After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal
This is After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds and the Paranormal. The podcast that takes you to the shadiest corners of the past, unpicking history’s spookiest, strangest, and most sinister stories. Join historians Anthony Delaney and Maddy Pelling, every Monday and Thursday to take a look at the darker side of history. From haunted pubs and Houdini, to witch trials and weird UFO sightings. After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds and the Paranormal - a podcast by History Hit, the world's best history channel and creators of award-winning podcasts Dan Snow's History Hit, Gone Medieval, and Betwixt the Sheets. Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Episodes
The end of Elizabeth I's life was shrouded in darkness and plots as powerful figures circled her throne. How did Elizabeth hold off contenders reaching for the crown? And did James VI & I steal it in the end?
Our guest today is Dr Tracy Borman whose new book The Stolen Crown: Treachery, Deceit and the Death of the Tudor Dynasty is out now.
Edited by Tom Delargy. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
We often think of Egyptian Pharaohs as a glamorous god-king of Ancient times, yet the truth of these people is a lot, lot darker.
Who was the first Pharaoh? What shocking, violent stories surround some of these figures? How did their rule of Ancient Egypt come to an end?
Joining Anthony and Maddy today is the always-fantastic Campbell Price, Egyptologist at University of Liverpool, and curator of Egypt and Sudan at the Manche...
There are a disturbingly high number of contenders for the title of Rome's Darkest Emperor - so as you can imagine, things get extremely disturbing in this episode.
Joining Anthony and Maddy to introduce you to a couple of them, is Rome-based historian and tour guide, Alexander Meddings.
Edited by Tom Delargy. Produced by Stuart Beckwith. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
You can now watch After Dark on Youtube! www.yo...
Join Anthony and Maddy as they spend a day - or should that be night? - in the life of a 19th century body snatcher.
Find out which months they favoured for body snatching, why they never stole the dead body's possessions, and why they would never steal a body under a full moon - all referenced from a real-life grave robber's diary.
Edited by Tom Delargy. Produced by Stuart Beckwith. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
Did she do it? Did serving girl Eliza Fenning poison the dumplings she served the Turner family? This is a true crime case from 1813 that brings together class tensions, sexism, the law. have a go hero forensics! It's easy to see why this trial gripped the nation. Maddy tells Anthony the story of Eliza Fenning and the poisoned dumplings.
Edited by Tim Arstall. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
The Ancient Egyptians had a very different idea about death than most people do today.
And the idea of mummification is (excuse the pun) wrapped up in so many modern ideas, that we can lose its real purpose.
Joining Anthony and Maddy today to take us through the gory details of mummifying a body, and explaining where the term 'mummy' even comes from, is Dr. Campbell Price, author and Egyptologist at University of Liverpool.
On June 16, 1836, in New York City, Mary Jones stood in a courtroom that was a cauldron of hatred. Mary was African American and one of the first known transgender women in US history. Anthony Delaney tells Maddy Pelling the final story from his new book out now: Queer Georgians: A Hidden History of Lovers, Lawbreakers and Homemakers (published as Queer Enlightenments in the US).
Edited by Richie Power. Produced by Freddy Chick....
Hear a chapter of Anthony's new book, Queer Georgians: A hidden history of lovers, lawbreakers and homemakers. It's out now!
For more information, click here.
Anthony tells listeners why he wanted to write this book, and introduces a special chapter, exclusive for After Dark listeners!
After Dark will return to its normal programming on Monday (Sunday for subscribers).
In today's episode, we're taking you inside the towering walls of Ancient Rome's Colosseum to find out the dark reality of what happened there.
From the sex appeal of gladiators, to the choreographed means of human sacrifice, and the eternal question: did they really have sharks in there?!
Joining Anthony and Maddy today is historian and Rome-based tour guide, Alexander Meddings, to take us back to this world.
Edited by Am...
What price might a man pay for sex in the 18th century? Well, if it was with another man, he might pay with his life.
