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History Cafe

History Cafe

By: Jon Rosebank Penelope Middelboe
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 True history storytelling at the History Café. Join BBC Historian Jon Rosebank & HBO, BBC & C4 script and series editor Penelope Middelboe as we give history a new take. Drop in to the History Café weekly on Wednesdays to give old stories a refreshing new brew. 90+ ever-green stand-alone episodes and building...

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Episodes
  • #26 Why blow up Parliament anyway? - Ep 3 Blowing up the Gunpowder Plot

    #26 Why blow up Parliament anyway? - Ep 3 Blowing up the Gunpowder Plot
    Jul 9 2025
    The parliament of 1604 refuses to grant the king money. They’re still paying for the effects of the last plague. But this is Cecil’s job. What to do? On 5 November 1605 the assembled MPs and peers are calmly informed that there has been a devilish Catholic plot to blow the lot of them up. A plot that their king and Cecil have brilliantly foiled. Unsurprisingly, this time, they vote the king the money he so badly needs. Job done. (R)

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    30 mins
  • #25 'Here lieth the Toad' - Ep 2 Blowing up the Gunpowder Plot

    #25 'Here lieth the Toad' - Ep 2 Blowing up the Gunpowder Plot
    Jul 2 2025
    We take a look at James I’s shadowy chief minister Robert Cecil who manages to implicate most of his Catholic enemies in the plot. Cecil was so desperate to improve King James’s dire view of him (his father had caused the execution James’ mother, Mary Queen of Scots) he would stoop to anything. (R)

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    35 mins
  • #24 'There is no state trial so totally devoid of reality' - Ep 1 Blowing up the Gunpowder Plot

    #24 'There is no state trial so totally devoid of reality' - Ep 1 Blowing up the Gunpowder Plot
    Jun 25 2025
    We look at the story the government published as The King’s Book, more than 500 witness statements and other contemporary sources and conclude, like the Victorian antiquarian Jardine who wrote up the trial from the State Papers, there is no reliable corroborating evidence for the gunpowder story we’ve been told. (R)

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    33 mins
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