A History of England

About A History of England

A full explanation of how, over five centuries, England got Britain into the state it's in today, and all in brief podcasts of under ten minutes each. Or at most a minute or two over. Never more than fifteen.

Publisher

David Beeson

Category

history

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

19 Nov 2020

Latest episode

15 Apr 2026

Latest episodes

276 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   15 Apr 2026

   274. Is Zionism Anti-Semitic?

   The Middle East seems to be forever a flashpoint for instability in the whole of the world. Much of its instability is down to the presence in the region of the state of Israel. It has been for a long time the target of terrorist outrages, including what is possibly the worst in history, the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023. But it is also itself a regional superpower ready repeatedly to wreak terrible violence on neighbours it feels represent or harbour a threat against it. At the moment, that’s happening in both Gaza and Lebanon. In this additional episode to A History of England I look at one of the seminal moments that opened the door towards the foundation of that state. That was the British government’s issuing of the Balfour Declaration, backing the formation of a Jewish state in Palestine, on 2 November 1917. That led to a lamentable history in which Britain tried to administer the territory until it pulled out and the Jewish state was founded there. The fundamental problem, that it was already the homeland of another people that resented being driven from its homes by Jewish immigrants, was never resolved. The present tensions flowed directly from that failure. Curiously, back in Britain, one and only one minister in the British government that issued the Declaration stood out against it. And on what grounds did he reject it? Why, because he viewed it as anti-Semitic. What makes that opposition particularly curious is just who – and what – he was. Illustration: Map showing Eastern Turkey in Asia, Syria and Western Persia. Royal Geographical Society (Map), Mark Sykes & François Georges-Picot (Annotations). https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MPK1-426_Sykes_Picot_Agreement_Map_signed_8_May_1916.jpg#/media/File:MPK1-426_Sykes_Picot_Agreement_Map_signed_8_May_1916.jpg Public domain Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

2. 

   22 Feb 2026

   273. From a humble address to a royal arrest

   Well, we’re living in curious times. For the first time in four centuries, a member of the British royal family has been arrested in connection with a criminal investigation. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the previous Prince Andrew, was already a marginalised member of the family, as result of his association with the American sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, but now that association has led to his potentially facing the prospect of jail itself. But that’s not where the episode starts. It opens by talking about another of those strange rituals of the British constitutional system, a procedure left over from the distant past, more or less adapted to modern needs. This is the ‘humble address’, once a way for parliamentarians, supposedly (though often not genuinely) loyal subjects of the crown, to address the monarch. In this case, it was a means to force a modern British government – the current one – to make available information about the appointment of Peter Mandelson, the other Brit in trouble over Epstein, as ambassador in Washington DC. Those two cases, Mandelson’s and Mountbatten-Windsor’s are progressing well towards a destination that doesn’t look particularly healthy for either of them. Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, voices are already being raised to ask, ‘if the British can investigate prominent people involved in an essentially American scandal, why can’t a few of the people equally tainted with it over here face the same treatment?’ Let’s see who might be listening… Illustration: Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor being driven away from the police station where he was taken for questioning after his arrest. Photo from The Guardian. Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

3. 

   20 Dec 2025

   272. What a fine mess you've got us into

   This is the last episode in this main series of A History of England. I may add others on specific topics – by all means use the comments to suggest any you’d like me to examine – or in response to interesting new developments. This episode looks at what has happened since the 2024 election. There’s been a rise in xenophobia that sometimes shades into outright racism. A party of the hard right, Reform UK, is leading in the polls. Labour, in office though perhaps not in power, seems to have lost its sense of direction and has been pandering to Reform UK’s views in the hope of winning back voters it has lost to them, with little sign of success so far. Indeed, its own standing just keeps sliding downwards. After that, I recap the series, from the days of Henry VIII, showing how England grew from a minor state on the edge of Europe to a leading power. Then, having pushed through the union with Scotland to form Great Britain, it became the ruling power of a major global empire. However, while the empire enriched a minority of people back home, it left the mass of the people in poverty, often in misery. Imperial wealth made individuals rich but not society as a whole. The twentieth century saw the empire collapse and British society become much more equal. In need of a new role, Britain tried being the partner of the United States and also a major member of the European Union. But the ‘special relationship’ with the US seems pretty well dead in the water now and, in a major self-inflicted wound, the Brexit vote of 2016 took Britain out the EU. Now with a growing menace to the whole continent, including Britain, from Russia, the Starmer government is trying to put together new alliances without confronting its right-wing critics by working to rejoin the EU. Together with the anti-immigration stance it’s taking to try to woo Reform UK voters back, that policy is making a return to economic growth more difficult than ever. That only stokes the grievances felt by many at home, encouraging the hard right further. Britain seems to caught in a dilemma of its own making. The Starmer government has adopted policies that are making things worse not better. Sadly, the logic of its position means it can’t change those policies. Change though, and not the kind of change Reform UK proposes, is desperately needed to get Britain out of the mess that England has led it into. Quite a dilemma, as I said. Illustration: The British bulldog confused about the way forward. Image from ChatGPT. Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

Who has been a guest on A History of England

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Heinz Guderian
• Erwin Rommel
• Charles de Gaulle
• Friedrich Pauls
• Bertram Ramsay

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.4 / 5

9 ratings

Spotify

4.9 / 5

37 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 56 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

77

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

90