ancient world

Lost Cities of the Ancients episode 1: Pi-Ramesses

Lost Cities of the Ancients episode 1: Pi-Ramesses

History / 3 minutes of reading / / By

Lost Cities of the Ancients episode 1: Pi-Ramesses – This episode looks at the legendary lost city of Piramesse. This magnificent ancient capital was built 3,000 years ago by the Egyptian pharaoh Ramesses the Great, but long ago the whole city disappeared. When it was rediscovered by early archaeologists, it opened up a bizarre puzzle – when Piramesse was finally found it was in the wrong place, somewhere Ramesses the Great could not possibly have built it.     Recreating the stories of both the early archaeologists and the ancient Egyptians, the film enters a lost world, recounting the strange […]

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Pompeii - New Secrets Revealed with Mary Beard

Pompeii – New Secrets Revealed with Mary Beard

History / 3 minutes of reading / / By

Pompeii – New Secrets Revealed with Mary Beard: With unparalleled access to Pompeii and featuring cutting-edge modern technology, Mary Beard guides us through this amazing slice of the ancient world.     For the first time ever, CT scanning and x-ray equipment bring new light to the secrets of the victims of the 79 AD eruption. Mary unpacks the human stories behind the tragic figures – gladiators, slaves, businesswomen and children. She goes behind the scenes of the Great Pompeii Project, where restoration teams have gradually removed the layers of time and deterioration from the frescoes and mosaics of houses

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The Ancient World episode 5 - The Spartans

The Ancient World episode 5 – The Spartans

History / 3 minutes of reading / / By

The Ancient World episode 5 – The Spartans: Bettany Hughes chronicles the rise and fall of one of the most extreme civilisations the world has ever seen, one founded on discipline, sacrifice and frugality where the onus was on the collective and the goal was to create the perfect state and the perfect warrior.     Hughes reveals the secrets and complexities of everyday Spartan life; homosexuality was compulsory, money was outlawed, equality was enforced, weak boys were put to death and women enjoyed a level of social and sexual freedom that was unheard of in the ancient world. It

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The Ancient World episode 3 - The Minoans

The Ancient World episode 3 – The Minoans

History / 2 minutes of reading / / By

The Ancient World episode 3 – The Minoans: In this fascinating feature-length documentary historian Bettany Hughes continues her history of the Ancient World with a visit to Crete to recount one of the greatest archaeological discoveries ever made.     The story of the Minotaur and the Labyrinth is perhaps the most compelling of all Greek myths. Just over 100 years ago, English archaeologist Arthur Evans went to the ‘Minotaur’s Island’ to explore the roots of this myth and discovered instead a sophisticated Bronze Age civilisation that had been lost to history for thousands of years. He called them The

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The Ancient World episode 2 - Engineering Ancient Egypt

The Ancient World episode 2 – Engineering Ancient Egypt

History / 3 minutes of reading / / By

The Ancient World episode 2 – Engineering Ancient Egypt: Through their superlative buildings, the legacy of the Egyptian empire continues to enthrall people to this day.     Yet these incredible structures were made over 4,000 years ago. Historian Bettany Hughes explores what drove the people of this ancient civilisation to build on such a massive scale. The story is told through the reigns of two pharaohs – Khufu and Ramesses II. Separated by 1,200 years, they both ruled during periods of incredible architectural ambition. Under Khufu, the Great Pyramid of Giza was constructed; while under Ramesses II the temples

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The Ancient World episode 1 - Alexandria The Greatest City

The Ancient World episode 1 – Alexandria The Greatest City

History / 3 minutes of reading / / By

The Ancient World episode 1 – Alexandria The Greatest City: Three cities dominated the ancient world: Athens, Rome and a third, now almost forgotten. It lies hidden beneath the waters of the Mediterranean and a sprawling modern metropolis.     Alexandria was a city built on a dream; a place with a very modern mindset, where – as with the worldwide web – one man had a vision that all knowledge on earth could be stored in one place. Bettany Hughes goes in search of this lost civilisation, revealing the story of a city founded out of the desert by

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Andrew Marr’s History of the World part 2

Andrew Marr’s History of the World part 2

History / 2 minutes of reading / / By

In Andrew Marr’s History of the World part 2, Andrew Marr tells the story of the first empires which laid the foundations for the modern world. From the Assyrians to Alexander the Great, conquerors rampaged across the Middle East and vicious wars were fought all the way from China to the Mediterranean. But this time of chaos and destruction also brought enormous progress and inspired human development.   Andrew Marr’s History of the World Part 2 – Age of Empire   In the Middle East, the Phoenicians invented the alphabet, and one of the most powerful ideas in world history

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