hydraulic engineering, the composition of ancient classics like the I Ching and the Art of War, and the appearance of the powerful philosophies of Confucianism and Taoism. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 19: Three Silver Higa Amulets, mid-1700s
–Three pendant amulets, in form of a forearm with closed fists |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 16: The “PW” Hadley Chest, 1690-1710
Unlocked for the public, after one year for patrons only: |
| Fortresses on Sand: The History of Florida — pt. 4
From 1763 to the 1840s, Florida was repeatedly tossed and traded among the British, Spanish, and American empires, as all sorts of adventurers — from Greek and Turkish indentured workers, to Scottish speculators, to Seminole warriors, to West African widows, to British Army deserters, to Mexican pirates, to “Cracker” cattle-herders — attempted to establish themselves and exploit the subtropical landscape. Under American rule, two societies take shape in the Florida Territory — one of cotton plantations and the other of backcountry homesteads — and come to loggerheads over questions of development and ultimately, the idea of statehood. Quick Sample: |
 | Taking Stock of 5 Years of Historiansplaining, & Teaser: The Library of Ashurbanipal
We take stock of the growth of “Historiansplaining,” which has brought together listeners and guests, ranging from scholars and critics to regular working people, from America to Asia and Australia. We consider the different lectures that have proved most popular and attracted the attention of journalists, and we preview possibilities for the future, such as videos and series on music in history, which may be realized with enough patron support. Finally, we hear the names of all current active patrons, and an excerpt from the latest patron-only lecture, examining the largest discovery ever made of texts and documents from the ancient world, the Library of Ashurbanipal, in Mosul, Iraq. |
| Fortresses on Sand: The History of Florida – pt. 3
We consider the struggles of European colonists and missionaries, indigenous tribes, and African laborers to protect their territories and secure their freedom through two tumultuous centuries of Spanish rule in Florida. From the first arrival of yellow fever, to the construction of an indestructible limestone fortress, to the creation of the first black-led town in America, the Spanish era laid the foundations of a distinctive Floridian society which miraculously persisted and was never conquered by its powerful enemies to the north. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 19: The Holy Grail – pt. 2
How did the Holy Grail transform from the object of a purifying spiritual quest to a Faustian symbol of the corruptions of power? We consider the evolution of the Grail myth from the later medieval romances through Le Morte D’Arthur, the works of Tennyson, Wagner, and T.S. Eliot, and the portrayals of the Grail by Monty Python, Dan Brown, and Jay-z, and finally we consider the modern quests to uncover the hidden truth of the Grail — whether as a pagan fertility symbol, a Christian spiritual allegory, or a code identifying the secret bloodline of Jesus Christ. |
| Myth of the Month 19: The Holy Grail – pt. 1
Why did an enigmatic relic discussed in a series of medieval romances of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table leap out of the Arthurian myths and rise to become the most famous object in the history of literature? What does the vessel represent spiritually, morally, and sexually? And what the heck is a “grail” anyway? We begin by examining the medieval legends and what they say about the origin, nature, and miraculous powers of the sought-after holy relic. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 16: “The Founding Fathers”
Released to the public after one year for patrons only: Quick Sample: |
| Fortresses on Sand: The History of Florida – pt. 2
After 1500, Florida becomes a battleground in a new struggle for control of North America; we discuss the repeated doomed attempts by French and Spanish adventurers, from Ponce de Leon to the Huguenot colonists at Fort Caroline, to establish a foothold in Florida, until Spain finally succeeds in creating a lasting European stronghold at Saint Augustine. |
 | Dissecting the “Dawn of Everything” – A Conversation with Geoff Shullenberger
I join with Geoff Shullenberger of “Outsider Theory” to discuss the sweeping and challenging new book, “The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity” by David Graeber and David Wengrow. We consider the book’s marshalling of new archaeological evidence to debunk mechanistic and deterministic assumptions about the rise of civilization, its deep rejection of Marxism, and its insistence on the human ability to imagine and create an infinite range of social and political futures. We examine the weaknesses and limitations of the book, including its over-emphasis on personal freedom, its gross inaccuracy with regard to the eighteenth century, and its blindspot regarding the profound powers of myth, ritual, and the natural environment, all of which deeply guide and shape societies in ways that Graeber & Wengrow ignore or casually discount. |
| Fortresses on Sand: The History of Florida – pt. 1
We discuss the complex and multilayered history of Florida, beginning with the prehistoric peoples that survived in and mastered the tropical landscape, built monumental mound complexes, and formed powerful kingdoms that would eventually confront the first European invaders. Quick Sample: |
 | Uncovering the Medieval Slave Trade — A Conversation with Hannah Barker
Before Columbus had even set foot in America, medieval Europe and the Islamic Middle East already had a long history in trading and exploiting slaves. An important branch of the slave trade involved buying captives from the shores of the Black Sea and trafficking them through the Mediterranean to the commercial cities of Italy or to Egypt, where many of them became slave soldiers or even rulers (called “Mamluks”). We discuss the history of the trade, who these thousands of slaves were and what became of them with Hannah Barker of Arizona State University, author of “That Most Precious Merchandise: The Mediterranean Trade in Black Sea Slaves, 1260-1500.” Quick Sample: |
 | 2021 in Historical Context — Global Crisis, Labor Unrest, and “It’s A Wonderful Life”
We consider the strange ambiguous developments of this year, including the political paralysis in the US, the furors over mask and vaccine mandates, and most importantly, the labor reshuffle or “great resignation,” in light of crises past, including the bubonic plague and World War I and World War II, which have tended to bring class conflict and upheavals of the labor regime in their wakes. We examine the classic Frank Capra Christmas movie “It’s A Wonderful Life,” made 75 years ago in the aftermath of World War II, as an illustration of the post-war settlement that has shaped the conditions of work and home life since that time, and finally thank the 116 patrons that currently support this podcast. |
 | Unlocked: History of the United States in 100 Objects # 14: The Winthrop Alchemical Physician’s Chair
Unlocked for the public, after one year for patrons only: |
 | Blood and Oil: The History of Tulsa
America marked this year the 100th anniversary of the race massacre that destroyed the Greenwood district of Tulsa, the so-called “Black Wall Street,” but left out of the commemorations were the contexts that led to the outbreak of civil violence: the town’s Indian origins in the Trail of Tears; the massive cattle and oil booms that gave rise to a powerful and organized class of business magnates; the city’s chaotic and crime-ridden expansion, which fueled vigilantism, including lynchings of both white and black victims; and the patriotic frenzy of the First World War and the Red Scare, with its hysterical fear of Bolshevism and revolution. Finally, we consider the recovery of Tulsa from the shocks of the 1921 massacre, the Klan’s reign of terror, and the Depression, after which it has evolved into a comparatively liberal cultural capital amidst the conservative Plains Midwest. Tulsa is an extreme example in miniature of America’s tumultuous and confused rise to industrial power. Quick Sample: |
 | Unlocked: Myth of the Month 14: Astrology
Released to the public after one year for patrons only: Why do we divide history into epochs separated by “revolutions”? Astrology. How did Magellan chart his course around the globe? Astrology. How did Ronald Reagan schedule his acts of state? Astrology. We trace how the highest of the occult arts evolved from interpreting omens in ancient Babylonia, to containing medieval epidemics, to providing fodder for middle-brow magazines. Whether you are a believer or not, is the secret rhythm of our lives. Quick Sample: |
 | Doorways in Time: The Great Archaeological Finds #3: The Terracotta Army & the Tomb of Qin
In 1974, group of Chinese farmers drilling a well in a parched field in a far northwestern corner of China found pieces of terracotta sculpture, which would point the way to East Asia’s greatest ever archaeological discovery — a tremendous trove of sculpted warriors, each one unique, amassed in a great army marching eastward from the necropolis of Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor. Just spared destruction in the Cultural Revolution, the army is most likely only the tip of the iceberg of the wonders still waiting to be excavated deep within the emperor’s burial mound. In 1974, group of Chinese farmers drilling a well in a parched field in a far northwestern corner of China found pieces of terracotta sculpture, which would point the way to East Asia’s greatest ever archaeological discovery — a tremendous trove of sculpted warriors, each one unique, amassed in a great army marching eastward from the necropolis of Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor. Just spared destruction in the Cultural Revolution, the army is most likely only the tip of the iceberg of the wonders still waiting to be excavated deep within the emperor’s burial mound. |
 | Taking Stock of Money in Politics: The Powell Memo Fifty Years Later
At a time of intensifying hope and anxiety over the direction of the Supreme Court, we take stock of how the lawmaking process and the judiciary have changed over the past fifty years with the mobilization and funneling of large amounts of money into the political realm; we focus especially on the little-known but pivotal “Powell Memo” of 1971, in which a lawyer for the Tobacco Institute decried the rising tide of attacks on the “free enterprise system” and proposed a coordinated counter-offensive by the business class that sounds uncannily close to our present reality. The Powell Memo forms a critical moment for understanding the intense politicization of judicial appointments, the ubiquity of paid political advertising on the airwaves and in print, and ironically, the rise of a new “anti-capitalist” radicalism. |
 | Myth of the Month 18: Robin Hood — pt. 1: The Master of the Forest
In the first installment on the Robin Hood mythos, we consider how the legend of Robin Hood has evolved from a series of brutal tales of a medieval outlaw bandit in the fifteenth century to that of the swashbuckling champion of the poor of modern pop culture, and how he picked up sidekicks like Friar Tuck and Maid Marion along the way; we consider the literary significance of the early stories as as an expression of the frustrations and aspirations of the yeoman class. Quick Sample: |
 | India – pt. 2: Foundations of Hinduism
What do Hindus believe? What rituals, traditions, and ethical principles does one follow as a Hindu? What does Hinduism say about the soul and spiritual enlightenment? We trace the development in ancient and classical India of the multi-layered and comprehensive philosophy of life that we today call Hinduism, from the ancient rites of the Vedas, through the dramatic epics of the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, to the rise of the ecstatic musical and mystical worship of bhakti. Quick Sample: |
 | India – pt. 1: Creating Civilization in South Asia
We discuss the complex geography of the Indian Subcontinent, and how early societies in India, beginning with the mysterious Indus Valley Civilization, developed cities, technology, art, and literature, giving rise eventually to the flourishing Maurya and Gupta empires and the inventions of the Buddhist, Jain, and Hindu religions. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 17: The Hiawatha Belt
–Made of leather, sinew thread, and wampum (quahog shell) beads, ca. 1400s–In possession of the Onondaga Nation, central New York. This most ancient and precious ceremonial wampum belt, created by the Ondondaga tribe to record the proclamation of the Great Law of Peace at the founding of the Iroquois Confederacy (or more properly, the Haudenosaunee), was the subject of more than a century of legal wrangling, confusion, and controversy, even appearing at one point at the Chicago World’s Fair, before finally returning to its home in upstate New York. |
 | Unlocked: History of the United States in 100 Objects # 12: The Naylor Bowling Ball, 1670-1700
Unlocked after 1 year for patrons only: |
 | Chasidic Judaism: What is it and where did it come from?
