PODCAST · history
Tony Robinson's Cunningcast
by Tony Robinson
Tony Robinson is best-known for playing turnip-brained Baldrick who always had 'a cunning plan' in the iconic TV show Blackadder. He's presented countless documentaries throughout his 50-year career, including 20-years on Channel 4's Time Team, inspired by his passion for history and for digging deep into the past to understand more about the present. That's his thing! In his history podcast, Tony is delving into weird and wonderful stories that grab his attention. He’s asking: Why was Stonehenge built? What did the past smell like? Why were pies invented? Why do our dogs love us so much? When did tattoos stop being taboo? What do bones tell us about past humanity? When did Jelly become a thing? Who wrote the Bible? Who is Putin and what makes him tick? No subject is off limits, because everything has a history. Along the way, Tony is joined by experts and special guests, including Miriam Margolyes, Stephen Fry, Raksha Dave, John Lloyd, Ali
Episodes
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Cunningcast S3 BEST BITS
Tony looks back at the best bits of Cunningcast Series 3 with series producer Melissa FitzGerald. Series 3 features fabulous episodes on Stonehenge, Shipwrecks, Vladimir Putin, Dogs, The Beatles, Sutton Hoo, The Bible and more with some very special guests. If you like these best bits but haven’t...
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Unravelling The DEAD SEA SCROLLS
In this bonus episode of Cunningcast, Tony Robinson is joined by biblical scholars John Barton and Francesca Stavrakopoulou to explore the Dead Sea Scrolls and what they reveal about the origins of the Bible and early Christianity. From their dramatic discovery in the late 1940s and recent AI-led...
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Who Wrote the BIBLE?
Today Tony is joined by an Anglican priest, John Barton, and an atheist scholar, Francesca Stavrakopoulou, to strip away myth and reverence and reveal the Bible as a messy, brilliant, centuries-long experiment in storytelling, belief, politics, and power. Full of sex, violence, poetry, argument,...
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Writing History: THE HOUSE OF WOLF
In this special collaborative episode, Tony Robinson sits down with Time Team’s Helen Geake for an immersive dive into ‘The House of Wolf’, his gripping new historical saga. Tony reveals how decades of archaeology, storytelling, and acting shaped the novel’s vivid world of Alfred the Great,...
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The BEATLES, John & Paul: Part 3 'The End'
The third part of Tony’s chat with The Beatles biographer Ian Leslie, exploring the emotional and creative partnership between John Lennon and Paul McCartney. They discuss how Lennon’s 1966 “more popular than Jesus” remark shook him, how the Beatles abandoned touring for studio experimentation…
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The BEATLES, John & Paul: Part 2 ‘Love Me Do’
The second part of Tony’s chat with Beatles biographer Ian Leslie, exploring how John Lennon and Paul McCartney’s unique and complex relationship shaped The Beatles. When Tony first heard ‘Love Me Do’ he was blown away by the new sound he was hearing, and he’s been a lifelong fan of The Beatles...
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The BEATLES, John & Paul: Part 1 ‘If I Fell’
This year, alongside writing his own book, Tony was gripped by that of another writer - Ian Leslie’s ‘John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs’. Tony, who is a lifelong Beatles fan, has invited Ian onto Cunningcast to chat all about The Beatles. In Part 1 of this 3 Part mini-series, Ian and Tony…
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When Did We Start Grieving for Our DOGS?
In this bonus episode, Tony and his guests the veterinary scientist Daniel Mills and dog historian Stephanie Howard-Smith discuss how our attitudes towards dogs, and mourning their deaths, have evolved. We hear about the dog paintings of Edwin Landseer from Stephanie and how dogs read human...
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How Did DOGS Become the Perfect Pets?
Tony is a great dog lover but sadly since he made ‘Do Our DOGS Really Love Us?’ In Series 1 he lost his beloved Holly-Berry, a rescue Westie. He has since tried another dog ‘adoption’ which didn’t work out so well, so today, Tony wants to explore how and why dogs have become the ‘perfect’ pets…
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Reconstructing the SUTTON HOO SHIP
One of Tony’s favourite things going on at Sutton Hoo currently is the reconstruction of the world-famous Sutton Hoo burial ship which was discovered in Mound 1 in 1939 by the archaeologist Basil Brown. The ship is believed to be the grave of King Rædwald, the 7th Century Anglo-Saxon ruler of…
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Unearthing the Secrets of SUTTON HOO
Today Tony is digging up the secrets of Sutton Hoo, England’s iconic Anglo-Saxon royal burial site, with Professor Martin Carver, who led the 1980s excavations, and Laura Howarth, Archaeology and Engagement Manager at Sutton Hoo, National Trust. The 1939 dig by Basil Brown for landowner Edith...
