Did the age of chivalry ever really exist? The discovery of 38 mutilated skeletons from the War of the Roses in the late 15th century casts doubt on this age. The bodies had multiple stab wounds and their noses and ears had been cut off which, suggests archaeologist Chris Knusel, was to prevent their souls going to heaven.
It was a catastrophe beyond the scope of imagination – an entire army of 20,000 men, slaughtered by barbarians. More incredible still, the perpetrators of this massacre were German tribesmen, a conquered people whose own leaders had long been 'Romanised' and were at this time merely regarded as harmless pacifists. But the Varus disaster, as it became known, became a defining moment in world history.
What links a mysterious golden pot discovered in a Bavarian lake, a castle designed like a particle accelerator, Hitler’s Quest for the Sword of Destiny, and a fatally doomed hunt for the Holy Grail? This is the true story of The Nazi’s Temple of Doom.
Nixon In The Den develops a fresh account of Nixon and his ruthless ambition to escape a loveless, impoverished background. Historian David Reynolds argues that Nixon was genuinely successful as an international statesman, with historic visits to Communist China and the Soviet Union in 1972 helping thaw the Cold War.
Part one of two. David Reynolds explores the reasoning behind the Second World War battles that took place in North Africa and Italy - an area labelled Hitler's `soft underbelly' by Winston Churchill.
Part two of two. David Reynolds explores the reasoning behind the Second World War battles that took place in North Africa and Italy - an area labelled Hitler's `soft underbelly' by Winston Churchill.
During the Second World War SS Intelligence developed a secret weapon to undermine and ruin the British war effort – it was a weapon made of paper. Operation Bernhard – the Nazi codename for this covert project – became the biggest currency forgery in history, counterfeiting, at today’s value, over three billion pounds.
This extraordinarily moving documentary tells the story of Holocaust survivor, Henia Bryer, in her own words. Born into a middle-class Jewish family, Henia lost her father, brother and sister during the German occupation. She survived four concentration camps (including Auschwitz) and the horror of the Death March.
A set of inscribed panels carved by the ancient Maya people of Central America inspired Dr Neil Brodie of Cambridge University, an expert on the looting of archaeological treasures, and Mayanist Simone Clifford-Jaegar, to mount an expedition to the jungles of Guatemala. Their mission – to find the lost city from which the stone panels came.
The notorious Stalag Luft III was a specially built prison camp on Germany's border with Poland. It held 10,000 Allied airmen of all nationalities during the Second World War, and was designed to be escape proof. But for Allied prisoners of war, it was their duty to escape.
Presented by Professor David Reynolds. Historian Professor David Reynolds reassesses Stalin’s role in the life and death struggle between Germany and Russia in World War Two, which he argues was ultimately more critical for British survival than ‘Our Finest Hour’ in the Battle of Britain itself.
Presented by Professor David Reynolds. Historian Professor David Reynolds reassesses Stalin’s role in the life and death struggle between Germany and Russia in World War Two, which he argues was ultimately more critical for British survival than ‘Our Finest Hour’ in the Battle of Britain itself.
No shortlist of the greatest generals in history would be complete with out the name of Hannibal. This film shows why he was both feared and respected by his enemies. Hannibal’s tactical genius is illustrated with the latest three-dimensional graphics technology and exciting dramatic reconstructions of his victories. This is the story of the General who took on the might of Rome.
Discusses General Elphinstone who led the disastrous British retreat from Kabul in 1839, General Redvers Buller who led men at Spion Kop in the Boer War, and Reichsmarshal Hermann Goering who let the British off the hook at Dunkirk.
20th Century beliefs that a new military technology would bring about cleaner wars and reduce casualties are confounded in this look at modern warfare from the Battle of the Somme to the Gulf War.
The programme also features Operation Eagle Claw, the clandestine operation ordered by President Carter in 1980 to free the American hostages held in the Tehran embassy. The newly formed Special Operations Group, Delta Force, began planning a daring rescue. However, inter-service rivalry intervened, with tragic results when the American aircraft carrying the rescue teams crashed into each other in the Iranian desert.
While escaping the Egyptians 2,500 years ago, the Persian King Cambyses led his army into the desert and disappeared forever. Despite efforts in the 1930s to discover what happened to him, no clues were found until 1996 when a geologist stumbled on evidence by accident. The Egyptian authorities have suppressed news of these findings until now. The Lost Army Of King Cambyses returns to the site to uncover the truth.
Examining the strategic failures of politicians. Included: the defeat of the Crusaders at the battle of Hattin in 1187. Also: Fascist Italy led by Benitto Mussolini invades Ethiopian territory in 1935; and Ronald Reagan orders the invasion of Grenada in 1983.
When American tycoon Steve Fossett failed to return from a solo flight over Nevada in September 2007 no-one could understand how such an experienced pilot could vanish into thin air. When Fossett’s wreckage was found in the Sierra Nevada Mountains by a lone hiker in October 2008, many believed the story was over. However, ITN Factual can reveal that Fossett’s plane is one of hundreds to have vanished from the skies above Nevada in the last 50 years.
A look at the tragic consequences of underestimating the enemy. During the Second World War, the British commander of Singapore believed it to be an impregnable fortress until a numerically inferior Japanese Army overran it. Similarly, 12 years on, the French lost the mountain garrison at Dien Bien Phu after failing to anticipate the resourcefulness of General Giap and his Vietmanese peasant army.
Francis Pryor examines the history of Britain near the end of the Roman occupation. The first instalment focuses on Britain under Roman rule, revealing a much greater degree of collaboration with the natives than was previously recognised.
Were the native Americans secret cannibals? New discoveries reveal that the Anasazi tribe killed and ate their victims. Investigations further afield have found that there may have been cannibals in Mexico and Cheddar Gorge in the South of England.
Francis Pryor examines the relics of the Dark Ages to build a fuller picture of this much-maligned era. Popular belief has always held that the departure of the Romans led to barbarism in Britain, but archaeological finds have shed light on a cultured, literate society that embraced the growing Romanised Christian religion and embarked on a profitable trading relationship with the Byzantine Empire.
In March 1944 the 1st and 4th Essex Battalion's were enmeshed in one of the most bloody, dramatic British engagements of the war - five brutal days of fighting for the key obstacle on the allied route to Rome. This is the story of the men who captured the mountain top.
Embark on a journey to explore the hidden world of the Harem, a world that has long been shrouded by mystery and erotic fantasies. In the 16th century the Turkish city of Istanbul was ruled by Suleyman the Magnificent. The center of his power was Topkapi Palace - at the heart of which was the harem. Into it came hundreds of women from all over the empire and beyond. It was a place where sex could equal power. This documentary tells the story of how some of these women came to play a pivotal role in running the world's largest empire from inside the mysterious and sometimes violent world of the Harem.
In the last programme of the series Francis focuses his attention on the Anglo-Saxon invasion.
Operation Desert Storm was only a day old when Tornado pilots John Peters and John Nichol were shot down in Iraqi territory and subsequently tortured and paraded on TV. Bruised and battered, the two men mumbled incoherently into the camera, and instantly became symbols around the world of Saddam’s savagery and aggression.
Defying the curse that has haunted their family for three generations, a member of the Carnarvon family returns to the site of Tutankhamun’s tomb for the first time in 75 years. In 1922 the fifth Earl of Carnarvon died from an infected mosquito bite just weeks after discovering the tomb. From that day the family name became synonymous with the curse of the Pharoahs.
Tony Robinson is joined by science journalist Becky McCall to investigate the case of Second World War psychic Helen Duncan, whose freakishly accurate forecasts about military campaigns led to an MI5 investigation and her imprisonment under an archaic witchcraft law of 1735. Duncan was deemed a serious threat to national security, but she claimed she was merely visited by the ghosts of ex-servicemen who told her secrets she could never have known.
What’s the process of retrieving a sunken ship and preparing it for display in a museum? How do archaeologists work underwater? One of the biggest wrecks ever discovered in Spain was the ‘Triunfante’, sunk during a French siege in 1795. We follow the process from its discovery to its display in a museum and learn what makes this ship so special.
Carthage was Rome's equal, rival and almost her conqueror. In 146 BC Roman general Scipio destroyed the city of Carthage so painstakingly and utterly that not a single building was left standing.
Carthage was Rome's equal, rival and almost her conqueror. In 146 BC Roman general Scipio destroyed the city of Carthage so painstakingly and utterly that not a single building was left standing.
Gold, Silver & Slaves looks at how the business of slavery was a case of slave-trading by complicit Africans, fuelled by the greed of African kings. This is the untold story of the greatest slaving nation in history. Up till now, Britain’s place in the history of slavery has been as the country that abolished the international slave trade.
Exploring what really happened at Herculaneum following the eruption of Vesuvius. Pompeii, the lost Roman city buried by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79AD, has long been a source of fascination to archaeologists. But its sister city Herculaneum, buried in the same eruption but to a much greater depth than Pompeii, reveals far more detail of how the Romans lived.
Looks at the life of the Roman emperor Vespasian, from childhood to his death in 79 AD. Provides insight into the sophisticated workings of the Roman Empire.
Unfinished Business looks at how Liverpool became the greatest slaving port in human history. This is the untold story of the greatest slaving nation in history. Up till now, Britain’s place in the history of slavery has been as the country that abolished the international slave trade.
Focusing on women of royalty such as Pharaoh Hatshepsut and Queen Nefertari, as well as women of high profession such as Lady Peseshet, the earliest female doctor known to the world, Fletcher reveals an ancient civilization unparalleled in its sexual equality.
They are two of history’s most talked about figures, but how much do we really know about the ill-fated lovers? What were their real characters and motives? Why did one of them lose their head? And how did their actions change the course of history forever?
They are two of history’s most talked about figures, but how much do we really know about the ill-fated lovers? What were their real characters and motives? Why did one of them lose their head? And how did their actions change the course of history forever?
The Old Corruption challenges the accepted version of the history of abolition, that the passive, suffering slaves were freed by benevolent white crusaders, revealing the corruption of the plantations owners, and how the inhuman treatment of African people was finally acknowledged.
Researching a climatic catastrophe that rocked the Earth in A.D. 535, causing two years of darkness, famine, drought and disease. Written records from China, Italy, Palestine and many other countries suggest a huge catastrophe blighted the world in 535AD. But the cause of it has been uncertain.
A devastating volcanic eruption in A.D. 535 leads to the emergence of new nations and religions. Written records from China, Italy, Palestine and many other countries suggest a huge catastrophe blighted the world in 536AD. But the cause of it has been uncertain.
In 1942, determined to prove that France was leading the fight against Nazism, General de Gaulle offered Stalin a squadron of French pilots to fight on the Soviet front. That regiment, known as Normandy-Niémen, were legendary, winning 273 aerial victories. But the men paid a heavy price. 43 pilots were killed during combat.
The Tirpitz. Winston Churchill referred to it as “The Beast”, a formidable, 53,000 tonne battleship that was arguably the most potent symbol of Hitler’s naval power. Churchill made its destruction a top priority, to be sunken at all costs. This is the story of perhaps the most important and daring air raid carried out by the legendary RAF squadron known as The Dambusters.
This is history like you’ve never seen it before. Dan delivers his extraordinary take on one of the most visceral and violent chapters in British History. The series begins with Henry II, a control freak betrayed by his own wife and children after the murder of Archbishop Thomas Becket. Episode two reveals the collapse of friendship between Henry III and Simon de Montfort, spiraling into bloody civil war. Edward II’s obsession with revenge tears England apart in episode 3. Finally, episode four tells the story of the boy king tyrant, Richard II, one of the most vicious and inventive despots in history.
Once the biggest and most influential city on the planet, founded by Alexander the Great and home to Cleopatra, Archimedes and the largest library in the world. How did this shining beacon for civilisation and knowledge meet its classical demise?
This is history like you’ve never seen it before. Dan delivers his extraordinary take on one of the most visceral and violent chapters in British History. Episode two reveals the collapse of friendship between Henry III and Simon de Montfort, spiraling into bloody civil war.
This is history like you’ve never seen it before. Dan delivers his extraordinary take on one of the most visceral and violent chapters in British History. Edward II’s obsession with revenge tears England apart in episode 3.
This is history like you’ve never seen it before. Dan delivers his extraordinary take on one of the most visceral and violent chapters in British History. Episode four tells the story of the boy king tyrant, Richard II, one of the most vicious and inventive despots in history.
Krushchev’s decision to place nuclear weapons in Cuba sparked the Cuban Missile Crisis. But what’s relatively unknown is that he was responding to an earlier perceived threat from America: the stationing of nuclear weapons in Murge, Italy - within striking distance of the USSR. We reveal how Murge was transformed unwittingly into a theatre of the Cold War.
Documentary exploring the murky circumstances behind the escape of one of Britain’s most notorious spies. In 1963, at the height of the Cold War, a well-educated Englishman called Kim Philby boarded a Russian freighter in Beirut and defected to Moscow from under the nose of British Intelligence. For the best part of thirty years he had been spying for the Soviet Union, much of that time while holding senior jobs in MI6.
Lost Worlds investigates the very latest archaeological finds at three remote and hugely significant sites - Angkor Wat, Troy and Persepolis.
A moving and intimate portrayal of Nelson Mandela filmed on the campaign trail in the days leading up to South Africa's first democratic election.
The Roman empire was a time of power and brutality, fuelled by violent games and bloodbaths. However, it was also abundant in refinement and extreme sensuality. Food and cooking was an key indicator of success, with quality and abundance of dishes the primary measure. As the first and largest european civilisation, Rome was at the epicentre of culinary innovation, with an acute emphasis on vegetables, meat and spices.
Sexpionage tells the stories of two women who were seduced by secret agents working for the East German intelligence service, the Stasi. At the height of the Cold War the Stasi would regularly despatch their agents to the West German capital, Bonn, armed with the task of forming long term relationships with single women working at embassies or government ministries.
In 1495 a new disease hit Europe. It was deadly, devastating and attacked those who were promiscuous, well-heeled and well-travelled. But what was Syphilis and where had it come from? The traditional view has been that syphilis was part of "the Columbian exchange" – one of the things, along with tobacco and the potato, that the New World gave the Old.
This programme includes an award-winning trilogy whose theme is the miraculous resilience of the human spirit in the face of adversity.
This is an extraordinary story of the most disturbing witch trial in British history and the key role played in it by one nine-year-old girl. Jennet Device, a beggar-girl from Pendle in Lancashire, was the star witness in 1612 in the trial of her own mother, her brother, her sister and many of her neighbours; thanks to her chilling testimony, they were all hanged.
