Podcasts by Germany: Memories of a Nation
Neil MacGregor, director of the British Museum, explores 600 years of Germany's complex and often challenging history using objects, art, landmarks and literature.
Further podcasts by BBC Radio 4
Podcast on the topic Geschichte
All episodes
Barlach's Angel from 2014-11-06T10:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on Ernst Barlach's sculpture Hovering Angel, a unique war memorial, commissioned in 1926 to hang in the cathedral in Güstrow.
Producer Paul Kobrak.
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The New German Jews from 2014-11-05T10:00
After concentration camps like Buchenwald and extermination camps like Auschwitz, it seemed that the story of Jews in Germany must come to a full stop at the end of the war. Why would any Jew in...
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Out of the Rubble from 2014-11-04T10:00
Neil MacGregor talks to a Trümmerfrau, a woman who cleared rubble from the streets of Berlin in 1945, and focuses on a sculpture by Max Lachnit, a portrait of a Trümmerfrau made from hundreds of...
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The Germans Expelled from 2014-11-03T10:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on a small hand-cart to tell the story of the forced movement of more than 12 million Germans, who fled or were forced out of Central and Eastern Europe after 1945.
...
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At the Buchenwald Gate from 2014-10-31T10:00
Neil MacGregor visits Buchenwald, one of the earliest and largest concentration camps.
Producer Paul Kobrak.
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Purging the Degenerate from 2014-10-30T10:00
Neil MacGregor examines how the Nazis attacked art they viewed as 'entartet' - degenerate.
He charts how Goebbels, Hitler's propaganda minister, led a process designed to purify all Germa...
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Money in Crisis from 2014-10-29T10:00
Neil MacGregor examines the emergency money - Notgeld - created during World War One and its aftermath. Small denomination coins began to disappear because their metal was worth more than their ...
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Kathe Kollwitz: Suffering Witness from 2014-10-28T10:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on the art of Käthe Kollwitz (1867-1945), who expresses the loss and suffering of war, especially after the death of her younger son Peter at the front in 1914.
Neil...
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Bismarck the Blacksmith from 2014-10-27T10:00
Neil MacGregor charts the career of Otto von Bismarck (1815-98), known as the Iron Chancellor: he argued that the great questions of the day should be decided by 'iron and blood'.
Bismarck...
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Bauhaus: Cradle of the Modern from 2014-10-24T09:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on the Bauhaus school of art and design, founded in Weimar in 1919. Our cities and houses today, our furniture and typography, are unthinkable without the functional elega...
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From Clock to Car: Masters of Metal from 2014-10-23T09:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on the long tradition of German metalwork, from finely-engineered clocks to the Volkswagen Beetle. German gold and silversmiths were established as the best in the world, ...
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Porcelain: The White Gold of Saxony from 2014-10-22T09:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on how 18th century German chemists discovered the secrets of Chinese porcelain, known then as 'white gold' - translucent, fine-glazed, and much-coveted. Porcelain became ...
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Dürer: An Artist for All Germans from 2014-10-21T09:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on the work of Dürer (1471-1528), arguing that he is the defining artist of Germany, his image - and his self-image - known to all Germans. He was a new kind of artist, cl...
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Gutenberg: In the Beginning Was the Printer from 2014-10-20T09:00
Neil MacGregor examines the life and legacy of Johannes Gutenberg, who invented moveable type and pioneered the printing press. For many, it is the moment at which the modern world began, as the...
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1848: The People's Flag and Karl Marx from 2014-10-17T09:00
Neil MacGregor reflects on the events of 1848, when black, red and gold became the colours of the flag for a united Germany, and Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels published The Communist Manifesto....
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Iron Nation from 2014-10-16T09:00
Neil MacGregor charts the role of iron in 19th century Prussia, an everyday metal whose uses included patriotic jewellery and the Iron Cross, a military decoration to honour all ranks.
Pro...
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Holbein and the Hansa from 2014-10-15T09:00
Neil MacGregor charts the rise and fall of the Hansa, or Hanseatic League, a great trading alliance of 90 cities, including Lübeck, Hamburg, Danzig, Riga and London.
He also focuses on the...
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Riemenschneider: Sculpting the Spirit from 2014-10-14T09:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on the religious sculptures of Riemenschneider (c1460- 1531), whose reputation as an artist has steadily risen. He is seen as a supreme sculptor, working in a peculiarly G...
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The Battle for Charlemagne from 2014-10-13T09:00
Neil MacGregor visits Aachen cathedral to examine the legacy of Charlemagne (c. 747-c. 814) - was he a great French ruler, or was he Charles the Great, a German? And what is the significance of ...
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One People, Many Sausages from 2014-10-10T09:00
Neil MacGregor focuses on two great emblems of Germany's national diet: beer and sausages. He visits Munich to find out how regional specialities represent centuries of regional history and dive...
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The Walhalla: Hall of Heroes from 2014-10-09T09:00
Neil MacGregor visits the Walhalla, one of the most idiosyncratic expressions of national identity in 19th century Europe - a temple to German-ness, modelled on the Parthenon, built high above t...
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One Nation Under Goethe from 2014-10-08T09:00
Continuing his focus on the things which bind Germans together, Neil MacGregor examines the life and work of Goethe, the greatest of all German poets: "There is a case for arguing that if Americ...
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Fairy Tales and Forests: The Grimms and Caspar David Friedrich from 2014-10-07T09:00
Continuing a week of programmes with a focus on the things which bind Germans together, Neil MacGregor reveals how the fairy tales collected by the Grimms and the landscape art of Caspar David F...
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Luther and a Language for All Germans from 2014-10-06T09:00
Neil MacGregor continues his series with a week of programmes with a focus on the things which bind Germans together - ranging from the importance of the great German writer Goethe, and the sign...
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Fragments of Power from 2014-10-03T09:00
Neil MacGregor discovers how coins reveal the range and diversity of the Holy Roman Empire, with around 200 different currencies struck in the different territories of Germany.
It's an ext...
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Strasbourg - Floating City from 2014-10-02T09:00
Neil MacGregor visits Strasbourg, now in France, but also a city with a key place in German history, culture and precision engineering, as revealed by a model of the cathedral clock, now in the ...
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Kafka, Kant and Lost Capitals from 2014-10-01T09:00
Continuing the week's theme of Germany's floating frontiers, Neil MacGregor visits two cities now beyond Germany's present borders, but which played important roles in Germany's intellectual and...
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Divided Heaven from 2014-09-30T09:00
Neil MacGregor examines the story of the two Germanys, East and West, created in 1949, through objects including a wet suit used in an escape attempt from the East in 1987, which was later used ...
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The View from the Gate from 2014-09-29T09:00
Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum, begins his series examining 600 years of German history through objects, with a reflection on Germany's floating frontiers.
Twenty-five year...
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