In Our Time: History

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the origins and evolution of an alliance which transformed the geopolitics of the classical world: the Delian League. Since the start of the 5th Century BCE, city states across Greece had been fighting a series of armed conflicts in the Greco-Persian Wars. After the defeat of a second Persian invasion in 478 BCE, a league of cities across Greece came together and formed a new alliance led by Athens. That alliance is now known as the Delian League, after the island of Delos where it was established. In the following decades, Athens used the Delian League to grow its own wealth and formidable naval power. Cities which tried to leave the alliance found themselves violently put down and their lands confiscated by the Athenians. What had begun as a cooperative alliance sworn to resist the Persian Empire gradually started to seem like it may have created another imperial power: the Athenian Empire.
With
Leah Lazar
Lecturer in Hellenistic Culture at the University of Manchester
Polly Low
Professor in the Department of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Durham
And
Paul Cartledge
AG Leventis Senior Research Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge
Producer: Martha Owen
Aristophanes (trans. David Barrett and Alan H. Sommerstein), The Birds and Other Plays (Penguin Classics, 2003)
Mary Beard, The Parthenon (Profile Books, 2010)
M. Canevaro and D. M. Lewis, 'Between ‘The Character of the Athenian Empire’ and The Origins of the Peloponnesian War (and beyond): The Popularity of the Athenian Empire Revisited' (Polis 41:1, 2024)
Paul Cartledge, Ancient Greece: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press, 2011)
Lisa Kallet and John H. Kroll, The Athenian Empire: Using Coins as Sources (Cambridge University Press, 2020)
Leah Lazar, Athenian Power in the Fifth Century BC (Oxford University Press, 2024)
Polly Low (ed.), The Athenian Empire (Edinburgh University Press, 2008)
Malcolm F. McGregor, The Athenians and their Empire (UBC Press, 1987)
Robin Osborne (ed. and trans.), The Athenian Empire (Cambridge University Press, 2023)
P. J. Rhodes, The Athenian Empire (Clarendon Press, 1985)
Thucydides (trans. Robin Waterfield, introduced by Polly Low), The History of the Peloponnesian War (Basic Books, 2025)
Thucydides (ed. Robert B Strassler), The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War (Free Press, 1998)
Thucydides (trans. Rex Warner), History of the Peloponnesian War (Penguin Books, 2000)
Thucydides (trans. Martin Hammond), The Peloponnesian War (Oxford University Press, 2009)
In Our Time is a BBC Studios production
Spanning history, religion, culture, science and philosophy, In Our Time from BBC Radio 4 is essential listening for the intellectually curious. In each episode, host Misha Glenny and expert guests explore the characters, events and discoveries that have shaped our world.

At the Hay Festival, Misha Glenny and guests discuss the impact of the Norman invasion on the people and land of Wales and across the modern border with England in what became known as The Welsh Marches, march being a term for a militarized borderland. Hay was one of the first Marcher lordships. Even before 1066, William the Conqueror knew that he would have to subdue the Welsh if he were to control the English and he allowed more and more Norman warlords to establish virtually their own private kingdoms in these Marches. Later some of the Lords were to use these bases to invade Ireland rather than conquer the rest of Wales. Marcher Lords built numerous castles such as the one at Hay and many new towns would then grow up alongside these where there was one law for the English and another for the Welsh and, though the Acts of Union under the Tudors brought an end to much of the Marcher Lords' powers, the distinct identity of these Welsh Marches continued.
With
Rhun Emlyn
Lecturer in the Department of History and Welsh History at Aberystwyth University
Helen Fulton
Professor of Medieval Literature at the University of Bristol
And
Huw Pryce
Emeritus Professor of Welsh History at Bangor University
Producer: Simon Tillotson
Reading list:
R. R. Davies, The Age of Conquest: Wales 1063-1415 (Oxford University Press, 2001)
R.R. Davies, Lordship and Society in the March of Wales 1282-1400 (Oxford University Press, 1978)
John Fleming, The Welsh Marcher Lordships II: South-West (Logaston Press, 2023)
Ben Giles, The Welsh Marches: 40 Town and Country Walks (Pocket Mountains, 2012)
Philip Hume, The Welsh Marcher Lordships I: Central & North (Logaston Press, 2021)
Max Lieberman, The March of Wales, 1067–1300: A Borderland of Medieval Britain (University of Wales Press, 2018)
Max Lieberman, The Medieval March of Wales: The Creation and Perception of a Frontier, 1066-1283 (Cambridge University Press, 2010)
D. Huw Owen, The Lordship of Denbigh 1282-1543 (University of Wales Press, 2024)
Mike Parker, All the Wide Border: Wales, England and the Places Between (HarperNorth, 2024)
Dewi Roberts, Both Sides of the Border: An Anthology of Writing on the Welsh Border Region (Gwasg Carreg Gwalch/Eagle Rock Press, 1998)
Christopher Somerville, The Welsh Borders (Philips, 1991)
David Stephenson, Patronage and Power in the Medieval Welsh March: One Family's Story (University of Wales Press, 2021)
David Walker, Medieval Wales (Cambridge University Press, 2008)
In Our Time is a BBC Studios Production
Spanning history, religion, culture, science and philosophy, In Our Time from BBC Radio 4 is essential listening for the intellectually curious. In each episode, host Misha Glenny and expert guests explore the characters, events and discoveries that have shaped our world.

