In the lowlands of Burma lie the remains of thousands of crumbling temples...

In this episode, we tell one of the most colourful stories of civilizational survival: the story of the Bagan Empire of Myanmar. Find out how this kingdom rose up in the Irrawaddy river valley of central Myanmar, and built one of the most remarkable series of monuments to have survived from the medieval world. Discover what life was like for the people who lived there, and find out what happened to cause its sudden and complete collapse.

16. Bagan - City Of Temples

Buried beneath the city streets of the Tunisian capital of Tunis, an ancient city lies forgotten...

In this episode, we look at one of the most dramatic stories to come down to us from the ancient world: the rise and fall of the empire of Carthage. Find out how this city rose out of the Phoenician states of the Eastern Mediterranean, and set out on voyages of discovery and settlement that put them at the centre of the ancient world. And hear how the city of Carthage was destroyed, and its memory nearly wiped from the earth.

SOURCES: https://www.patreon.com/posts/sources-for-17-81369494?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

Credits:

Written and produced by Paul Cooper
Sound engineering by Alexey Sibikin

Voice actors:

Michael Hajiantonis
Lachlan Lucas
Alexandra Boulton
Simon Jackson
Tom Marshall-Lee
Chris Harvey,
Nick Denton
Paul Casselle

17. Carthage - Empire Of The Phoenicians

In the far east of the Eurasian steppe, the sound of hoofbeats is growing...

In this episode we travel along the vast grassland corridor of the steppe, to hear one of the most remarkable and unlikely stories from medieval history – the story of the Mongol Empire. Find out how this group of nomadic horse riders united the peoples of the Mongolian steppe, and forged them into a truly unique kind of state. Discover how they conquered much of the lands of Eurasia, and brought the distant cultures of China, Persia, the Middle East and Europe into contact. And hear the story of how the world’s largest land empire finally came apart, and left the world as we know it in its wake.

Voice Actors:

Michael Hajiantonis
Henry Stenhouse
Lachlan Lucas
Alexandra Boulton
Simon Jackson
Tom Marshall-Lee
Chris Harvey,
Nick Denton
Amrit Sandhu
Matt Bidulph
Paul Casselle

Readings in Arabic were performed by Oussama Taher.
Readings in Chinese were by Richard Teng.
Readings from the secret history of the Mongols in Mongolian were performed by Uiles

19. The Mongols - Terror of the Steppe (Part 1)

In the far east of the Eurasian steppe, the sound of hoofbeats is growing...

In this episode we travel along the vast grassland corridor of the steppe, to hear one of the most remarkable and unlikely stories from medieval history – the story of the Mongol Empire. Find out how this group of nomadic horse riders united the peoples of the Mongolian steppe, and forged them into a truly unique kind of state. Discover how they conquered much of the lands of Eurasia, and brought the distant cultures of China, Persia, the Middle East and Europe into contact. And hear the story of how the world’s largest land empire finally came apart, and left the world as we know it in its wake.

Voice Actors:

Michael Hajiantonis
Henry Stenhouse
Lachlan Lucas
Alexandra Boulton
Simon Jackson
Tom Marshall-Lee
Chris Harvey,
Nick Denton
Amrit Sandhu
Sebastian Balzarolo
Matt Bidulph
Paul Casselle

Readings in Arabic were performed by Oussama Taher.
Readings in Chinese were by Richard Teng.
Readings from the secret history of the Mongols in Mongolian were performed by Uiles

19. The Mongols - Terror of the Steppe (Part 2)

In this Citations Needed News Brief interview, we're joined by Rutgers professor Eric Blanc to discuss his new book "We Are The Union," and lay out how any meaningful resistance to Trump and Trumpism has to be grounded in a growing, strong, confrontational labor movement. 

News Brief: Trump's Hollow Working Class Aesthetics and How Unions Can Lead a Real Resistance

WATCH the video of this interview here: https://youtu.be/G9ao_vRwvL0?si=O2rvPqgFWFcOOxXG

Abby Martin talks to investigative journalist Matt Kennard and author of The Racket, about the machinations of US Empire under Trump, and how the British Empire never died but simply tethered itself to the United States.

FOLLOW Matt: https://x.com/kennardmatt

EMPIRE FILES VIDEOS + MERCH + SOCIALS + ARTICLES +PATREON  + EXCLUSIVE CONTENT :: https://linktr.ee/empirefiles


Trump's Naked Imperialism & How the British Empire Never Died w/ Matt Kennard

In this News Brief, we break down an object lesson in racist US-Israeli national security state toadyism.

