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PODCAST

Ancient History Fangirl

Jenny Williamson and Genn McMenemy

An ancient history podcast run by two Millennial women. Misbehaving emperors, poison assassins, mythological mayhem; it’s like if Hardcore History met up with My Favorite Murder in the ancient world, with a heavy helping of booze and laughter.

history

All Episodes

71:04

How an Empire Ends: Life of Amalasuintha

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/06/19

⁠Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! In our last episode, we told you all about the rise of Theodoric the Great and the founding of the Ostrogothic Kingdom in Italy. Now, we’re going to tell you all about the women in his family—and the effect they had on his kingdom. Theodoric had a wife, a sister, and three daughters—all of whom played an important role in his empire-building. His wife was the daughter of another powerful Germanic tribe—the Franks—and he married off his

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93:46

RE-RELEASE: 536 AD: A Volcanic Murder Mystery

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/06/12

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! ⁠What was the worst year to be alive? Some researchers have a very specific answer to this question: 536 AD. This is a year when the global temperature dropped, and it was winter all year round—for multiple years. The sun disappeared for 18 months as the world was covered in a veil of sulfuric dust. Crops failed. People starved, and fell to eating each other and warring over scarce resources. From China to Mexico, thriving civilizations

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99:49

How an Empire Ends: Theodoric the Great and the...

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/06/05

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! After 75 years under Hunnic dominion, the Ostrogoths seized their freedom and set about taking over control of the Western Roman Empire. The man who led them was named Theodoric the Great. He was a member of an ancient Gothic family called the Amali, which went all the way back to the Crisis of the Third Century. Supposedly. Theodoric was the founder of the Ostrogothic Kingdom, which upended a thousand years of Roman rule in Italy

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70:12

How an Empire Ends: 75 Years Under Hunnic Dominion

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/05/22

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! In our last episode, we talked about how the Visigoths came to be: forged in the fire of the Gothic War of 376-382 and the immigration crisis that went along with it. Now, we’ll take a look at what happened to their kin who stayed on the northern side of the Danube—the Greuthungi who were not allowed to cross. What happened to them was 75 years under Hunnic dominion. This time changed them. Some were brutally exploited. Still others

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76:02

How an Empire Ends: the Starving Camps

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/05/08

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! In our last few episodes, we’ve told you what we know about pre-Roman Gothic archaeology, culture, and history. We’ve told you about conditions both inside and outside the Roman Empire that kicked off the Migration Era. And now we’re going to tell you the story of one of those Gothic Wars in detail: the war of 376-382 AD. A war that may have occurred during Alaric’s childhood—and that may have been a radicalizing event for him and for

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73:28

How an Empire Ends: Rome's Gothic Immigrants

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/04/24

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! In our last episode, we took a look at the outside forces driving the engine of the Migration Era: Hunnic migrations and invasions, constant displacement and conflict at the Roman borders. But Goths lived inside Rome too—in the heart of the Italian peninsula, and also in the outer provinces, in territories that were conquered by force. This story isn’t just about Goths that lived outside Rome. It’s also about the Goths that lived

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59:33

How an Empire Ends: The Migration Era

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/04/10

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! It was the beginning of the Migration Era where the Goths’ history with the Roman Empire begins. The Migration era was a cycle of wars and conflicts lasting hundreds of years. Alaric’s sack of Rome was only a small part of it. What started it? Nobody knows. But it would have been an extremely chaotic time to be alive, when ordinary people had to leave all that they’d built and flee in the face of invaders—who were also refugees fleeing

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108:04

How an Empire Ends: Culture of the Goths

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/03/27

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! In our last episode, we delved into the archaeology of the pre-Roman Goths. But what about Gothic culture? What do we know about pre-Roman Gothic culture, before the Goths were Romanized? To get a real sense of what is authentically Gothic is really difficult. We don’t have much information about the Goths’ daily lives or culture. We know almost nothing about their pre-Christian religious practices and beliefs. What we do have is a lot

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70:42

How an Empire Ends: Origin of the Goths

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/03/13

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! The Roman Empire stood for a thousand years. Many causes have been given for its downfall—but if just one group of people could be said to be culpable, it would be the Goths. They stormed its borders en masse, scored outsized victories that no one had won before, killed two emperors and raised up their own, sacked the city of Rome after a thousand inviolable years; and built their own kingdoms within the Empire’s decaying corpse. Their

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68:40

Rebel Daughters of the Roman Empire (With Tana Rebellis)

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/02/27

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! In Enemy of My Dreams, Jenny based her heroine Julia partially on Julia the Elder—rebellious daughter of Augustus who got herself exiled to Pandateria for being, as the ancients say, “too slutty.” Julia the Elder refused, REFUSED to rein it in. And for that, we adore her. But accounts of her life are told by men, sometimes her political enemies. She may have been a victim of slander, or engaged in deeper plotting that her dad wanted to