This landmark documentary was produced 5 years after the end of The Falklands War and features interviews and insights from both the Argentinian and British sides.
Recently a team of fossil hunters working in Kenya came upon a set of fossilised teeth and a series of bones. Their find set in motion a chain of events that ignited excitement across the scientific world, for if they were correct in their findings, not only would they have found the oldest human ancestor, but much of the received wisdom humankind’s evolution would have to be rewritten.
Prince Charles Edward was Queen Victoria’s favourite grandson. In 1900, the sixteen-year-old Prince was the only viable British contender for the hugely wealthy Dukedom of Saxe Coburg and Gotha in Germany. Ordered to go by Queen Victoria, he took the title and was transformed from a British Prince into a German Duke – Herzog Carl Eduard. The course of his life was altered in ways neither he nor Queen Victoria could have ever imagined.
The Spartans chronicles the rise and fall of one of the most extreme civilisations the world has ever witnessed. A civilization that was 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.
The Spartans chronicles the rise and fall of one of the most extreme civilisations the world has ever witnessed. A civilization that was 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.
The Spartans chronicles the rise and fall of one of the most extreme civilisations the world has ever witnessed. A civilization that was 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.
Before it became the setting for the hit series 'Downton Abbey', Lord and Lady Carnarvon opened the doors of Highclere Castle, their stunning lakeside country house, for a documentary all about the running of their rambling estate in Hampshire.
Britain would have lost her empire and the war in 1942 had Axis forces beaten the British army in the Middle East. Tim Collins re-investigates Britain’s critical desert campaign, and the controversial battle tactics needed to take on the unbeaten Panzer army in total war, preventing Hitler from gaining Egypt, Iraq and the oilfields.
This is the story of a final showdown between two titans of war in uninhibited warfare without buildings, cities or populations. In 1942 The British Army was being pushed back towards Cairo at a rate of almost 100 miles a day. Within a week, Rommel would take Egypt. The allies would lose the Mediterranean, Asia, the Iraq oilfields and its nascent US ally.
Britain’s Wicca Man tells the extraordinary story of Britain's fastest growing religious group - Wicca - and of its creator, an eccentric Englishman called Gerald Gardner.
ALICE IN WONDERLAND is said to be the most quoted book in print, second only to The Bible, with a passionate army of fans who regularly congregate around the world to celebrate its rich and playful world. But what of its creator, the mild-mannered and unassuming Oxford University Math Don, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, aka. Lewis Carroll?
This feature-length documentary examines Islam's rich and significant contribution to western art and culture. Presenter and art critic, Waldemar Januszczak, sets out on an epic journey of discovery across the Muslim world from Central Asia to the heart of the Middle East and beyond.
Uncle Hitler introduces us to the descendants, family members, acquaintances and employees of Adolf Hitler. The documentary focuses on exploring the unknown story of Hitler's family and the dramatic fates of those related to the most hated man in history.
Between the years 950 AD to 1290 AD, on the Northern border of South Africa, traversing the conference of the Shashi – Limpopo Valley, which today divides Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa, existed an ancient African Kingdom, called Mapungubwe. From the Iron Age to present day this unique one-hour film explores the history and tells the story of this remarkable city.
At the end of the Second World War, ten thousand prisoners of war anticipated liberation courtesy of the advancing Russian Red Army. The Nazis dashed these hopes. They forced the prisoners to march out of Stalag Luft III in the dead of winter toward the centre of a collapsing Third Reich in order to keep the P.O.W.’s as hostages. ‘Forced March to Freedom’ tells the story of this amazing test of endurance through the eyes of Robert Buckham of West Vancouver, a bomber pilot and artist who produced countless sketches and water-colours of prison camp life, as well as one of the only chronicles of the forced march itself.
Akhenaten is ancient Egypt's most mysterious and puzzling pharaoh - for no apparent reason he destroyed the established religion of Egypt and moved 50,000 people to a lonely bay on the edge of the Nile, where he built a magnificent city from scratch. Why Akhenaten unleashed this astounding revolution has never been fully explained. Now the Egypt Detectives set about uncovering the real portrait of the rebel pharaoh.
The personalities and spectres of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin loom large in the events of the twentieth Century. They were similar in some respects and yet very different in others.
The Coronation in 1953 appeared to be a glittering triumph for the House of Windsor. But behind the scenes there was a three-cornered story of jealousy and rivalry at the highest level.
An examination of the mental battles waged between 20th-century leaders Winston Churchill and Franklin D Roosevelt during the first two years of their relationship. A duel of false promises, evasion and delusion ensued, which was far removed from the more familiar image of friendship and loyalty.
Egypt is full of mysteries. One of them is the Pharaoh who's moving statue travelled thousands of kilometres without cranes, trucks or even a wheel. How was it done? Time to bring in the Egypt Detectives.
Archaeologists have made an astonishing claim that could change our understanding of the life of Tutankhamun forever. Many of the burial goods found in Tutankhamun's tomb may not have been his at all. Working with Tutankhamun expert Nicholas Reeves, the Egypt Detectives try to determine the daunting problem faced by his successors and how it was solved.
Lost Worlds investigates the very latest archaeological finds at three remote and hugely significant sites - Angkor Wat, Troy and Persepolis. Lost Worlds travels to each site and through high-end computer graphics, lavish re-enactment and the latest archaeological evidence brings them to stunning televisual life.
From the 900-year-old remains of Angkor Wat in the Cambodian jungle the staggering City of the God Kings is recreated. From Project Troia, in North West Turkey, the location of the biggest archaeological expedition ever mounted the lost city is stunningly visualised and finally from Persepolis the city and the great Persian Empire are brought to life.
A body inside a coffin which it is too large for, missing genitals, and an obvious overbite are the clues which set the Mummy Investigation Team on the trail in this mystery. They know who the coffin was made for – a female Egyptian temple dancer – what they need to know is who rests there now and why this mummy is in such strange condition.
A team of experts excavates a famous WW1 battlefield in search of a top secret tunnel and a giant 60-foot flame-thrower. Historian Peter Barton and archeologist Tony Pollard travel to northern France to find secret tunnels and a giant flamethrower lost for almost a century.
Built for use during the opening day of the Battle of the Somme, the bloodiest clash of WW1, this 60 foot weapon of terror fired a blast of flaming oil over 100 yards long. Barton hopes to recover the machine and with the help of the British Royal Engineers, build a working replica at a specially built test site. For the first time in almost a century, this mechanical dragon will roar once more.
Marking the centenary of World War One, historian David Reynolds explores the enduring shadow the conflict has cast over Britain and Europe in the century that followed. Travelling to locations across Europe, from Slovenia to the Sudetenland, Belfast to Berlin, David Reynolds traces the war’s legacy, arguing that it unleashed forces we still grapple with today.
This remarkable series also looks again at how the experience of war haunted the generation who lived through it, in particular the soldiers who survived it – dynamic characters such as Benito Mussolini, Eamon de Valera, Philippe Petain, James Ramsey MacDonald and Thomas Masaryk. Reynolds examines how these men shaped the peace that followed war, often in unpredictable ways.
Marking the centenary of World War One, historian David Reynolds explores the enduring shadow the conflict has cast over Britain and Europe in the century that followed. Travelling to locations across Europe, from Slovenia to the Sudetenland, Belfast to Berlin, David Reynolds traces the war’s legacy, arguing that it unleashed forces we still grapple with today.
Intrigue and mystery have always surrounded the pyramids. Mysteries abound about how and why they were built, but questions still remain unanswered about where they were constructed. With Miriam investigating the geology of the Nile Valley and Dominic the Egyptian religion and myth, the Egypt Detectives try and piece together some logic behind the geography of the royal tombs.
On a desolate mountain top in California lives the world’s oldest organism – a gnarled and twisted bristlecone pine. The scientist who discovered the tree gave it the name Methuselah. It was a seedling when the Egyptian pyramids were being built and a mature tree at the time of Christ. It is now over 4,000 years old.
This programme follows the award-winning trilogy whose theme was the miraculous resilience of the human spirit in the face of adversity. The original trilogy examined London, Berlin and Leningrad, and showed how their people coped with the ravages of World War II. This one-off studies Paris and the effects that the war had on the French nation.
The Dark Ages have been misunderstood. History has identified the period following the fall of the Roman Empire with a descent into barbarism – a terrible time when civilisation stopped. Waldemar Januszczak disagrees.
The Dark Ages have been misunderstood. History has identified the period following the fall of the Roman Empire with a descent into barbarism – a terrible time when civilisation stopped. Waldemar Januszczak disagrees.
The Dark Ages have been misunderstood. History has identified the period following the fall of the Roman Empire with a descent into barbarism – a terrible time when civilisation stopped. Waldemar Januszczak disagrees.
The Dark Ages have been misunderstood. History has identified the period following the fall of the Roman Empire with a descent into barbarism – a terrible time when civilisation stopped. Waldemar Januszczak disagrees.
They invented the alphabet and modern navigation and introduced wine to Europe. But after the sacking of Carthage by the Romans in 146 BC and the destruction of their famous library, the world was left with very little evidence of Phoenician life and culture.
In 1934, Pamela Travers created the ‘practically perfect’ woman in Mary Poppins who bought order into the chaos of people’s homes. Decades later, the magical English nanny is still adored by children and parents alike.
Comrade Philby is the fascinating story of a British agent and Oxbridge gent who turned spy for the Russians. Harold Adrian Russell Philby, known to his Muscovite companions as Comrade Kim, defected to the Soviet Union in 1963, working as a British affairs consultant until his death in the late 1980s. He was buried with the military honours normally reserved for a KGB agent.
Britain's system of social welfare, law and order and a yearning for knowledge had made us the envy of Europe - and a country under threat from violent and oppurtunistic raiders. But what was it really like to live just before the end of the first millennium? 1000 AD recreates life circa 999 AD, showing the everyday lives, loves and passions of the Anglo-Saxon people.
In contrast with the common representation of the middle ages as a gloomy era haunted with famine, this episode provides a more positive view on medieval cuisine. Throughout Europe, medieval kitchens were often filled with innovative, healthy and savory dishes.
Some of the least pleasant employment opportunities open to people in the Middle Ages. Tony Robinson discovers how fullers spent their working lives stomping on newly woven cloth in vats of stale urine, while leech collectors risked infection by wading into marshes and letting the bloodsuckers cling to their legs.
Tony Robinson sets out to sift the fact from the fiction on whether Robin Hood, the legendary dispossessed nobleman hiding out in Sherwood Forest did actually exist.
Among the thankless tasks tackled by Tony this week are the work of the midshipman, lighthouse keeper, stoker and trimmer, the men of Britains first navy who survived on minimal rations, and the men who wore sacks on their heads on the luxury liners. Finally he experiences the dangerous occupation of the Victorian lifeboat man.
Tony Robinson goes on the trail of William Wallace, the Scottish warrior whose story was told in the film Braveheart.
This is the extraordinary and deeply moving true story of the million British horses who served in the 'Great War'. It is told using rare archive and testimony, combined with the latest historical research.
The real Scottish king Macbeth was a far cry from the great Shakespearean villain, but his story was even more fascinating, presenter Tony Robinson discovers in his continuing series which uncovers the myths behind legendary British heroes. The original and real King Macbeth lived in the 11th century and reigned from 1040 to 1057.
This documentary commemorates the Battle of Britain, paying tribute to those who ended Nazi intentions of gaining control of the British skies. 13 Hours That Saved Britain explores the events of 15th September 1940, which Churchill described as the 'crux of the battle'.
This episode tries to unravel the reasoning behind Mark Chapman's shooting of John Lennon. Between 1988 and 1993 "First Tuesday" firmly established itself as a major showcase for documentary on British television, achieving consistent praise from critics, warm appreciation from viewers and a number of awards.
During the fourteenth century the Renaissance started in Italy, and slowly spread throughout Europe. As shown in this episode, the refreshing Renaissance era indicates an intellectual, philosophical, artistic and religious revolution and is mainly influenced by humanism.
Tony Robinson reveals the grim occupations in Victorian Britain and explains that the workhouse was possibly the most infamous place of employment in the 19th century, and a day of picking oakum reveals the full horror of this sinister location. He also tries his hand at digging railways and rat-catching, as well as perhaps the worst job of them all, the tanner - a vocation that brought with it an intolerable stench and guaranteed social rejection.
The French Revolution in 1789 had a major impact on French society, as it meant the end of an era of absolute monarchy. Old ideas of hierarchy and power were replaced by new ones, including the emergence of the bourgeoisie. Of course, these social changed left its trails in the culinary world. As is shown in this episode, Paris was the birthplace of the first restaurants where the Nouveaux Riches wined and dined.
Tony Robinson presents a series examining some of history's least pleasant employment opportunities. He begins in the first millennium, trying his hand at everyday tasks including back-breaking mining by ancient Roman methods, and Saxon ploughing using wooden implements and oxen. He also enters the world of the Viking egg collector, which involved scaling cliff faces in search of guillemot eggs.
Between 1968 and 1972, NASA successfully sent 24 men where no human beings had been before or since. The final mission, Apollo 17, flew in December 1972 and closed the final chapter in NASA's triumphant Apollo Program. The Apollo 17 Experience is an emotive, informative and inspirational tribute to the spirit of human exploration and mankind's final steps on the Moon.
In this episode, hear first hand testimonials and dialogue from the incredible men who walked on the moon. Incredible footage and photos give a unique and beautiful experience of their data collection process and journey home.
Samurai Bow explores the violence, beauty and reverie which surround the Samurai's earliest weapon. With stunning dramatic reconstruction, we reveal the ancient way of the Samurai and explore how the bow could avert wars when put in the hands of a true master.
This week we take a close look at the worst rural jobs and remember those who risked their necks to maintain the heart of rural life, shifted excrement to produce enduring images of the countryside and saved souls in the villages by eating bread.
Ancient Egypt was considered to be the origin of the practice of mummification. In Chile, however, spectacular graves containing mummies a thousand years older than those of the Egyptians, are being unearthed.
Told through the eyes of a daring modern day adventurer, this is the story of a unique chapter in the history of one of the world's greatest super-powers. This program chronicles the history of the great Ming Dynasty ‘treasure’ ships. Built in the early 15th century these ships gave China the capability of exploring and perhaps conquering the ‘world’.
Tony Robinson explores the major uprising across large parts of England in 1381; it's origins, motives and aftermath.
Tony Robinson explores the major uprising across large parts of England in 1381; it's origins, motives and aftermath.
To this day, the Spitfire remains in our minds as the fighter aircraft that saved Britain from invasion and defeat. Spitfire: The Birth of a Legend tells the story of this legendary aircraft from a radical design on the drawing board to the fighter aircraft that became the symbol of Britain’s determination to fight on to victory.
