HistoryExtra
type: channel
link: https://www.historyextra.com
description: Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast
date: 2026-04-20T15:46:07.000Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
items: Power, pomp and the Peacock Throne: the Mughal empire at 500
items: Could Tudor sleep tips fix your insomnia? Here’s what they got right (and wrong)
items: He was one of England's greatest astronomers – so why has no one heard of him?
items: Sores, sweat and secretions: the pox in early modern London
items: Juana Inés de la Cruz: life of the week
items: Pocahontas: life of the week
items: What your hands say about you – according to history
items: The Gunpowder Plot | Podcast series
items: Over 70 observers watched this Stuart queen give birth. Why did they still doubt the baby was real?
items: In post-medieval Scotland, two specific crimes reveal the challenges faced by ordinary women

Power, pomp and the Peacock Throne: the Mughal empire at 500
type: item
date: 2026-04-20T15:46:07.000Z
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Historical people
description: Five centuries ago, the birth of the Mughal empire heralded a new era of social and religious tolerance, international trade, and artistic and intellectual flourishing. Jagjeet Lally traces the fortunes and legacy of the dynasty that transformed India
encoded: Boy meets girl. Boy and girl fall deeply in love. Boy’s disapproving father forbids their union. The pair strive to be together, against the odds – but, in a tragic denouement, their young love is thwarted forever. It’s a timeless trope that’s long been stock in trade of Bollywood cinema. But when the girl is a courtesan and dancer, and her suitor is an imperial prince whose father – the Mughal emperor Akbar – holds the power to sentence her to death by immurement (being bricked up in a wall), the result is a sensational, lavish box-office hit. Mughal-e-Azam (The Great Mughal), a 1960 blockbuster that smashed records for Indian cinema, is now an established classic. That film, based on a legend about the prince who later ruled as the emperor Jahangir, is rooted in the popular consciousness of the Mughal empire. That mighty, influential and long-lasting power was, according to one definition, founded 500 years ago this month, and ruled much of India for som e three centuries. The film touches on themes of romance, power, conflict, control and more, all linked in many minds with that dynasty. But who were the real Mughals, how are they remembered today – and is that legacy accurate? <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2026/04/DXN48Awebready-d474b24-e1776688295226.jpg" width="1500" height="1000" alt="Two individuals in elaborate historical attire stand in an ornate interior with carved pillars and arches. One wears a purple‑and‑pink outfit with gold embroidery and a jeweled headpiece; the other wears a light green garment with maroon and gold detailing and a pearl necklace." title="Dancer Anarkali is courted by Salim, son of the Mughal emperor Akbar, in the 1960 Bollywood blockbuster Mughal-e-Azam, based on a legend about the future ruler Jahangir (Image by Alamy)" /> The dynasty originated in 15th-century central Asia with a prince named Babur, whose ancestors included Genghis (or Chinggis) Khan. Babur was an even more direct descendan…

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Could Tudor sleep tips fix your insomnia? Here’s what they got right (and wrong)
type: item
date: 2026-04-04T14:57:04.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Period
subject: Tudor
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: What did the people of the early modern period, including the Tudors, believe about sleep?
encoded: If you ever have trouble sleeping – as many people do – you might consider seeking the assistance of a book. Or perhaps, a new mattress, or fancy blackout curtains. One method you likely haven’t tried is putting a cold apple on your head. But, centuries ago, the Tudors and other people of early modern Britain believed that this was an effective sleeping aid. The apple on the head is only one part of a much broader – and deeper – school of thought about how to achieve the best sleep. People in Tudor and early modern Britain treated good rest as something that needed conscious preparation, discipline and care. And, the fact is, much of their thinking still has value today. “I do think we can learn about sleep hygiene from the early modern period,” says Professor Sasha Handley, “partly because sleep was a much more prominent concern in day-to-day life.” So what did the Tudors do when they couldn’t sleep? Speaking on the Life Lessons From History series of the HistoryExtra podcast, Handley explains their tips and tricks, and sets out how they align – and misalign – with modern thinking “People’s sleeping habits were part of an interconnected ecosystem of lifestyle habits that were meant to keep the body healthy and prevent illness,” Handley explains. “Sleep was one of six lifestyle behaviours widely identified by physicians, medical practitioners, and ordinary people as things they had to take regular care of in order to stay healthy in the long term.” “It’s part of this preventative healthcare culture that we don’t really have anymore,” Handley says. As well as dictating the value of sleep, this culture also shaped where people slept, what they slept on, what they ate before bed, and what they did when they woke in the night. No such thing as a modern bedroom One of the biggest differences from modern life is spatial. “The word ‘bedroom’ is not used terribly often,” Handley notes. That is partly because beds were not usually confined to a room used only for sleep. “Dep…