Michael of “Xai How Are You” and I discuss the history of the Chasidic / Hasidic movement, a Jewish lay mystical and pietistic movement, which originated among Ashkenazi Jews in Eastern Europe in the 1700s, flourished in the 1800s, survived the pogroms and world wars, and in recent years has been reborn as both a pillar of Orthodox Judaism and a bridge to the Reform and secular worlds. |
 | Doorposts and Gates: How Jews Have Subdivided Themselves Through History
Michael of “Xai How Are You” and I discuss the different ways that Jews have distinguished themselves into groups and sub-groups, from the Biblical tribes to the Sephardic and Ashkenazi ethnic groups to the modern Reform, Orthodox, and Conservative movements. We lay the groundwork for an upcoming discussion of the origins and character of Chasidic Judaism. |
 | Film: The Green Knight – History, Myth, and Modern Shame – A Historian’s View
We consider the narrative structure, symbols, and meanings of the story of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in the context of the Middle Ages and the Arthurian cycle, and how the 2021 movie staring Dev Patel has been adjusted to speak to modern sensibilities. I argue that the Green Knight myth has relevance today as a parable about shame. |
 | Before Jamestown: When England Colonized the Amazon — A Conversation with Melissa Morris
How did the early colonists in Virginia know that they could profitably grow a species of tobacco from South America? They learned about it from the series of mostly short-lived English, French, and Dutch colonies and outposts in tropical South America, between the Amazon and Orinoco rivers, in the area called “Guiana.” We discuss with historian Melissa Morris of U. of Wyoming how these early colonies, despite being almost totally forgotten by historians, left a lasting imprint on the Americas, and reveal the haphazard and unpredictable nature of early global empires. |
 | Unlocked: Myth of the Month 12, Finale: The Historical King Arthur
Released to the public after one year for patrons only: Archaeology, geography, linguistics, textual analysis — all of these fields of knowledge must be brought to bear on a centuries-old question: Was there a “real” King Arthur? Answer: It’s complicated. We discuss the likelihood that some “historical” personage underlies the layers of legend. |
 | The Middle Ages: 1066 – Sailing Into the Storm
1066 — the year of the Battle of Hastings and the Norman Conquest — is the most famous date in English history. Few understand, though, that far more happened in this cataclysmic and pivotal year than just the Norman defeat of an English army on a field in East Sussex. The culmination of centuries of shifting struggle over control of England, the events of 1066 show how even epochal changes in a society can hinge on minor accidents of timing, weather, health, and personal choice. Image: Modern re-enactors representing Harold Godwinson’s army at Hastings. Quick Sample: |
 | Becoming Modern: Dutch Batavia and the Ideology of Early Modern Empire – A Conversation with Deborah Hamer
Were the Dutch proto-capitalists? Were they Americans before America? What was the Dutch West India Company, and how did it work? I talk to Deborah Hamer — historian, research associate at the Omohundro Institute, and associate editor of the New York history blog Gotham — to discuss her work on marriage and gender in the early Dutch colony in Batavia (as they called the conquered city of Jakarta), how it illuminates the Netherlands’ obsessive efforts to create a stratified, orderly, and moral Protestant society in Southeast Asia, and what it reveals about the wider European colonial mindset. |
 | Myth of the Month 17: Anglo-Saxonism
Who the heck are the “Anglo-Saxons,” and why are Americans getting all lathered up about “Anglo-Saxon institutions”? Find out where the Anglo-Saxon myth came from and how over the past three hundred years it’s been used to justify Parliamentary supremacy, the Rhodes Scholarship, the American entry into World War I, immigration restrictions, and college admission quotas. You never knew you were suffering under the Norman yoke, but now you do. Quick Sample: |
 | History of the British and Irish Travellers
Travellers, Tinkers, Gypsies, Kale, Scottish Travellers, Gypsy Travellers, Romani Gypsies, Romanichal, Pavee, Showmen, Van People, Boat People, Bargers – All of these multivarious peoples, with different ancestries, religions, and traditions, their different languages, dialects, and “cants,” share in common a longstanding itinerant lifestyle and the distinct identity that stems from it. Roving all around the British Isles and sometimes settling down, the various tribes of Travellers have provided metal goods, horses, music, and entertainment to British and Irish markets for centuries, but have become the flashpoint of political fury and even of violence in the twenty-first century. Quick Sample: |
 | History of the Roma (“Gypsies”), part 2 — A Stateless People in Modern Europe
We follow how the Roma or Gypsies rose to a period of toleration and even renown as the quintessential musical masters of the Romantic era, only to fall under renewed persecution and suppression the twentieth century, culminating in the Nazi Holocaust — called the “Devouring” in Romani. We consider the lives of remarkable Roma of the modern age, such as the boxer Johann Trollmann and jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt, the birth of a pan-Roma identity movement in the 1970s, the anti-Roma backlash of the 2010s, and finally the possibility that the Roma may be drawn into the geopolitical maneuverings of modern India. |
 | History of the Roma (“Gypsies”), part 1 — From Ancient Origins to the Eighteenth Century
Who are the Roma — also colloquially called “Gypsies”? Where did they come from, and how did they end up all over Europe? How have they endured through persecution, expulsions, and political upheaval, without a state or country of their own? We trace the path of this remarkable and resilient people from their mysterious origins in India to their arrival in Constantinople and medieval Europe and through the wave of persecution and ethnic cleansing in the 1600s. Quick Sample: |
 | Doorways in Time: The Great Archaeological Finds #1: The Sutton Hoo Treasure
Why was the excavation depicted in Netflix’s “The Dig” the most important archaeological discovery ever made in Britain, or arguably in all of Europe? How did some artifacts found in a mound near an English widow’s garden in Suffolk on the eve of World War II revolutionize our understanding of the Dark Age? Why would they come to serve as symbols of the ancient roots of the English nation, and how did Sutton Hoo vindicate the new science of archaeology? The story that Netflix did not tell you. Quick Sample: |
 | Freemasonry — Its Growth and Spread Before 1789
How did Freemasonry expand in the 1700s from a small, secretive fraternity in Lowland Scotland to a massive global network, with lodges from the Caribbean to Russia to India? Who became Freemasons in the 1700s, and what sort of opposition and persecution did they face? What was their relationship to radical groups like the Illuminati? We examine to the growth, expansion, and divides in Freemasonry in the eighteenth century, all of which laid the groundwork for the Craft to influence the course of the age of revolutions. Quick Sample: |
 | War & Pandemic, a Historian’s Perspective; and Teaser: “The Founding Fathers”
Since the Covid-19 pandemic has killed over half a million Americans, is it historically sound to say that the disaster is “bigger” than World War II? What do such comparisons mean, and are they illuminating? Such questions are truly a new dilemma, since from ancient and biblical times through the First World War and the Spanish Flu pandemic, people have usually understood war and pestilence as going hand in hand. Here, I present a recording of my recent interview with a journalist about putting pandemic and war into historical perspective, followed by an excerpt from my recent patron-only lecture on “Myth of the Month 16: The Founding Fathers.”Image: “Death on a Pale Horse,” by Gustave Dore, 1865. Music: Fandango, by Soler or Scarlatti, early 1700s, arranged for Midi file by El Gran Mago Paco Quito. Please become a supporter to hear all Myths of the Month: http://www.patreon.com/user?u=5530632 |
 | Emergency Podcast: The Royal Crisis in Historical Context
The messy exit of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle from the royal family marks the third great crisis of the British monarchy in the past hundred years – following the abdication of Edward VIII to marry an American divorcee in 1936 and the breakup of Charles and Diana’s marriage in the 1990s. Michael and I discuss the ramifications for the monarchy, Britain, the empire, and the world, situating the disaster in the context of the crown’s central role in the long-running struggle to redefine Britain as it loses its imperial status. Since the reign of Victoria, the monarchy has lost its political “hard” power but has correspondingly gained in the “soft” power of social influence and celebrity, rising to become the primary symbol representing the British nation to itself, and forcing the monarch to navigate the tension between Britain’s place at the head of the multi-racial Commonwealth and its connection to Europe. The appearance and quick departure of a bi-racial American woman in the royal family serves as a test of the monarchy’s supposed embrace of a color-blind future. |
 | The Voynich Manuscript, the “World’s Most Mysterious Book” — A Historian’s View — pt. 2
The Voynich Manuscript — often called the “world’s most mysterious book” — consists of 116 leaves of parchment covered in outlandish botanical and astrological drawings and thousands of lines of undeciphered text in an unknown language. A century after images of the codex were first published, still not one line has been decoded. What could it say? And more importantly from the historical perspective, who created it and why? This is the most balanced and impartial consideration of the evidence that you will find. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 15: The Newport Spirit Bundle, 1700s
