Throughout history, people have got tattooed for a huge range of reasons, whether religious devotion, artistic expression, or to demonstrate cultural belonging – or cultural difference. Dr Matt Lodder talks to Charlotte Hodgman about 5,000 years of tattooing history, exploring everything from the punishment tattoos of ancient China to the pilgrim tattoos ado ... Show More
Today
Juana Inés de la Cruz: life of the week
She led “a life that really, in many ways, shouldn't have been possible”. So says historian Paul Gillingham of Juana Inés de la Cruz. This 17th-century polymath and nun challenged a host of social conventions – earning, through her extraordinary books and poems, a place in the pa ... Show More
30m 40s
Mar 1
Does Magna Carta matter today?
Politicians invoke it, activists wield it, and legal thinkers debate what it can offer the modern world. But what does Magna Carta really mean today? In this fourth and final episode of HistoryExtra's Sunday Series on the charter, Emily Briffett and historian Nicholas Vincent con ... Show More
38m 15s
May 2023
330: Herodotus: The Birth of History
Born on the Western edge of an empire that stretched all the way to India, Herodotus was a Greek historian of the 5th century BC. His major work The Histories, a long and detailed account of the Greco-Persian Wars and the cultures of the ancient world, is considered the founding ... Show More
53m 45s
Feb 2023
How to Write Historical Fiction | Interview with historian and author Dan Jones on his new novel Essex Dogs
<p>Every historian I know has a secret dream of writing historical fiction, but few ever do it. Dan Jones, a longtime friend of Tides of History and an outstanding historian, has actually done it: <em>Essex Dogs</em>, his fantastic debut novel about a group of soldiers during the ... Show More
58m 38s
Nov 2021
Writing a New History of the Middle Ages: Interview with Dan Jones on Powers and Thrones
<p>Friend of the Show, TV presenter, author extraordinaire, and historian Dan Jones returns to Tides to discuss his new book, <em>Powers and Thrones: A New History of the Middle Ages</em>. It’s a wonderful book and a tremendous achievement, written with both a consummate grasp of ... Show More
52m 36s
Apr 2023
What do I need to know before getting a tattoo?
A 2022 YouGov study suggested that 26% of British people have at least one tattoo, a statistic which reflects just how the perception of tattoos has changed over the years. They used to be reserved for subcultures, but are now very much in the mainstream, and seen as a positive w ... Show More
4m 6s