History

This episode continues the unfolding story of the original thirteen colonies, tracing how distinct communities—often separated by belief, ambition, and circumstance—took root along the...

Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro Altamirano was born in 1485 in Medellín, Spain, to a family of minor nobility. Though his lineage carried...

This episode of The Empire: A 250 Year American Story zooms in on the origins of the first English colonies, tracing how their distinct...

This episode traces the unlikely, often harrowing path that led a small band of English believers to the edge of a continent—and into the...

  The latest episode of The Empire: A 250‑Year American Story plunges listeners into the turbulent world that shaped the earliest European settlements in North...

Between 900 AD and 1492, the Catholic Church stood as the most powerful institution in Europe—spiritually, politically, and economically. Its monasteries preserved learning, its...

When we imagine Europe on the eve of Columbus’s 1492 voyage, we often picture a continent brimming with confidence—cathedrals rising, kings expanding their power,...

The next episode in our podcast series The Empire: A 250 Year American Story, revisits the familiar story of Christopher Columbus—but strips away the...

Christopher Columbus was born between late August and late October of 1451 in the bustling maritime Republic of Genoa, a world where the sea...

In this episode of our podcast series The Empire: A 250 Year American Story, we continue our look at the old world, before the...