A small cloth sack, containing nails, beads, glass, and a cowrie shell, found under the floorboards of the garret of the oldest house in Newport, Rhode Island, points toward the continuation and adaptation of African practices in New England and throughout the complex “African Atlantic.” We discuss with Michael J. Simpson, Phd student at Brown University, who is researching slavery and the slave trade in Rhode Island. |
 | The Sabbatai Zevi Messianic Movement
I discuss, with Michael of “Xai, how are you?”, the life and times of Sabbatai Zvi, the purported messiah of the 1660s, and the massive messianic awakening that he sparked and that swept across the entire Jewish diaspora in 1666, drawing in men and women, wealthy and poor, clergy and laity, Sephardic and Ashkenazi, and even Jews and gentiles. We consider the development of messianic theology and kabbalah that paved the way for the Sabbatian movement, as well as the lasting imprint that it left on Judaism in the modern era. |
 | The Voynich Manuscript, the “World’s Most Mysterious Book” — A Historian’s View — pt. 1
The Voynich Manuscript — often called the “world’s most mysterious book” — consists in 116 leaves of parchment covered in outlandish botanical and astrological drawings and thousands of lines of undeciphered text in an unknown language. A century after images of the codex were first published, still not one line has been decoded. What could it say? And more importantly from the historical perspective, who created it and why? This is the most balanced and impartial consideration of the evidence that you will find. In this first part, we consider the physical features and visual content of the book; in the second part, we will examine the mysterious text, and evidence as to its preovenance and chain of ownership. |
 | Myth of the Month 15: “The State”
What did Shakespeare mean when he wrote that “something is rotten in the state of Denmark”? Why do we call independent countries “states” endowed with “sovereignty”? Why do historians and philosophers speak of “state formation” and clashes between “church and state”? How did these concepts come about, and what do they mean in international law and political theory? The answer runs from absolutist royal courts through the French Revolution and the Weimar republic of Germany; after centuries of struggle and democratization, the concept of “the state” has formed to fill the vacuum left behind by the Crown. |
 | Unlocked: History of the United States in 100 Objects # 10: The Peregrine White Cradle, ca. 1620
Made of willow wicker on a wood frame, made ca. 1620, and most likely in the Netherlands – Allegedly brought on the Mayflower; held by the Pilgrim Hall Museum, Plymouth, Mass.This rocking cradle was reportedly stowed on the Mayflower in anticipation of the birth of Peregrine White, the first English child born in New England, who came into the world as the ship was temporarily anchored in Provincetown Harbor. Passed down for centuries in the wealthy, powerful, and embattled White and Winslow families, the cradle reflects both the Pilgrims’ unprecedented ambition to create a self-perpatuating European society in exile, and their strict child-rearing practices that sought to shape the infant into a miniature adult. |
 | Creating the Caribbean — The Colonial West Indies, pt. 1, 1496-1697
How did a chain of sparsely populated islands, stalked by earthquakes, hurricanes, and deadly tropical diseases, become the most powerful and prosperous colonies on earth? We trace how bands of adventurers, including pirates and Crusader knights, took advantage of Spain’s fragile hold on the Caribbean islands, superior seafaring skills, and the growing slave trade, to build unlikely new societies, while the Irish and African laborers that they forced into service adapted or struck out for freedom. |
 | Unlocked: Myth of the Month 10, pt. 4: the Shakespeare Authorship Controversy
Unlocked for the public, after one year for patrons only, the final lecture of the series on Shakespeare: Could it be that “Shakespeare” wasn’t Shakespeare? — That someone else, perhaps a highly-educated aristocrat, actually wrote the works attributed to the actor from Stratford? Am I a crackpot for even entertaining such a ridiculous idea? We consider the evidence. I know this is an absurdly long one, but forgive me, it was so much fun to research and record. Quick Sample: |
 | Roots of Religion: The early church, pt. 2 – Houses Divided
How did the early church hammer out a shared set of practices and teachings out of the welter of confusion and bitter contestation among Montanists, Docetists, Donatists, Paulines, Gnostics, and Ebionites? Why did it take 300 years just for the church to settle on the “creed” that most of us now understand as the core of the faith? |
 | Roots of Religion: The Early Church, pt. 1 – Christianity on the Road
How did a small movement of Jewish fanatics, devastated by the ignominious demise of their leader, rise to become the official state religion of the Roman empire, Armenia, Georgia, and Ethiopia? We trace the dramatic rise of the new faith through three centuries of preaching, prophesy, and persecution. Quick Sample: |
 | Age of Absolutism 3: Bourbon France, 1589-1789
When we speak of “absolutism,” most of us think immediately of Louis XIV, the Sun King, and his splendrous court at Versailles. But those glittering images cover over a centuries-long struggle by the Bourbon dynasty to consolidate power by forging quiet strategic alliances with the lower and middle classes against the nobility, building up a precarious potemkin village that would soon collapse under financial strain, throwing all of Europe into confusion. |
 | Becoming Modern: Colonial Latin America – The Baroque Age, 1542-1764
How did a series of brutally conquered states and forced labor camps evolve over 200 years into a flourishing empire of trade, art, and culture? How did this new civilization manage land, money, and the status distinctions of ancestry and color? Why did Spanish America, one of the biggest imperial domains ever seen on earth, fail to benefit the mother country? And how did a cloistered nun in Mexico City come to be known as the first intellectual leading light of the Americas? |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 13: Dutch Iron Fireback with a Robed Figure
Made of cast iron, probably in the Netherlands, ca. 1650 – found at the Schuyler Flatts, Colonie, New York – held by the New York State Museum. A mysterious fragment of an iron fireback found near the hearth of an old manor house in what was New Netherlands shows how we have misunderstood the Dutch – a people who strove for stability, domesticity, and traditional social hierarchy to link their far-flung colonies with the homeland. |
 | England, Interrupted: The Interregnum and Restoration, 1650-1685
What happened to England in the power vacuum left in the wake of the execution of Charles I? Why were the Puritans, so pious in morals and strict in governance, unable to create a lasting Commonwealth? And why did the return of the monarchy unleash a wave of lewd hedonism that is shocking even more than three centuries later? The explosion of empire, the slave trade, religious toleration, the modern metropolis of London, and the enshrinement of theater as the English national art form, and the consitutional balance of power still in place in both Britain and the United States all have their roots in the tumultuous years from 1650 to 1685; if there is any period of English history that you must know in order to understand the present, it is this one. |
 | Myth of the Month 13: Feudalism
Feudalism – it’s what they did in the Middle Ages! Nobles controlled the land and extracted labor from the serfs, and everyone from peasants to great lords was arranged in a big hierarchical pyramid leading up to the king. Or were they? We examine the ambiguities inherent in the idea of “feudalism,” and the reasons why it simply cannot hold up to examination against the historical record. Finally, we consider why the myth of feudalism developed and has persisted as a way of justifying the inequalities of our own era. |
 | Becoming Modern: Scientific Revolution, Part 2 — The New Powers, 1660-1800
How did the Restoration of the English monarchy and the dawn of empire set the stage for the peculiar set of practices and assumptions that we now call “science,” and how did they begin to unlock powerful secrets of the earth, the heavens, fire, and steam? And why did John Locke kind of secretly hate Isaac Newton? Image: “An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump,” by Joseph Wright, 1768How did the Restoration of the English monarchy and the dawn of empire set the stage for the peculiar set of practices and assumptions that we now call “science,” and how did they begin to unlock powerful secrets of the earth, the heavens, fire, and steam? And why did John Locke kind of secretly hate Isaac Newton? |
 | The Middle Ages: Anglo-Saxon England and the Vikings, 757-1066
How did a set of seven fractious kingdoms unite into a new kingdom, known as “England,” while under almost constant attack by Viking berserkers from across the North Sea? Full Episode > Also see:
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 | The Origins of Policing — from the Middle Ages to the First World War
Why do we have uniformed officers called “police” who do things (like patrolling streets and investigating missing persons) that we call “policing”? We trace the evolution of law enforcement over the past two hundred years in response to urban growth, immigration, and labor unrest, and the struggles over who controls the police and their activities. |
 | The Trials of Bolivia: A Conversation with Oliver Rhoads Murphey
Why did the US government support and supply substantial aid to a left-wing revolutionary government in Bolivia in the 1950s, at the same time that it was undermining or overthrowing similar regimes in other nations? What does this striking but forgotten incident reveal about American ambitions in Latin America? And what light does it shed on the strife engulfing Bolivia today, after yet another elected leader has been forced out of power? We discuss and find context with Oliver Rhodes Murphey, whose dissertation seeks to solve the puzzle of American involvement in the heart of Andean South America. |
 | Unlocked: History of the United States in 100 Objects, 8 # Pueblo Communion Chalice
