41. The Rise of Ataturk

This is the beginning of the most dramatic imperial collapses in history. Why were Ancient civilisations so interconnected 3000 years ago? How did this interconnectedness lead to their downfall? Did people at the time know that disaster was on the horizon? In Episode 1 of a brand ...  Show more

In 1979, the people of Iran took to the streets to topple the Shah. This year they are back in the streets shouting “Long Live The Shah”. How did this happen? How did a country which so volcanically threw out the Shah in 1979 want the same family back again in 2026? What are the ...  Show more

On the 19th of May, 1919, an Ottoman general stepped ashore at the Black Sea port city of Samsun. This marked the beginning of the Turkish War of Independence, and ultimately the end of the Ottoman Empire. The man's name was Mustafa Kemal, the soldier, statesman and reformer w ...

Defeat in the First World War dealt the Ottoman empire a terrible blow, but it wasn’t terminal. Ryan Gingeras tells Spencer Mizen that it was what happened next – between 1918 and 1922 – that condemned the empire to its fate. (Ad) Ryan Gingeras is the author of The Last Days of ...  Show more

A Sultan in Autumn: Erdogan Faces Turkey's Uncontainable Forces (I. B. Tauris, 2021) is a primer for anybody who wants to understand modern Turkish politics and its central player Recep Tayyip Erdoğan who, for better or worse, has shaped Turkish politics and society for the last ...  Show more

In 972AD a princess of the Byzantine Empire was sent by her uncle, the Roman emperor in Constantinople, to marry the son of Otto the Great - Emperor of the Latin West. A tantalising and formidable figure, Theophanu became a major player in one of the most tumultuous and mysteriou ...  Show more