The Irish famine: everything you wanted to kn...

In 1708, the Spanish galleon San José was sunk by a British warship off the coast of Colombia, vanishing beneath the waves with a treasure trove of unimaginable riches. The wreck's exact location remained a mystery for centuries – until a maritime archaeologist named Roger Dooley ...  Show more

When picturing a fairy, you might imagine a childlike creature with wings. But this is a far more modern image than we might think. In this episode, Matthias Egeler tells Lauren Good about the ways in which our perceptions of elves and fairies have changed throughout history – an ...  Show more

Between 1845 and 1852, Ireland suffered an appalling famine after the repeated failure of the potato crop, its national staple. But though caused by a natural blight, a combination of ancient prejudices, simmering tensions and political short-termism turned a national emergency i ...  Show more

If you enjoy the true stories told in Survival, check out this episode from our series Natural Disasters: By the late 1840s, with no end in sight to the potato famine gripping Ireland and no help coming from the British government, the Irish people were left with few options. For ...  Show more

If you enjoy the true stories told in Survival, check out this episode from our series Natural Disasters: In 1845, a fungus destroyed Ireland’s potato crops, leaving the Irish population without its main food source. The first months of the famine morphed into a bureaucratic nigh ...  Show more

In the mid-1800s, the poorest people in Ireland ate almost nothing but potatoes. Other crops were for selling. So when a blight cut a swath through the potato crop, the impact was severe, and politics played a significant role in the tragedy.