Unlocked for the public after 1 year: |
 | Myth of the Month 12: The Arthur Cycle — pt. 2: The Rise and Fall of Camelot
When Jackie Kennedy told reporters that she and the late President used to listen to the soundtrack of the musical “Camelot,” the word immediately caught on as the name for the Kennedy White House — portrayed as a brief, golden period of wise rule, ended by tragedy. More than a thousand years’ worth of romantic associations could be evoked with three simple syllables. In this second segment, we consider how the chivalric legend of the Round Table and the Court of Camelot was conceived and elaborated, from French courtly romances, through the first English Arthurian epic of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, to the popular novels, plays, and movies of the modern times. |
 | Myth of the Month 12: The Arthur Cycle — pt. 1: Creating “King Arthur”
Why does the earliest known picture of King Arthur show him riding on a goat and charging towards a deadly cat-monster? How has the tale of King Arthur and his knights evolved since it first emerged from Celtic folklore? We consider the shaping of the Arthur story from the songs of mysterious Welsh and Breton bards to the high medieval romances of French courtier-poets. |
 | Unlocked: Myth of the Month 8: “The West”
After one year on Patreon for patrons only, Myth of the Month #8 becomes open to the public: |
 | The Middle Ages: Crossing the Waters – Britain in the Dark Age
Romans, Brythons, Picts, Angles, Gaels, Saxons, and Jutes — how did this kaleidoscopic welter of contending tribes crystallize into the medieval Christian kingdoms we know as England and Scotland? We consider the most tumultuous and mysterious period in British history, following the Roman withdrawal, as locals and Germanic migrants sought to assert power and maintain stability. Despite the great uncertainty, Britons mastered new knowledge, developed a poetic tradition, and passed on an enduring romance around the sacred power of water. Image: 6th-century Anglo-Saxon inlaid gold disk brooch, found in gravesite in Kent. Image courtesy of Metropolitan Museum of Art. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 11: Human-Effigy War Club, ca. 1640s
Made of Hickory wood, shells, and copper on the Atlantic coast of North America, ca. 1640s, and held in the collection of Skokloster Castle, Sweden. This elaborately carved and ornamented wooden weapon was most likely ceremonial, created by a Lenape Indian artist to represent the authority of a chieftain or warrior. But how did this priceless Native American artifact end up in the collection of a castle in Sweden? This object and its journey tell a largely forgotten story of Sweden’s moment of imperial glory and ambition in the mid-1600s, which left a mysterious imprint in North America. Suggested |
 | The Spanish Flu, pt. 2 — The Great Flu and Modern Memory, 1920-2020
What is the legacy of the greatest pandemic to hit the globe in the past two centuries, carrying away 3% of the entire human race? What has been its after-life through the past century?What health and psychological impacts did it leave behind? What are the enduring questions and mysteries that science and history must unravel? And how has our art, literature, and popular culture remembered — or more often, forgotten — this great disaster?In this first installment on the great Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918-20, we consider the staggering scope and deep reach of the viral disease that swept the world three times, infecting one third of humankind and killing more people than the World War that nonetheless overshadowed it in the public mind. The second installment will consider the lingering impacts of the pandemic, its enduring mysteries, and the possible reasons it has been forgotten. |
 | The Spanish Flu, pt. 1 — A World in Ashes, 1918-1920
In this first installment on the great Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918-20, we consider the staggering scope and deep reach of the viral disease that swept the world three times, infecting one third of humankind and killing more people than the World War that nonetheless overshadowed it in the public mind. The second installment will consider the lingering impacts of the pandemic, its enduring mysteries, and the possible reasons it has been forgotten. |
 | Myth of the Month 11: The “1619 Project” and the place of slavery in American history
The 1619 Project — an essay collection published in last August’s New York Times magazine — has ignited intense debate about American history, raging outside the walls of academia. Commemorating the 400th anniversary of the first African captives landing in Virginia, the various authors the case for the central importance of slavery and African-Americans to the meaning of America. We examine how the project reinforces the traditional myths of American exceptionalism and continual progress, while casting African-Americans in the starring role of Whig history, as the embattled tribe leading the quest towards liberty. |
 | Special Comment, and How are my listeners?
Our moment in a little historical perspective, and why will not descend into any greater “barbarism” than where we were already. |
 | Through a Glass Darkly: The 1980s in Current Television — A Conversation with Sonia Saraiya of Vanity Fair
What’s with the spate of 1980s themes on current “prestige” television? Is it Gen. X. nostalgia for their youthful days in suburban malls? Or something more? Television critic Sonia Saraiya discusses how our unresolved identity crises seem to have led us into a fascination with the last years of the Cold War, and with the secret mistakes and machinations that took place on both sides of the old Iron Curtain. (Also listen for contributions from Kali the cat.) Quick Sample: |
 | Back to the Dark Age – How People Adapted to the Fall of the Roman Empire
What did people do when the Roman empire fall apart around them? Recent scholarship, based on new archeological discoveries and techniques, argues that in the “dark” centuries between 450 and 750 AD, the people of western Europe, from conquering kings to ordinary peasants, improvised new political alliances, maintained law and order, improved the productivity of their land, and invented new crafts and art forms, building a resilient and inventive society on the foundations (often literally) of the old. Quick Sample: |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 6: Bronze Cannon with Fleur-de-Lis Emblem, 1540s
About 10 ft. long-made in France, ca. 1540s-lost in shipwreck, ca. 1562-5, Located on bottom of the Atlantic Ocean near Cape Canaveral. We examine the mysteries surrounding a French bronze cannon recently discovered on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean near Florida, amidst the wreckage of an unidentified sixteenth-century fleet. The cannon and other artifacts are rare, priceless remnants of French Protestants’ ill-fated attempts to colonize North America before the Spanish, and their discovery sparked a heated international legal dispute. The mysterious shipwreck gives us a window into a rare moment when Europe’s vicious religious wars spilled over into the Americas. Image courtesy of Bobby Pritchett., Pres., Global Marine Exploration Inc. |
 | Beyond Plymouth Rock: The Deep Beginnings of New England — A Conversation with Michael J. Simpson
Anticipating the 400th anniversary of the foundation of Plymouth colony, Michael J. Simpson and I discuss the deep background of the creation of “New England” — the long history of contact, exchange, violence, disease, and acculturation among indigenous and European peoples, both before and after 1620, that created a complex creolized world before any Puritans were even on the scene. Michael’s instagram: @hiddenhistoryri (Payment for this installment will be split between the two collaborators) Quick Sample: |
 | Unlocked: Myth of the Month 6: Political Left and Right
Unlocked after one year for patrons only, a discussion of our fixation with organizing political views into an axis “left” against “right”: |
 | Myth of the Month 10: Who Was Shakespeare? — pt. 3: “The Maiden’s Organ”
How could Shakespeare have possibly allowed his sonnets — personal, sexual, and often scandalous — to be published? I advance my own theory to account for the printing of the most shocking book of poetry in the history of literature, and discuss the possibilities as to the identities of the alluring Young Man and Dark Lady. Finally, we consider the light that the Sonnets shed upon Shakespeare’s plays, particularly his obsession with gender ambiguity and androgyny. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 10: Who Was Shakespeare? — pt. 2: “Comfort and Despair”
What do Shakespeare’s sonnets actually say? What can they tell us about the life or character of the man who penned them? Not only romantic and philosophical, the sonnets are erotic, desperate, and often angry, laced with shocking sexual imagery and emotional confession; as a group, they break all conventions of Elizabethan poetry, and trace the ghostly outline of two passionate affairs — one a brief, tawdry fling with a mature voluptuous woman, and one a long, fraught relationship with an androgynous young man. This will be followed by a discussion of the publication of the sonnets, the possible identities of the “Dark Lady” and “Fair Youth,” and their relation to the plays; and then by a discussion of the “authorship controversy.” Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 10: Who Was Shakespeare? – pt. 1: The Monument and the Man
Who was William Shakespeare? He is far more elusive, and his life more obscure, than his fans and biographers will admit. We consider the massive, bloated mythology that has built up around the great Bard over the centuries, and then examine the remarkably scant surviving documentary records from the writer’s own lifetime, which tend to paint a both bizarre and unflattering picture. The first of three installments examining the reality of Shakespeare. Quick Sample: |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 9: Bartmann Jug with Guelph Coat-of-Arms, 1600-1610