Between 1850 and 1920 over 3 million people – half the population – emigrated from Ireland, escaping desperate poverty. Believing America to be a saviour and a life of hope, the ‘Addergoole 14’ saved fiercely in order to afford a ticket aboard the Titanic and escape to the land of dreams. Told using interviews with the descendants of survivors, these are new perspectives of the conditions on board, and the events of April 12th 1912.
This film tells the definitive story of Britain’s most notorious criminals who, in just ten years, acquired a chilling aura of fear through extreme violence, unparalleled in Britain’s underworld.
In this instalment, Tony Robinson goes in search of the truth about one of Britain's most maligned monarchs, Richard III. Robinson investigates whether Richard really did murder his two nephews, the Princes in the Tower, aged nine and 12, before usurping the throne. And if he did, what were his real motives?
Tony Robinson examines disgusting occupations from Stuart times, including saltpetre men who collected urine and dug up latrines to gather the gunpowder ingredient potassium nitrate. He also looks at the petardier's assistant, who had to blow the gates off besieged castles, and discovers the modern violin was only made possible because string-makers rummaged for their raw materials in the guts of dead sheep.
Lets Cook History is an entertaining and informative five-part series exploring the origins of European cooking and eating habits. Each episode reconstructs a famous meal on from a different period in history, depicting the evolution of tastes, customs and world trades that have shaped the contemporary cuisine.
Much of the west coast of Australia was discovered by accident when Dutch treasure galleons ploughed into its fringing coral reefs and left chests of gold and silver on the coral floor.
A look at the mythical roots in art and literature of Merlin - magician, hero and historical mystery. Merlin is the archetypal wizard, Welsh and Celtic in origin but with connections across the water in Cornwall and middle Europe, and, of course, the Arthurian legends.
On September 19th 2008 high-rank security officer Herman Simm was arrested for delivering thousands of top secret documents to Russia. His job was to protect secrets, but instead, he ended up selling them to the Kremlin.
Ever since their discovery in 1947, the Dead Sea Scrolls have captured the imagination and interest of scholars and the public. After more than fifty years of research, the diverse perspectives of biblical scholarship, science, and technology will bring this legendary find to life.
Ever since they were discovered in 1947, the Dead Sea Scrolls have proved to be one of the most important finds ever, informing man-kind of their origins and, since they contain a 2000-year-old incarnation of the Bible, charting religious and sociological history. Learn how archaeologists found them and how the entire world reacted to their discovery, and watch a reenactment that purports to trace just how the documents ended up where they did.
Was the most expensive painting ever sold at auction a fake? This award-winning documentary explores the authenticity of the Sunflowers painting by Vincent van Gogh, bought in the late 1980s for a then record sum by a Japanese insurance company.
For nearly 500 years the Norse people dominated the oceans, known by their remarkable ships and known for their death, destruction and burning down of anything in their way. They used sophisticated navigation methods and navigated safely over remarkably long distances.
This week plucky Tony Robinson continues his look at The Worst Jobs in History with a rundown on the worst royal jobs. As Tony takes on the work traditionally done at court we learn of the miserable lot of food tasters, whipping boys, falconers, and laundry women who beat Elizabethan laundry with paddles similar to cricket bats.
Tony Robinson reveals the real story behind the last great Anglo Saxon king. Far from being just the loser at the Battle of Hastings, Harold was a charismatic leader.
There are only 600 Cuiva, a group of nomadic hunters left in Columbia, with perhaps another 400 across the border in Venezuela. They once roamed the plains, but now are restricted to a small strip of land.
Dr Suzannah Lipscomb takes us back to Tudor times in search of the household killers of the era. Suzannah discovers that in Tudor houses the threat of a grisly, unpleasant death was never far away in a world (and a home) still mired in the grime and filth of the medieval period - and she shows how we still live with the legacy of some of these killers today.
This week we meet the water caddies who delivered water on their backs from wells to peoples' homes; fire-fighters who had only their own wetted beards to breathe through when they entered blazing buildings; the dockers and deal porters who, with no regard for health or safety issues, serviced the tall ships; brick makers; and crossing sweepers who shovelled the muck left by hundreds of horses and swept the streets keeping crossing places clean for the passing gentry.
Protestants and Catholics compete to enforce their religion on the traditional Maku and Barasana people of the forests of Colombia.
While the Victorians confronted the challenges of ruling an empire, perhaps the most dangerous environment they faced was in their own homes. Householders lapped up the latest products, gadgets and conveniences, but in an era with no health and safety standards they were unwittingly turning their homes into hazardous death traps.
Four hundred years ago, hundreds of innocent people were killed as an obsession to stamp out Satanism swept the British Isles. Dr Suzannah Lipscomb investigates the events of this dark period in our history.
Four hundred years ago, hundreds of innocent people were killed as an obsession to stamp out Satanism swept the British Isles. Dr Suzannah Lipscomb investigates the events of this dark period in our history.
The idea that Columbus discovered America has been receding for many years. Leif Eiriksson’s settlement there five hundred years earlier was regarded as semi-mythical until excavations in Newfoundland proved its truth. Before Columbus describes how there is an increasing body of evidence to show that Europeans were crossing the North Atlantic continually after 1000AD.
Julius Caesar is one of the monumental figures of history. He forged the role of Emperor and was worshipped as a brilliant general and reformer, but he was killed by the people who knew him best.
Julius Caesar is one of the monumental figures of history. He forged the role of Emperor and was worshipped as a brilliant general and reformer, but he was killed by the people who knew him best.
The dawn of the 20th century and the reign of a new King ushered in an era of fresh inventions and innovations that transformed the way we lived. Electricity, refrigeration and a whole host of different materials promised to make life at home brighter, easier and more convenient. But a lack of understanding of the potential hazards meant that they frequently led to terrible accidents, horrendous injuries - and even death.
Wallis Simpson found herself at the centre of a national scandal when she was seen to ensnare Edward VIII and lure him from the throne of England. But in this explosive film, biographer Anne Sebba sifts through a newly discovered cache of documents - shown in this film for the first time - that contains 15 secret letters written by Wallis Simpson herself around the time of the abdication.
Tony Robinson's Romans series continues as he examines the life of Nero.
Tony Robinson's Romans series continues as he examines the life of Caligula.
Nearly thirty years after his parents exchanged their wedding vows, Prince William walked down the aisle at Westminster Abbey with his new bride. 'My Mother Diana' looks at how Diana’s life, her relationship with the House of Windsor, the media and the public have shaped her eldest son, Prince William.
Anthropologist Jacques Lemoine looks at the Meo (Hmong) who were originally aborigines of northern central China but forced to migrate south to avoid oppression and to preserve their way of life. Today they live in villages scattered over China and Southeast Asia.
On 9th September 2015, Queen Elizabeth II became the longest serving British monarch. One of the most enduring images of her coronation in 1953 is that of Her Majesty surrounded by her dukes. Their influence once extended beyond the merely ceremonial, they were a crucial part of the architecture that supported the monarchy.
Since Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 AD, burying the city of Pompeii, it has been frozen in time. But now, more secrets behind the ancient Roman city are being revealed with the help of new technologies in Science Channel’s Lost World Of Pompeii Pompeii is a delicately conserved attraction that is under constant threat from the wears and tear of extensive tourism, the specter of landslides and the possibility of another devastating eruption from Mount Vesuvius.
Two Finnish filmmakers and a team of international divers go in search of a WWII German U-boat and attempt to uncover the facts of a 60-year mystery. The U-479 went missing in November 1944, in the Gulf of Finland.
The second episode begins with the tragic story of the biggest maritime disaster in history; the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, while the Swedes dive down to the wreck Steuben in the Baltic Sea. In the former East Germany there is a chance to explore a Russian submarine, while the adventures and diving around Estonia continues, taking in the sights of Hiiumaa Island and taking a trip to old Soviet bunkers.
In the final episode the team make the journey to the Finnish archipelago to hear the story of the world's only intact treasure ship, the Vrouw Maria. The following day they finally reach their destination, meeting a side scan sonar expert to explore the mystery behind the submarine Lembit and U-479 collision. Having achieved their mission in solving the mystery the team head home, taking a last dive into the English Channel and make plans for future diving adventures.
Historian Dan Jones tells the story of the Wars of the Roses, a 30-year civil war between the House of York and House of Lancaster during which the crown changed hands seven times.
The continuing story of the Wars of the Roses. Dan Jones reveals how in 1461, six years after the conflict began, Henry VI had his crown snatched away by the young Edward IV - a plot masterminded by the Earl of Warwick, a baron known as the Kingmaker. However, when the monarch and his mentor fell out, Warwick kicked Edward off the throne - and incredibly reinstated Henry VI.
Historian Dan Jones examines one of the most infamous chapters of the Wars of the Roses, asking whether Richard III really did kill the Princes in the Tower in 1483. At the time of Edward IV's death, his younger brother Richard was an English hero, a great military leader who had shown unswerving loyalty to the crown. So what could have happened to change him into a child-murdering tyrant in just three months?
The Wars of the Roses ended in August 1485 when Henry Tudor defeated Richard III at the battle of Bosworth. However, Henry would never have become king and founded the Tudor dynasty without his mother, Margaret Beaufort. Historian Dan Jones concludes his history of the feud by revealing how the widow kept her only son safe as England descended into chaos and why she embarked upon a bold but risky plan to place him on the throne.
One of history's greatest test pilots, Capt. Eric "Winkle" Brown recounts his many adventures flying dangerous aircraft and setting aviation records.
In 1962 the world came closer to nuclear war than ever before or since, as the United States and the Soviet Union confronted each other over the presence of Soviet missiles on the island of Cuba.
For 13 days in 1962, the world was on the brink of nuclear war. Krushchev's decision to place nuclear weapons in Cuba sparked the Cuban Missile Crisis. But what's relatively unknown is that he was responding to an earlier perceived threat from America: the stationing of nuclear weapons in Murge, Italy - within striking distance of the USSR. We reveal how Murge was transformed unwittingly into a theatre of the Cold War.
On the 1st August 1936, 100,000 spectators watched as Hitler and the Olympic delegates arrived at the Olympic opening ceremony in Berlin. The Olympic flags hung cheerfully side-by-side banners bearing the Nazi swastika. With the help of specialists and images from Léni Riefenstahl’s 1938 film, ‘Olympia’, we see what really went on behind the scenes and investigate the secret negotiations and compromises made by the International Olympic Committee to bring the Olympics to Berlin.
The ancient Egyptians were obsessed with divinity, death and the afterlife and reincarnation. Christy Kenneally visits Saqqara, south of Cairo, where the Egyptians learned the technique of mummification and built the first pyramid, an early prototype for the grand monuments of the Giza pyramid complex. He journeys on to explore the ruins at Abydos, Karnak and Luxor, arriving finally at the island of Philae, the site of the last hieroglyphics and a little-known shrine to Egypt's lost Gods.
Peter Snow looks at the untold stories of British scientists and engineers who developed some of the modern world’s most incredible technology. The series covers rockets, the mobile phone, computer games, Formula 1 racing cars, the Harrier jump jet and the tilting train.
On 15 March 1921, Talat Pasha, a high-ranking Turkish dignitary, was shot dead in a Berlin street by a young Armenian. A few months later, Soghomon Tehlirian, his assassin, appeared before a German court. He faced the death penalty. Yet, during the trial, the victim gradually changed into the guilty party, and the accused was finally acquitted.
Emily Davison stepped into the path of the King's horse at the 1913 Derby and was fatally injured. Clare Balding uncovers her story and finds out how a middle-class governess became a radical activist.
Brothers Colin and Ewan McGregor follow up their documentary The Battle of Britain with a film exploring Bomber Command, a rarely told story from the Second World War.
For 2,000 years almost all evidence of Cleopatra had disappeared - until now. Neil Oliver investigates the story of a ruthless queen who would kill her own siblings for power.
CS Lewis's biographer A.N. Wilson goes in search of the man behind Narnia - best-selling children's author and famous Christian writer, but an under-appreciated Oxford academic and an aspiring poet who never achieved the same success in writing verse as he did prose.
Historian Dan Snow puts his walking boots on and sets off to see what the British landscape can teach us about our Norman predecessors. From their violent arrival on these shores to their most sustaining legacies, Dan's three walks follow an evolutionary path through the Normans' era, from invasion to conquest, to successful rule and colonisation.
Dan's second walk explores what the invaders did next, as they aimed to cement their rule across a diverse nation. Despite William the Conqueror being confirmed as King, the Normans had only completed stage one of their colonisation, and few areas were as unstable as the Welsh borders.
For 56 years Prince Charles has been the king in waiting – a wait that has surely been hard on him. Against the background of his wedding to Camilla the film examines his controversial ideas on architecture (nothing too modern, please), on medicine (coffee enemas and a diet of liquidised fruit) and on religion (flirting with Islam, Sikhism and regularly visiting the Greek orthodox monasteries on Mount Athos). Looking at the heir to the throne's difficult relationships with women, family and the public, we find out what makes Charles tick.
Two thousand years ago one of history's most notorious individuals was born. Professor Mary Beard embarks on an investigative journey to explore the life and times of Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus - better known to us as Caligula.
Dan Snow concludes his journey in Yorkshire. The north of England suffered a series of brutal military campaigns known as the Harrying of the North, that ended up with the Normans taking control all over the country. The historian examines the architectural legacy of the invasion, visiting landmarks such as Helmsley Castle and Rievaulx Abbey, and learns how a local lord established an institution that revolutionised the community and trade of the moors.
In the first episode, Professor Joann Fletcher goes in search of the building blocks of Egyptian civilisation and finds out what made ancient Egypt the incredible civilisation that it was.
This is the incredible true story of Nancy Wake, the daring allied spy who became the Gestapo’s most wanted woman in WWII. Codenamed ‘The White Mouse’ for her elusiveness, this international femme fatale was a key inspiration behind Sebastian Faulkes’ celebrated fictional spy Charlotte Gray.
Columbanus, a monk and an outsider from Ireland, built the monasteries which became Europe's first universities, established a writing system to encourage the spread of liberal values, and risked his life when he demanded high standards of leadership from powerful leaders - bishops, kings and even popes. These foundations are said to have preserved Western civilisation through the Dark Ages.
Historian Ruth Goodman and archaeologists Peter Ginn and Tom Pinfold turn the clock back as they learn how to build a medieval castle using the tools, techniques and materials available in the 13th century.
The professor explores one of Saqqara's last pyramid complexes to illustrate how Ancient Egypt's `Pyramid Age' came to an end. A worsening climate combined with political upheaval, famine and economic difficulties to plunge the state into a dark era of civil war, with the land dividing into smaller city-states headed by ambitious small-town leaders.