NPR Asks Starving Palestinian Living On Rubble to Denounce Hamas, Co-Sign his Own Ethnic Cleansing

“Democrats Need to Face Why Trump Won,” states The New York Times' Ezra Klein Show. “Democratic strategist issues ‘hard truth’ to party members after losing election,” CNN tells viewers. “This Is Why Kamala Harris Really Lost,” writes Eric Levitz for Vox.

Since the 2024 presidential election, elite Democrats and the pundits in their orbits have taken to newspapers, podcasts, and cable channels to attempt to explain why Kamala Harris lost and Donald Trump won. Chief among the explanations is this one: Democrats became controlled and overtaken by the "Wokes," becoming overly concerned with pronouns and political correctness, too soft on immigration and crime, while the electorate drifted to the right and that, to win the future, Democrats have to––alas, and with the putative heavy heart––go right with them.

Instead of contending with how the Democratic Party has abandoned a working class composed of all races and gender identities, chased big money and been overtaken by venal PR flacks and lawyers, Democratic party officials, big donor funded “pollsters,” “strategists,” and elite media have done what they’ve always done whenever there's an alleged “soul searching” in the Democratic party: scapegoated vulnerable people, insisted on a fixed, intrinsically conservative voting base and repackaging what is simply a newer version of corporate-friendly status quo liberalism.

On this episode, part one of a two-part series we’re calling "The Empire Strikes First,” we examine how party elites sought, before the election was even called on the night of November 5, 2024: to control the narrative and maintain their status and power within the party, blaming everyone but themselves, relying on tortured data and transparently self-serving conclusions which permit them to continue their longstanding process of justifying elite-serving, center-right policy, feigning Deep Concern for the preferences of Joe Six Pack, all while making sure their “consultant” gravy train chugs along unabated.

Our guest is UC-Berkeley professor Jake Grumbach.

The Empire Strikes First Part I: Party Elites Who Lost to Trump (Twice) Blame Everyone But Themselves

One of the most unlikely tales of a society’s fall in is the incredible saga of the Vikings of Greenland. 

Find out the history of how these European settlers built a society on the farthest edge of their world, and survived for centuries among some of the harshest conditions ever faced by man. Discover how this civilization was able to overcome the odds for so long, and examine the evidence about what happened to cause its final and mysterious collapse. Including Viking poetry, Inuit folktales and thousands upon thousands of walrus.

Credits:

Sound engineering by Thomas Ntinas

Voice Actors:

Jacob Rollinson
Jake Barrett-Mills
Sebastian Garbacz
Special thanks to Jordan Ashley Moore (Ancient Literature Dude) for his readings of Old Norse poetry.

Music by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
Source: incompetech.com/music/royalty-fre…isrc=USUAN1100209
Artist: incompetech.com/

Fall of Civilizations

4. The Greenland Vikings - Land of the Midnight Sun

Today, the Songhai Empire is all but forgotten by history. But this medieval kingdom was once the most powerful force in Africa.

Find out how this civilization grew up on the fringes of the Sahara Desert, among some of the most extreme conditions that nature can throw at us. Discover how it grew and flourished, passing through a process known as the imperial cycle, and learn about what ultimately caused its sudden and dramatic collapse.

Credits:

Sound engineering by Thomas Ntinas

Voice Actors:

Jake Barrett-Mills
Rhy Brignell
Bryan Tshiobi
Pip Willett

Music by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
Source: incompetech.com/music/royalty-fre…isrc=USUAN1100209
Artist: incompetech.com/

7. The Songhai Empire - Africa's Age of Gold

A city in ruins. A dynasty in tatters. An empire in ashes...

This episode, we look at the remarkable story of the first empire of ancient China, the Han dynasty. With ancient Chinese poetry, songs and folk music, we look back at the first empire's rise, its remarkable technological advances, and its first, tentative attempts to make contact with the empires of the west. Finally, we look at all the reasons behind the first age of Imperial China's final, dramatic fall.

Credits:

Sound engineering by Thomas Ntinas

Voice Actors:

Claire Hynes
Jake Barrett-Mills
Shem Jacobs
Alex Peattie

Music by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

Source: incompetech.com/

10. China's Han Dynasty - The First Empire in Flames

A history podcast looking at the collapse of a different civilization each episode. What did they have in common? Why did they fall? And what did it feel like to watch it happen?

7. The Songhai Empire - Africa's Age of Gold

Fall of Civilizations Podcast