Histories Of The Unexpected

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis don the waders, bait the hook of history and cast out to land the unexpected history of FISH! Which is all about the fascinating history of cod (via the Vikings and Mr Birds Eye), it's about Samuel Pepys, the Royal Society, Sir Isaac Newton and Willughby and Ray’s exceptionally unsuccessful De Historia Piscium (The History of Fishes). It's also all about the History of Fish and Chips, fly fishing and feathers stolen from historic birds, and marlin fishing off the coast of Australia. Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis get all mechanised and programme the unexpected history of ROBOTS! Which is all about AI and the rise of ChatGPT, popular culture, science fiction and imagining good and bad machines (think C3PO, R2D2 and Metal Mickey). It's also all about the Brazen Head automaton and the late medieval polymath Roget Bacon, via Robert Greene's Elizabethan play, Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay (c.1590), as well as the Industrial Revolution, dancing bears and mechanical automata. Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this RERELEASE episode from the archive the Histories of the Unexpected team explain how the history of Christmas is actually all about BAD LUCK - Who Knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest RERELEASED episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis don their most Artic-like winter wear to track down the extraordinarily unexpected history of SNOW! A festive taster for all our listeners! Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis take stock of half a century (in honour of the Daybell's milestone Birthday!) to unwrap the extraordinarily unexpected history of THE NUMBER 50! Which is all about models of how we interpret the past, the headlines on 3 December 1972, and the remarkable meanings and symbolisms of the number 50!! It's also about the fascinating history of the £50 bank note, and the notion of historical figures on the back of legal tender. Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis pinch the historical pus out of the extraordinarily unexpected history of SPOTS! Which is all about female beauty and false advertising in the nineteenth century in the United States of America, and the strangely titled Arsenic Wafers, which it was advertised were entirely safe and ensured a blemish free complexion. It's also all about the Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4, and the history of acne, teenagers and dermatology!! Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis shout TALLY HO! and follow the historical scent of the extraordinarily unexpected history of FOXES! Which has nothing whatsoever to do with fox-hunting, but is in fact all about the remarkable sport of fox-tossing (as well as aerial golf!), and Basil Brush and the history of British light entertainment. It's also all about Operation Fantasia in the aftermath of Pearl Harbour when the Office of Strategic Service (America’s wartime intelligence agency) experimented with psychological warfare against the Japanese based on Shinto kitsune, or fox-shaped spirits with magical abilities. And it's also all about stuffed foxes (and/or wolves) in museums; Aesop's Fables and the story of the fox and the grapes, and the board game Fox and Geese. Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis get all hush, hush (we'd love to tell you, but then we'd have to kill you....) about the extraordinarily unexpected history of SECRETS! Which is all about Elizabethan Catholics, recusancy laws and priest holes (and a recent adventure at the wonderful Harvington Hall); it's about secret codes and ciphers, and the practice of hiding sweaty gloves in chimneys to deter malign spirits. It's also all about D-Day and operations in WW2, misogynistic attitudes in the past of women not being able to keep secrets, and Charles Swynnerton's Indian Nights' Entertainment; or, Folk-Tales from the Upper Indus. Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis tackle the extraordinarily unexpected history of BEARS! It's not all about Teddy Bears - Paddington, Winnie-the-Pooh and Rupert bear - in fact it's all about bear attacks and how to avoid them; keep bears at pets (via Lord Byron). It's also all about accidents and bear-baiting in Shakespearean England, and travel. Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis tackle the extraordinarily unexpected history of MUMBLING! Yes! It does have a history, and this one takes us back to the basics of the concept of histories of the unexpected, which is the historical equivalent of rambling around the past like a bull in a historical china shop. Mumbling is all about historical definitions and talking with your mouth full; it's about 90s rap phenomenon, mumble rap; linguistic compression trips and the history of colour, as well as Rocky Balboa and Marlon Brando's Don Corleone in The Godfather. It's also all about speaking in tongues, and the great vowel shift and mass migrations! Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis uncover the fascinating and remarkably unexpected history of OLD AGE! Which is all about being rude about old people and the gendering of the muff, via William Hogarth's 1746 etching 'A Taste of the High Life' and Piercy Roberts ‘Comfort for an Old Maid’. It's also all about intergenerational oral history projects between school pupils and residents in car homes, the history of isolation and loneliness; the photograph and William Turner's famous painting The Fighting Temeraire! Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis try to take very seriously indeed the unexpected history of IDIOTS! Which is all about the current disarray in British politics (the kamikaze budget) and the concept of the useful idiot - or a person who is duped into acting for a cause without properly knowing what they're doing - a la Tory party recklessness via Vladimir Lenin. It's also all about the incredibly important field of disability history and the idea of the 'disabled' mind and the curious case of Miss Fanny Fust; the history of the dunce and childhood teasing! Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this fourth and final RELEASE for HALLOWEEN 2022, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis discuss the unexpected history of FEAR! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this third RELEASE for HALLOWEEN 2022, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis discuss the unexpected history of MONSTERS! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this second RELEASE for HALLOWEEN 2022, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis discuss the unexpected history of ZOMBIES! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this RERELEASED episode for HALLOWEEN 2022, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis try to breathe new life into the unexpected history of CORPSES! Which is all about the eccentric Cornish landowner Sir James Tillie (1645-1713), who demanded that upon his death his body should be tied to a chair facing the River Tamar in a purpose-built mausoleum at Pentillie Castle (and he was to be fed every day!); Viking corpse doors and mortuary practices related to doors; and superstitions to do with bleeding corpses. It's also all about sixteenth- and seventeenth-century burial practices; exhumation, posthumous execution and corpses on the move (via Oliver Cromwell); Thomas Hood's poem, The Death Bed; body farms and swamp men! Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis wander down memory lane and bump into old friends in this reminiscence about the unexpected history of REUNIONS! Which is inspired by James's recent gaudy at his old college, and is in fact all about the history of fine dining, pomp and ceremony in twentieth-century Oxford University; it's black family reunions after the abolition of slavery in the United States of America, and the reunion of loved ones after the Second World War. It's also all about the Fujian Tulou (large earthen buildings that housed an entire family clan) in South East China, and the growth of family genealogy in the US around the Civil War. Who knew? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis unpack the box, set up the pieces and roll the dice of history to play around with the unexpected history of BOARDGAMES! Which is all about POW camps during WW2, portability and the Vasa Warship, which sank on its maiden voyage in 1628; it's about Hadrian's wall and chess as a way of look at a cultural history of the world, via the British Museum's Lewis Chessmen. It's also all about the history of game playing, the symbolism of backgammon and Arabic Biographer Ibn Khalikan (1211-82) and the mysterious world of Dungeons and Dragons. Who knew? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis are inspired by having just watched a fantastic new film on Netflix called I Used to be Famous, so much so that we have done a whole episode based around it on the unexpected history of FAME! Which is all about the phenomenon of celebrity, and the changed fortunes of the famous from Ancient Rome, through P.T. Barnam to the Beetles and Elvis, and the rise of boybands . It's also all about the fall from power, as in the cases of Sir Walter Ralegh and Mussolini, as well as recycling in Ancient Rome and the erasure of political has-beens from the face of the imperial city. Who knew Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this latest episode, the Unexpected duo, Professor James Daybell and Dr Sam Willis head down to the beach of history and dig into the unexpected history of BUCKETS! Which is all the history of seaside holidays, sandcastles, childhood pastimes and sand eels. It's also all about the Great Fire of London in 1666 (via seventeenth-century fire buckets); Roman and medieval situlas and religious ceremonies, as well as alum collecting, urine and the history of leather - which of course is all about GLOVES, GLOVES, GLOVES! Who knew! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.