Beautifully filmed from the air, Royal Britain tells the story of the monarchy through the places that bore witness to murder, romance, politics, execution and celebration. We explore the sweeping landscapes where battles were fought for the crown and dynasties changed.
The Lost Tomb of Jesus is a documentary which makes a case that the 2,000-year-old "Tomb of the Ten Ossuaries" belonged to the family of Jesus of Nazareth.
Ruth, Peter and Tom look at the ingenious features medieval castle-builders came up with to withstand attack from an ever more formidable array of siege engines.
Joann explores the peak of ancient Egyptian civilisation by looking at the Colossi of Memnon, two massive stone statues depicting Pharaoh Amenhotep III, and examining the lives of the workers and artisans involved in the building of the Valley of the Kings.
A great granddaughter of Queen Victoria, Prince Philip’s mother married into the Greek royal family – only to see the Greek monarchy overthrown by revolution. Fleeing into exile, she suffered a severe nervous breakdown. She was locked away in mental hospitals and subjected to experimental treatments by psychiatrists – including Sigmund Freud himself. The trauma had a shattering effect on Princess Alice’s marriage and led to a fractured childhood for her only son Prince Philip.
This is the story of Harry Burton, one of the great heroes of British photography. As the official photographer for Howard Carter’s Tutankhamun excavation during the 1920s, Burton created some of the 20th Century’s most famous images and helped to make Tutankhamun an international sensation.
Ruth, Peter and Tom enter the surprisingly colourful world of medieval interior design. The castles that we see today are in fact scarred by centuries of decay. Most of their original roofs, carpentry and interior finishes have long since disappeared, but in their heyday they were lavishly decorated.
The historian reveals how Egypt's enemies exploited a country weakened by internal strife, travelling south to Sudan to examine the story of the forgotten Nubian kings, who ruled Egypt from their southern homeland for a century, even building their own pyramids to bury their monarchs.
After the death of Diana Princess of Wales, conspiracy theories filled the headlines. As so many of the conspiracy theories are absurd, many simple questions about the fatal night of August 31st have never been asked. By the end not only Princess Diana but also Dodi Al Fayed and the driver Henri Paul were dead.
For centuries pilgrimage was one of the greatest adventures on earth, involving epic journeys across the country and around the world. This series sees Simon Reeve retrace the exciting adventures of our ancestors. He learns about the forgotten aspects of pilgrimage, including the vice, thrills and dangers that all awaited travellers. He explores the faith, the hopes, desires, and even the food that helped to keep medieval Britons and more recent travellers on the road.
The team delve deeper into the secrets of the skilled communities who built medieval castles. The stonemasons working on the castle walls are dependent on blacksmiths, whose metalwork was magical to the medieval mind-set.
Simon Reeve follows in the footsteps of thousands of travellers from previous centuries, as he travels from northern France to northern Spain, and then crosses western Europe to arrive in Rome.
Ruth, Peter and Tom look at the castle’s place in the wider medieval world. 13th century Europe was a busy, developing, connected place, where work, trade, pilgrimages and Crusades gave people the opportunity to travel across the continent and beyond.
The people of Pompeii had ample warning that the volcano was about to erupt, and yet they apparently stayed put, awaiting death in their hundreds. Why? The skeletons of those who stayed behind were miraculously preserved in the dust and very few show any sign of damage, violence or attempts to flee. How, then, did they die? This film reveals the terrible truth of what happened to the people of Pompeii on that fated day.
Stephen Fry takes a look inside the story of Johann Gutenberg, inventor of the world's first printing press in the 15th century, and an exploration of how and why the machine was invented.
During the Second World War, the government of Canada commissioned artists the record the activities of the Canadian military. Some were send to Europe, others painted the home front. In all, more than 5,000 paintings were produced.
Nursing sisters were the first women to be fully accepted into the military during the First and Second World Wars. In this moving and emotional, Gemini winning documentary we tell the story of these brave women, and pay homage to their selfless actions as they paved the way for women's equality.
Operation Valkyrie: The Plot To Kill Hitler is the definitive film on Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and the ‘Valkyrie’ conspiracy to assassinate Hitler on 20th July, 1944. Produced in collaboration with the official German Foundation dedicated to the memory of the conspirators, it features testimonials and eyewitness accounts from all of the aristocratic families involved in the plot, including the last living conspirator to escape Hitler’s wrath, and Maria Countess von Stauffenberg who knew Claus all her life.
Canadian military accomplishments in the last hundred days of World War I, when the German Army was destroyed, surpassed those of any other army. The Canadian success was, in no small measure, due to Arthur Currie, whom a recent British historian describes as "the most successful Allied General and one of the least well known."
Dr Suzannah Lipscomb looks at the hidden dangers of the British postwar home. In the 1950s, people embraced modern design for the first time after years of austerity and self-denial. The modern home featured moulded plywood furniture, fibreglass, plastics and polyester - materials and technologies that were developed during World War II.
Incorporating myth, history and contemporary investigation, Bernstein tells the story of how human beings have become intoxicated, obsessed, enriched, impoverished, humbled and proud for the sake of gold. From the past to the future, Bernstein′s portrayal of gold is intimately linked to the character of humankind.
Incorporating myth, history and contemporary investigation, Bernstein tells the story of how human beings have become intoxicated, obsessed, enriched, impoverished, humbled and proud for the sake of gold. From the past to the future, Bernstein′s portrayal of gold is intimately linked to the character of humankind.
Meet Jim Charlesworth - professor, entrepreneur and Dead Sea Scroll Hunter. A man convinced that a large number of the scrolls have yet to come to light, and that he, like a modern-day Indiana Jones can track them down. He is not alone in his quest. Other scroll hunters, archaeologists, scholars and scientists, share his conviction. For those who deal in scrolls, or deal in the secrets that they hold, the story is far from over.
King Constantine of Greece had been a King in name only since being ousted in a military coup in 1967. From his base in London, he travelled the world, rubbing shoulders with the political elite such as Nelson Mandela, Fidel Castro and the Queen of England. He tirelessly worked for “his people” and the good causes he has established.
Incorporating myth, history and contemporary investigation, Bernstein tells the story of how human beings have become intoxicated, obsessed, enriched, impoverished, humbled and proud for the sake of gold. From the past to the future, Bernstein′s portrayal of gold is intimately linked to the character of humankind.
According to the Bible, The Ark of the Covenant was a box which housed the two tablets of stone inscribed with the Ten Commandments. It was constructed by a man called Belazeel on Mount Sinai in Ancient Egypt to the instructions given to Moses by God.
Aukland Harbour, New Zealand. July 10th 1985. French navy combat men place two mines against the hull of the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior. At ten minutes to midnight, the bombs explode, sinking the ship and killing photographer Fernando Pereira.
There is no shortage of theories exploring how these monoliths were constructed- from the Creator-god to aliens and giants. This programme chronicles University of Pennsylvania researcher Alexei Vranich's expedition to prove his theory of how the American Stonehenge was created: that the stones were transported across Lake Titicaca on gigantic totora reed boats and then laboriously dragged another 10 kilometers to the city.
Rupert Everett follows in the footsteps of romantic poet Lord Byron, 200 years after he embarked on his infamous tour of Europe.
Rupert Everett follows in the footsteps of romantic poet Lord Byron, 200 years after he embarked on his infamous tour of Europe.
Britain’s Treasures from the Air takes a spectacular look at how the National Trust has pursued its simple mission to preserve Britain's most valued places, 'for ever, for everyone.' From its humble beginnings over a century ago, it's now a national institution and one of Britain's biggest landowners with properties ranging from vast areas of countryside and coastline, to churches and even entire villages!
Sam's Army is a compelling portrait of a complex man and the formidable military he built. Sam Hughes was not your standard-issue military leader. Canada's World War I Minister of Militia and Defence concentrated power in his own hands, insisted that the Canadian military use the ill-conceived Ross rifle and liberally promoted his cronies. But there was no denying Hughes was a visionary. He assembled the world's largest-ever volunteer army and bucked superiors to keep his ferocious fighting force together in one Canadian Corps.
Recreates for the viewer one of the greatest battles in Canadian military history. The programme shows Canadian character at its best, forging an identity for a country that before the First World War had been seen only as a British colony – an identity and a character that became recognised and respected throughout Europe.
Italy's most powerful organised crime group is no longer Sicily's Cosa Nostra but the 'Ndrangheta', a shadowy Mafia from the southern region of Calabria.
For 50 years, Berlin was the symbol of the Cold War. The city at the heart of the intelligence war between the US and the Soviet bloc. Thousands of KGB or CIA, agents observed each other, cogs in the biggest information war in history.
King Herod is regarded as the most fascinating and appalling figure of the biblical world. Shrouded in legend, the evil King is portrayed in every Christmas Nativity play as a monster who killed hundreds of babies and tried to slaughter the baby Jesus in order to retain his title – King of the Jews. But who was the real Herod? Was he real at all, or just a figure of myth?
Made in conjunction with the Imperial War Museum, Duxford, this programme tells the story of these great war planes. Stunning air-to-air flying sequences are intercut with interviews with pilots and aircrew of the British and American air forces. Some of the fighter aircraft featured are the Supermarine Spitfire, the Hawker Hurricane, the Messerschmitt Bf109, the P-47 Thunderbolt and the P-51 Mustang.
Hollywood actor Sean Bean tells the story of Waterloo, one of history’s most decisive battles. Sean’s journey of discovery is inspired by his own experiences of playing Napoleonic soldier Richard Sharpe in TV films based on Bernard Cornwell’s best-selling novels.
A gripping ninety minute special first broadcast on BBC1 and presented by Hollywood Superstar Ewan McGregor and his brother Colin to mark the 70th Anniversary of the Battle of Britain – arguably the most important event in modern British history and the only aerial war in world history.
In a case that shocked the nation maids Christine and Lea Papin admit to the murder of the mother and daughter of their master.
A fascinating investigation into some of the most notorious, infamous and terrifying crimes in French history - cases that gripped the public’s imagination, inspired books and movies and became the catalysts for social change.
Part two of Hollywood actor Sean Bean telling the story of Waterloo, one of history’s most decisive battles. Sean’s journey of discovery is inspired by his own experiences of playing Napoleonic soldier Richard Sharpe in TV films based on Bernard Cornwell’s best-selling novels.
For forty years the Australian Intelligence & Security Organistion (ASIO) hunted spies and subversives. In the process it opened files on students, unionists, Aboriginal activists, and writers and as many as half a million other citizens. Persons Of Interest shows how things really happened in this dirty war against dissent. Using actual files, recently discovered secret surveillance film and photographs, these films are the personal stories of lives under the microscope of Government surveillance. In light of the Snowden, NSA scandal and with ASIO possessing more power than ever - Persons Of Interest is a timely addition to the debate.
Nobody would have guessed that Pierre- François Lacenaire would become a murderer; he was born into a well-to-do family and was a brilliant student. Early on he found he had a passion for letters and poetry. But he will end up on fringes of society. His violent crimes lead to his journey towards what he used to call his fiancee, "guillotine".
Forty years after the end of the Vietnam War the crippling effects of Agent Orange, a chemical sprayed during combat, are revealed.
In a journey that takes him through command centers and battlefields, he explores why half-a-million men were killed or wounded in the bitter endgame of the ‘Great War’ and unravels how Germany ultimately plunged to total defeat. November 11th proved to be a doomed peace, a prelude to a century-long struggle for mastery of Europe. David Reynolds argues that it was the frenetic politicking and brutality of the fighting in 1918 that sowed the seeds of the even bloodier Second World War just 20 years later.
This touching documentary investigates the tragic stories of the 306 British & Commonwealth soldiers shot for acts of cowardice and desertion during World War One.
Vietnam is often called "the war that won't go away", largely because of the continuing controversy of the POW/MIA (Prisoners Of War / Missing In Action) issue. Families of those who were POW/MIA in Vietnam organized an activist movement which went on to pursue a question which still haunts America nearly decades later: were soldiers left behind in captivity after the Vietnam War?
The Rouen Museum has just returned a severed Maori head, which has been in its collections for 150 years, to New Zealand’s Te Papa Institute. This film reveals the story of how such heads ended up in European museums, and the Maori people's efforts to have the head returned. The story has its origins in the worst periods of colonial conquest, and perfectly illustrates the philosophy of relationships between the West and indigenous peoples in the 19th century.
The Exodus. The very word invokes an epic tale of Pharaohs and Israelites, plagues and miracles, the splitting of the sea, the drowning of an army, Moses and revelation. The story is at the very heart of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
What happens when artifacts are stolen? What happens when jewels, riches, and remains need returning? And who has the right to some of archaeology's greatest discoveries?
With continuing releases of major films and TV series on Sherlock Holmes, the fictional character has never been more popular. But what about his creator, the author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, whose own life was at times as dark and as mysterious as the man he created? This brand new documentary explores the intriguing world of Conan Doyle and discovers the truth behind his decision to to kill off the man who had dominated his life for so long in one dramatic episode.
When a soldier dies at war those who are closest to them are the ones affected the most and for the children in this documentary, growing up without a parent is the harsh reality they live in.
Rodez, 1817, the public prosecutor Antoine Bernardin Fualdès is discovered floating in the Aveyron waters. France is in its restoration period, and the struggle between imperialists and Bonapartists is burning on. Rumours and fake confessions are everywhere as the sordid circumstances of his murder come out bit by bit. For three years, this affair enthralled France and the rest of the world.
A gruesome tale set during the First World War, The Bluebeard Case tells of a seemingly respectable man who targets single women and sets about seducing them, with the sole aim of murdering them. But it doesn't stop there. He goes on to burn their bodies on his stove in his house in France, and finally strips them of all their assets.
The series showing how World War Two was documented by German and British home movie makers looks at the experiences of children, captured on film by parents and friends.
Is it possible to find a middle ground between Christianity and popular music? With celebrity views and real stories throughout, this documentary discusses the balance between the culture of music and the life of being a Christian.
How WW2 was documented by home movie makers. This episode looks at how women delt with the war and how the responsibilty and credibility of women grew as the war went on.
The world is a battlefield with Nazi Germany attempting to take over Europe, but halfway around the world another battle is taking place, China is under attack from Japan.
Paris, December 1937, a murder who's willing to do anything to prove himself is at lose. But who was this mysterious man and what were his motives to commit the crimes he did?
Ukrainian film director Sergey Bukovsky takes the viewer on a poignant journey of discovery as he and several Ukrainian students absorb the testimony of local people who escaped brutal execution and those who rescued friends and neighbours during the Holocaust.
