Its 1637 and we are in Paris where at Cardinal Richelieu's urging, King Louis XIII granted letters patent formally establishing a council...

For more than 500 years, Europeans believed a Christian king ruled over a vast empire somewhere in the wilds of Africa, India or the Far...

Today we travel to Florence in Italy where the English poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning died. Married to another poet – Robert Browning,...

Today the famous Trevi Fountain was finished by Pannini, and was officially opened and inaugurated on this day by Pope Clement XIII. We...

Today we remember how in 1493 Pope Alexander VI, in an age of exploration divided the 'New World' between Spain and Portugal. Giving the...

Michelangelo was born today, in 1474. His achievements as a sculptor, painter, architect and poet mean that he is often considered to be...

Today Christians around the world are preparing to enter Lent with one last blowout. Today we look at the traditions that mark this...

In todays pod, we go back to the 7th of February and the year 1497, and remember how the famous ‘Bonfire of Vanities was lit today by the...

Today in 1302, we remember how the Italian poet Dante Alighieri was exiled from Florence. In exile Date wrote the celebrated work The...

Today in 1412 the Medici family agreed to become the official bankers of the papacy, which turbocharged their businesses across Europe. ...

Today in 1610 the Italian Astronomer Galileo made his first observation of the four largest satellites of Jupiter, which are now named...