Sipping Time

Ancient Rome has had a rich, lasting artistic legacy, influencing arts and culture into our modern world. Examples of sculpture, architecture, and writing abound, but what about painting? Beyond a few scant examples, very little has survived of this art form, once regarded as the highest in all Roman society. We dive into the story of Roman painting - how it developed, its artistic heritage (datin...

By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way comes... On this episode of Sipping Time, we are joined by friend of the show Kieran, who takes us through the fascinating stories of witches, and their trials, in Scotland. We discuss witch trials, while looking at them through both contextual and modern lenses, the context of Jacobean Europe, and dive deep into the dark, grisly tales of wit...

We're back with another Visits show - this time exploring the fascinating history of Montréal, Canada! We catch up on Sami's trip there as he takes us through the history, architecture, and general vibes of the place (spoiler alert, we use the word 'lit' a lot!). We dive deeply into the city's pre-founding, the dynamics of French/English North America, and go hard on the fascin...

Following a shared trip to Warsaw, Sipping Time is back to discuss the history of Poland’s resilient capital. Nicknamed the ‘Phoenix City’, Warsaw has had an extremely turbulent past - with resoundingly high highs and devastatingly low lows.  We unpack some of the stories that led to this reputation, seeking to understand the historical contexts of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Swedish a...

Escape rooms - a new and exciting type of game, based on playful exploration and problem-solving, where players are thrown into locked rooms and dared to escape! Sometimes quite literally. It's very possible that you yourself have been to one, or even a few. We jump into the topic alongside a guest, Mairi Nolan, a passionate escape room afficionado with an extremely impressive amount of completed...

Most people will have heard of Napoleon Bonaparte - Emperor of France and one history's most famous Great Men. Much less famous is the life of his only son and heir, Napoleon François Joseph Charles Bonaparte; Napoleon II. Nicknamed 'L'Aiglon' ('The Eaglet'), Napoleon II's story is punctuated by its briefness. Reminiscent of Phaeton, son of Helios, who was burned entering the atmosphere in his fat...

Empire - an abstract hyperobject that defies human measurement, and yet an aspect of history that has been felt very intimately and tangibly throughout time. We dive into this exploration of the meaning and purpose of empire, using the examples of the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires. How and why did they fall? What can we learn from this? And what silly stories can we tell along the way? Brace yours...

This time we're diving deep into the history of the Battleship Yamato - the heaviest and most powerfully armed battleship ever constructed. We provide ample historical context (as always), including Japanese Isolationism, the Meiji Restoration, and the Russo-Japanese War. We look at how these movements modernised Japan in an incredibly short span of time, and how this developed aesthetically too....

The final episode in our three-part series on the history of arches! We continue to cover plenty of ground (probably too many!), as we span another thousand years. We then gracefully spare our precious listeners from a further seven parts, ending it at the beginnings of the renaissance, neatly tying everything together with a throwback to some earlier examples.  We pick up where we left off w...

Part two of our epic three-part series on the history of arches!  We continue to delve deeper into the history and application of arches through time - starting with where we last left off, the inception of Christian architecture in Rome, then travelling east where we gush over Byzantine and Hellenistic architecture, as well as fascinating examples from the Parthian empire, Ptolemaic Egypt, a...

The first episode of our epic three-part series on the history of arches! Far from merely sipping, we're chugging down history in this episode, driving our way through thousands of years of history, touching on different cultures and approaches to architecture.  The humble arch - a powerful and mathematically beautiful creation, able to withstand immense amounts of pressure as well as adding...

British food - a concept ridiculed across the globe for its blandness and lack of ingenuity. Being two Brits, and not completely in disagreement with the reputation, we dive into how this has come about, whether the reputation is accurate, and if things could've ever been different.  How has the 'english breakfast' come about, and is it technically a mezze? How much is a 'quart', and is one i...