That's Old News

At this point in our story, Napoleon is still a young man but lacks direction. His posting as an artillery officer was going nowhere, he failed to bring the revolution to his native Corsica, and was cast out as a political refugee from his homeland. It was through a turn of fate that his friend, Antoine Christophe Saliceti, had recommended the young artillery officer for a position commanding the...

"Sadness, anger, horror, pain, silence, trauma – all words that describe the legacy of the Irish Civil War. Although the conflict only lasted eleven months, the trauma of the Civil War can be seen all over this island – North, South, East and West, like a wound that has not healed." - Liz Gillis. From the outbreak of the war, to the Free State offensive in the south, to the clean-up oper...

Rabies - a vaccine preventable, zoonotic, viral disease affecting the central nervous system. It infects mammals, spreading through saliva, scratches, or direct contact with mucosa (eyes, mouth, or open wounds). As soon as clinical symptoms , rabies is near-100% fatal. It is present on all continents except Antarctica, and is responsible for, at least, some 59,000 deaths annually. Historically it...

"The art of history lies in the debate" is an adage that Arron lives by. One can be as well read on any particular topic as possible, but it is through discussion that facts are made concrete and we can fully understand a topic. It opens our minds to opposing viewpoints that challenge what we believed, and either helps to reinforce or reassess our positions. And what better way than to d...

What do the release of Shrek, a turkey puppet singing at the Eurovision, and two tone-deaf Irish "artists" with too much free time and hairspray have in common? Well they make it onto our tier list of course! These 3 along with 27 more events of the last 25 years have made an impact on our world in one way or another, and today the gang is going to rank them from S tier all the way down...

All legends have an origin. For the great Napoleon Bonaparte, that origin was on the small Mediterranean island of Corsica - purchased just one year before his birth. In the span of one lifetime he came from a modest but humble upbringing, especially by French standards, and became the dominant power of Europe. His story, from the first signs of life to the final breaths before death, is so fascin...

The guerrilla stage of the Irish Civil War has come to an end. With a defeat in conventional warfare and now being scattered to the wind, Anti-Treaty IRA forces are now completely unable to mount an effective resistance against the Free State forces who for months have constantly kept up mounting pressure against their strongholds in the south and west. Clean up operations are now underway to ensu...

I've been working on the railroad, all the live long day! I've been working on the railroad, until a 3'8" tamping rod is blown right through my brain!... wait a minute those aren't the lyrics. Well if your name happens to be Phineas P. Gage and you work as a blasting foreman during the great western railroad expansions in the United States then those lyrics hit a lot closer to...

What do you do to celebrate Christmas? Do you wait until the family is all downstairs to start opening presents from Santa with a hot cup of cocoa? Maybe you head off to Christmas morning mass? Perhaps you get all the family together for Christmas dinner? Or do you instead get so drunk on eggnog full to the brim with rum, whiskey, and grog, and stage a riot at your local military academy that beco...

On the morning of March 31st 1926, a local gardener from the La Mancha estate in Malahide ran into town screaming out for help. The house, set in thirty acres of good farmland, was on fire, and the six occupants - four brothers and sisters, their domestic servant, and the farm hand - were still inside. The Gardai, Ireland's police force, were alerted and together with local firefighters they rushe...

Paracelsus, Vesalius, Tagliacozzi, and Wormius. Despite what you may be thinking, these aren't the names of horrible diseases that you may contract in your lifetime. They're actually the names of some prominent figures in the history of medicine. However, if you had any kind of ailment and your local medicine man was any of these lovely gentlemen then you'd have better odds of survival if you just...

The police force in the United States resembles its own little army, with weapons and equipment on hand that make our little Irish minds boggle as to why they could possibly need all this firepower within arm's reach. But that's a very interesting question - Why? Why is it that policing in the USA requires such weapons to be readily available? What happened that forced local police departments to...

