History Extra podcast

Nathalia Holt discusses four women who undertook life-threatening missions and harnessed crucial intelligence in the early days of the Central Intelligence Agency

Paul Pettitt answers listener questions on what cave art can reveal about the palaeolithic era

Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch discuss the complex tale of a little-known Nazi plot to kill Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt during the 1943 summit in Tehran

Britain’s common land has often been considered a wild place for wild people – Professor Angus Winchester explains how it played a key role in local economies and communities

Lloyd Bowen describes the ambiguities in Welsh identity and nationhood that arose in the decades following the Acts of Union in the early 16th century

Kathy Kleiman reveals how six women helped create the world’s first modern computer

Dr Matt Lodder explores 5,000 years of tattooing history – from Otzi the Iceman, to King Edward VII

Christian Wolmar answers listener questions on the history of the railways, from industrial innovation and early rail journeys to the transformative nature of train travel

Dan Stone considers forgotten and misunderstood aspects of the Holocaust, from its international nature to the ways its horrors reverberated for decades afterward

Tom Sancton tracks the infamous kidnapping case of Baron Édouard-Jean Empain – from chopped-off fingers and police shootouts to the collapse of an industrial empire