In this episode, Anthony introduces us to 43-year-old milkman Gabriel Lawrence. Together, he and Maddy take us inside the Molly Houses of Georgian Britain, and through the criminal system from arrest, to imprisonment, to sentencing and execution.
This story can be found in more detail in Anthony's new book, 'Q...
Jack the Ripper as we think of him, is an invention of the Victorian media. They took the complete absence of hard facts about the killer, and populated it with the period's anxieties, fantasies and fears.
We're joined again by Dr Bob Nicholson, presenter of ‘Killing Victoria’ podcast on BBC Sounds.
Edited by Tim Arstall. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
Please vote for us for Listeners' Choice ...
This episode contains descriptions of execution and torture.
To be Hanged, Drawn & Quartered. Put on the Rack. Impaled on a spike. This list paints a very dark picture. What was the reality of execution and torture in the Medieval world? Was it as bad as we think? Worse?
Guiding us through this very grim history is Matt Lewis host of the History Hit podcast 'Gone Medieval'.
Produced by Annie Coloe. Edited by Freddy Chick. ...
Today we step into the shadowy world of W.T. Stead—a Victorian journalist whose life was as controversial as it was groundbreaking.
Hear how he uncovered a sex scandal which shocked the nation, dabbled in the supernatural, and also… predicted the Titanic disaster (and ultimately, his own death).
Please vote for us for Listeners' Choice at the British Podcast Awards! Follow this link, and don’t forget to confirm t...
This 1897 New York murder case that has it all - a villain, an incredibly useless police force, and a duck who saves the day. The incredible Dr Cat Byers (@heymorguegirl) joins Maddy and Anthony to tell this story.
Edited by Tomos Delargy. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
Please vote for us for Listeners' Choice at the British Podcast Awards! Follow this link, and don’t forget to confirm the...
Through the industrial fog of Victorian London, in one of the city's most notorious slums, a murder took place that shocked a nation.
The Bermondsey Horror, as it was called at the time, centred around a young woman and her older partner, and a wealthy man who was lured to their home one night.
How did the gruesome events unfold? What did Charles Dickens have to say about the public execution? And what was the social impact o...
It was a murder mystery that gripped 19th century France and changed crime investigation forever.
Who was the body in the trunk? What were the groundbreaking techniques used in the forensics investigation? And how did the murder case unfold from there?
Taking Anthony and Maddy back to France in 1889 and through this story is historian and author Dr. Cat Byers.
This episode was edited by Tom Delargy and produced by Stuart B...
What happens when you're left on a desert island with a psychopath? This is a story so horrendous it would be hard to believe were it not for the skeletons left behind. Maddy Pelling takes Anthony Delaney through the shipwreck of the Batavia.
Edited by Tim Arstall. Research by Phoebe Joyce. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
Please vote for us for Listeners' Choice at the British Podcast Awards! Foll...
For Albert Pierrepoint, execution was a family affair. His father and uncle were hangmen and from the 1940s until the late 1950s Albert was Britain's "Number One" executioner. Which meant he was the one sent to hang the Nazis who ran the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp at the end of the war.
Who was Albert Pierrepoint? What does it take to be able to execute hundreds of people? And what is 'The Drop'?
Edited and produced by ...
Today we’re going behind the foreboding doors of the Victorian workhouse to ask - ‘Could we survive it?’. From Oliver Twist's gruel to songs about flogging, from lice-ridden clothing to soul destroying isolation. Our guest is Oskar Jensen, author of "Vagabonds: Life on the Streets of Nineteenth Century London".
Edited by Tim Arstall. Produced by Freddy Chick, Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.
Please vote for us for Listeners...
If you think your job is bad, have you tried being a plague doctor in 17th century Venice?
Join Anthony and Maddy as they wake up on a quarantine island and take you through a day in the life of a plague doctor, including the sights, smells and horrors of what you would have seen as you explored plague-riddled Venice in 1631.
Find out what they would have worn, what they did on their lunch break, and what the perks of the job...
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