The history of all the peoples of the Russian Empire

I studied Russian and Russian history in the UK and Russia and have spent over 18 years studying, working and living in Russia.

My podcast is about Russia as an empire. It’s not the history of the Rus, or the Russians, or Slavs. It’s the history of all the peoples that have been in the Russian Empire - Tatars, Chuvash, Yakuts, Finns, Poles, Ukrainians, Armenians, Georgians and all the others.

If you love history, if you’ve watched the news from Eastern Europe or Central Asia and wondered what lies behind those situations, or want to know more about Russia beyond the Kremlin, this podcast is for you.
 

I enjoy listening to podcasts while running, gardening and cooking. I listen mainly to other history podcasts, literature, and linguistics related subjects.

This podcast germinated from the seed of my wife, who is Tatar, being frequently annoyed that no one knows what that means. My own studies focused on Tatar history, and she kept suggesting I made a podcast on Russian history to get the word out. I thought about it, but decided it would be too niche. Instead, I thought it would be better to cast the net wider - there are around 150 ethnic groups in Russia today, 15 have their own autonomous republics, but it seems hardly anyone outside Russia knows who they are. So I decided to tell the story of the Russian Empire from the point of view of everyone involved and bring their unknown stories to the world.

In early 2021, I started planning an outline for the period from the emergence of the ancestors of the Slavic, Turkic, Iranic and other peoples that would go on to inhabit the empire, through to the creation of the Russian Empire by Ivan the Terrible. The first episode came out in July 2021.
 

I do a lot of reading. I have always tried to keep abreast of the new publications in this field, but for the purposes of the podcast I started taking more organised notes.

Once I have figured out what I am going to talk about in an episode, it usually takes me about a day to write, record and edit.
I work for myself, so I fit it in.

I spend about $100 a year on the website. I spend too much on books, but that is a lifelong problem.
 

The podcast is motivation to delve deeper into areas of Russian history that lay outside of my studies and learn new things myself. There are always new things to learn. I enjoy making contact with people in the academic world to discuss their research.

The feedback from people saying that the podcast is telling them something new that they’ve not come across elsewhere is very satisfying. I especially appreciate the messages I’ve received from ethnic minority people in Russia thanking me for telling the world about them and recommending books to me.

I have made a few dollars from donations and Amazon affiliations, at some point I will add a Patreon for additional content.
 

I bought a microphone and record into Logic. I’ve made heavy electronic music with lots of distortion for years but never had vocals, so it’s been a learning curve getting a clean sound.

My show is script based, so there’s not a lot of preparation.

My interview episodes are recorded in Zoom.
 

History podcasts is an enthusiast genre. I get a lot of listeners just from people looking for a new country narrative history podcast to listen to, and word of mouth among history podcast fans.

The most effective marketing is exchanging promo clips with other history podcasters - I can nearly always see a bump in new listeners checking out the first episode after one goes out somewhere. There’s a supportive community of history podcasters and people enjoy the opportunity to collaborate.

I have Facebook and Twitter and try to post some other interesting things there too.
 

I think the main points are to know what you want to talk about and keep putting it out. Each episode brings in a few more people.
 

You can find all the podcast episodes with links to all the main platforms on www.therussianempirehistorypodcast.com, along with accompanying blogposts with maps and other relevant pictures, bibliographies, and a Resources page with recommended reading and other podcasts.