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37:10

RE-RELEASE: Attila the Hun and the Rebel Princess

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/02/20

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! In 450 AD, the Imperial Princess Honoria--daughter of Galla Placidia--was desperate to escape her arranged marriage. So she made an indecent proposal--to Attila the Hun. On this single action, cities were torched. Saints were raised. Thousands died. And Venice was founded. Find out how it all went down. Sponsors and Advertising This podcast is a member of Airwave Media podcast network. Want to advertise on our show? Please direct

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38:29

RE-RELEASE: Ataulf x Galla Placidia

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/02/13

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! He was a fierce barbarian warlord—a man who had stood between his people and the Roman Empire since the sack of Rome. She was a Roman Imperial princess with a core of iron strength. Born enemies, the love of Ataulf and Galla Placidia is marked by tragedy—but in its time, it burned hot enough to reshape an Empire. This is their story. Sponsors and Advertising This podcast is a member of Airwave Media podcast network. Want to advertise on

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81:24

AHFG Book Club: Enemy of My Dreams with Jenny Williamson

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/02/06

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! This week’s Book Club author interview is none other than up-and-coming romantasy and historical romance author Jenny Williamson, discussing her upcoming debut Enemy of My Dreams: her huge historical crush on Alaric of the Goths, the inspiration for her entirely-made-up hot-mess heroine, and how she adds “verisimilitude” to her fight scenes. Join Genn and guest co-host Liv Albert, of Let’s Talk about Myths, Baby!, as they crack open a

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66:46

In Search of the Real Alaric (With Douglas Boin)

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/01/30

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! Who was Alaric of the Visigoths, really? It’s a difficult question to answer. Alaric left no manifesto. There is nothing in his own words to explain his motivations for sacking Rome, or all the choices he made leading up to that fateful day. All we have are the assumptions of his enemies, which sometimes don’t’ make a lot of sense. Enter Douglas Boin. His groundbreaking biography, Alaric the Goth: an Outsider’s History of the Fall of

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57:06

AHFG Book Club: Sexy Shifters and Fallen Angels with...

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/01/23

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! This week, we feature a conversation with the OG romance novelist—the one all our romance novelist friends list among their favorites. Nalini Singh has an impressive, multi-decade career with several long-running, blockbuster romantasy and paranormal series featuring sexy shifters, fallen angels, and dangerous psychic warriors. Join us as we explore these fascinating worlds and discuss the secrets to a long-running career in romance and

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52:25

RE-RELEASE: Stuff Alaric Said

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/01/16

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! On August 24, 410 AD, Alaric and the Visigoths sacked the city of Rome. Before he sacked it, he starved it. Before that, he went toe to toe with the Roman Empire for fifteen years—uniting disparate tribes, holding a people together, and achieving more against Rome than any barbarian leader before him. Sponsors and Advertising This podcast is a member of Airwave Media podcast network. Want to advertise on our show? Please direct

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16:34

End of Season 12 Announcement

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/01/09

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! It's the end of Season 12--and what a year it's been! We had some big things happen in 2024 and we hope that 2025 will be even bigger and more exciting. Join us as we discuss what it was like covering the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, our upcoming books and novel projects, and our plans for the podcast going forward. Thank you so much for taking this journey with us! Sponsors and Advertising This podcast is a member of Airwave Media

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61:34

RE-RELEASE: Janus: God of the New Year

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2025/01/02

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! Janus is the two-faced god of the Roman pantheon. He was the god of beginnings and endings, of dual natures, of passageways and passage through time. He’s the god of thresholds and doorways and gates, and the god of change, both concrete and abstract. He’s constantly in motion; he’s the god who’s always just passing through. Janus may not be very well-known. But in his time, he was considered one of the most important gods—perhaps more

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46:49

A Very Alaric Christmas

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2024/12/26

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! How would Alaric of the Visigoths celebrate the midwinter holiday (Christmas? Solstice? Yule?). The idea was kicked around a lot between the two of us until it seemed imperative that we actually write this episode. And thus, an episode was born. In this episode, Alaric is about six years old. He doesn’t exactly understand that his life is hanging by a knife’s edge – caught between the invading Huns and the colonizing Romans. This is the

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80:34

RE-RELEASE: Frau Holle: Wicked Woman of Yule

Ancient History Fangirl ·

2024/12/24

Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! This year, we’ve found one of the most metal and wild Yuletide goddesses yet – Frau Holle. Human sacrifices, spindles in yer vag, plague, starvation, caves of offerings and bones, the Grimms brothers, golden showers, child cannibalism, ZOMBIES – are any of these putting you in the Yuletide spirit? They should. Because we’re about to share with you the story of a very Frau Holle Christmas. Sponsors & Advertising This podcast is a member of

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326 results

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