A History of the C-Word

It's been estimated that between eight and twelve percent of soldiers in contracted a venereal disease during the American Civil War. What on earth were they up to?Kathryn Olivarius is a Professor at Stanford. She joins Kate to discuss syphilis, why it spread so far during the wa ...  Show more

If there's one sure way to irritate an historian of the Medieval period, it's to ask why the people of the Middle Ages didn't wash.In this episode, we did just that with Dr Eleanor Janega. Kate and Eleanor get into whether there really was poo everywhere, how the Victorians ruine ...  Show more

Was Rasputin really Russia’s greatest love machine? Did he have any healing powers? And why might his penis be pickling in a jar?

In this episode, we are drawing this mystical man out of his cloud of green smoke to find out which of the things we know about him might ...

With candor and cunning, sex historian Kate Lister chronicles the curious journey of an ancient, honest word with innocent origins and a now-scandalous connotation in this uproarious love letter to etymology, queens, cows and all things "cunt."

Kevin Stroud from the History of English Podcast joins me for a fascinating discussion and dive into... well, the history of English!In this episode, we talk about a variety of things, including:Why TH doesn't have its own letterIn what part of England the language was standardis ...  Show more

This episode contains references and words of a sexual nature.

Did Alexander the Great and the Queen of the Amazons really have sex for 13 days solid? What do we know about his male lovers? And how did his sex life stand up to that of his dad’s?

To ...