The Fever Tree Hunt

How do you uncover the true life of a woman whose existence is wrapped in myth, propaganda and a famous animated children’s movie?This is the true story of Matoaka - a young Powhatan girl who you probably know as Pocahontas. This is the mystery of a child, a hidden history and a ...  Show more

It’s round. It has a hole in it. It symbolises nothing and yet it is the possibility of something... meet zero.The zero we know and love today is the foundation of our modern world. And we have India to thank for it; in particular one special Indian birch bark book — the Bakhshal ...  Show more

Most heists target gold, jewels or cash. This one targeted illegal seeds. As the British established their sprawling empire across the subcontinent and beyond, they encountered a formidable adversary — malaria. There was a cure — the bark of the Andean cinchona tree. The only pro ...  Show more

Trees have the remarkable ability to pass knowledge down to succeeding generations and to survive the ravages of climate change, if only we’d let them alone, according to the German forester Peter Wohlleben. In The Power of Trees (translated by Jane Billinghurst) he explains t ...

2/2. The British Empire aggressively pursued the opium trade well into the 19th century, fueling an addiction epidemic within China. The Qing government was determined to stamp out this destructive trade, leading to the First and Second Opium Wars. But the British Royal Navy w ...

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the effective partition of England in the 880s after a century of Viking raids, invasions and settlements. Alfred of Wessex, the surviving Anglo-Saxon king and Guthrum, a Danish ruler, had fought each other to a stalemate and came to terms, with Gu ...  Show more