Hilarious Histories - What’s So Funny About The Past?

Public historian Greg Jenner embarks on a quest to find out how comedy writers make history funny.

Greg is the historical consultant to all eight series of CBBC’s Emmy and Bafta-winning Horrible Histories. In short, he is both a history nerd and a comedy nerd.

Over the three hours we'll hear a range of comedy from the BBC archives including Pauline Pepys Dowry, starring David Mitchell, Olivia Coleman, Katherine Parkinson and Sharon Horgan; Austentatious with Cariad Lloyd, Rachel Parris, Andrew Hunter-Murray; and stand-up from Eddie Izzard.

There’s also excavated audio of Monty Python discussing the controversy surrounding The Holy Grail and Life Of Brian, and a choice selection of shiny trinkets from Horrible Histories.

To help Greg grapple with the big questions over accuracy, ethics, and whether Mr Darcy wore underpants, he’ll be chatting to comedian-turned-classicist Natalie Haynes; Horrible Histories head writer Ben Ward; Austentatious improvisers Cariad Lloyd and Andrew Hunter-Murray, and Stephen Fry, who apparently was in a show called Blackadder.

Pictured: Greg Jenner and Stephen Fry

• Producer: Anne-Marie Luff

Publicity contact: Radio 4 Publicity