Alexander Litvinenko, a former officer of the Russian secret service, died in London in 2006 from poisoning by radioactive polonium. This film reveals for the first time the remarkable details of the Scotland Yard investigation into Alexander Litvinenko’s murder by Russian agents, and how he helped the police on his deathbed.
Roman cooking traditions are very very different from how we prepare and cook food nowadays and some of their styles are interesting to say the least.
Medieval cooking traditions are very very different from how we prepare and cook food nowadays and some of their styles are interesting to say the least.
People were as promiscuous in the past as they are today...with a much more horrifying, uncomfortable and potentially deadly outcome.
The Sacred City presents compelling evidence that suggests the holy city of Mecca is in the wrong location and that the worlds 1.6 billion Muslims are praying in the direction of the wrong city. Compiling evidence from both historic sources and new technologies point to the correct location in this seismic, revelatory new film.
A story of human endeavour, the contest between British and German air forces in 1940 which became a defining point of the Second World War. With unseen footage from the feature film, Battle of Britain, this series provides an unbiased accounts of the events in the skies above Britain. A chronological account of a country preparing to defend itself against a rising empire.
Chávez is a documentary based on the public and political life of the Venezuelan Ex-President from the day of the rebellion he commanded on February 4th, 1992 until his death on March 2013.
Princes of the Yen reveals how post-war Japanese society was transformed to suit the agenda of powerful interest groups, and how citizens were kept entirely in the dark about this. History is now repeating itself around the world.
Fighting the Blue: Spirits in the Wind. We look at the saviour of the Battle of Britain, Hugh Dowding, who was instrumental in structuring an entire air defence force that could take on the massive aerial might of the Luftwaffe. We argue that it was primarily Dowding who saved Britain from defeat against Hitler in 1940, only to be ignominiously humiliated at the end of the conflict.
The Worst Jobs in History: Middle Ages. Tony Robinson discovers how fullers spent their working lives stomping on newly woven cloth in vats of stale urine.
In 1958, an Italian archaeologist discovered the mummified remains of a two-and-a-half-year-old boy in a cave in southwestern Libya. But this was a mummy with a difference: it was far older than any comparable examples found in Egypt.
The Cathedral of Christ the Saviour is a Russian Orthodox cathedral in Moscow, Russia, on the northern bank of the Moskva River, a few hundred metres southwest of the Kremlin. With an overall height of 103 metres (338 ft) it is the tallest Orthodox Christian church in the world.
Showing the vital role that women played throughout the Battle of Britain and beyond, serving in the WAAF (Women's Auxilliary Air Force) in the factories and airfields, radar stations and operations rooms across Britain, and in the ATA (Air Transport Auxilliary) flying and delivering Spitfires and Hurricanes wherever needed.
The Mummy Research Team at the University of York examine a Peruvian mummy that had lain hidden in a London storage facility and attempt to discover why it was preserved in an unusual cross-legged posture.
Dr Joann Fletcher is on a mission, she and the Mummy Investigation Team at York University have been called in to look at a mysterious case – a female mummy inside a beautifully painted Egyptian coffin. There’s only one catch, they’re not allowed to open the coffin. In one of the teams’ most unusual cases they must solve the mystery of this woman’s demise without ever having access to her mummy.
A bodiless mummy head is examined and clues about the person are gathered from the head alone.
A 1995 documentary outlining the restoration of a Fleet Air Arm Hawker Sea Hurricane to flight capable status.
The research team at the University of York examines the wounds of a South American mummy to ascertain whether the man was a victim of crime.
Don't miss this compelling one-hour documentary about the vital role women played in putting an end to World War II by working for Canadian spymaster William Stephenson -- a.k.a. "the Man Called Intrepid."
Biographer A.N. Wilson uncovers the intriguing personal life of Queen Victoria through her journals and letters in this psychological portrait of Britain's longest reigning monarch. With Queen Victoria's writings read by Anna Chancellor.
Biographer A.N. Wilson uncovers the intriguing personal life of Queen Victoria through her journals and letters in this psychological portrait of Britain's longest reigning monarch. With Queen Victoria's writings read by Anna Chancellor.
She’s probably the most controversial woman in Chinese history – Wu Zetian, who rose from lowly concubine to become the only woman in all Chinese history to dare to take the title “Emperor”
In June 1812, the United States of America declared war on Britain and invaded its colony of Upper Canada. Britain was already locked in a life and death struggle with Napoleon in Europe, leaving Upper Canada poorly defended and vulnerable to attack.
Millions of Londoners cross these bridges every week. Most of them hardly give it a second thought. But bridges are much more than merely a means of transport - ways of getting from one place to another. They are also ways of linking the present to the past. London's Bridges are not just functional objects - they're also symbols, metaphors, which transform, connect and inspire.
How Ancient Egypt created beer.
Margaret Thatcher's rare interview with Miriam Stoppard, 1985.
Former Royal Chef Graham Newbould who was once a chef on the Royal Yacht Britannia for the Queen reveals what goes on in the kitchens of the famous House of Windsor.
Simon travels on to the Holy Land, following in the footsteps of Victorian travellers who used the definitive guide book of the period, published in 1876 by Thomas Cook, whose grand excursions to the Holy Land pioneered the modern package holiday.
Following the tragic fire at Notre Dame, 15th April, we thought we'd share this documentary of the cathedral in its prime. Reaching to the heavens, Notre-Dame has stood as a beacon in the heart of Paris since its construction in 1163.
Wild mustangs have long been an icon of native peoples and early settlers of North America. Yet their fate today is uncertain. Traded, stolen, and wild for 400 years, an estimated 2-3 million roamed North America in 1890 until they became almost extinct.
The Sahara is the biggest desert on earth. It takes its name from the Arab word for "emptiness". In the dead heart of that emptiness there's a place called the Tenere. The Tenere takes its name from the Tuareg word for "nothing". A nothing the size of France in the middle of an emptiness the size of the United States. It's no wonder the locals call this place "The Land Of Fear”. David Adams retraces the trade routes of the people who call this stove-hot corner of the planet home.
Travel journalist Simon Calder takes a journey from across the south of England - by bike, rail and car. In this documentary film, Simon explores the legacy of the Beeching railway cuts. He examines the arguments for reopening some of the branch lines axed in the 1960s.
Iran is one of the earth’s final frontiers. My journey takes me from the bustle of Tehran, via the Valley of the Assassins to ancient cities unchanged since Marco Polo first entered them eight centuries ago. But this isn’t just a journey through an ancient landscape. It’s a journey in search of one of the world’s least known religious sects ... the ancient Fire Worshippers Of Yazd.
In Montgomery, the first ten seats of every bus were reserved for white patrons, regardless of whether or not they were being used. It was common to see blacks standing over the empty seats. On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks and three other black passengers were asked to move from their seats which were behind the white section in order to allow a white man to be seated. The three others conceded after being threatened. However, Ms. parks continued to refuse and was arrested, jailed, booked, fingerprinted and fined.
Adams makes the pilgrimage from Lalibela to Gondar in the northern wilds of Ethiopia, and paddles by papyrus kayak across lake Tana. His quest: to find the Ark of the Covenant.
This is the untold story of the greatest slaving nation in history. Up till now, Britain’s place in the history of slavery has been as the country that abolished the international slave trade.
The battered dhow carves its passage though the tourmaline waters of the South Indian Ocean. Its patched lateen sail fat with monsoon wind, the salt air fragrant with cloves. Barely heard at first, the faint cry of a muezzin crackles through the dawn’s early light. Heads turn to the horizon. The turbaned helmsman eases off the sailrope & utters just one magical word.... Zanzibar. Zanzibar. The Spice Island. A real world Shangri-la. The island at the end of the earth. David Adams sails south in search of the lost world of Arab seafarer.
On June 6, 1944, thousands of Allied servicemen landed on the shores of northern France with a mission to free western Europe from Nazi tyranny. Over the ensuing hours and days, the men faced decimating machine-gun fire, mortars and artillery, eventually fighting their way inland, but not before suffering a staggering number of casualties.
In the far-flung reaches of Siberian Russia there’s a place unlike any other on earth. A place nine times zones from Moscow. A place so far east it’s almost west. A place called Kamchatka, the snowbound Eden. One hundred thousand lakes; 300 geysers; 414 glaciers; 100 volcanoes all crammed into a peninsula the size of California. But it’s also a nuclear no-go zone. Off-limits to the world for most of the 20th century. In fact, more Americans have been into outer space than have crossed Kamchatka in the last hundred years.
A technical marvel of her time, Constitution gave our young republic its first victories at sea and began a tradition of excellence for the U.S. Navy. Now restored to her original splendour, the Constitution is now the oldest commissioned vessel in the US Navy.Relive the legend and watch this famous ship as she reaffirms America's dreams & as her crew sails into the twenty-first century.
For the better part of 400 years people have searched the deep canyons & towering ice peaks of these mist-covered cloud forests trying to locate the lost cities of the Inca. They were all after one thing; gold. Any gold would do but there was one thing desired above all others, the Great Golden Disc of the Sun. The most sacred of all Inca relics. The Inca Holy Grail.
This fascinating documentary takes us back to the early days of the Thames barge matches when they started in 1863 - the second oldest sailing competition in the world. This documentary includes the first and second episode.
David Adams re-lives the last days on the last trail of two American heroes, Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, through the deserts of Bolivia. In 1908 the two legendary outlaws disappeared in the south of Bolivia not far from the border of Argentina. Were they killed by the Bolivian Cavalry? Or did they fake their deaths and escape to the USA and Europe as rich men?
This fascinating documentary takes us back to the early days of the Thames barge matches when they started in 1863 - the second oldest sailing competition in the world. This documentary includes the third and forth episode.
Nowhere else on Earth is the difference between the tranquillity & beauty of the physical world and the brutality & disorder of the people who live in it brought into such sharp contrast as it is in the former Soviet satellites that span the gap between Europe & Asia. Nagorno Karabagh. Ossetia. Abkhazia. Ingushetia. Chechnya. Dagestan. Who’d even heard of them before the 90s?
This fascinating documentary takes us back to the early days of the Thames barge matches when they started in 1863 - the second oldest sailing competition in the world. This documentary includes the fifth and sixth episode.
The Irish Brigade was an infantry brigade, consisting predominantly of Irish Americans, that served in the Union Army in the American Civil War. The designation of the first regiment in the brigade, the 69th New York Infantry, or the "Fighting 69th", continued in later wars.
Afghanistan is not so much a country as a series of shifting borders. This is the most militant Islamic state on Earth but it was once was peace loving and Buddhist. In the Bamiyan Valley north of Kabul the two largest statues of Buddha on the planet were carved in the third century. David Adams was the last Westerner to exhaustively film them before they were blown up in 2001.
Documentary chronicling the life and career of Joshua Slocum, the sailor who became the first solo circumnavigator of the globe. From his birth in Nova Scotia in 1844 to his mysterious disappearance at sea in 1909, this film offers an in-depth view of a fearless and charismatic sailor, writer and adventurer.
Legend tells of a utopian kingdom hidden among the towering mountains of inner Asia. A paradise on Earth, yet a place apart. A place of spiritual contentment and eternal life. A place that’s become known to the West as Shangri-La. For century’s romantics, adventurers and the devout risked their lives searching for this heaven on Earth. Many perished in the quest.
David Adams’ journey takes us into a Sudan we rarely see. On the flat waters of the Nile, he hears the creaking of the rigging catching the wind as river-travelers have for thousands of years. While the battlements of ancient fortresses standing on shore are occasional reminders of the region’s violent past, he is able to contemplate that era from the relative peace of the wide river.
Recorded between 16 and 18 April 1993, this first episode of the legendary Time Team series sees the team try to find evidence of what the Athelney site's settlement looked like in the time of Alfred the Great, focusing on the search for Alfred's Athelney Abbey and fort.
Discover the story of the steamship SS Ventnor, which, in 1902, sank off Hokianga, North Island, with the remains of 499 Chinese gold miners on board.
With the American public galvanised and the expertise of over 200,000 scientists and engineers, Von Braun masterminded the development of the Saturn V; the rocket that flew 24 men to the moon and launched the greatest adventure in the history of exploration.
Guided by the insights of a Buddhist monk, we explore the lives of the Burmese intertwined with the reconstruction of the road and the environmental effects it will have on one of Southeast Asia's last remaining wildernesses.
Working against the clock, the Time Team reveal by excavation a unique piece of military engineering that holds the key to just how the Roman army survived - around AD100 - in this remote outpost of the Empire.
The extraordinary story of General Tom Thumb, the world’s first global show business celebrity. Just 31 inches tall, he went from humble beginnings in America to international superstardom, eventually performing on stage to over 50 million people, including President Lincoln and Queen Victoria.
A television special focusing on four areas where women's progress has been most dramatic: Politics, Sexuality, Work and Family. By using Babe (the 1940s gal reporter, created by Cathy Jones of This Hour Has 22 Minutes) as our tour guide and narrator through the 20th Century, this information is packaged in an entertaining as well as informative manner.
Cambodia is a country of impenetrable jungles and ruins lost in time. Where kings became gods and monks still seek heavenly peace. Now, this mysterious land has begun to open up to reveal the dark beauty that has lured adventurers here for centuries. For more than 30 years, the jungles have been cut off from the modern world, and much of that time it has been a Khmer Rouge stronghold.
The Time Team turn their attention to Much Wenlock, Shropshire. Over their allotted three days, they reveal in present-day gardens and, in the kitchen of one family, fascinating evidence about the early development of a medieval town and an important aspect of England's past.
The extraordinary story of General Tom Thumb, the world’s first global show business celebrity. Just 31 inches tall, he went from humble beginnings in America to international superstardom, eventually performing on stage to over 50 million people, including President Lincoln and Queen Victoria.
The vast desert country veiled from the East by fear, prejudice and misunderstanding. Adams follows in the wheel tracks of Ancient Rome's 'chariots of fire' - the first wheeled vehicles to cross the Sahara and discover a little-known land of exotic brilliance, ancient cities and forbidding deserts.
The Time Team travel to the site of a Dark Age man-made island - known as a crannog - in Llangorse lake, near Brecon in Wales.
In this documentary we set out to prove that the Welshman Sir Rhys ap Thomas, master of Carew Castle in Pembrokeshire, killed King Richard III, changing the course of British history.
The Peterloo Massacre was England's Tiananmen Square. On August 16th 1819, tens of thousands of cotton spinners and their wives and children gathered in St Peter's Fields in central Manchester to hear the fiery words of a radical orator called Henry Hunt, preaching revolution and equality. With orders to arrest him, a radical militia on horseback and sabres drawn charged into the middle of the crowd. Hundreds were brutally wounded, and 11 men, women and children died.