Made of salt-glazed stoneware, in Frechen, Germany, ca. 1605–Found at James Fort, Jamestown, Virginia–Held in Collection of Historic JamestowneIn some ways, this Bartmann (or “Bearded Man”) stoneware beer jug with an effigy of a jovial fat man and coats of arms is typical of the wares that poured our of Germany in the 1600s, several of which were found in the long-lost ruins of James Fort, the first English fortress at Jamestown. On the other hand, a peculiar feature of its decorative crest suggests possible hidden meanings, hinting at secret Catholic sympathies threatening England’s first serious effort to colonize the New World. |
 | Becoming Modern: The Road to Civil War – Class Conflict and Constitutional Crisis in Stuart England, 1603-1650
Struggles between chief executives and legislatures are dominating the news on both sides of the Atlantic, as Americans debate impeachment and the UK is engulfed by a Brexistential crisis. Most of the terms and precedents for these struggles go back to the 1600s and King Charles I’s efforts to govern without the support of Parliament, which led to political backlash, civil war, and social upheaval from the halls of Westminster to the smallest peasant farmsteads. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of the Month 9: The US Constitution and the Origins of the Senate and Electoral College
Why does our government work the way it does? Is it supposed to represents citizens, or states? We consider the origins of the U. S. Constitution, particularly the creation of the controversial bodies (Senate and Electoral College) that represent the public in skewed and disproportionate ways. We dispel the false notion that these bodies were created in order to protect small states, tracing instead the Framers’ quest to tamp down the “excess of democracy” of the 1780s, wrest control over monetary policy away from the poor majority, and strike a careful balance between slave and non-slave states. Quick Sample: |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 4: The Maine Norse Coin
After one year, my lecture on the only authentic pre-Columbian European artifact ever found in the United States becomes public. Quick Sample: |
 | In the Ocean of Land: The History of Central Asia — pt. 2
We trace how the conquests of the infamous Tamerlane, the “great game” of imperial rivalry, and the revolutions of modern Russia shaped the map of central Asia that we see today. We consider how contemporary central Asians try to navigate the dangerous shoals of environmental disaster and rampant corruption, often while tethered to older Islamic, Turko-Mongolic, and nomadic traditions — particularly in the looming shadow of a resurgent China. |
 | In the Ocean of Land: The History of Central Asia — pt. 1
We consider the vast sweep of Central Asian history, from the first nomads to tame the horse and gain mastery of the steppes, to the splendrous cities of the first Silk Road, to the rise of Ghenghis Khan. Few Westerners learn the dizzyingly complex and tumultuous history of Central Asia, even though it forms the linchpin connecting all the major civilizations of the Old World, from Europe to Persia to China. Finally, we consider the unsettling paradox of the Mongol empire, which fostered a vibrant cosmopolitanism at the same time that it brutally repressed subject peoples. |
 | The Middle Ages: Freemasonry – Its Origins, Its Myths, and Its Rituals
Freemasonry: What is it? Where does it come from? What is one taught as a Freemason? What do they do in their closed-door rituals — and why? Freemasonry in the 1700s is my own field of research, and as a thank-you for reaching 50 patrons, I give a deep illumination of this unusual Society’s roots in the gatherings of stonemasons in the late Middle Ages, its mythical connections to Solomon’s Temple and the Crusades, and its elaborate system of symbols and initiatory rituals, which cast the Masons as a quasi-priestly caste with a shamanic connection to the world of the dead. |
 | Myth of the Month 4: Secularization — or, Send in the Nones!
We examine the long-debated “secularization thesis” — ie, the notion that as societies modernize they become less religious. From Max Weber’s belief that science and rationality disenchant the world, to Charles Taylor’s and other current scholars’ argument that religious views have become relative and debatable where in the past they were taken for granted, the secularization thesis has evolved and adapted with the times. We carefully examine Pew Research data showing that education does not particularly correlate with loss of religious commitment, especially among Christians, and observe that instead, a new, younger generation of “nones” has given up on traditional institutions even as they remain interested in religious ideas and practices. We also uncover some of the long history of skeptical and even atheistic ideas in the West running back to the 1600s and earlier, which suggest that our own day is not necessarily any more “secular” than what came before. Quick Sample: |
 | Becoming Modern: Age of Absolutism 2 – Tudor England, 1485-1603
We follow the five Tudor monarchs’ struggle to consolidate power in royal hands and forestall a collapse back into the civil wars that ravaged England in the 1400s. Beyond the soap operas of Henry VIII’s marriages or Elizabeth’s love affairs, we consider the real workings of power, money, and propaganda as England rises from a European backwater to a commercial powerhouse and leader of the Protestant world, especially as seen from the viewpoint of the Dudleys, the longest-surviving family of royal consiglieri operating behind the Tudor throne. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 7: The Dorion Mission Seal, ca. 1680s
Seal stamp, made of Bronze, with image of St. Catherine of Alexandria, made in Spain, ca. 1680s, possibly earlier-used by Santa Catalina de Guale mission, in Georgia and Florida, and found on Amelia Island, Florida. The only surviving Spanish mission seal ever found in the United States, this small bronze stamp was once the critical link to Spain’s northernmost mission in America. Small enough to sit in the palm of the hand, the Dorion mission seal encapsulates a history of religious zealotry, conversion, and inter-imperial struggle in what is now the American southeast. Image courtesy of the History Miami Museum. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 2: Statuette of a Farming Goddess, ca. 1100 AD
Found in Monroe County, Illinois, made of bauxite or “flint clay”, dated to early 12th century AD. We consider the statuette of a woman tearing into the back of a serpent (known to archaeologists as the Birger Figurine), which was found broken in pieces and buried in a pit outside of a small village site in Illinois. The figurine, despite its small size and condition, is the most exquisite piece of art surviving from the Mississippian civilization, a massive and powerful urban society that dominated the interior of North America for more than three hundred years before falling into decline and obscurity. The statuette most likely represents a goddess of death and rebirth that presided over the Mississippians’ prosperous golden age. |
 | Special Comment: Monarchy, Magic, and the Modern Romance of “Game of Thrones”
Two secret informants and I continue our conversation stemming from Game of Thrones, wherein we consider the relationship of monarchy and magic to the malaise of modern life. Why did British rulers claim the power to heal the sick by the touch of a hand, and why did a group of Scottish students in the 1950s break into Westminster Abbey to steal a 300-pound slab of sandstone called the “Stone of Destiny”? More broadly, why are modern people still obsessed with stories of kings and queens, and why do we tune in by the millions to see a royal wedding? The furor over Game of Thrones is just the latest demonstration that monarchy serves as a symbolic anchor in a chaotic world, and the desire for such an anchor is just as strong today as it was in the depth of the Dark Age. |
 | History as it Happens: Notre Dame and the Nine Lives of Gothic Cathedrals
We put the disastrous fire at Notre Dame de Paris into historical perspective — by considering the history of Gothic cathedrals, their cosmic religious meanings, and their remarkably powerful and mysterious construction. How did medieval builders create these massive, complex structures without steel, steam power, electricity, or even written plans? We also follow the tumultuous experiences of Notre Dame itself, the social and symbolic center of Paris–from religious riots and Revolutionary iconoclasm to malign neglect and controversial restorations. Finally, we consider the resilience of Gothic buildings through fire, lightning, earthquake, war, and revolution, and ask what other important monuments or community buildings we should support in our own communities. Quick Sample: |
 | Milestone: 2 Years of Constant Historiansplaining
I take stock of the growth and reach of the podcast, Historiansplaining, who is listening, who is contributing, and how I seem to be especially appealing to Canadians. I preview possible upcoming topics, such as Central Asia and the U.S. Constitution. |
 | Myth of the Month 2: The Exodus
We examine the origins and the political and theological meanings of the myth of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt. We consider the possible real historical events that might underly the exodus story, including the argument put forward in Richard Elliot Friedman’s new book, The Exodus. Finally, we trace some of the many ways that peoples around the world, from the early Christians to Rastafaris, have adopted the exodus myth and cast themselves as the new Israelites. Quick Sample: |
 | Myth of The Month 7: Game of Thrones
We examine George R. R. Martin’s new mythology for the middle class: the TV series Game of Thrones and the series of books upon which it is based. Martin and his collaborators draw on the 15th-century Wars of the Roses and later dynastic struggles in Britain to present an amoral world, lacking in honor, bereft of cosmic justice, and eerily reminiscent of the contemporary West. We examine historical precedents for the “Red Wedding,” and the symbolic resonance of characters such as the Starks and Littlefinger. Finally we consider the possible historical meaning of the show’s final-season premier date of April 14th. |
 | The Middle Ages: History of Universities, Part 2 – A Crumbling Tower?
