Our guest today is the New York Times bestselling historian Charles King, the author of Every Valley: The Desperate Lives and Troubled Times that Made Handel's Messiah.

The Messiah is one of the best known pieces of all classical music and, as King suggests at the beginning of this conversation, it 'may be the world's greatest monument to the possibility of hope'.

To tell us more about how such an extraordinary piece was written, as well as to take us along to its premiere in Dublin in April 1742, King sat down with us for a travel back through time just the other day.

Charles King is the author of Every Valley: The Desperate Lives and Troubled Times that Made Handel's Messiah

Scene One: 13 April, 1742. The words 'Comfort ye/Every Valley' at the premiere of the Messiah in Dublin.

Scene Two: 13 April, 1742. The words 'He Was Despised' at the premiere of the Messiah in Dublin.

Scene Three: 13 April, 1742. The Hallelujah chorus at the premiere of the Messiah in Dublin.

Memento: The original manuscript of Handel's Messiah.

Presenters: Peter Moore and Min Kym

Guest: Charles King

Production: Maria Nolan

Our guest today is Tharik Hussain, a travel writer turned historian who has recently produced an enchanting study of Europe's Islamic history. To investigate this at close quarters, in this episode he takes us back to Córdoba in the year 929 – the greatest city in Europe at the time, a place of wealth and splendour with a population of around 100,000.

By 929 Córdoba was emerging as a rival power base to Baghdad. At a Friday prayers, early in the year, its ruler Abdul Rahman III declared himself Caliph of the Caliphate of Cordoba, Al Andalus. This was a decisive political move.

Tharik takes us into the Grand Mosque to see this happen and he then guides us on a tour of two more equally intriguing sites.

Tharik Hussain is the author Muslim Europe: A Journey in Search of a Fourteen Hundred Year History

Scene One: Friday Prayers in the Great Mosque of Córdoba. 17 January 929.

Scene Two: Inside a Córdoban hospital, or 'maristan'.

Scene Three: One of the great synagogues of Cordoba in search of a young Jewish boy called Hasdai Ibn Shaprut.

Memento: The plans that were drawn up for AR III’s Caliphate City – Madinah az Zahra.

Presenter: Peter Moore

Guest: Tharik Hussain

Production: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Our guest today is Sarah Wise, an author known for her incisive social studies of nineteenth century history. In this episode Wise takes us back to a more recent year, 1947, so she can investigate the moment when the British public began to turn against the Mental Deficiency Act of 1913.

The Mental Deficiency Act was a terrifying piece of legislation that resulted in the imprisonment of tens of thousands of vulnerable people. As Wise explains, many of its victims were young, working class women who were deemed incurable 'moral imbeciles'. As such they were locked away with no hope of release. In 1947 this began to change.

Sarah Wise is the author The Undesirables: The Law that Locked Away a Generation.

Scene One: George Scott Rimmington's bungalow in Newton Abbot (September 1947)

Scene Two: Publication of The News of the World's expose of Margery X (1947)

Scene Three: Cambridgeshire MP stands up in the Commons and asks Aneurin "Nye" Bevan a question (30 January 1947)

Memento: A pencil written letter from 'Christine' to her mother.

Presenter: Peter Moore

Guest: Sarah Wise

Production: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

In this episode from our archive we spoke to the archeologist and broadcaster Neil Oliver, a figure familiar to millions in the UK. While Oliver's television work has taken him around the world, he retains a special connection to his Scottish homeland. One historical site, in particular, continues to enchant him: Skara Brae.

Skara Brae on the wind scoured Orkney Islands is the best-preserved Neolithic settlement in all of western Europe. Embedded inside its stone houses and in the surviving monuments are tantalising clues to how our ancient ancestors lived and how they died.

In this episode Oliver takes us back four and a half millennia to around 2,500BC to see Skara Brae as a dynamic, living community. He then explains the mysteries that surround its abandoment and considers the significance of the settlement to us today.

Scene One: A day in the life of Skara Brae

Scene Two: The great mystery of the settlement's abandonment

Scene Three: Where did the people go?

