Episodes

We talk to Margarita, Berti, Founder and owner of the "Italian matters" project about the best practice for learning Italian, including dos and don'ts, sources and approaches. If you want to look her up, you will find Margari...

Just a quick message to let you know that the podcast may be slowing down a bit over the next month or so as i am studying for the exam to become a recognised Italian tour guide. Also to give you a little hint for an upcoming...

In this episode of A History of Italy , we explore the extraordinary life of Isabella d’Este , one of the most influential women of the Italian Renaissance and arguably the closest thing the 15th and 16th centuries had to a m...

We are opening a new section of the podcast website with contributions from you, dear listener! You can send in articles, thoughts, family stories and so on. They should be: Pertinent to Italy, trips to I taly Italian culture...

When the president of the brand new Republic of Italy, Luigi Einaudi decides in 1946 he wants to exercise his right to select 5 illustrious Italians to be senators for life, one of his choices falls on world famous conductor ...

Episode Summary The 16th century didn’t start kindly for the Republic of Venice—but if history has taught us anything, it’s that Venice had a knack for bouncing back. In this episode, we follow Venice from near-collapse durin...

Here are your show notes , in the same structured style and tone as before: Show Notes Episode Overview In 1525, revolutionary ideas inspired by the Protestant Reformation spread from Germany into the Alpine valleys of Trenti...

Episode Overview Continuing our tour of the Italian peninsula in the early 1500s, we move north from the Kingdom of Naples , through the Papal States and Tuscany, across the Apennines, past Genoa, and into what is today the r...

Episode Overview Having toured Spanish Sardinia and turbulent Sicily, we now complete our circuit of southern Italy by turning to the Kingdom of Naples . Once secured for Spain by the legendary Gonzalo de Córdoba, Naples beca...

Episode Overview Having raced through the early 1500s following the Italian Wars, the Medici popes, Leonardo da Vinci, and the creation of the Medici duchy in Florence, it’s time to slow down and look at the parts of Italy we...

New Edit To celebrate the 200th anniversary episode, which coincided with the 8th anniversary, we decided to hear from you, dear constant listener to create a special episode to celebrate this great milestone with many more h...

Episode Summary With Giovanni dalle Bande Nere gone, we return to Florence to witness the dramatic collapse of the centuries-old Florentine Republic and the emergence of Medici princely rule. Against the backdrop of the Sack ...

In this episode, we trace the final chapters in the life of Giovanni dalle Bande Nere, the last great condottiero of Renaissance Italy, and his unlikely, enduring friendship with the scandalous writer Pietro Aretino. From pol...

Episode Summary Picking up where we left off, Giovanni de’ Medici , son of Caterina Sforza and known to history as Giovanni of the Black Bands , continues his meteoric rise through the bloody and chaotic world of Renaissance ...

Hello You! for our 220th and 8th anniversary episode I thought I would invite contributions from the most VIP I could think of... YOU! So please send in a sound file or, if you don't feel like it, written message with a contr...

In this episode, we reunite with an old friend of the show — Caterina Sforza , the indomitable “Tigress of Forlì.” From her, we follow the turbulent and violent early life of her son, Giovanni de’ Medici , known as Il Gran Di...

In this episode, we pick up with Emperor Charles V consolidating his power over Italy after the Battle of Pavia (1525) , where the French king Francis I was captured. The uneasy Italian states, including Pope Clement VII (Giu...

After three episodes exploring the life of Leonardo da Vinci, we return to the turbulent stage of the Italian Wars. In this episode, we pick up in the early 1520s, a period shaped by papal politics, dynastic rivalries, and th...

This is a guest episode by Dirk Hoffmann of the history of the German podcast, in which he tells us all about the impact of one of the most important inventions in human history, Gutenberg printing press.

Just to let you know I haven’t disappeared!

We explore the fascinating intersection between one of the world’s most famous relics and one of its most brilliant minds: Leonardo Da Vinci and the Shroud of Turin . Was Da Vinci somehow connected to this mysterious cloth? C...

Early Life & Education Born illegitimate, Leonardo spent his youth sketching and observing nature. After moving to Florence, he entered the prestigious workshop of Andrea Verrocchio, where he learned not only painting but als...

Starting from reasons to have a good cry, particularly concerning hair, we then head to Vinci, outside Florence in the mid 1400's to witness the birth and early childhood of Leonardo to see the start of some of the characteri...

In this episode, we dive into the dramatic papacy of Pope Leo X, exploring his efforts to secure Medici power, his architectural and social reforms in Rome, and his role in the early days of the Protestant Reformation. We tra...