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the group which came to be known as the Levellers and emerged during what would become arguably one of the bloodiest and most turbulent periods of English history. After the First English Civil War, the Levellers started calling for reforms to achieve legal and social equality. They pushed for a new constitution, extended franchise, popular sovereignty, and religious toleration. To do this, the Levellers pioneered the use of pamphlets and petitions, as well as taking to the streets in their thousands to demonstrate wearing their signature sea-green ribbons and sprigs of rosemary. To some they were radical, and to others not radical enough. Though the Leveller movement itself may have been short-lived, the arguments that they made have both inspired and challenged generations since.
With
Teresa Bejan
Professor of Political Theory and Fellow of Oriel College, University of Oxford
Ted Vallance
Professor of History and Dean of Research and Doctoral Study at the University of Roehampton
And
Clare Jackson
Honorary Professor of Early Modern History and Walter Grant Scott Fellow in History at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge
Producer: Martha Owen
Reading list:
Teresa M. Bejan, First Among Equals: Visions of Equality before Egalitarianism (Belknap Press, forthcoming in 2026)
Michael Braddick, The Common Freedom of the People: John Lilburne and the English Revolution (Oxford University Press, 2018)
Rachel Foxley, The Levellers; Radical Political Thought in the English Revolution (Manchester University Press, 2013)
Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down (Penguin, 1972)
Ann Hughes, Gender and the English Revolution (Routledge, 2011)
John Rees, The Leveller Revolution: Radical Political Organisation in England, 1640-1650 (Verso Books, 2016)
John Rees (ed.), John Lilburne and the Levellers: Reappraising the Roots of English Radicalism 400 years on (Routledge, 2017), including 'Reborn John: The Eighteenth-Century Afterlife of John Lilburne' by Edward Vallance
Andrew Sharp (ed.), The English Levellers (Cambridge University Press, 1998)
Edward Vallance, A Radical History of Britain: Visionaries, Rebels and Revolutionaries - the men and women who fought for our freedoms (Abacus, 2010)
Blair Worden, Roundhead Reputations: The English Civil Wars and The Passions of Posterity (Penguin, 2002)
In Our Time is a BBC Studios production
Spanning history, religion, culture, science and philosophy, In Our Time from BBC Radio 4 is essential listening for the intellectually curious. In each episode, host Misha Glenny and expert guests explore the characters, events and discoveries that have shaped our world.

