History Cafe

By: Jon Rosebank Penelope Middelboe
Listen for free

  • Summary

  • True history storytelling at the History Café. Join BBC Historian Jon Rosebank & HBO, BBC & C4 script and series editor Penelope Middelboe as we give history a new take. Drop in to the History Café weekly on Wednesdays to give old stories a refreshing new brew. 90+ ever-green stand-alone episodes and building...

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
    All rights reserved
    Show more Show less
World
Show more Show less
Episodes
  • #71 Most who were burned were not Protestants - Ep 4 Bloody Mary Tudor?

    #71 Most who were burned were not Protestants - Ep 4 Bloody Mary Tudor?
    Jan 29 2025
    Until six weeks before the child was due, everybody at court and indeed in Europe, believed Mary was pregnant. She suffered a rare disorder - pseudocyesis - maybe triggered by a tumour on her pituitary gland that would eventually kill her. The imminent birth of a Catholic heir to the Anglo-Spanish dynasty meant that the select council governing the kingdom really now had no alternative but to grasp the nettle of suppressing any potential causes of unrest – including any remaining shreds of die-hard Protestantism - and promptly. We also discover, that the majority of those who were burned were not Protestants at all, but followers of much older, rural religions. (R)

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
    Show more Show less
    42 mins
  • #70 More interested in pirates than heretics - Ep 3 Bloody Mary Tudor?

    #70 More interested in pirates than heretics - Ep 3 Bloody Mary Tudor?
    Jan 22 2025
    Who ran the persecution of heretics in England 1555-58? England was a joint monarchy but historians traditionally accused bigoted Mary of running the clamp down herself - with her cousin, Reginald Pole the Archbishop of Canterbury. There’s no evidence it’s true and Pole was useless at running anything. But didn’t Mary intervene to make sure Thomas Cranmer was burned – Henry VIII’s archbishop? No, again. Cranmer was tried by the pope and Mary had no power to spare him. As for Mary’s Privy Council, they turn out to have been more interested in pirates than heretics. Much more important was Bartolomé Carranza, a Spanish friar, King Philip’s trusted eyes and ears at the English Court, but he was later accused of heresy by the pope for being too lenient. Finally the campaign in England was distinctively English, not Spanish. That points the finger for responsibility at Philip’s own select council of veteran English courtiers. But almost all of them had for years been Protestants. What was going on? (R)

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
    Show more Show less
    39 mins
  • #69 Who exactly was a heretic? - Ep 2 Bloody Mary Tudor?

    #69 Who exactly was a heretic? - Ep 2 Bloody Mary Tudor?
    Jan 15 2025
    England in the mid-1550s was being governed by a joint monarchy: Philip and Mary and a select council of extremely able English politicians. Almost all of them had experience in government stretching back through the violently protestant regime of Edward VI. To all appearances they had for years been living as active protestants. And yet here they were in a government that was conducting a campaign against religious heresy that we have always understood to be a Catholic campaign to stamp out Protestantism. (R)

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
    Show more Show less
    38 mins

What listeners say about History Cafe

Average customer ratings

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Audible.com reviews

Amazon reviews
No Reviews are Available