In the second part of our exploration of the history of universities, we discuss the apotheosis of the university in the American republic, the rise of the German-style research university, and the arrival of women in the elite universities. We end by considering the current crisis of universities, as humanities departments disappear, sexual-assault scandals tarnish prestigious schools, and the public turns an increasingly jaundiced and cynical eye toward the academic “ivory tower.” |
 | The Middle Ages: History of Universities, Part 1 – Flower of the Middle Ages
Universities are unique — a quintessential product of the High Middle Ages that has miraculously survived and even flourished in the modern world. In the first part of the history of universities, we examine the origins of the first universities in the power struggles of Popes and emperors; the ways that medieval students learned, lived, and annoyed their elders; and the ways that universities adapted to and withstood serious challenges from Renaissance humanism and the republic of letters. Next will be the rise of universities in America, the modern research university, and the current crisis of academia. Quick Sample: |
 | Book Review: “Why Liberalism Failed” — Part 2
I discuss the various strengths and weaknesses of Patrick Deneen’s critique of liberalism, and put forward my own slightly different argument that liberalism is like a cargo cult – taking ordinary human creations and elevating them to products of divine intervention. George Carlin helps out along the way, and we close with a consideration of the recent “market capitalism” controversy stirred up by Tucker Carlson. |
 | Book Review: “Why Liberalism Failed” — Part 1
In the first half of my discussion of Patrick Deneen’s “Why Liberalism Failed,” I examine the structure of Deneen’s argument, tracing his effort to connect present-day crises in education, science, culture, and morality to the fundamental flaws in “liberalism,” which he calls the “operating system” of modern Western society, and which he claims has left us isolated, lonely, and afraid, with our social system possibly on the brink of collapse into a totalitarian nightmare. Cheers! I will not charge patrons for this commentary until I post the second part. |
 | Special Comment: The “Sokal Squared” Hoax and the Academic Cult
I have a conversation with a friend in the scientific field about the recently exposed “Sokal Squared” academic hoax, by which three junior professors concocted a series of intentionally absurd, nonsensical articles and had several of them accepted into respectable academic journals. What are the implications of their success? Is “theory” or “postmodernism” to blame? The lax standards of humanities journals? The drive to “publish or perish” in academia? Does the problem extend to social science or “hard science” fields? And what should be done about it? We try to sort through the confusing picture, and I recommend possible responses, such as the inclusion of non-academics in the peer-review process. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 5: Set of Chevron-Patterned Glass Beads, ca. 1500
A set of nine chevron-patterned glass beads, made in Venice, ca. 1500, and found in Telfair County, Georgia. A fistful of Venetian glass beads may be the crucial clue to tracing the route of the first European explorer to raid and rampage through the interior of North America — Hernando de Soto. |
 | Update to Listeners, Thanks to Patrons, and Happy Birthday to Mom
I update my patrons on future plans for the podcast despite a pause of more than two months, and encourage listeners to comment on what they want to hear about in coming months |
 | Becoming Modern: Age of Absolutism 1 – Central Europe and the Rise of the Habsburgs
We follow how a relatively obscure family of Swiss counts took advantage of the chaos of the late Middle Ages to become the most powerful dynasty in the history of central Europe, towering over European affairs, ruling “an empire on which the sun never sets,” and even setting their sights on the dream of global dominion. We then consider the obstacles that the French, the Ottoman Turks, and the Protestants threw in the way, leading to the disastrous 30 Years’ War and the Hapsburgs’ gradual fall from power. |
 | Myth of the Month 5: Capitalism
There is no such thing as capitalism. With debates over the relative meanings and merits of socialism and capitalism currently flaring up in the United States, we examine why “capitalism” is an undefinable and meaningless concept, and how it came nevertheless to hold a mythic and almost magical power over the minds of academics and ordinary citizens alike. Quick Sample: |
 | Becoming Modern: Scientific Revolution, Part 1 — Alchemy and Apocalypse, 1500-1660
We unearth the tangled roots of the earliest forms of modern science, beginning with the radical alchemical theories of the rabble-rousing healer called Paracelsus, and running through the heated debates over Galileo’s astronomy, which broke down the distinction between the earth and the heavens. Due to these shocks, the old teleological, or purpose-driven, scheme of the world broke down, giving way to a free-for-all of speculation and apocalyptic excitement.We question the historical meaning of the concept of “science,” and consider how modern-day pop scientists like Neil DeGrasse Tyson portray the past selectively in order to build the myth of reason and science as beacons of light amidst superstition. Quick Sample: |
 | The History of Scotland, the Romance of Scotland, and “Outlander”
What is behind the popularity of Outlander? Why have crazed fans of the show from around the world begun to overrun Scottish castles? – and why did the UK Prime Minister secretly meet with TV executives to stop its premier in 2014? We examine the show’s success in light of Scottish history and politics, and in the context of the ongoing romance of Scotland, by which modern people project their longings for tradition, attachment, and honor onto a small, craggy country in the north of Britain. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 3: Scarlet Macaw Feather Sash, ca. 1150 AD
A sash made of yucca rope, leather, squirrel pelt, and scarlet macaw feathers – Found in Lavender Canyon, Utah, and dated to Ancestral Pueblo Civilization, ca. 1150 AD. Made with more than 2000 tiny macaw feathers, this sash is unique in the archeological record, probably the most complex and the most personal artifact ever found from the ancestral Pueblo civilization. Also informally called “Anasazi” and known for its cliff palaces, this civilization flourished for several centuries before collapsing in the 1100s, around the time when this complex and mysterious object was left behind in a cave. |
 | From the Cotswolds to Cool Britannia – observations on a trip through England
I recently returned from a family trip through Great Britain, and want to share with my patrons the sights that we saw in England, arranged chronologically, from Stonehenge to the “Crystal Phallus.” The layered remains of Britain’s past ages – Roman, Gothic, Georgian, Victorian – encode their builders’ vastly different hopes and visions for the island kingdom. The country is full of extraordinary scenery, but the attempt to “see England,” even in such a simple act as boarding a train, entangles us in the unending struggles over who defines such a complicated nation. Next installment: Scotland. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details Also see: |
 | Becoming Modern: Age of Ice and Fire: The General Crisis Of The Seventeenth Century
We trace the waves of crop failure, famine, pestilence, and war that swept over Europe in the 1600s as the climate sunk into a “Little Ice Age” and armies literally marched across frozen seas. In the midst of unimaginable crisis, alchemists, astrologers, and apocalypticists scoured the Bible for prophecies to explain the disasters around them as part of the approaching End Times. Many of the defining institutions of the modern world we know today – such as overseas colonization, investor-owned corporations, public education, religious toleration, and scientific academies – have their origins as attempts to cope with the crisis of the seventeenth century and prepare the way for the Second Coming. Quick Sample: |
 | Becoming Modern: The Catholic Reformation
We examine the long movement for reform stretching from the Middle Ages through the 1600s, in which Catholic leaders strove to centralize and standardize church teachings. Mystics like Teresa of Avila and artists like Bernini inspired a physically and emotionally compelling form of worship centering on the sufferings of Christ and the Virgin Mary, while the elite special forces of the new piety were the Jesuits, whose schools and missions spread the new Catholicism within Europe and around the world, as far away as China. The Catholic Reformation, much more than just a negative response to the Protestant Reformation, served to further many of the same ideas and aspirations as its Protestant counterpart. |
 | Myth of the Month 3: Race
We examine the origins of racism, or the notion that the human species can be subdivided into distinct and observable biological categories. The notion of human “races” began as a strategy for dividing and controlling workers in European colonies, particularly 17th-century Virginia. We consider the basic logical incoherence of belief in race, and compare it against the new information that we are gaining from genetics, which shows a fairly closely interrelated human species, with all people living today sharing the same set of ancestors as of about 3,400 years ago. Finally we consider the recent flare-up of controversy over the difference in average IQ between “racial” groups in the US, which neuroscientist Sam Harris helped to spark on his podcast earlier this year. Quick Sample: |
 | Becoming Modern: The Century of Splintering – The Reformation in its Swiss and Radical Phases, 1519-1619
We explore the new, contending forms of Protestant Christianity that sprang up in the wake of Luther, including the strict, austere Swiss Reform embodied in John Calvin’s Geneva, and the radical anabaptism that burst onto the scene in the failed millennial kingdom at Munster. We consider how the new Reformed movement hammered out a shared orthodoxy emphasizing original sin and predestination, which we now (somewhat inaccurately) call “Calvinism,” and we trace the roots of some of the more extreme ascetic pacifist sects that have persisted down to our own time. |
 | History of the United States in 100 Objects # 1: Panther Effigy Pipe, 200-500 AD
Panther Effigy Pipe -Found in Posey County, Indiana-Carved from Steatite-dated to the Middle Woodland Period, 200-500 AD.In the first of the series on American objects and artifacts, we examine a tobacco pipe in the form of a wildcat — specifically a puma, whose name comes from the Quechua word for “powerful.” It was most likely used in rituals by shamans or priests of the Hopewell civilization, which built enormous, mysterious ceremonial complexes resembling Stonehenge — only lacking a source of stone, did so out of wood and earth. The effigy pipe reflects the artistic range and sophistication of the Hopewell as well as their fascination with the mythic power of animals. |