The incredible story of the Avro Lancaster, one of the finest bombers of the Second World War, which played a crucial role in the long and savage campaign to defeat Hitler's Third Reich. This documentary features interviews with surviving veterans of Bomber Command, who share frank personal accounts of their part in an aerial battle of attrition which claimed the lives of 55'000 aircrew.
Tony Robinson, Professor Mick Aston and the Team investigate one of Britain's greatest historic landmarks: Westminster Abbey. Surrounded by the sights and sounds of Parliament Square, the archaeologists have three days to pin down the location of a lost sacristy, a stronghold that was built by Henry III almost 800 years ago and is said to have housed the biggest collection of treasure this side of the Alps.
How Britain transformed from a colonial power into a global financial power. At the demise of empire, City of London financial interests created a web of offshore secrecy jurisdictions that captured wealth from across the globe and hid it behind obscure financial structures in a web of offshore islands.
This is the story of a man caught between the pressures of public duty and the demands of a private life with a publicly deteriorating marriage. it is a unique insight into the man whose destiny it is to be King.
Jan Leeming show us what medieval cooking was really like.
Excavations conducted by the Kent Archaeological Field School at Syndale, in Kent, have produced some interesting Roman finds. The most exciting was the discovery of what is thought to be an 'ankle-breaker ditch', a special military design that incorporates a trap at the bottom to perform the task it was named after. A day or two's march from where the Romans landed in 43 AD, and on the north-Kent route they would have taken on their way to the Thames, could this be the site of the first Roman fort in Britain, dating back to the Claudian invasion?
Documentary chronicling the events that led to the impeachment proceedings of US President Bill Clinton, featuring archive footage and comprehensive interviews.
This program provides a moving account of the unique life of the twentieth century's most remarkable woman, with an American perspective on the events of her life and history, including footage from the auction held to sell her dresses.
Jan Leeming show us what Tudor cooking was really like.
The team and experts head to Llancaiach Fawr manor, near Caerphilly, South Wales, to investigate an ancient moat. The team's geophysicists feel the site should provide them with the ideal conditions to determine what the ditch was originally designed to guard - but the project soon becomes one of the most baffling investigations in the programme's history.
The story of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's relationship, examining whether their marriage has radically changed the British monarchy.
With her informal style and sense of fun Sarah Ferguson seemed like a breath of fresh air sweeping through a somewhat outdated institution. "The Fergie Story" provides a unique glimpse into the life of the woman who could have been one of the most influential members of the Royal Family.
Jan Leeming show us what 17th Century cooking was really like.
Groby Old Hall in Leicestershire was once home to the legendary White Queen: Elizabeth, the wife of Edward IV. The Team are here to help the new owners, who have saved the house from dereliction, to find out what has gone on in their garden over the centuries.
A new insight into the story of Giacomo Casanova. A true son of the renaissance, Casanova was a musician, a cleric, a spy and a lover. He led a tempestuous life where he amassed and lost fortunes, invented the National Lottery, fought duels with Counts, and had the most famous love life of all time.
A profile of the Duchess of Cambridge, exploring her transformation from a seemingly ordinary young woman to a future monarch and what this means for the royal family.
Jan Leeming show us what Georgian cooking was really like.
Tony Robinson and the Team visit a tiny windswept island off the coast of Wales. The only way to get to it is by rigging a 500-metre zip wire way above the wave-lashed rocks. Incredibly, it seems that Gateholm Island in Pembrokeshire was once inhabited, but whether by Romans, Vikings, Celts or druids nobody knows.
A new insight into the story of Giacomo Casanova. A true son of the renaissance, Casanova was a musician, a cleric, a spy and a lover. He led a tempestuous life where he amassed and lost fortunes, invented the National Lottery, fought duels with Counts, and had the most famous love life of all time.
Documentary detailing the highs and lows of Queen Elizabeth II's reign as head of the British monarchy.
Jan Leeming show us what Morris dancers ate.
Tony Robinson and the team take on the task of locating the remains of Brown's villa and see if they can join up the dots.
A new insight into the story of Giacomo Casanova. A true son of the renaissance, Casanova was a musician, a cleric, a spy and a lover. He led a tempestuous life where he amassed and lost fortunes, invented the National Lottery, fought duels with Counts, and had the most famous love life of all time.
Who is the 'real' Prince Harry? A feckless playboy partying at nightclubs with a blonde on his lap? Or a physically brave young man destined to distinguish himself in unexpected ways? Despite relentless media scrutiny, much of it negative, Harry remains a tantalising, elusive mystery.
Jan Leeming show us Charles Dickens' kitchen and the food he ate.
The Team visit Jersey to investigate the origins of Mont Orgueil Castle: a fortress that came to symbolise the Channel Islands' bond with Britain.
The mysterious island of Crete has always loomed large in imagination, as the home of the Minotaur -- that monstrous creature, half-man half-bull -- imprisoned in Daedalus' labyrinth. Before Crete collapsed in fire and violence, it gave birth to Europe's first civilisation nearly 5,000 years ago, and boasted an advanced, prosperous Mediterranean civilisation with hinged doors, flush toilets, and magnificent palaces.
Using unique BBC footage, this documentary tells the story of two royal women, each of whom rebelled against convention in her own way, until they both became royal outcasts.
The team explores the grounds around Belton House near Grantham which were home to thousands of men training for frontline duties in WWI.
A new insight into the story of Giacomo Casanova. A true son of the renaissance, Casanova was a musician, a cleric, a spy and a lover. He led a tempestuous life where he amassed and lost fortunes, invented the National Lottery, fought duels with Counts, and had the most famous love life of all time.
From student to royal girlfriend and then to modern day princess, Kate Middleton has made a remarkable journey. In less than a decade, this normal girl from an ordinary background has won her prince charming and become the prospective Queen of England.
Tony and the Team search for the remains of a renegade knight's Norman castle in one of Northern Ireland's most picturesque spots.
Chronicling the romantic life of Britain's royal family in the 20th century, this documentary explores the history of royal marriages and asks what's next for a royal family increasingly battered by media pressures and whose business is shared with the whole world.
Laos: the most bombed country, per capita, on the planet. Australian bomb disposal specialist Laith Stevens has to train a new young "big bomb" team to deal with bombs left from the US "Secret War", but meanwhile, the local children are out hunting for bomb scrap metal. Vividly depicting the consequences of war with the incredible bravery of those trying to clear up the mess.
The first stone henge to be discovered in Britain for a century would be cause enough for major celebration. But there's double bubbles as Tony Robinson and his hardy team of archaeologists celebrate their 200th dig.
The story follows Estonian ex-farmer Albert, who now lives in England.
Lying on the remote north west coast of England is one of the most secret places in the country - Sellafield, the most controversial nuclear facility in Britain. Now, Sellafield are letting nuclear physicist Professor Jim Al-Khalili and the television cameras in to discover the real story.
If the medieval dead could speak, what would they tell us? They would recount extraordinary tales of pagan rituals, plague, and the cruel land in which ordinary folk struggled just to stay alive. Now, centuries after they were buried, the medieval dead are about to rise from their graves. This series reveals true stories of medieval life by examining the skeletal remains that lie buried below the earth's surface.
Over thirty years ago a teenage boy, scuba-diving off Teignmouth beach in Devon, found a bronze cannon on the seabed. He discovered that it was part of an ancient ship that was wrecked some 400 years ago. After all that time under water is there still enough of the ship left for Time Team to identify it? And where did it originally come from - could it in fact have been part of the Spanish Armada?
Andy and Lisa Wyrick are concerned, their four year old daughter Heidi has two imaginary playmates; "Mr. Gordy," an elderly man who pushes her on the swing, and "Con," a younger man Heidi describes as "missing an arm and covered with blood." When Lisa tells a neighbour of Mr. Gordy and Con, she is astonished to learn that the two men once lived in the area, and they're both deceased.
Midsummer 1361. In Gotland, Sweden King Valdemar and his Danish army attack the walled town of Visby. While the town’s rich merchants look on, a hastily recruited army of feudal peasants is quite literally cut to pieces by the Danes right outside the main gates. 1800 of the townsfolk are killed in the most brutal and clinical way.
Time Team investigate Oakham Castle in the tiny county of Rutland. It's Britain's best preserved 12th-century building but its grounds are full of mysterious lumps and bumps crying out to be investigated.
The Last Of The Few takes a detailed look at the Battle Of Britain Memorial Flight as it prepares for its 50th year of display & commemorative flying with a thrilling display at the Biggin Hill International Air Show in 2007.
A Channel 4 film about West Indian ex-servicemen and women who served in the British forces in both world wars. The personalities include a soldier who fought for the English regiment in WWII, a pilot who joined the ATS, plus other individuals who were in the ground crew in the RAF.
After Diana's death, the focus has shifted to Charles, the widower, parent and heir to the throne. This program examines his relationship with his sons William and Harry, his long-term lover Camilla and his future as King. With contributions by royal experts David Starkey and Anthony Holden.
A good few years ago, the ancient Mayans were thought to be a mysterious and peaceful people governed by astronomer-priests. But in 1965, Russian linguist Yuri Knorosov cracked the phonetic code of Mayan hieroglyphic writing in the confinements of his bustling Leningrad study.
As old as the century she lived in, the Queen Mother was a revered figure in British life. A symbol of courage in the Second World War and an enduring icon of stability, the Queen Mother maintained a level of loyalty and affection matched only by the Queen herself. This remarkable portrait digs beneath the surface and presents a balanced account of her life.
The Team visit Portsmouth to try and uncover one of the city's oldest buildings - a medieval hospital. But after three days of bone-chilling weather and confusing archaeology can the Team work out what stood on Governors Green over 500 years ago?
This in-depth documentary looks at the scandals that have blighted the credibility and popularity of the royal family through the ages, right up to the more recent controversies surrounding Diana, Fergie and Camilla.
For a woman with a very public image, it was often difficult for Princess Diana to conduct a private life. She captured the hearts of the nation but what really went on behind closed doors?
The team attempt to uncover an ornate mosaic floor in the burial grounds of St Kyneburgha church.
An analysis of the trials of being an up-and-coming royal in the modern world, and how they compares with the life of a celebrity.
In 29 April 2011, William and Catherine were married in a fairy tale wedding watched by more than two billion people and celebrated the whole world over.
Tony and the Team search for the remains of a renegade knight's Norman castle in one of Northern Ireland's most picturesque spots.
Romantic visions of the Explorer Hernando de Soto continue to celebrate the conquistador’s arrival in North America 450 years ago as one of the most important events in the history of mankind. But archaeology tells a darker story…
At 9:00 a.m. on February 19, 1945, the soldiers of the United States Marine Corps 5th Division, H Company lowered themselves down rope cargo nets into landing crafts rocking in five-foot seas. They were less than a mile from the shore of the remote South Pacific island of Iwo Jima. H Company was made up mostly of 18 to 20 year-old boys who had been training for this day for over a year.
This is the story of Sarah Ferguson, once Her Royal Highness, Duchess of York - now an exile from the royal family - a woman who had everything, then threw it away when forced to exploit her name during a huge scandal.
A team of archaeologists have just three days to excavate the site of an Elizabethan blast furnace after finding clues in a test pit dug as part of Time Team Big Dig. The team also explore medieval furnaces at nearby East Wall and try smelting their own iron.
In 1856, workmen in a cave in the Neander valley near Dusseldorf, Germany, unearthed a human skeleton. Its skull had a low, protruding brow, large teeth, and a massive bone structure. And from this discovery began a lengthy dispute: did the Neanderthal man represent an abnormal modern human? Or an extinct ancestor?
Guernsey and its neighbouring islands have a unique distinction which sets them apart from the rest of the British Isles. Together with the rest of the Channel Islands, they were the only part of the British Isles to fall to Nazi Germany in the Second World War.
Hopton Castle was the site of a massacre during the English civil war. There is only one account of the battle and subsequent slaughter of the defenders. The Time Team decides to investigate the site and try to establish how much of the account is actually true.
Rising out of the highlands of Sub-Saharan Africa are the ruins of the long-secluded, spectacular Great Zimbabwe. Dismissed by racist explorers as the work of some ancient black civilisation and stripped by ignorance and prejudice of many of it’s priceless artefacts, white colonisers were certain that Black Africans could not have built the towering stone walls. Only now, after a century of abuse, is the Great Zimbabwe reclaiming it’s uniquely African heritage.
The most photographed woman in the world, Diana, Princess of Wales was a unique media phenomenon. But how was the phenomenon created and who created it - Princess, Palace, media or public?
An eagle-eyed forest ranger spotted bits of Roman building poking out from the forest floor in Cambridgeshire's Bedford Purlieus Wood and cutting-edge aerial visualisations reveal evidence of a complex of building foundations hidden in the woods. Tony and the Team investigate what these buildings were and why they were here
Published in 1918, Frederick Bligh Bond's 'The Gate of Remembrance' detailed excavations at Glastonbury Abbey. Recorded in the book were automatic writing sessions in which Bligh claimed to have been contacted by dead monks who had guided the excavations. Bond's employer, The Church of England, fired him and he faced reputational ruin. But was there any way that Bond could have located the buildings he found at the abbey without spirit help?
Documentary looking back over the life and reign of Queen Elizabeth II. Charting many of the changes which have taken place since she came to the throne in 1952, it describes how Elizabeth's role as head of state has remained constant throughout. It also chronicles many of the Queen's royal tours and tells of her affection for the Commonwealth.
The tale of the Israelites’ conquest of the Promised Land has long been an article of faith wherever the Bible is widely read and respected. But recent discoveries suggest that the military defeat of the Promised Land, as detailed in the Book of Joshua, simply never occurred.
After a chance discovery of Saxon pottery in the town Burford, the Time Team attempt to unravel the history of this medieval town. With the help of a group of school children they put together a time line 1500 years long.
From fairy tale bride to estranged royal wife and mother, Princess Diana captivated hearts and headlines. But this documentary goes behind the secret life of scandal and marital betrayal.
Lucy Worsley explores the different houses in which Jane Austen lived and stayed, to discover just how much they shaped Jane's life and novels.
Chef Christian Bauer visits Asia’s Royal Families to learn and reinterpret their favourite dishes. In Balasinor, India – he meets Princess Aaliya Babi and cooks their family favourite: Lasaniya Kheema – a minced lamb with green garlic.
Although almost twenty-five years have passed since the end of Israel’s most ambitious archaeological undertaking, the name of this site, Masada, still exerts romantic appeal. For many Israelites and visitors to Israel, the isolated, flat-topped rock in the Judean Desert remains the most visible symbol of the power and significance of modern archaeology.