Misha Glenny and guests discuss an ancient civilisation who lived over 2000 years ago in the southwest of modern-day Libya. During prehistoric times, the Sahara Desert was greener and even had large lakes, but for the last 5000 years it has been a hyperarid environment. Extreme swings of temperature and limited surface water might make the Sahara seem like an inhospitable place to live, but an ancient people in North Africa known to us as the Garamantes thrived there. Following descriptions of the Garamantes in Roman and Greek texts, the Garamantes have often been seen as pastoral nomads, or as tribal barbarians on the periphery of the Mediterranean world. But the work of archaeologists in recent decades has revealed something different. Evidence suggests a society with flourishing towns and cities, complex underground irrigation systems, a key role in trade routes across the Sahara – and may give us a broader view of ancient history.
With
David Mattingly
Emeritus Professor of Roman Archaeology at the University of Leicester
Farès Moussa
Visiting Fellow at the University of Southampton and Cultural Heritage Consultant
And
Josephine Quinn
Professor of Ancient History and Fellow of St John’s College, University of Cambridge
Producer: Martha Owen
Reading list:
C.M. Daniels, The Garamantes of Southern Libya (Oleander Press, 1970)
C. Duckworth, A. Cuénod and D.J. Mattingly (eds), Mobile Technologies in the Ancient Sahara and Beyond (Trans-Saharan Archaeology Volume 4, Cambridge University Press, 2020)
M.C. Gatto, D.J. Mattingly, N. Ray and M. Sterry (eds), Burials, Migration and Identity in the Ancient Sahara and Beyond (Trans-Saharan Archaeology Volume 2, Cambridge University Press, 2019)
R.B. Hitchner (ed.), A Companion to North Africa in Antiquity (Wiley-Blackwell, 2020), especially ‘Beyond barbarians: the Garamantes of the Libyan Sahara’ by D.J. Mattingly
D.J. Mattingly, Between Sahara and Sea: Africa in the Roman Empire (Michigan University Press, 2023)
D.J. Mattingly (ed.), The Archaeology of Fazzan, Volume 1, Synthesis (Society for Libyan Studies, 2003)
D.J. Mattingly (ed.), The Archaeology of Fazzan, Volume 2, Site Gazetteer, Pottery and other Survey Finds (Society for Libyan Studies, 2007)
D.J. Mattingly (ed.), The Archaeology of Fazzan, Volume 3, Excavations Carried out by C.M. Daniels (Society for Libyan Studies, 2010)
D.J. Mattingly (ed.), The Archaeology of Fazzan, Volume 4, Survey and Excavations at Old Jarma (Ancient Garama) Carried out by C. M. Daniels (1962–69) and the Fazzan Project (1997–2001) (Society for Libyan Studies, 2013)
D.J. Mattingly, V. Leitch, C.N. Duckworth, A. Cuénod, M. Sterry and F. Cole (eds), Trade in the Ancient Sahara and Beyond (Trans-Saharan Archaeology Volume 1, Cambridge University Press, 2017)
D. Mattingly, S. McLaren, E. Savage, Y. Fasatwi and K. Gadgood (eds), The Libyan Desert: Natural Resources and Cultural Heritage (Society for Libyan Studies, 2006), especially ‘The Garamantes: The First Libyan state’ by D. Mattingly
P. Mitchell and P. Lane (eds), The Oxford Handbook of African Archaeology (Oxford University Press, 2013), especially ‘Roman Africa and the Sahara’ by A. Leone and F. Moussa
M. Sterry and D.J. Mattingly (eds), State Formation and Urbanisation in the Ancient Sahara and Beyond (Cambridge University Press, 2020)
Some of these books are available for free from Open Access Books: British Institute for Libyan & Northern African Studies
In Our Time is a BBC Studios production
Spanning history, religion, culture, science and philosophy, In Our Time from BBC Radio 4 is essential listening for the intellectually curious. In each episode, host Misha Glenny and expert guests explore the characters, events and discoveries that have shaped our world.

Misha Glenny and guests discuss a turning point in world affairs in 1898 that left Spain greatly reduced as an imperial power and the US the owner of the Philippines, Guam and Puerto Rico, with a significant influence over the newly independent Cuba where the war broke out. The US had been eyeing Cuba for decades, waiting for the right moment and the right kind of action, and in April 1898 intervened in the long-running fighting on the island for independence from Spain. With a much stronger navy it was a very uneven battle and the US soon triumphed over Spanish forces from Manila to Santiago de Cuba. This brief war confirmed the US as a power on the world stage and made a shocked Spain turn inwards to ask what had gone wrong. Meanwhile, people in the Philippines were about to attempt a new and bloody independence fight with the US.
With
Frank Cogliano
Professor of American History at the University of Edinburgh
Mary Vincent
Professor of Modern European History at the University of Sheffield
And
Stephen Wilkinson
Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at the University of Buckingham
Producer: Simon Tillotson
Reading list:
Sebastian Balfour, The End of the Spanish Empire, 1898-1923 (Clarendon Press, 1997)
Sebastian Balfour, ‘Riot, Regeneration and Reaction: Spain in the Aftermath of the 1898 Disaster’ (The Historical journal 38.2, 1995)
Ada Ferrer, Cuba: An American History (Scribner, 2021)
Greg Grandin, America, América: A New History of the New World (Torva, 2025)
Richard Kluger, Seizing Destiny: How America Grew from Sea to Shining Sea (Alfred a Knopf Inc, 2007)
Robert W. Merry, President McKinley: Architect of the American Century (Simon & Schuster, 2017)
Walter Nugent, Habits of Empire: A History of American Expansion (Alfred a Knopf Inc, 2008)
Louis A. Pérez Jr., Cuba Between Empires, 1878–1902 (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1983)
John Lawrence Tone, War and Genocide in Cuba, 1895-1898 (University of North Carolina Press, 2006)
Mary Vincent, Spain, 1833-2002: People and State (Oxford University Press, 2007), especially chapter 3
In Our Time is a BBC Studios Production
Spanning history, religion, culture, science and philosophy, In Our Time from BBC Radio 4 is essential listening for the intellectually curious. In each episode, host Misha Glenny and expert guests explore the characters, events and discoveries that have shaped our world.