 | Becoming Modern: Witchcraft and the Great Witch-Hunt, 1484-1700
We trace the roots of the idea of witchcraft in the “cunning folk” of the Middle Ages. We consider how the church and state began to fuel fear of witchcraft and persecute witches in the tens of thousands during the age of the Renaissance and the Reformation. We consider theories of why witch-hunting arose so dramatically in this age, including economic strain and political agendas. Finally, we examine evidence for an enduring shamanic belief system centering on ecstatic night journeys that may have provided the inspiration for the mythical witches’ sabbath. Quick Sample: |
 | Becoming Modern: The Life of the Commoners – Adaptation and Rebellion, 1400-1600
We examine how Europe’s peasant majority worked, played, and survived in the late Middle Ages and the early modern era, including the elaborate customs governing land tenure, marriage, and inheritance. We consider how, during the recovery following the Black Death, steadily growing population and rising prices put the squeeze on commoners as well as the nobility, forcing peasants to seek out more marginal lands and toil for more meager rewards, while encouraging landlords to raise rents and evict tenants. At the same time, growing armies and governments laid a heavy burden of taxes and conscription on the third estate. Finally, we examine the wave of peasant rebellions that roiled Europe in the late 1400s and early 1500s, as commoners fought back against impoverishment, rising rents, taxes, and the enclosure and sale of common lands. |
 | Becoming Modern: Renaissance Humanism
We trace how a small group of scholars, obsessed with classical antiquity, mastered the more ancient form of Latin, thus unlocking the worlds of Roman and Greek politics. Seeing themselves as the peers and equals of the ancient statesmen, the “humanists” called for a new form of learning aimed towards action and ambition. Machiavelli sketched out the path to princely power, Erasmus excavated the original meanings of the Bible, and Michelangelo captured the subtle powers of the human body. The humanists invented the idea of a “modern” era distinct from the “Dark Ages,” and furthered the transformation of Europeans’ grasp of reality — from a realm defined by social relationships to one defined by the senses. |
 | Myth of the Month 1: The Enlightenment
There was no Enlightenment. Steven Pinker’s new book, “Enlightenment Now,” is a classic re-statement of the myth of the Enlightenment which holds that in the 1600s and 1700s, Europeans threw off the tired dogmas of the Middle Ages and embraced a new philosophy of Reason, Progress, Science, and Humanism. In fact, the 1700s were a period of confusion, with no clear unifying ideas or trends: occultism, mysticism, and absolute monarchy flourished alongside experiments in democracy and chemistry. “The Enlightenment” forms one of the central pillars of Whig history, serving to re-affirm the notion that our present-day beliefs and values are rational and coherent. Quick Sample: |
 | The Myths We Make: Using the past as an ideological tool
All of history is, to one degree or another, mythology — the weaving of a coherent, usable narrative out of the chaos of people’s lives. We consider how societies all over the world, since before the beginning of civilization, have developed myths to explain the world that they experience. We also trace some of the major schools of academic history, which have tried to fashion overarching storylines to give meaning to human struggles — from Biblical providential history to Marxism to postmodernism. We begin by examining the most central myth of the origins of American society: the “first Thanksgiving.” Quick Sample: |
 | Becoming Modern: Spanish and Portuguese Expansion and the Conquest of the Americas
We trace how Portugal and Spain, two previously marginal European kingdoms, rapidly and unexpectedly exploded onto the world scene, building a chain of fortified colonies stretching from North Africa to China, and conquering the larger and richer empires of Mexico and Peru. The early Iberian colonizers sought to continue the tradition of the Crusades and the Reconquista, and saw their foreign conquests as steps towards retaking Jerusalem; the benefited not only from superior weaponry and navigation, but from cataclysmic disease epidemics that brought the Pre-Columbian empires to their knees. |
 | Becoming Modern: Making The Modern State – Spain, Portugal, and the Inquisition
We explore European monarchs’ early quest to consolidate royal power and establish their subjects’ direct loyalty to the crown. In particular, we trace the early triumphs and slow declines of the Spanish and Portuguese monarchs, driven by the pioneering ambitions of Isabella of Castile, Philip II of Spain, John II of Portugal, and the formidable Marques de Pombal. We also examine the workings of the Spanish Inquisition, which served as a crucial cornerstone of the modern bureaucratic state, with its systems of mass surveillance, ideological propaganda, and obsession with extracting confessions from the accused. |
 | Becoming Modern: The Print and Gunpowder Revolutions, 1300-1700
The early modern era – from the 1400s through the 1700s – is the monarchical age par excellence, with royal courts presiding over consolidated realms and monstrous armies capable of crushing smaller neighbors and internal rivals. The map of Europe transformed, and the reasons were, firstly, technological: the printing press broke through previous barriers to the creation of texts, allowing for the rapid spread of new ideas and propaganda, while new infantry tactics and gunpowder allowed royal governments to batter down the power of mounted knights and castles. Society became ever more centered on royal power and patronage, leaving behind a vestigial nobility to seek out a new role in the world or give way to nostalgia, as dramatized in the first great psychological novel, Don Quixote. We conclude by considering Cervantes’ novel as a touchstone of the shift from the medieval world, where reality is defined by social relationships, to the modern, where reality is defined by the senses. |
 | Book Review: “The Strange Death of Europe” — Part 2
In the second part of our discussion of Douglas Murray’s “The Strange Death of Europe,” we examine the history of social cohesion and identity in Europe. We point out Murray’s failure to mention Brexit as a sign of the inherent weakness in European identity, and consider the complicated and challenging roots of modern-day terrorism in Europe. |
 | Book Review: “The Strange Death of Europe” — Part 1
The first part of an examination and discussion of Douglas Murray’s controversial book, “The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam” (Bloomsbury, 2017), and its dire warning that a wave of migrants with beliefs and customs inimical to the West are on the verge of changing Europe forever. We weigh his careful debunking of elite mythology about immigration against his own falsehoods and manipulations of the facts. Finally, we consider his harrowing portrayal of a continent adrift without a sense of purpose, history, or belonging, and the truly difficult questions that it raises.(I will not charge patrons for this review until I post the second part). |
 | Becoming Modern: Islam 2 – From the “Golden Age” to the Fundamentalist Reaction
We trace the tortured path of Islam over the past 1,000 years, from the “Golden Age” of art, philosophy, and interreligious tolerance under the Abbasid empire to the rise of oppositional movements like sufi mysticism and finally, the Mongols’ sudden rain of destruction. We follow the return to power of new Muslim empires, the deepening of the Shiah-Sunni split, and finally, the emergence of an intolerant modern fundamentalism in reaction to the insidious and seductive influence of “the great Satan.” We trace the tortured path of Islam over the past 1,000 years, from the “Golden Age” of art, philosophy, and interreligious tolerance under the Abbasid empire to the rise of oppositional movements like sufi mysticism and finally, the Mongols’ sudden rain of destruction. We follow the return to power of new Muslim empires, the deepening of the Shiah-Sunni split, and finally, the emergence of an intolerant modern fundamentalism in reaction to the insidious and seductive influence of “the great Satan.” Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details Also see Roots of Religion: Islam 1 – Muhammad, the first Caliphate, and the core teachings |
 | Roots of Religion: Islam 1 – Muhammad, the first Caliphate, and the core teachings
We trace the shocking and rapid rise of Islam in the 600s, as a confederation of desert towns and tribes unite around Muhammad and his prophesies from the Abrahamic god, then swiftly launch a stunning campaign of conquests against the major empires of the age. We consider the roots of the basic teachings and practices of the new religion, including the Qur’an, the hadiths, the Five Pillars, jihad, shariah, the divide between Sunni and Shiah, and Islamic laws regarding the status of women and of Jews and Christians or “people of the Book.” |
 | Land of Vital Blood: Pre-Columbian America
The Americas before Columbus were not an idyll frozen in time. They were a world of struggle and ambition, with a history just as complex and tumultuous as Europe’s. We trace how hunting-gathering peoples invented agriculture and built cities and empires that rose and fell across the centuries, all depending on human power, without the benefit of pack animals. We consider the shared norms and practices that seem to unite the diverse and far-flung peoples of the Americas, such as intensive multi-crop agriculture, fascination with astronomy and the calendar, and a highly formalized diplomatic language governing war and peace. |
 | In Search of the Dawn: Human Prehistory
Most of the human story is so-called “pre-history,” which in fact is inseparable from history and still going on today. We trace the origins of the human species around 300,000 years ago in Africa, including our early adaptation into long-distance hunters. We examine our long and awkward co-existence with other human-like species such as Neanderthals and Ebu Gogo, as well as our slow development of critical technologies like sewing and pottery that allowed us to out-compete them. We trace the dangerous and improbable journey across sea channels and deserts that a small band of our distant ancestors had to make in order to populate the entire world beyond Africa. Finally, we consider the mysterious roots of the technology that eventually allowed for the rise of urban civilization — agriculture. Quick Sample: |
 | Goodbye to Catalonia?