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The Enduring Mystery of ATLANTIS
Today Tony is diving beneath the surface of one of history’s most enduring legends: Atlantis. Joining him are maritime archaeologist and bestselling author, David Gibbins, and the writer Damian Le Bas. A life-long fascination with the Atlantis myth has shaped both their work. Together they…
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In Search of SHIPWRECKS and SUNKEN CITIES
Tony has been lucky enough to dive all over the world, he’s even dived on the Titanic with the film director James Cameron. So today on Cunningcast, Tony’s exploring underwater history with David Gibbins, maritime archaeologist and author of A History of the World in 12 Shipwrecks, and Damian Le...
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TRAILER: Cunningcast Season 3
🎙️ Tony Robinson’s Cunningcast is back, with new episodes dropping Thursdays… Actor, presenter and author, Sir Tony Robinson is back with another series of his hit ‘history with a twist’ podcast. Throughout the series, the ‘eternally curious’ Sir Tony combines his unique blend of wit, brains…
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What Drives Vladimir PUTIN?
Today we bring you a bonus episode on Vladimir Putin, digging deeper into who he really is and what makes him tick. Tony and his expert guests Mark Galeotti and Anna Arutunyan unpick the man from the myth. They discuss how Putin is a pragmatic, cautious leader, shaped more by circumstance than by...
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Who is Vladimir PUTIN and What Makes Him Tick?
Vladimir Putin casts a shadow over our lives, but it wasn’t always that way, there was a time when the West was in love with Putin, so what’s happened? Today Tony and his guests Mark Galeotti and Anna Arutunyan unpick the man from the myth. They discuss how Putin was shaped by a tough childhood…
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Decoding STONEHENGE
Today we bring you a bonus episode on Stonehenge, digging deeper into the mysteries of the world’s best-known ancient stone circle. Tony speaks to leading archeologist Mike Parker Pearson and top geologist Jane Evans about Stonehenge’s altar stone, once thought to come from Wales, which is now...
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New Discoveries at STONEHENGE
Cunningcast is back and Tony is kicking off his new series with one of his favourite subjects, Stonehenge, where new discoveries show that once again this ancient site is throwing up new evidence. Tony has invited his old friend, leading archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson, to discuss the Altar...
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Cunningcast Season 3, Coming Soon...
Announcing the launch of Season 3 of Tony Robinson’s Cunningcast on Thursday 11th September. Follow us on social media and wherever you get your podcasts to make sure you don't miss it! Series 3 will treat listeners to brand-new episodes covering: · New discoveries at STONEHENGE · Who is Vladimir...
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Cunningcast S2 BEST BITS
In advance of the new series of his cunningly curated history podcast, coming soon, Tony looks back at the best bits of Cunningcast Series 2 with series producer Melissa FitzGerald. Series 2 features fabulous episodes about Tattoos, Bones, Jelly, Magic, Cars, Beards, Bletchley Park, Hadrians…
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CHRISTMAS with CHRISTINA ROSSETTI - Re-release
Another chance to hear a Cunningcast Christmas treat: Tony reading his favourite poem ‘Goblin Market’ by Christina Rossetti. He's discussing the context and history of Rossetti’s iconic work with Madeleine Callaghan, Senior Lecturer in Romantic Literature at the University of Sheffield. In his...
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DEMENTIA ACTION WEEK: A Defining Year
To mark Dementia Acton Week, Tony is bringing you a special episode dedicated to the past, present and future of this difficult disease with his expert guest Fiona Carragher, Director of Research and Influencing at the Alzheimer’s Society. Dementia the UK’s number one killer, 1 in 3 people will...
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BEN ELTON | Blackadder: The Lost Pilot
Ben Elton is on Cunningcast today. Ben was the co-writer on Blackadder Series 2, 3 and 4: they talk about Ben's comedy roots, working on The Young Ones with Rik and Ade and how Ben got the Blackadder gig via a near miss TV sitcom about Madness. They also chew over the highs and lows of working on...
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A Cunning History of Dr WHO and the WHONIVERSE
Fresh off the back of celebrating 60 years of Dr Who last year and looking ahead to welcoming the 15th Doctor to the blockbuster show, Tony is joined by Sophie Aldred who played Dr Who’s assistant Ace and the writer, broadcaster and Dr Who superfan, Matthew Sweet. Together they look back over an...
