Travels Through Time

In this episode we head back to the Anglo Saxon Age with Edoardo Albert to meet the 'Father of English History' – the Venerable Bede.

Bede is a beguiling character. He lived just a few generations after the arrival of Christianity in Britain in remote Northumbria, a place that Pope Gregory regarded as being on the very edge of the known world.

But from these outer limits, Bede redefined the world in which he lived. 'It has ever been my delight', he wrote, 'to learn and teach and write'. Throughout his life he produced a steady stream of books on subjects from history to natural philosophy.

Edoardo Albert takes us back to see Bede at the peak of his powers, in the monastery at Jarrow in the year 716. This, as Albert explains, was a pivotal year for Bede as the quiet world in which he lived was disturbed by the departure of a beloved elder.

Find out more about Edoardo Albert's Bede: The Man Who Invented England.

Show Notes
Scene One: 4 June 716. A walk around St Paul's Monastery at Jarrow.

Scene Two: 4 June 716. Abbot Ceolfrith, Bede's friend and mentor, sets off for Rome.

Scene Three: 4 June 716. Bede at work in his cell.

Memento: A copy of the Rule of the monastery at St Paul along with a recording of the monks singing.

People/Social
Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Edoardo Albert

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

In this episode prize-winning author Nandini Das takes us back to 1630s England to see a country still grappling with the legacies of the Reformation. Elsewhere we see the beginnings of Enlightenment and watch as questions about citizenship and belonging are raised in new and intriguing ways.

The Stuart Age, like the Tudor one that preceded it, is among England's most cherished. In her new book, This Little World, Nandini Das examines the history of this time not from the central but from the illuminating perspective of the ‘merchants, migrants, sailors, travellers and spies’ who, drawn together, helped forge a nation.

Find out more about Nandini Das's This Little World: A New History of Tudor and Stuart England.

Show Notes
Scene One: Elizabeth Cary kidnaps her youngest children from London and smuggles them off to continental Europe to be brought up as Catholics. 

Scene Two: In Virginia, Thomas Key leaves for England, leaving behind the mixed race daughter borne by an African enslaved woman.

Scene Three: In Oxford, John Tradescant the Elder is given the contract for the new Botanical Garden.

Memento: The Iliad of the Casket.

People/Social
Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Nandini Das

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

Alexander the Great is one of the most famous figures in history. Today our guest, Edmund Richardson, takes us back to see him in the year 331 BCE – the remarkable year when Alexander's story transformed from the impressive into the truly spectacular.

At the beginning of 331, many of those in Alexander's army might have supposed that it was time to return to Macedon after a successful campaign on the coast of the Mediterranean. Instead, Alexander founded a city in his own name on the northern coast of Egypt, struck out to consult the oracle at Amun, then turned back to meet his great enemy, King Darius of Persia, in one of the greatest battles in history. Gaugamela. 

The scenes, characters and storylines in this episode of Travels Through Time all feature in Edmund Richardson's book, Alexander: God, King, Man.

Show Notes
Scene One: The foundation of Alexandria in Egypt. 

Scene Two: Alexander journeys to the oracle of Amun.

Scene Three: Alexander's defeat of Darius at Gaugamela.

Memento: The Iliad of the Casket.

People/Social
Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Edmund Richardson

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

In the autumn of 1983 the world came very close to nuclear disaster without even knowing about it. US President Ronald Reagan would later recall the 'really scary' events of that year, which, as our guest Taylor Downing explains, were among the most dangerous of the Cold War Era.

The nuclear scare of 1983 was generated by a series of factors that coalesced in terrifying style. There was the bellicose rhetoric of a new president, the paranoia of the aging political elite in the Kremlin and the disorienting pace of technological change.

Downing guides us through the various elements of this frightening story in this episode, which climaxes with a moment of high drama in November 1983.

The scenes, characters and storylines in this episode of Travels Through Time all feature in Taylor Downing's book, 1983: The World At The Brink.

Show Notes
Scene One: 23 March 1983. The White House Oval office; Reagan publicly announces on TV his Strategic Defense Initiative, known as his Star Wars policy.

Scene Two: 26 Sept 1983; Serpukhov-15 Early Warning Satellite station 80 miles south of Moscow; Lt Col Stanislav Petrov takes a shift in what becomes a dramatic night.

Scene Three: 9 November 1983; NATO Command HQ, Mons Belgium and Kuntsevo Clinic outside Moscow; Able Archer 83 reaches its climax.

Memento: The Soviet situation board.

People/Social
Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Taylor Downing

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

Live from Dr Johnson's House off Fleet Street in London, in this episode the biographer and historian Paul O'Keeffe takes us on an immersive dive into the year 1806. This was a time when both the British and the French attempted to come to terms with the fall out of the Battle of Trafalgar.

News of Trafalgar was received in Britain with great ambivalence. The sheer scale of the victory was thrilling, but it was marred by the death of Admiral Nelson. King George III reflected the national mood when he declared that it was a victory that had been bought at too dear a price.

While Britons buried Nelson and set about commemorating the battle, in France there would be ramifications of a rather different kind of Admiral Villeneuve – whose strange death is described by O'Keeffe as 'either a murder of an extremely tenacious suicide'.

Our thanks to Min Kym for the music, the fine folk at Dr Johnson's House for all the support and for everyone who came along to an enjoyable night. 

The scenes, characters and storylines in this episode of Travels Through Time all feature in Paul O'Keeffe's book, Trafalgar: Battle and Aftermath.

Show Notes
Scene One: 9 January 1806. Walking up to St Paul's with the seven sailors of HMS Victory during Nelson's funeral.

Scene Two: 22 April 1806. Inside the 'locked room' to solve the mystery of Admiral Villeneuve's death.

Scene Three: April 1806. Sadler's Well Theatre to witness a re-enactment of the Battle of Trafalgar.

Memento: A piece of the flag carried by the sailors into St Paul's.

People/Social
Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Paul O'Keeffe

Producer: Maria Nolan

Music: Firelight performed by Min Kym.