How does an empire spanning three continents and half a millennium fall apart?

In the final episode of our series on the Roman Empire, we're joined by Professor Peter Heather to unravel Rome's collapse - from the chaos of the third-century crisis to the deposition of the last Western emperor. Wh...

538 million years ago, life on Earth changed forever. In an evolutionary burst known as the Cambrian Explosion, complex animals rapidly appeared in the oceans, laying the foundations for almost every major animal group alive today.

Tristan Hughes is joined by the mighty Henry Gee to explore biol...

Deep beneath the sunny streets of Palermo, Sicily, the Capuchin Catacombs are home to over a thousand people, most of them still standing in their Sunday best.

Warning: this episode contains discussions of child death

Why did the residents of the catacombs want to be buried standing up? And how...

What did it take to rule an empire that was never meant to have an emperor?

In this second episode of our series on the Roman Empire, we're joined by classicist Mary Beard to trace how Roman leadership evolved over a thousand years - from the competitive power-sharing of the Republic, to the car...

One of the most famous and recognisable Persian kings of antiquity, Darius the Great was an Achaemenid superstar, ruling the Achaemenid Persian Empire some 2,500 years ago. His tale is preserved in the writings of the Greek historian Herodotus; Darius’ story stretches from India to Ukraine and th...

How did a cluster of Iron Age huts grow into one of history's greatest civilisations?

In the first episode of our series on the Roman Empire, we're joined by Dr. Simon Elliott to trace Rome's rise - from its humble origins on the banks of the Tiber to the moment Augustus became the first Empero...

Gonorrhea and syphilis are no laughing matter, especially in a time before antibiotics. How were symptoms first recorded, and what were the disturbing treatments people endured?

Joining Anthony today as a special guest co-host is Cat Irving, Human Remains Conservator at Surgeons’ Hall in Edinbu...

In 73 BC, a gladiator escaped slavery and launched a rebellion that shook the Roman Republic to its core. His name was Spartacus, and his uprising became one of the greatest threats Rome had ever faced from within.

Tristan Hughes is joined by Ben Kane to explore the dramatic story of Spartacus a...

Today, we uncover a forgotten SAS mission straight out of a war thriller: an elite unit jumps the chain of command and hijacks a 'pirate train', turning it into a weapon against fascist Italy. Their goal? To launch a surprise attack deep behind enemy lines on an Italian concentration camp and fre...

What if Iron Age Britain was never a land of barbarians at all, but a world of skilled farmers, powerful women, trade, ritual, and spectacle? Tristan Hughes is joined by Professor Tom Moore to reveal a far richer pre-Roman Britain, from roundhouses and hillforts to chariots, feasts, and buried of...

What lurks behind the door of Dr. Kahn's Grand Anatomical Museum in Victorian London?

Step inside and find out what shocked the public (and medical establishment) of 19th-century Britain so much that it was eventually forced to close.

To take you there today, Anthony is joined by guest co-hos...

Dan explains the Battle of Brunanburh, an epic clash that decided the fate of the British Isles. On one side, the forces of King Æthelstan, fighting for his vision for a unified England; on the other, a massive ‘anti-Wessex’ coalition of Vikings, Scots and Celts, determined to stop the English pr...

For most of human history, we were not alone. Human evolution was shaped by multiple human species living side by side, from Neanderthals in Europe to Denisovans in Asia, before all but one disappeared.

In this episode of The Ancients, Tristan Hughes is joined by Ella Al-Shamahi to explore the s...

Artemisia Gentileschi's paintings personify female rage against men. She paints women beheading men, hammering nails into their skulls, brandishing their dead faces. In her personal life, Artemisia was the victim of sexual abuse, torture and public shaming. Can we read her traumatic personal life...

Greed, Lust, Pride, Sloth, Gluttony, Envy, Wrath! You might be surprised to learn the true history of the Seven Deadly Sins doesn't start in the bible. Rather, they were first thought up by a Greek monk in the 4th century who'd fled to the desert after becoming embroiled in a scandal with a marri...

Armageddon is more than just a biblical prophecy hailing the end of days. It is a real place: Megiddo, an ancient city that for thousands of years stood at the crossroads of empires, trade routes and wars in the ancient Near East.

In this episode of The Ancients, Tristan Hughes is joined by frie...

In the 19th century, Japan's samurai era ended, and the country transformed from a secluded feudal society into a modern industrial superpower. From sweeping political reforms to rapid industrialisation, this is the story of how Japan reinvented itself in just decades and emerged as a formidable ...

This is the story of a fake Princess from far-off lands who hoaxed Georgian Britain. What was the truth of her story? Today we are celebrating the upcoming publication of Maddy's new book 'Hoax: Truth and Lies in the Age of Enlightenment' by sharing one of the stories from it.

Today we are celebrating the upcoming publication of Maddy's new book 'Hoax: Truth and Lies in the Age of Enlightenment' by sharing one of the dark stories from it. The haunting of Cock Lane is the most iconic ghost story in London's long history, taking place in the year 1762. Was it a hoax?

Yersinia Pestis - the most feared disease in human history - has long been thought to be the Plague of Justinian in 541 AD. But new studies of ancient DNA have revealed traces of Yersinia pestis dating back more than 5000 years.

In this episode of The Ancients, Tristan Hughes is joined by Laura...

In Ancient Mesopotamia, the boundary between the living and the dead was not always fixed... some even believed it could be crossed. But why would the living seek counsel from the dead? How common were these practices? And what answers did people hope the spirits might reveal?

In this episode, A...

In 1553, Mary Tudor became the first woman to sit on the English throne - a reign of just five years, that history has remembered almost exclusively through the lens of her enemies. But today, we revisit the story of "Bloody Mary" to ask: was she really a ruthless tyrant?

Joining us is Professor...

In 79 AD, life in Pompeii unfolded beneath the shadow of a tremoring Mount Vesuvius. Streets bustled, businesses thrived, and merchants built fortunes, unaware disaster was hours away. But what happened when that disaster struck? How did these ordinary Roman citizens seek to survive the last days...

On a summer day in Sarajevo in 1914, a young man fired two rounds of his pistol in the middle of the street, killing a Royal couple... He didn't know it then, but his actions would cause a chain reaction, resulting in the First World War. But who were Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife, the Du...