Conor's Irish Civil War series continues with the immediate fallout from the previous Free State Offensive that saw any hopes for the continuation of a conventional war completely dashed, and a return to the guerrilla warfare that characterised the War of Independence. But having suffered a crucial defeat in Munster, IRA forces are more disconnected than ever. This week we see the beginnings of th...

Around this time last year, three disenfranchised history students decided that the world needs something it has never seen before - a podcast! I know, what a completely original idea! In the time between then and now we've suffered through a horrendous take on the life and exploits of Napoleon courtesy of Ridley Scott, embarked on what will culminate in a fantastic five-part series that will cove...

The history of medicine is so vast and eyebrow raising that you would be forgiven for asking how we, as a species, managed to survive this long without accidentally wiping the lot of us off the planet. With the last episode ending in the Medieval period there are still centuries of crazy and hilarious medical practices to comb through and they're nothing short of baffling to say the least. From tr...

Learning a new language is hard, and when the Duolingo bird is outside your bedroom threatening your family unless you keep up your streak and do your German lessons today - it can be a bit overwhelming. But when it comes to the Native American Navajo language, even the Duolingo bird misses some of his lessons. That's because this incredible language is so complicated that if you weren't ingrained...

Conflict is inherent to the human experience. It has shaped our world since the earliest times when Ungo Bungo wanted Bongo Dongo's priceless large rock collection. To this day nothing had changed. With resources aplenty and neighbours who can't stand to live next to each other, many have resorted to conflict to get their way. It is no surprise that Prussian strategist Carl von Clausewitz's words...

Many moons ago a young man called Conor began exploring the outbreak and initial stages of the Irish Civil War. Unfortunately he was ambushed by a squad of Anti-Treaty IRA and hauled all the way down south to the (real capital) city of Cork. Luckily for him he managed to escape, but not before witnessing the newly formed Irish Free State take the fight directly to the IRA who ran from Dublin down...

The history of health and medicine is such a crazy ride that it's truly a shock to consider just how good the quality of healthcare is today as opposed to even as recent in human history as a century ago. But in order to get to this point we have had a long and varied history of absolutely crazy medical procedures that you wonder how anyone was even left alive to improve on some of these things. F...

How do you improve the millions of weapons of war that we've come to know throughout history? Do you perhaps create bullets that can be loaded into magazines to move away from single shot muskets and rifles? Would you instead create a massive tube and fill it with the biggest lead ball you can find to create a cannon and do away with catapults? Perhaps you would instead strap a massive bomb to the...

The Irish struggle for independence spans centuries of conflict and contains many prominent figures, from the FitzGeralds of Kildare to Michael Collins. From military figures to politicians and humble labourers, many Irish men and women are remembered for their contributions to this ultimate goal. One such figure who was instrumental in the success of the Irish War of Independence was Kerry born T...

What better way to spend your day than listening to the emergence of the theories that helped to start the bloodiest war in human history? Nothing, that's the answer. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the gang as they explore the origins of one of the deadliest and most controversial "sciences" ever put to paper. From its origins and links with Darwinism, its emergence as a "legitim...

History is great. It's accessible to all, there are millions of written histories across plenty of subjects, and it helps us to understand how we got here. Facts and figures paint a story of how we came to be where we are today, and historical debate helps us to greater understand the past. But what happens when you just... don't do your research and then go onto a podcast that brings in m...

The most common thing in the history of humanity is our need to fight each other on both national and international theatres of war. But what happens when you've had enough of shooting the humans and want something else to shoot at instead? Well in our quest to wage war in every conceivable way possible, throughout history we've conscripted animals to go to war with us! Join Arron this wee...

Spooky scary skeletons most certainly send shivers down your spine, but of course they are not the only haunting figures that go bump in the night. Irish Mythology is home to many creepy creatures that have inspired many haunting figures throughout history, but the Irish ones are the best on the simple and inarguable fact that I said so. Join the gang this week as they do a second part to the myth...