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A Totally Tremendous History of the TURNIP (Baldrick’s Favourite Vegetable)
20 years after playing Baldrick, Tony is still stopped in the street and asked where my turnip is! Turnips made him famous, so today Tony is talking turnips in history: have they always been so unloved, a food fit only for animals and peasants like Baldrick, or is this a recent British bugbear?…
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HOWARD GOODALL | Blackadder: The Lost Pilot
Today Tony is talking to the composer Howard Goodall CBE, who wrote the now iconic Blackadder theme tune. Howard is one of Britain’s best-known composers of choral music, stage musicals, TV and film scores. He wrote the themes tunes for many hit comedy shows including Red Dwarf, Mr. Bean, The…
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Building The Wall: An Enthusiast’s Guide to HADRIAN’S WALL
Marching 73 miles from coast to coast across the narrowest neck of England, Hadrian’s Wall was the north-west frontier of the Roman Empire for nearly 300 years and yet there is still so much we don’t know about it: only 5% of the wall has been excavated and 7% is viable today. Tony is joined by...
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BLETCHLEY PARK: Codebreaking Then and Now
Passwords and codes are something we take for granted in the digital age, but this is such a new development and today Tony is going back to a time when making and breaking codes was an almost exclusively high-level military activity: most famously done behind closed doors by the brains at...
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A Fan-tash-tic History of FACIAL HAIR
Men’s facial hair is very prone to fashions: moustaches and beards are back in, but why is that and what sparks bread trends and facial hair fashions? To help him find out, Tony has invited ‘beard’ historian Alun Withey and male grooming influencer Robin James | Man For Himself. They discuss 17th...
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RICHARD CURTIS | Blackadder: The Lost Pilot
Today Tony is talking to his old friend and collaborator, the screenwriter Richard Curtis. They share memories of making Blackadder from the early years to how it all ended. Along the way, they discuss Richard’s comedy roots and how he became a top comedy screenwriter: meeting Rowan Atkinson at...
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The Past, Present and Future of CAR Engineering and Sustainability
Electric cars are the future of motoring, or so we are told, but today’s Cunningcast guests don’t agree. In fact, Hugo Spowers of Riversimple thinks hydrogen is the future and he’s designing hydrogen powered cars to prove it. Together with experienced car broadcaster Richard Sutton, they give…
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Conjuring Up… A History of Stage MAGIC
Today Tony is conjuring up a history of stage magic: from Reginald Scot's 1584 ‘Discovery of Witchcraft’ to Servais LeRoy ‘The Belgium Conjuror’ and Talma, ‘The Queen of Coins’ via escapologist Harry Houdini to TV magic with David Berglas, Paul Daniels and David Copperfield. Tony also explores...
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DAVID MITCHELL | Blackadder: The Lost Pilot
Comedian David Mitchell is joining Tony on Cunningcast today. They cover David’s comedy awakening; meeting Robert Webb and the early years of Peep Show; how Olivia Coleman got involved; his love of Blackadder; playing William Shakespeare and working with Ben Elton in Upstart Crow and meeting his...
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A Wobbly History of JELLY: From Elite Dining to Kids’ Parties and Back Again
It's all going a bit wobbly in Cunningcast Towers as we are talking about the history of jelly. Tony wants to rescue jelly from its place as a children’s party food because there was a time when making jellies was an art form and took pride of place on the tables of the wealthy. He’s invited...
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What Do BONES Tell Us About Past Humanity With ALICE ROBERTS
Tony catches up with Alice Roberts to talk about her new book ‘Crypt’ and what developments in the extraction of ancient DNA from bones can tell us about the humans they once belonged to. They cover the syphilitic anchoress of All Saints Church, Fishergate, York; new findings about the Black…
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The History of Painting on Skin: Where Do TATTOOS Come From?
The art of painting on the skin, it’s fashionable now, but it wasn’t always so. To kick of the second series of his cunningly curated podcast, Tony and his special guests Matt Lodder and Grace Neutral discuss where we can find the oldest tattoos, what’s the history behind them, ancient and modern...
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Tony Robinson's Cunningcast Season 2 TRAILER
Sir Tony Robinson is back with another series of his cunningly curated history podcast. Series 2 of Tony Robinson's Cunningcast treats listeners to brand-new cunningly curated episodes including; · The history of painting on skin: where do TATTOOS come from? · What do BONES tell us about past...
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Christmas with CHRISTINA ROSSETTI: Tony Reads GOBLIN MARKET
A Cunningcast Christmas treat: today Tony is reading his favourite poem ‘Goblin Market’ by Christina Rossetti, an often-overlooked member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and he's discussing the context and history of Rossetti’s iconic work with Madeleine Callaghan, Senior Lecturer in Romantic...
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TRAILER: CHRISTMAS Episode and SERIES 2 announcement
Tony Robinson is pleased to announce his Christmas episode of Cunningcast is dropping on the 21st December and stay tuned for Series 2, starting in the new year. Follow us on social and hit the notification bell wherever you get your podcasts to make sure you don't miss out. X: @cunningcastpod...
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Cunningcast S1 BEST BITS
Tony looks back at the best bits of Series 1 with Cunningcast’s series producer Melissa FitzGerald. If you like the these best bits but haven’t heard the full episodes, have a wander back and check them out. Or if you listened first time and liked them so much that you want to hear them all over...