The team travel to the Isle of Mull to investigate a series of strange structures found deep in a forest. There is suspicion the site may be a previously unknown Christian Church, or it could be a simple farmers dwelling.
The romantic yet tragic story of Prince William of Gloucester: the Queen's playboy cousin reminiscent of real-life James Bond. Prince William had a forbidden love affair with the glamorous Zsuzsi Starkloff whom he met in Tokyo, but unable to choose between his lover and his duties, he died in a place crash, aged only 30.
In an age of science, one tale of the supernatural continues to seduce us: the legend of the vampire. At last, scientists are digging vampires out of their tombs to take a good, long look at them. What they're finding is a surprising factual side to the ancient legend. Fact may be stranger than fiction!
Was Cleopatra black? Was Socrates? Did Egyptian armies conquer ancient Greece, thus setting the cradle of Western civilization in motion? Is this wishful thinking on the part of historical revisionists…or is it a long-suppressed historical fact?
Two hundred years ago, Swansea was one of the wealthiest cities in the country, if not the world. The source of those riches was neither the coal nor the steel recently associated with the area, but copper.
Tony Robinson explores the mysteries and legends of the Icknield Way's prehistoric mines, hidden caves, demonic dogs and mysterious ley lines, as he travels from the Norfolk coast to Bedfordshire's hills.
This week, Balinese Prince Tjokorda Raka Kerthyasa of Ubud has invited Chef Christian Bauer to his island home to prepare bebek betutu, or dirty duck. But will Chris find himself set back by the ancient kitchen of this centuries-old household?
Sweeping aside nearly 2,000 years of doubt and mystery, ongoing excavations in Germany’s Teutoburg Forest have revealed the location of one of the bloodiest battles of antiquity.
There's a problem in the chocolate-box village of Bitterley in Shropshire. The village's school and cottages cluster prettily around the green. But the village church and the manor house lie more than half a mile away, on the other side of a lumpy, bumpy empty field.
This week, Princess Astrini of Solo Indonesia invites Chef Christian Bauer to prepare one of her late father’s favourite dishes – the Huzarensla salad. It’s a dish that is so simple that it’s challenging – and Chris needs to do what he can to reinvent this classic recipe.
The National Trust Roman fort of Branodunum has produced some impressive aerial photographs of cropmarks, promising substantial buildings and multiple finds from the second to the fourth centuries AD. Some outstanding geophysics results are also hugely encouraging. If anything it was larger than the current Brancaster. The close proximity of the sea would have been vital to travel and commerce, and there was certainly much marine traffic.
The extraordinary story of how two RAF squadrons sank Germany's most dangerous Second World War battleship, after 34 failed attempts.
The late King Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia was a famous cook. This week, Chef Christian Bauer visits Princess Norodom Buppha Devi and re-invents the King’s favourite dessert – a banana and peanut butter cake. Will his version prove just as sweet as the kingly treat?
Following the discovery in 1995 of a set of human remains in a coffin on the coast of Patagonia in Argentina, a team of scientists set out to find out if they belonged to the long-lost grave of Catherine Roberts, the first Welsh woman to die in Patagonia shortly after she arrived with the first group of settlers in 1865.
A new sovereign can revive a royal family or be its kiss of death. So will the controversial successor to Queen Elizabeth II spell the end of Britain’s thousand-year monarchy?
Tony Robinson explores the ridge walks and ancient traversal tracks that ancient Celtic warriors and travellers used to navigate the British Isles.
Through a series of candid interviews with Royal families and their kitchen, we de-mystify the monarchy through cooking and learn how their country’s unique and traditional dishes have played a part in their lives.
This is the story of the world's first blue water sailors: the Austronesians and Polynesians who conquered the largest ocean on the planet. Their story begins in Southeast Asia more than 5,000 years ago, when the Austronesians began an eastward thrust into the Pacific.
Witchcraft Among The Azande - Once one of the largest tribes in Africa, the Azande kingdom spread across what is now the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Southern Sudan.
Describes the western world's most potent religion, Catholicism, and its inquisitions to maintain power at any cost in medieval France, 15th century Spain, Renaissance Italy and even into the 19th century. Historians, experts and Church authorities advise on the handling of this controversial subject matter.
This sailing documentary of Sinbad focuses on the story of Arabian ships and seafarers is often overlooked. But to remind us, there are the dhows of the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean, carrying cargo over waters that witnessed the birth of sea trade. Dhows helped spread Islam throughout the world, turning the Arabs into a major political force. The principal link in the lucrative trade between East and West, they also made Arab merchants a fortune.
Exploring The Ship Wreckage - At the end of WWII millions of German civilians fled the encroaching Soviet Army. The situation at the Polish ports was chaotic; ships were loaded way over capacity. And off the coast, Soviet submarines were lying in wait, ready to attack. In the end, 20,000 people died amongst the ship wreckage. It was one of the worst civilian maritime fatalities of all time.
The story of the Chinese Dragon seafaring is one of adventure, courage and ingenuity that ranges far beyond transporting goods. The moment people were able to move long distances at sea, they became less isolated. Along with their cargoes came other people and new ideas. The resulting interaction would shape the face of the world.
Fernando and Isabel proclaim themselves the Catholic Monarchs. In the war to drive the remaining Muslims from the south of the Kingdom their scapegoats become the Conversos, Jews who have converted to Christianity and who are now accused of being traitors and heretics secretly trying to undermine the Church. The Spanish Inquisition is born and a campaign of terror begins.
Here, we take a retrospective on notorious criminals and their robberies. They did it for money, for fame, and for thrills. They used disguises, cunning, and bravado. Some travelled through foreign lands, leading top detectives on a wild pursuit around the world. Some got away with millions, others captured within days. They're the leaders, followers, and masterminds behind the 20th Century's greatest robberies.
Tony visits one of Britain's oldest oak trees and the shrine of Thomas Becket, uncovers a lost battle site of Julius Caesar and marvels at the discoveries of Darwin, on the North Downs Way in Kent. Roman militias have used the same roads we use today to traverse the fields of Britain over vast distances in an efficient manner.
The Spanish Inquisition Documentary - The War on Ideas. Italy, 1522. The decadence of a Medici Pope in Rome outrages the devout priest in Germany named Martin Luther. In the face of the Protestant Reformation, a fanatical monk sets out to exterminate the heresy. On his path to power he will create the Roman Inquisition. And he will become the most hated Pope in history.
In Battles Lost and Won, we investigate each crucial battle that decided the resources, territory and strategic advantage of nations at war.
Within a few hundred years, western ships and sailors spread all over the world, and dominated its trade in the name of god and greed. But the ships that allowed them to do so would not last forever. During the 19th century the era of sail came to a gradual close.
Bologna 1858, a Jewish boy is kidnapped by the Inquisition. His father takes up a struggle begun by Napoleon 60 years earlier. The emperor nearly succeeds in dismantling the inquisition and securing its secret files, but the popes regain their earthly powers. Decades later a desperate father will fight to get back his son. The boy becomes a symbol for an embattled pope. The jewish father and the emperor unleash the forces that bring about the end of the inquisition.
Retracing The Conflicts of WW 2 - Across every theatre of the Second World War battle strategies were designed to capitalise on terrains with better access to supplies. Despite these tactics, many forces were stretched beyond their limits, facing unforeseen conditions and underestimating targets. These battles won and lost would determine possession of territory, resources and the strength to go on fighting.
How does an inner city African American kid with a self-proclaimed violent temper, become a world renowned brain surgeon, an inspiring role model for disadvantaged youth, a medical innovator and achieve success... against all odds? In 2001, CNN and Time Magazine named Ben Carson one of the nation's 20 foremost physicians and scientists.
In KZ Auschwitz, infamous Nazi doctors as Mengele and Schumann performed horrible and mostly fatal experiments "in vivo" on thousands of deportees, women, men and children, in order to find ways of fast and massive sterilization of "inferior races", and methods to promote the fertility of the German "Herrenvolk".
Deciding The War - Every battle is both a victory and a defeat – it depends which flag you fly. Across every theatre of the Second World War battles were decided not only by strategy but by armies in their element, capitalising on the terrain and with better access to supplies or by forces stretched beyond their limits, facing unforeseen conditions and targets underestimated.
Daniel Hale Williams (January 18, 1856[1] – August 4, 1931) was an American general surgeon, who in 1893 performed the first documented, successful pericardium surgery in the United States to repair a wound. He founded Chicago's Provident Hospital, the first non-segregated hospital in the United States and also founded an associated nursing school for African Americans.
The Madness of The Nazi Experiments - In KZ Auschwitz, infamous Nazi doctors as Mengele and Schumann performed horrible and mostly fatal experiments "in vivo" on thousands of deportees, women, men and children, in order to find ways of fast and massive sterilization of "inferior races", and methods to promote the fertility of the German "Herrenvolk".
Hugh Verity was a night flight pilot in WWII until 1942 when he volunteered for RAF special duties and became involved in one of the most extraordinary and effective operations of the secret war - flying from Englands Sussex coast in a single-engine Lysander aircraft and landing in German occupied France delivering and collecting agents of the French Resistance in absolute secrecy - by the light of the moon. This is the story of those secret missions by moonlight.
Was there a crucial battle that lost Mussolini his iron grip on fascist Italy?
In KZ Auschwitz, infamous Nazi doctors as Mengele and Schumann performed horrible and mostly fatal experiments "in vivo" on thousands of deportees, women, men and children, in order to find ways of fast and massive sterilization of "inferior races", and methods to promote the fertility of the German "Herrenvolk".
The campaign where the tide turns, kicking off the beginning of the end for the Axis powers...
Shirley Anita Chisholm was an American politician, educator, and author. In 1968, she became the first black woman elected to the United States Congress, and she represented New York's 12th congressional district for seven terms from 1969 to 1983.
In writing INVISIBLE MAN in the late 1940s, Ralph Ellison brought onto the scene a new kind of black protagonist, one at odds with the characters of the leading black novelist at the time, Richard Wright. If Wright’s characters were angry, uneducated, and inarticulate — the consequences of a society that oppressed them — Ellison’s Invisible Man was educated, articulate, and self-aware.
A re-creation of the dogfight between one American and one Japanese pilot who faced each other over the Pacific in the summer of 1942.
How does the North Korean Government help spread its anti-capitalist message to its citizens? This chilling film reveals the sort of state funded messaging the government promotes to its people.
Prof Kate Williams studies the legacy of the Stuarts through the eyes of an aristocratic Welsh clan. After Elizabeth I's death in 1603, James VI of Scotland claimed the throne.
War with Japan - Battles Won and Lost moves its focus to the Pacific Theatre and the conflict with the formidable Empire of Japan.
The Restoration of the monarchy was heralded by the return of Charles II from exile. Now reestablished on the throne, the Stuart monarchy started reasserting itself upon the tapestry of British history...
Tony Robinson takes us along with him as he explores Britain's ancient roads and trailways. This week, we follow him as he walks the Abbot's Trail and along the Ancient Road of the Dead.
As the war in the Pacific escalates, the Japanese have already established a foothold in mainland China, Singapore and Indonesia. However, the Australians prepare an offensive to drive the Japanese back...
The Restoration of the monarchy was heralded by the return of Charles II from exile. Now reestablished on the throne, the Stuart monarchy started reasserting itself upon the tapestry of British history...
Tony Robinson takes us on a walk through Britain's ancient tracks and trailways. This week, we tackle the ancient roads of Boudicca and the trails followed by her Celtic followers.
This week, we explore some of the penultimate battles of the second World War, including possibly the most horrific battle of the World War.
This week, we join Tony Robinson and the rest of the Time Team as the guys head to Caerau Hillfort, to unearth the remains of an ancient hill settlement discovered in Cardiff.
Professor Kate Williams reflects on the reign of King James II, who ruled for only three years. Learn how this last Stuart king was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of 1688.
Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, was not always in a state of political strife. In 1885 the British army invaded Burma and deposed its King. He died in exile, ending a thousand years of monarchy. The royal family vanished, and the country was plunged into war and the longest military dictatorship of modern times. But after a century of silence they are back, and they’re on a journey to bring the family - past and present - back together.
This week, Tony and the team help charismatic Hektor Rous, the son of `Aussie Earl' Keith Rous, piece together the mysterious history of the family's Tudor country home in Suffolk.
Michael Wittman didn't know, when he enlisted at 19, what kind of fate awaited him fighting for the Axis Powers. Regarded as one of the Nazi's most effective and feared tank commanders, his death is shrouded in mystery. How was he defeated, and by who?
This week, Tony discovers an ancient shark tooth, and takes us on a mountain hike to the secret country retreat of novelist and poet D.H Lawrence.
A portrait of Elly and Henry: a pioneering inventor, and the woman who made everything in his life possible throughout their 66 years together.
An ancient site that yields burials dating back to 2000BC, along with some rare Saxon brooches, beads, spears and jewellery is discovered on the army training ground on Salisbury Plain.
Bordering Nepal and Tibet, we find the highest mountains in the world; the Himalayas. This is the home for the Sherpas, from where the first man to climb Mount Everest came from. This documentary follows three brothers, all native to the Himalayas but living completely different lives.
Battle of Britain - This episode examines the spirit of the Londoners who defied the Axis, and ultimately ended the war in the last weeks of September. The RAF with fewer resources, fewer men, and fewer machines had beaten the might of the Luftwaffe.
Time Team host Tony Robinson embarks on a final trek along one of Britain's ancient by-ways. This time, having previously travelled along a Bronze Age trackway, he turns his attention to a relatively modern route. Originally a Roman road, Dere Street stretched from York through to the Central Belt of Scotland, but its Roman name has been lost to history.
Tony Robinson and team head to the Lake District on an expedition that takes them both higher and deeper than they've ever dug before. They're on the trail of a forgotten piece of the nation's industrial heritage: the Lake District used to be a major source of valuable copper.
The Cold War. In the decades following World War II, a new era of frosty relationship was ushered between the greatest superpowers of the time. We know much of the history of US/Russian tensions during this time. But what of the enigmatic third party?
Sinking of the Lusitania: Terror at Sea is an English-German docudrama produced in 2007. This 90-minute film is a dramatisation of the sinking of the RMS Lusitania on 7 May 1915 by a German U-boat, U-20.
In the 1960s, a young PhD student decided to excavate a South Oxfordshire field where a farmer was regularly ploughing up Roman remains. Now aerial pictures show clear building lines in the ground, indicating that there was something big in the field, and the farmer who owns it continues to turn up Roman brick and tile.