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He was one of England's greatest astronomers – so why has no one heard of him?
type: item
date: 2026-03-31T11:00:06.000Z
creator: York Membery
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Historical people
subject: Space
description: Children's author and screenwriter Frank Cottrell-Boyce chooses Jeremiah Horrocks (1618–41) as his history hero
encoded: When did you first hear about Jeremiah Horrocks? As a child, I saw him and his telescope on the stained-glass windows at St Michael’s Church in Much Hoole, Lancashire. The windows, depicting his groundbreaking observation of the transit of Venus in 1639, were such an unexpected sight that I never forgot them. What kind of man was he? Born into an ordinary Lancastrian family, he lived in a small, tight-knit Puritan community. He was later a sizar at Cambridge University, where he had to chop wood and wait on the other students. He was fascinated by astronomy and the question of time from an early age – partly because his father was a watchmaker – and it became his life’s passion. Read more | Star witness: how the Royal Observatory transformed our understanding of astronomy and time What made him a hero? Unlike most great astronomers in history – such as Kepler, who worked for the Holy Roman Emperor – Horrocks was of modest means. He bought a telescope for two shillings and sixpence, and just had a strong sense in his bones of the rhythm of the moon and the tides – perhaps because he’d lived alongside the Mersey, with its huge tidal range. He paid great attention to the natural world around him, partly due to a profound religious conviction: he thought there was purpose in looking at the stars. When Newton spoke about standing on the shoulders of giants, one of the people he was talking about was Horrocks. What was Horrocks’ finest hour? He didn’t have a finest hour – but he did have one of the finest 15 minutes in history. On the day of the transit of Venus, there was thick cloud. It was also a Sunday so, being a Puritan, he was busy. But he set up his telescope all the same. A little after three o’clock, the sky cleared for a short while and he watched Venus move across the face of the sun. He wrote an important treatise on the transit, Venus in sole visa. The airport in Liverpool, which is just around the corner from where he lived, is named after John Lennon – but…

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Sores, sweat and secretions: the pox in early modern London
type: item
date: 2026-03-23T08:00:01.000Z
creator: Charlotte Vosper
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Olivia Weisser reveals the pox-ridden world of early modern London, from sickening symptoms to tortuous treatments
encoded: With sinful associations and incredibly painful symptoms, the pox could be a damning diagnosis in the early modern period. In this episode, Olivia Weisser speaks to Charlotte Vosper about the pox-ridden world of London in the era. She takes us behind the doors of medical practitioners, on to the streets in search of cures, and into the city's courtrooms. If you'd like to find out more about historical diseases and their (rather tortuous) treatments, then check out this HistoryExtra article by Dr Elma Brenner about the reality of medieval medical treatments for the Black Death. Go beyond the podcast.

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Juana Inés de la Cruz: life of the week
type: item
date: 2026-03-03T08:00:29.000Z
creator: Spencer Mizen
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Life of the week (podcast series)
description: Paul Gillingham reveals how a fiercely independent nun rose to become one of the great literary figures in Mexican history
encoded: 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 pantheon of great Mexican literary figures. Here, in conversation with Spencer Mizen, Paul discusses the life of a woman he describes as "the Spanish Shakespeare". If you'd like to learn more about the people who have shaped Mexico over the past 500 years, listen to Spencer Mizen's conversation with Paul Gillingham on the history of Mexico – from the conquistadors to the cartels. You'll find that in our archive.

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Pocahontas: life of the week
type: item
date: 2026-02-17T08:00:28.000Z
creator: Emily Briffett
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Life of the week (podcast series)
description: Camilla Townsend uncovers the real Pocahontas, a young Powhatan woman who navigated diplomacy, captivity and empire
encoded: Pocahontas's life is shrouded in myth – but how much of that lore is true? Speaking to Emily Briffett, historian Camilla Townsend brings us face to face with the real Pocahontas, revealing how she acted as a diplomatic bridge in a fragile encounter with English colonists – and considering the way in which her legacy still shapes our view of American history. The story of Native American societies decimated by European arrival is a familiar one. But, while undoubtedly important, that’s only one part of the story. In this podcast episode, Kathleen DuVal looks back at 1,000 years of Native American history to uncover a rich, complex picture of North America's Indigenous people. Go beyond the podcast.

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What your hands say about you – according to history
type: item
date: 2026-02-11T08:00:41.000Z
creator: Elinor Evans
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Alison Bashford reveals how palm and hand reading has shaped science, medicine and ideas about the human body, from ancient times to the present day
encoded: What do your hands reveal about you? Historian Alison Bashford joins Elinor Evans to explore the extraordinary history of how people have interpreted the human hand. From ancient divination to cutting-edge medical diagnostics, her book Decoding the Hand reveals how palm reading once sat at the centre, not the fringes, of science. In this episode, she explains how hands were used to predict character, diagnose disease, and even identify criminals – and why they still hold such symbolic power today.