What is going on in Catalonia? We trace the long history of the small region in Spain’s northeastern corner, considering how medieval rebellions, dynastic struggles, and radical anarchist unions all helped to lay the groundwork for the separatist movement that today is flirting with unilaterally breaking away from Spain. We also account for the refusal of neighboring countries or the EU to say anything about the Spanish crisis, since Catalan independence threatens the survival not only of Spain, but of almost every large nation-state in Europe and the liberal internationalist order that they have built. |
 | Milestone: 5,000 Plays — Thanks to My Patrons
I trace the locations of my growing base of listeners, from Brazil to Berlin to Michigan to the Philippines, and send a tremendous thank-you to my patrons who have made it possible for this podcast to continue thus far. I preview likely topics for forthcoming lectures and ask for suggestions, questions, and outright condemnations. |
 | Becoming Modern: Martin Luther – Shout at the Devil
Exactly five centuries ago this month, Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on a church door in Wittenberg, thus sparking the Protestant Reformation. He was concerned not with freedom of thought nor with abuse of power by the Pope, as moderns might like to think, but with exposing the false doctrine that a person’s good actions can earn them a place in Heaven. Wracked by guilt and fear of going to hell, Luther had found relief only in the idea of a free, unmerited salvation. We consider Luther’s tactics in his war to reform the church, from his obsession with excrement to his attacks on Jews, all of which stemmed from his fundamental belief that he was engaged in a war for the soul of the Church against Satan and the Anti-Christ. [Contains adult language] |
 | The Middle Ages: The Jews of Europe, from the Middle Ages to the French Revolution
We trace the winding paths by which Jews, after the diaspora, sought out social and economic niches in which they were able to survive within European Christian society. We uncover the origins of the two main Jewish groups in Europe — the Sephardic and Ashkenazi — and consider how they adapted to changing conditions, including the increasing assimilation of German Jews in the 1700s, which led on the one hand to the beginnings of Jewish reform and on the other to the appearance of Hasidism, a mystical renewal movement. Most importantly, we consider the deep and long-denied influence of the messianic fervor that swept over Europe in the 1660s surrounding the mercurial and mischievous Greek rabbi, Sabbatai Zvi. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details Also see all 7 episodes On Judaism and Jewish History |
 | Becoming Modern: Columbus – The Tragedy and the Enigma
We examine the enigmatic and elusive figure of Columbus, from his likely Jewish background, to his bizarre and hairbrained scheme of sailing to Asia, his brutal and chaotic invasion of the West Indies, his struggle to defend his honors and titles, and finally his apocalyptic vision of his own role in the End Times. We consider how Columbus, a fairly obscure and rejected figure after his death, came to be held up as a symbol of both the best and the worst of the American psyche. Quick Sample: |
 | Jim Crow’s America, 1880-1960
We examine the three pillars of Jim Crow civilization — segregation, disfranchisement, and terroristic violence — and their roots in the corrupt bargain of 1877 that ended Reconstruction and the climate of racial pseudoscience that pervaded the late 1800s. We consider the different ways that Jim Crow was enforced in different parts of the country — in the South, with state action and paramilitary repression, and in the North, through exclusion from the labor movement. Finally, we consider how World War II and the integration of unions helped to bring about the collapse of Jim Crow society. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details Also see: |
 | The Confederacy — Its Roots and Its Legacies
We explore the history behind the statues being destroyed across America in a wave of iconoclasm — when and why they were erected, and what they represented. We consider the roots of the Confederacy, which lie in the rapid change in the American view of slavery — from an embarrassing but necessary evil in the 1780s to a positive good in the 1850s — that caused a sectional rift between North and South. We examine Confederates’ own words to understand why so many Southerners fought for the Confederacy — and why just as many of them refused. |
 | Roots of Religion: The Historical Jesus
We join in the ongoing quest for the historical Jesus — the struggle to unearth and understand who Jesus really was, what he said and did, and how he inspired a movement. We trace the basic bare-bones facts that can be deduced from early Christian writings and brief references in other texts, including Jesus’ baptism and crucifixion. We throw out the flimsy theories of hacks like Reza Aslan and Bill O’Reilly, as well as the junk theory that no Jesus existed at all, and instead examine the new archeological evidence that helps to account for some of the strangest passages in the Gospels. |
 | Roots of Religion: Who Wrote the Bible? – New Testament
We consider the long ideological struggles in the early church that led to the gradual collection of a canon of Christian writings that we now call the New Testament. We trace when, where, and why the various gospels and letters in the New Testament were written (hint: Matthew was not the first, not even close) and how they present different theological views. All in all, though, the New Testament writings were created to respond to the dilemma that as the years dragged on and Jesus’ disciples died off, the Second Coming that early Christians anticipated simply wasn’t happening. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | Roots of Religion: Who Wrote the Bible? – Hebrew Scriptures
We dissect the origins of the Hebrew Bible (also called the Old Testament by Christians), excavating the deepest layers of the collection of holy books, including the very ancient songs and prayers that were likely passed on orally for centuries before being written down, the scholarly theories of the lost documents that were stitched together to form Genesis and Exodus, and the differing points of view of the various prophets, scribes, and propagandists whose books made their way into the Hebrew canon… Quick Sample: Full Episode > Also see:
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 | Roots of Religion: Judaism – What Is It and Where Did It Come From?
We consider how best to understand the origins of the laws and customs of the Jewish people, or what we call “Judaism.” We begin by dispelling the notion that Judaism (or any other belief system apart from Christianity) can properly be called a “religion” — a category that derives originally from Christian practice and does not make sense anywhere else. We further examine the roots of the idea of “Judaism” as a concept for the Jewish way of life, concluding with a careful analysis of the meaning of the ancient Greek word “ioudaismos,” which originates in the Book of Maccabees. Finally, we trace the best possible explanation for the origins of the Jewish people in the Bronze-Age Near East, using archaeological evidence including an ancient Egyptian monument and the vandalized ruins of Canaanite temples. Ultimately, we should be able to understand Judaism and its God as the creations of a particular Middle Eastern people not entirely unlike their ancient neighbors. Quick Sample: |
 | Middle Ages 11: The Pulsating Body — The Medieval World View
We cap off the series of lectures on the Middle Ages by piecing together how the people of the high and late Middle Ages understood their place in the cosmos. From the lowliest peasants to popes and emperors, medievals believed they formed the limbs of a living, breathing social body, and that body or tree was part of a Great Chain of Being connecting rocks and dirt to stars and planets and ultimately to God. Through these metaphors we can understand why medievals disapproved of commerce and abhorred high finance. We end with a commentary on the great, crowning statement of the late medieval mind, the prologue to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. |
 | Middle Ages 10: Sex and Sexuality in the Middle Ages
We examine the ways that medieval people described, displayed, and generally failed to control their sexual appetites. While theologians sermonized on the dangers of carnal lust, parishioners surreptitiously met in churches and stables, kept themselves amused with dildoes, or luxuriated in brothels all over Europe. We also trace how medievals categorized one another’s sexual “orientations” using the complex concept of sodomy, and briefly consider the intense scholarly debate over the nature of same-sex bonding ceremonies in the Middle Ages. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | Middle Ages 9: Knowledge and Ignorance in the Middle Ages (and Today)
We examine how medieval scholars battled over the meanings of ancient Greek and Roman philosophy and of the Christian religion, while illiterate artisans made breakthroughs in architecture, engineering, metallurgy, and alchemy. The vast body of medieval scholarship came under attack during the Renaissance as so many “metaphysical obscurities,” while today we stand on the precipice of a true Dark Age of ignorance. |
 | Middle Ages 8: The Knights Templar
We examine the true history of the first brotherhood of warrior-monks, who rose to extraordinary power in the High Middle Ages, functioned as a shadow empire reaching from Jerusalem to the far corners of Europe, and then fell to their ruin amidst lurid accusations of religious and sexual crimes. Apart from the endless myths and conspiracy theories, the Templars left a lasting mark on Western society through their militarization of Christianity. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | Middle Ages 7: The Later Crusades and Their Legacies
We examine the long train of crusading expeditions of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, from the triumphs of Richard the Lionheart to the trainwreck of the sack of Constantinople. We consider the many ways that modern myths have distorted the Crusades for political purposes and erased the Crusaders’ central motivation: control of Jerusalem. |
 | Middle Ages 6: The First Crusade
We follow the bloody deeds and improbable victories of the first crusading army, as it slogs its way through Syria toward the ultimate prize. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | Middle Ages 5: The Crusades – Why Did They Happen?
We examine the forces that led the Pope to put forward the far-fetched scheme of mobilizing Christian knights to reclaim Jerusalem in 1095, and briefly consider what lesson the launching of the first Crusade holds for our own world almost 1,000 years later. |
 | Middle Ages 4: The Late Middle Ages
We discuss how the civilization of the High Middle Ages broke down under the onslaught of the Black Death, peasant uprisings, and the gunpowder revolution. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details |
 | Middle Ages 3: the High Middle Ages
We examine the flourishing of the Middle Ages between 1000 and 1300, which gave us chivalry, Gothic cathedrals, epics of King Arthur, and nearly all of the romantic images that we still associate with the medieval era, even as the noose of social conformity and repression began to tighten around the people of Europe. |
 | Middle Ages 2: The Dark Age — The Beginning of the Medieval World
How Europeans picked up the pieces in the wake of the breakup of the Roman Empire, created a new society that briefly flourished in the spectacular reign of Charlemagne, and then were plunged back into chaos at the hands of the Vikings. Quick Sample: Currently available to Patrons only, on the Patreon App and website: What do I get as a supporter? I’m already a supporter Full Episode Details Also see: |
 | Middle Ages 1: Exploding the Myth of the Middle Ages
In Dr. Sam’s first lecture on the Middle Ages, we start by clearing out the junk, such as the notions that medievals smelled bad and hunted witches, and then look into the mystical and apocalyptic roots of the idea of the “middle age.” Quick Sample: |
Things You Don’t Know
