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Hello and welcome to your Dead To Me with the Radio 4 comedy podcast that takes history

seriously. My name is Greg Jenner, I'm a public historian, author and broadcaster, and I'm

delighted to say that today we are recording live from the BBC Radio Theatre, which means

I get to say, hello audience. So I want to also say a huge thank you to the marvellous

musicians from the world famous BBC concert orchestra and their director Charles Mutter.

We're going to have music throughout the show. Say hello orchestra.

So today we are journeying back to the 15th century to Italy to delve into the life of the

genius artist all round polymath and my favourite person from all of history ever, which is

some feat. He was a literal Renaissance man and his name was Leonardo Da Vinci. Joining me are two

very special guests in history corner. She is professor of Renaissance history at Manchester

Metropolitan University as well as the author of the beauty and the terror and alternative history

of the Italian Renaissance. She was a BBC new generation thinker and the historical advisor to

the BBC adaptation of Hillary Mansell's Wolf Hall. And you will remember her from our episode on

the cheeky cheeky borsches, although scamps, they get around. It's Professor Catherine Fletcher.

Hi Catherine, welcome back. Hi Greg. Hi Greg, it's great to be back. I'm looking forward to the

history and I'm just about hoping my 1990s higher chemistry gets me through the science.

Don't worry, I think we've got someone who can handle the science. In comedy corner, he's an

absolute star of stand up. He crushed it on Taskmaster. He was iconic as the host of mock the week

across 17 years. He went toe-to-toe with Professor Brian Cox on Stargazing Live and lived to tell

the tale. He's the author of several books for adults and kids including Secret Science, the

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