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The Gunpowder Plot | Podcast series
type: item
date: 2026-01-22T14:09:30.000Z
creator: Danny Bird
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Remember, remember the 5th of November…
encoded: The Gunpowder Plot of 1605 ranks among the most audacious acts of treason in British history – a dramatic attempt by a small group of disaffected Catholics to blow up King James I and parliament, not long after the new Stuart regime took the throne. In this four-part HistoryExtra podcast series, Danny Bird and Professor John Cooper for a four-part series that bring this fraught, combustible moment into sharp relief, exploring the motives, betrayals and what-could-have-been consequences of this explosive act of treason.

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Over 70 observers watched this Stuart queen give birth. Why did they still doubt the baby was real?
type: item
date: 2026-01-17T11:00:51.000Z
creator: Serafina Kenny
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Period
subject: Stuart
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: The struggle between Catholicism and Protestantism came to a head in England when Maria of Modena gave birth to an heir with a claim to two crowns
encoded: On 10 June 1688, Maria of Modena, queen to King James II of England and VII of Scotland, gave birth to a son who was heir to both kingdoms. More than 70 observers watched it happen. But while that baby – James Francis Edward Stuart, would grow to adulthood – he would never wear either crown. Instead, scurrilous questions about the birth itself played a pivotal role in the eventual toppling of James’s rule in England. Speaking on the HistoryExtra podcast, Breeze Barrington, a cultural historian specialising in women’s history and the 17th century, explained why Maria of Modena’s labour was so closely witnessed and how it became key in ending her husband’s reign. The pressure was on Maria to produce an heir The most important job of a queen was to produce heirs. But there was extra political and religious pressure for Maria to give birth. Maria and James were Catholic, and they needed to produce a Catholic heir if they wanted to keep the ruling of England out of Protestant hands. Otherwise, the throne would go to Mary, James’ oldest legitimate child from his previous marriage, who had been brought up Protestant. Protestant factions at the English court, and in government, hoped that Maria wouldn’t have any sons who could prevent Mary from claiming the throne. “There was constant worry about England going back to Catholicism if there was a Catholic heir,” Barrington says. Read more | Your guide to the Glorious Revolution Maria had been pregnant many times before 1688, but many of those had ended in miscarriage or stillbirth; the few that survived died in infancy. “Maria was really concerned that she needed to have a son in order to secure the line of succession, so she went to Bath to take the waters in the hope that it would help her to become pregnant,” Barrington says. The reproductive health of the queen was in the interest of the nation, and so even Maria’s attempts to improve her fertility were of public concern. Members of the public went to watch her sitting in…

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In post-medieval Scotland, two specific crimes reveal the challenges faced by ordinary women
type: item
date: 2026-01-15T12:25:50.000Z
creator: Serafina Kenny
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Period
subject: Stuart
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: What do the crimes that women were charged with in a post-medieval Scotland reveal about the lives they lived?
encoded: In the court records of post-medieval Scotland, women appear for a strikingly limited range of crimes. While men were prosecuted for theft, violence and disorder, women were charged with offences that spoke directly to their bodies and behaviour. As Dr Allan Kennedy, a historian of early modern Scottish history, explains on an episode of the HistoryExtra podcast, “understanding what kinds of crimes are committed and how they are responded to gives you a really good understanding of the ordering assumptions of any given society”. In early modern Scotland, those assumptions produced a sharp gender divide in the law. “There’s a very strong split between what women were being prosecuted for and what men were being prosecuted for” in Scottish courts, Kennedy says. Women were accused overwhelmingly of two crimes: witchcraft and infanticide. Both were profoundly gendered offences, shaped by contemporary anxieties about women’s morality and place within the social order. And, both crimes expose the pressures faced by ordinary women in Scotland as the country stepped into the early modern era, and the reign of the Stuarts. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2026/01/GettyImages-463928361-1-1ef1f6e-e1768479587395.jpg" width="1498" height="1000" alt="Painted in 1621 by Daniel Mytens, this portrait shows James VI and I (1566–1625), a monarch deeply preoccupied with the threat of witchcraft. Convinced that witches were agents of the Devil, James personally oversaw trials in Scotland and authored 'Daemonologie' (1597), a treatise that fuelled persecution across Britain." title="James I, King of England and Scotland, 1621. Artist: Daniel Mytens" /> Witchcraft in early modern Scotaland One of the most common crime committed by women in 1600s Scotland was witchcraft. Between 1560 and 1706, approximately 6,000 people were tried for the crime in Scotland – three times the number tried in England, even though Scotland’s population was a quarter of the s…

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