Memento: A sharp stone knife

Presenter: Peter Moore

Guest: Neil Oliver

Production: Maria Nolan

Podcast partner: Unseen Histories

There's no more familiar piece of classical music than Antonio Vivaldi's The Four Seasons. But for all the recordings and broadcasts and interpretations of it that there has been over the past three centuries, there is still some mystery about the music. Why did Vivaldi write it? What were his inspirations? Where and when did The Four Seasons burst into life.

The broadcaster and author Dr Hannah French has written a wonderful, incisive book called The Rolling Year that examines questions like this. In this special episode Peter and the violinist Min Kym sat down with Hannah to find out more about Vivaldi, his music, Mantua and Manchester.

Enjoy the music. We'll be returning to the Travels Through Time format very soon!

Interviewers: Peter Moore and Min Kym

Guest: Dr Hannah French

Production: Maria Nolan

Music: John Harrison, The Four Seasons

After some time away, we've decided that now's the moment for some new forays into the past. Keep an eye on this feed – new episodes on the way!

In the meantime we thought we'd post one of our favourite ever interviews here. It's with the author Nikolai Tolstoy on his stepfather, the novelist Patrick O'Brian.

O'Brian was a writer of great gifts. His depiction of the late Georgian world is regarded as being very nearly as vivid as Jane Austen's. But who was he really? Where did he get his inspiration from? How did he treat those closest to him? Tolstoy, who knew Patrick as well as anyone alive, answers these questions.

We hope you enjoy this episode. Happy 2026 and more soon!

After a short break at TTT, enter the world’s largest flying machine.

‘R101’ was one of the most ambitious creations of the airship era. Plans for it began about a century ago in the 1920s. The vision of engineers and politicians was that the 1930s were to mark the start of a new epoch in air travel. R101 was to lead the way. Huge airships were going to glide through the imperial skies, binding together the distant outposts of the British Empire.

In 1930 R101’s story reached its tragic climax when, seven hours into a flight from its base in Bedfordshire, it crashed to the north of Paris. Of the fifty or so on board, only a handful survived the hydrogen fireball.

R101’s story, and the history of the era that created it, are the subject of a new book by the New York Time bestselling author S.C. ‘Sam’ Gwynne. His Majesty’s Airship tells the story of ‘the life and death of the world’s largest flying machine’.

In this episode Sam takes Peter back to see R101 as the moment of disaster nears.

To be in with winning one of two hardback copies of His Majesty’s Airship, just head to the Unseen Histories Instagram page and follow/like this post.

For more, as ever, visit our website: tttpodcast.com. To read an extract and see images from His Majesty’s Airship, visit unseenhistories.com

Show notes

Scene One: 30 June 1930. Royal Airship Works, Cardington. R101 is beset with problems.

Scene Two: 4 October 1930. The departure of R101 from Cardington, Bedfordshire.

Scene Three: 5 October 1930. Near Beauvais, France. The crash, and aftermath.

Memento: R101’s Control Car

People/Social

Presenter: Peter Moore

Guest: S.C. Gwynne

Production: Maria Nolan

Podcast partner: Ace Cultural Tours

Theme music: ‘Love Token’ from the album ‘This Is Us’ By Slava and Leonard Grigoryan

Follow us on Twitter: @tttpodcast_

See where 1930 fits on our Timeline

Join Peter Moore and Sarah Bakewell for a little walking tour of Fleet Street in London. Instead of three scenes, in this episode they stop off at three locations, as Peter tells Sarah about three of the characters who appear in his new book: the printer William Strahan, the writer Samuel Johnson and the politician John Wilkes.

Peter Moore is a Sunday Times bestselling historian. His new book is Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness: Britain and the American Dream. Sarah Bakewell is a prize-winning and New York Times bestselling author, most recently of the history of humanism: Humanly Possible.

For more, as ever, visit our website: tttpodcast.com.

Location One: The Old Cheshire Cheese (William Strahan)

Location Two: 17 Gough Square (Dr Johnson's House)

Location Three: Near John Wilkes's Statue on Fetter Lane

Presenter: Peter Moore

Asking questions: Sarah Bakewell

Production: Maria Nolan

Podcast partner: Ace Cultural Tours

Theme music: ‘Love Token’ from the album ‘This Is Us’ By Slava and Leonard Grigoryan

Follow us on Twitter: @tttpodcast_