We live in the golden age of dragons – they appear in Game of Thrones, most film adaptations of the works of J.R.R. Tolkein, and nearly everything tangentially related to fantasy. They date back millennia, appearing in every cultures mythology, from...
Today
Belisarius Reconquered Africa and Italy for Rome. Why Did Rome Destroy Him for It?
In 533, a twenty-eight-year-old general named Belisarius sailed from Constantinople with 15,000 men to reconquer North Africa from the Vandals, a kingdom that had held it for nearly a century since the sack of Rome. The last time the Eastern Empire had attempted the crossing, the ... Show More
52m 44s
Aug 18
New Archeological Tech Is Rewriting Everything We Know About the Ancient Past
Humanity’s story from 10,000 BC to 3,000 BC (from the end of the ice age to the beginning of civilizations) follows this pattern: primitive hunter-gatherers slowly progressed to farmers, then to village-builders, then to city-dwellers and kings. With enough food surplus to free u ... Show More
55m 41s
Feb 2024
Dragons: From the Ancient World to the Hobbit
Take dinosaur bones, snake poison, volcanic lava, fear of the unknown. Mix it all together and you have a dragon!Today we're finding out about the ancient origins of dragons and why there used to be a much wider variety of dragon types than we see today. Our guide is dragon exper ... Show More
41m 25s
Jun 2018
Robert D. Miller II, “The Dragon, the Mountain, and the Nations: An Old Testament Myth, Its Origins, and Its Afterlives” (Eisenbrauns, 2018)
People have long been captivated by stories of dragons. Myths related to dragon slaying can be found across many civilizations around the world, even among the most ancient cultures including ancient Israel. In his book The Dragon, the Mountain, and the Nations, Robert Miller chr ... Show More
29m 42s
Jul 2022
21. The Father of Dragons
Glaurung, the first of all dragons, issues forth from Angband to break the siege, but is he ready yet? Also, let's talk about the origin of Dragons in Tolkien's mythology.Join our Patreon for weekly bonus episodes, early access, and ad-free listening: https://www.patreon.com/lotr ... Show More
34m 28s