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MEN'S HEALTH WEEK: Living with PROSTATE CANCER
Tony has lived with prostate cancer for 10 years and yet he knows very little about it. 1 in 8 men in the UK will get prostate cancer and the risk of getting it rises with age, but men can also be pretty rubbish at getting medical concerns checked out, especially down in the nether regions. In…
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TRAILER: PROSTATE CANCER and S1 BEST BITS special episodes COMING SOON
As we reach the end of Series 1, Tony Robinson is pleased to announce a special episode on PROSTATE CANCER in partnership with Prostate Cancer UK to coincide with Men's Health Week PLUS a special episode celebrating the BEST BITS of series 1. Coming soon. Follow us on social and hit the...
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The National CENSUS 100 Years Apart
Tony is a self-confessed Census nerd and today he’s having a nose around the newly released data from the 1921 census, alongside data from the 2021 census, to reflect on the National Census 100 years apart: what it says about us and why it matters. Hosted by Sir Tony Robinson Twitter | Instagram...
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Do our DOGS Really Love Us?
Tony really loves his dog Holly Berry, but does she really love him back? During lockdown there was a huge surge in the demand for dogs and the ‘pandemic puppy’ became something of a cliché. Now we are all going back to work, these dogs are being left home alone more often and the ‘post pandemic’...
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KNIGHTS: What Would a Medieval Sir Tony Robinson have Looked Like?
Tony was knighted for services to culture back in 2013, and it got him thinking about the concept of Knighthood: where does it come from? How and why has it changed over time? What would a medieval Sir Tony Robinson have looked like? And what would his knightly duties have been? Hosted by Sir…
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Being JOHN LLOYD
This year is the 40th birthday of the TV show that changed Tony’s life. Since playing Baldrick in Blackadder, he’s still routinely asked in the street if he’d like a turnip. Blackadder was first broadcast on 15th June 1983, so today Tony has decided to test himself to see if he can find out...
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What Did The Past SMELL like?
Today Tony has followed his nose and chosen a topic which is often overlooked: what did the past smell like? Was it bad? Are we loosing smells to history? Tony doesn’t have a brilliant sense of smell so his two guests: smell historian William Tullett, and smell designer Tasha Marks, are on hand…
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CORONATIONS: Why Does the King Need a Stick and a Ball?
Tony remembers driving a matchbox royal coach under his dining table during Queen Elizabeth II’s Coronation in 1953. Ahead of King Charles’s Coronation on May 6th 2023, he’s finding out more about where this extraordinary ritual comes from and what it all stands for with historian Kate Williams…
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Women in Politics with JESS PHILLIPS
When Jacinda Ardern stepped down from her role as Prime Minister of New Zealand in early 2023, saying she was burnt out and wasn’t able to do her job to the best of her ability anymore, it was surprising, not only because she is such a successful global leader, but the way she did it, with such...
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Why Were PIES Invented?
Pies are one of life’s great pleasures: that delicious, crusty, warm, buttery foodstuff which Tony loves. Don’t you? Doesn’t everyone? The humble pie also has a history, and today Tony and his guests GBBO 2019 winner David Atherton and food historian Neil Buttery, are helping him get under the…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Tony Robinson is best-known for playing turnip-brained Baldrick who always had 'a cunning plan' in the iconic TV show Blackadder. He's presented countless documentaries throughout his 50-year career, including 20-years on Channel 4's Time Team, inspired by his passion for history and for digging deep into the past to understand more about the present. That's his thing!
In his history podcast, Tony is delving into weird and wonderful stories that grab his attention. He’s asking: Why was Stonehenge built? What did the past smell like? Why were pies invented? Why do our dogs love us so much? When did tattoos stop being taboo? What do bones tell us about past humanity? When did Jelly become a thing? Who wrote the Bible? Who is Putin and what makes him tick? No subject is off limits, because everything has a history.
Along the way, Tony is joined by experts and special guests, including Miriam Margolyes, Stephen Fry, Raksha Dave, John Lloyd, Ali
HOSTED BY
Tony Robinson
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Tony Robinson's Cunningcast have?
Tony Robinson's Cunningcast currently has 53 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Tony Robinson's Cunningcast about?
Tony Robinson is best-known for playing turnip-brained Baldrick who always had 'a cunning plan' in the iconic TV show Blackadder. He's presented countless documentaries throughout his 50-year career, including 20-years on Channel 4's Time Team, inspired by his passion for history and for digging...
How often does Tony Robinson's Cunningcast release new episodes?
Tony Robinson's Cunningcast has 53 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Tony Robinson's Cunningcast?
You can listen to Tony Robinson's Cunningcast on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Tony Robinson's Cunningcast?
Tony Robinson's Cunningcast is created and hosted by Tony Robinson.
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