Megan McGrath
29 episodes listed below
PRESS PLAY
Welcome to The Resurrectionists, a morbid archaeology and history podcast, hosted by osteoarchaeologist Megan McGrath. Dive into the fascinating history of human remains – from age-old burial customs to cutting-edge forensics. Embark on a bone-chilling expedition every week, as we resurrect enthralling cases of the macabre and morbid from across human history. Whether you're an archaeology enthusiast or simply drawn to history's darker enclaves, this podcast is your gateway. Tune in each week as we resurrect long-buried secrets, one bone at a time.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Specialist interviews use bodies, burials, and contested remains to reveal how historical evidence carries questions of power, belief, and ownership.
Megan McGrath begins with an arresting detail, then gives a specialist room to explain the larger historical problem behind it. The Resurrectionists moves between Victorian burial dress, the online sale of human remains, health and disease in 19th-century Richmond, fossil…
Ancient Egyptian mortuary priests turn up in lawsuits; your morbid curiosity has found its paperwork.
Press play if you want
Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Ancient Thebes comes alive through priestly disputes, lawsuits, and a very human paper trail.
Ancient Thebes emerges as a place where mortuary priests, burial customs, lawsuits, and legal paperwork all carry real weight, with Dr. Lauren de Heer, a research fellow in egyptology at University College Oxford, guiding the discussion through the documentary evidence.
Victorian burial dress becomes a sharp study of how the living wanted the dead to look.
The episode gives Frances Harvey's work a clear center, moving through history, fashion design, textiles, and her PhD on burial dress in the Victorian period. What stands out most is the attention to how a body was meant to look when dressed, composed, and almost alive.
Medieval undead stories explained through scholarship, saints, demons, and a little unease.
This episode starts with a grim burial and return story, then widens into a medieval question that is stranger than it first sounds: what happens when the dead do not stay put?
When fossils enter institutions, ownership becomes the dispute.
It treats restitution as a dispute that has long sat in cultural museums and is only gradually moving into natural history, where these objects are still often read as apolitical or sterile.
A clear-eyed look at how human remains can enter oddity culture and blur legal lines.
The Resurrectionists stays fixed on an uneasy question: what does it mean when human remains move through the same world as oddity culture and home decor? Dr.
A careful look at health and disease in Richmond, where the record is thin and the boundaries blur.
This conversation examines health and disease in 19th-century Richmond through death records, censuses, and the absences they leave behind. Jacqueline Dreyer provides steady historical framing for Black midwives, barbers, and other practitioners whose work moved across race,…
Mexican history, from the excavated to the conjectured.
Phoebe Judge narrates true crime history and interviews the authors who uncovered it.
Dramatized deep dives into American history, from the Galveston hurricane to Harper Lee's Mockingbird.
Dana Schwartz narrates the violent lives of monarchs, warlords, and queens.
Tracy Wilson and Holly Frey narrate overlooked history, from Courbet's realism to IUD regulation.
Architectural historian Jacqueline Dreyer discusses her research into Black medical professionals in 19th-century Richmond, Virginia, exploring how free and enslaved Black midwives, nurses, and barbers provided healthcare across racial lines.
Ancient Theban priestly archives preserved contracts, letters, and mummy lists, not just funerary texts.
Frances Harvey discusses Victorian burial dress on The Resurrectionist Podcast, drawing on her PhD at the University of Technology, Sydney and her background in history, costume design, and textiles.
["The Resurrectionists' \"Walking Dead: From Medieval Texts to Modern Media\" opens with William of Newborough's corpse returning home, climbing into bed, and alarming his wife.", "Megan interviews Polina Ignatova, whose PhD at the University of Lancaster examined walking dead narratives in medieval English texts and whose later work linked aquatic animals, sea monsters, and Lovecraft's Deep Ones.", "Polina compares medieval walking dead with modern zombies through Lazarus, St.
The Resurrectionists episode "Ancestors or Artifacts?
An interview with Dr.
An interview with Dr.
The host and a friend discuss basic bone anatomy, debunking the myth of the funny bone.
This episode explores the Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük, focusing on its burial practices where the dead were buried beneath the floors of homes.
An exploration of the Neolithic site Çatalhöyük, focusing on its burial practices and the blurred line between life and death.
This episode introduces the history of medical dissection and the resurrectionists who supplied bodies in the 1800s.