At the height of the Cold War, China's ally India would turn from friend to foe as the issue of Tibetan independence rips the Asian brotherhood apart.
The Siege of Malta was supposed to secure the North African campaign for the Axis powers. So how did the people of this tiny island country hold out against the might of Hitler and Mussolini's forces?
Tony and the team search for the remains of a renegade knight's Norman castle in one of Northern Ireland's most picturesque spots. King John sent John de Courcy to Ireland in 1170 as part of his invasion force, but de Courcy rebelled against his king's orders, instead establishing his own small kingdom and building a fine castle to defend it.
The Sino-Soviet solidarity was once deemed eternal but from the beginning of their alliance, the Chinese were frustrated by an unequal relationship with the Soviets.
For 100 years schoolboys have been playing a few feet above the remains of the most opulent palace in Britain. The Manor of More was masterminded by Henry VIII's right-hand man, the all-powerful religious leader and statesman Cardinal Wolsey, who was also responsible for Hampton Court Palace. Tony and the team do their utmost to find out what remains and visualise its former glory.
Moving Half The Mountain documents the true stories of the survivors from one of the worst atrocities of the Second World War the brutal use of prisoners (POWs) and forced local labour by the Japanese to build a railway linking Thailand to Burma. These men are now in their twilight years but their memories are as clear as though it were yesterday.
Tony Robinson and the team head to Dunwich. Coastal erosion has eaten away most of this once-bustling settlement, and before the whole place is lost to the sea, there's a last chance to find out more about the lost origins of this dramatically situated town. They don't just concern themselves with dry land though, employing high-tech sonar to explore the large portion of the medieval town that already lies beneath the waves.
As the first World War ends in 1919, the infamous Treaty of Versailles is signed in France to impose global peace on the defeated nations of Germany and Austria-Hungary. Explore how the far reaching consequences of this move set in motion the inexorable march to another World War...
Confucius is one of history's most influential men - a sage, philosopher and teacher - who, with Socrates and Buddha, lived at an extraordinary time in the evolution of mankind's civilization. This stunning drama-documentary explores the life and times of Confucius and demystifies his ideas.
Tony Robinson and the team visit Newmarket, the birthplace of horseracing, in search of the earliest archaeological traces of the sport. They dig in the heart of the historic town, in search of the remains of Charles II's racing stables, arguably the world's first. With a thick layer of concrete lying over the site, it's not an easy task. Plus, there's a second area to explore: Charles II's 17th-century Newmarket palace.
In effort to keep peace, treaties were proposed to keep the aggressors of World War 1 under-armed. The ratio of military power was drastically in favour of the US and Great Britain. This might have successfully kept peace, if it was only given a chance.
This one-of-a-kind documentary examines The Queen Mother, her love for her husband and daughters, her support for the institution of monarchy, her animosity towards Mrs. Simpson and Princess Diana and her extravagant lifestyle and love of racing, gardens and fashion.
Tony Robinson leads the team to the village of Beadnell on a beautiful stretch of the Northumbrian coast to explore an unusual promontory. Legend ties the site to local 7th-century Saint Ebbe, and it's widely believed that a 13th-century chapel stood here. Are the earthworks on the promontory an indication of Viking or even Iron Age inhabitants? The only way to find out is by putting spades into the earth.
Qin Shi Huangdi. He is the man who united, and indeed gave China its name. He conquered six powerful warring states and, in 221 BC, declared himself emperor of all China.
Two hundred years ago Swansea was one of the wealthiest cities in the country, if not the world. The Welsh port city once led the world in copper smelting, but today there's almost nothing to be seen of this unique heritage. As the archaeologists strip turf and shift tonnes of muck, they reveal the traces of this once-great industry and rediscover the story of the men who worked in it.
A look at the international upset and devastation caused by the global depression; unemployment, hyperinflation, despair are everywhere as people try to survive.
Property magnate Paul Whight is so keen to know everything he can about the history of his home that he's rashly invited Tony and the team in to do their worst.
New leaders come to power around the world, from Roosevelt in the United States to Hitler in Germany, while Japan consolidates its invasion of China's north east and militarism triumphs.
In the heart of a metropolitan city of 15 million people, and among the construction of a new billion-dollar transportation network, an archaeological sensation has been discovered: the ancient harbor of Theodosious. Theodosious was the last ruler of a unified Roman Empire. The harbour was lost for 800 years, until now....
The town of Kenfig, built around a natural harbour 800 years ago, appears to have been a thriving commercial success but then it vanished, leaving just a few castle walls to mark its existence. Amazingly, the ruins of the town may still lie buried under the sand dunes that have covered the whole site since. Tony and the team look at the history of the town, how it disappeared and how the Welsh fought Anglo-Saxon settlers.
It was the moment the world stood still. It provoked both shock and an outpouring of grief on a global scale – the abrupt and brutal ending in a tunnel in Paris of the life of the most famous woman in the world: Diana, Princess of Wales.
The Roman legionary fort of Caerleon in South Wales is one of the most famous and best preserved Roman sites in Britain. It stood on the edge of the Roman Empire, its huge amphitheatre, immense baths, and the scale of its ruined walls all testament to its power and importance. Tony and the team are joined by a group from Cardiff University to cast new light on a site once seen as solely a military outpost.
The power in Europe has shifted to the terrifying and unstable hands of Germany, with the Third Reich being the dominant force.
Tony and the team are invited by a family of Somerset farmers to answer a question that's been puzzling them for generations: was there ever actually a castle on top of the hill they call Castle Hill? Records show there was a Norman castle in the area, but they are not clear about exactly where and there are several likely locations. Finally the pieces of the jigsaw do join up, but only in a very unexpected way.
When WW2 became inevitable. While all of Czechoslovakia is annexed, the curtain goes up on what will become the world's first truly global and total war.
The documentary Dark Secrets of the Black Sea journeys to the said region and explores recently-unearthed archaeological evidence of a technologically-advanced civilization that once lay there, now submerged beneath the Black Sea.
Tony and the Team don their hunting green, pick up their bows and arrows and head for the fringes of Sherwood Forest, where residents of Clipstone village in Nottinghamshire believe some impressive ruins in a farmer's field may have played a part in the ancient tales of Robin Hood and Bad King John.
The first Stonehenge to be discovered in Britain for a century would be cause enough for major celebration, but there's double bubbles as Tony Robinson and his hardy team of archaeologists celebrate their 200th dig. The site is the bed of a Devon reservoir with a strange assortment of prehistoric remains.
The series follows the evolution of Mao Zedong’s rise to power, and in turn, how he created a new China. In 1972, Chairman Mao Zedong was not entirely joking when he asked Tanaka Kakuei, the visiting Japanese Prime Minister, whether he should thank him for the invasion – because it had changed the destiny of China.
Magdalen Islands: a documentary film that tells a universal tale of the myths and legends of sunken treasure and shipwrecks surrounding the remote Magdalen Islands, the Quebec archipelago in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, North America's tempestuous inland saltwater sea.
The Time Team visits the ruins of the home of the Grey family, and property the family had lived on for nearly 800 years. The team tries to establish the history of a castle built on the site in the 12 century.
Japan and Communist China: in this documentary series, we explore the second sino-japanese war, and the rallying effect it had on the solidification of Chinese communism. In 1972, Chairman Mao Zedong was not entirely joking when he asked Tanaka Kakuei, the visiting Japanese Prime Minister, whether he should thank him for the invasion – because it had changed the destiny of China.
Nazi Propaganda: Hitler saw propaganda emerge as a powerful tool of psychological warfare, one that he would use to build the Nazi movement.
The Time Team believes an 11th-century flour mill once stood on her land, near Stoke Trister in Somerset, and asks the Team to dig. There is reference to a mill in the parish in Domesday, and standing remains of a building depicted in a 1782 parish map. Multiple leat earthworks in the area indicate multiple mills over the centuries. The remains of the standing mill include parts of the last mill wheel, a 19th century overshot wheel.
The decade of propaganda, impassioned speeches, newspaper articles, posters and campaigning that led to one moment, Hitler being made Chancellor of Germany in 1933.
But what if Britain had lost in 1940? In the first episode of a new series, historians and experts will explore what might have happened if history had turned out differently. What were the Nazis’ secret plans to invade Britain? Would Churchill have gone down fighting? Could Britain have struck a peace deal with Hitler?
Tony Robinson heads to Jersey to investigate the origins of Mont Orgueil Castle. Today's castle is a Tudor structure built on earlier foundations, and it's that early castle, built by King John, that the Team are looking for.
When we think of the roots of European civilization it's to Greece and Rome that our thoughts turn. But there is a culture whose effect may be even more profound. Hundreds of years ago in faraway Iceland the Vikings began to write down dozens of stories - called sagas. These sagas are priceless historical documents which bring to life the Viking world.
An investigation into the use of creativity, art and entertainment as a form of survival during the Great Depression of 1929. Parallels are drawn between the creativity generated during the Great Depression and the global recession of 2009.
Tony Robinson doesn't usually get to decide where the Team should dig, but in this episode he chooses his first ever site for investigation: a German anti-aircraft battery on Jersey. The dig director was Dr. Ben Robinson.
The story of the Intruders, a group of airmen dubbed the `Bandits of the Air' by the Nazis thanks to its members' exploits in the skies above Europe's battlefields.We'll be looking at the Wooden 'Mosquito' - a seemingly innocuous and cheap fighter plane that terrorised the German Air Force.
Was Christopher Columbus born in Genoa, Italy? Most definitely not, say an unlikely collection of experts from European royalty, DNA science, university scholars, even Columbus's own living family. This ground breaking documentary follows a trail of proof to show he might have been much more than we know.
No other woman in modern times has commanded so much attention as Diana, Princess of Wales. Adored by the public as a fairy-tale princess, caring wife, devoted mother and fashion icon, this documentary examines the deeper side to her personality and reveals a woman constantly under extreme pressure.
Tony Robinson takes a look at the historic fascination with and terror of dead bodies. Why were our ancestors afraid of the dead to the point they'd mutilate the corpses of their loved ones?
The film features Belfast residents who saw the ship launched in May 1911 and who were also there when she set sail on 2nd April 1912 less than two weeks before she perished on her maiden voyage to America. The definitive story of the building of this magnificent ship.
Mankind has always catalogued its fear of the demonic influence. Tony learns about possession and exorcism, including a man who killed his wife.
Priests and nuns protest the Vietnam War by breaking into draft boards, destroying records and then waiting to be arrested. Their actions proved key in shaping the anti-war movement and eventually would play a part in the draft being abolished.
Geneticist Steven O'Brien investigates whether a genetic mutation that helped the inhabitants of a village called Eyam in Derbyshire survive the Black Death pandemic in the 14th century help scientists find a cure for AIDS.
Our ancestors blamed disease and illness on demons, sprites and God. They sought cures not in pills or plasters, but in prayer, potions and the paranormal. Tony attempts to recreate a horrifying surgical procedure pioneered 6,000 years ago, and later is immersed in a pit filled with the blood and viscera of a herd of slaughtered cattle. How effective a treatment might this be?
At the request of the Catholic Church in Lisbon, members of the Royal Archeology and Historical Association (RAHA) of Portugal excavate 78 mummies in a crypt beneath the altar of the Sacramento Church in Lisbon. In the course of excavation the researchers find handwritten books indicating there is a large amount of treasure buried - somewhere - near the mummy crypt. They also discover the exotic history of many of the mummies, including one known as 'The King of the Congo.'
Archaeologist Mike Pitts investigates the cause of death of a person, whose 3,000-year-old remains were found in a shallow grave at Stonehenge.
Before he became James I of England, James VI of Scotland nearly died in a terrible storm at sea - which he believed was caused by a spell cast by witches. In this episode, Tony Robinson takes a look at how black magic and witchcraft tangibly shaped the society of our ancestors.
In 1880 two men, Edison and Westinghouse, were battling to provide electricity for America. Edison’s system was low-voltage and dependable, Westinghouse’s was unpredictable and potentially deadly. Edison volunteered his rival’s Alternating Current system to power the first ever electric chair, ensuring Westinghouse would both foot the bill and field the negative publicity. Regrettably, the current’s voltage had been overrated and the convict’s death was not instantaneous.
Tony Robinson meets the vicious Gods of Yore and discovers what they demanded of our ancestors 2,500 years ago in Celtic Britain.
The Guy Fawkes Gun Powder plot takes viewers into the clandestine world of English Catholics in the early 17th century: persecuted by law, they were forced to worship in secret as their faith was believed to be disloyal to the crown. We'll meet the prime movers of the plot: the disgruntled sons of the persecuted elite.
When Steve and Pru Barlow fell in love with pretty Upton Castle in Pembrokeshire they had little idea what they were buying. It was a romantic mystery. Is it part of the network of castles built by Anglo-Norman immigrants to suppress the Welsh, Britain's native population? Or is it just a Victorian folly? Tony and the team take their trusty trowels to try to find the truth.
The progression of America is evident from its beginnings, through slavery, to the election of the first black president. Arguably, the journey to the election of America's first African American head of state was way back in March 5th, 1770...
Boudicca was a remarkable Celt who as leader of the Iceni Tribe, at the time of the Roman occupation of Britain. Follow in her footsteps to the historical landmarks of England's East Anglia.
Margaret Thatcher - The Iron Lady is the first major documentary to look back on the development and impact of this remarkable woman, whom commentators of both the political left and right agree changed the face of 20th Century politics forever. Featuring many excerpts from her powerful speeches and insightful contributions from her political supporters and detractors, a portrait emerges of a woman whose strength of conviction eventually became her weakness.
Ernest Shackleton - In 1914, after the sinking of his ship The Endurance, this hero saved his entire crew from a certain death. 100 years later our expedition sets out to explore the sub-Antarctic islands of Elephant, South Georgia and the South Sandwich by boat, ski and pulka.
Nearly 1,000 years ago, the Vikings left Scandinavia and settled across Europe - giving their name to Normandy along the way - before their Norman descendants seized the English throne at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. But what do we really know about them? By combining expert analysis with compelling drama, 'The Last Journey of the Vikings' (Swedish title: 'Vikingarnas sista resa') tells a new and often surprising story about this complex people.
The team face digging through a church graveyard in search of what could be one of the largest Roman structures ever built in Britain. Tony Robinson and his band are here at the request of the Reverend William Burke, vicar of the historic St Kyneburgha's church in Castor, Cambridgeshire. Under very close supervision, the Team must dodge the thousands of burials in the graveyard to get to an ornate mosaic floor.
A closer look at two of WW2's most terrifying and influential war machines that dominated their respective arenas: the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress and The German 'U-Boat' submarine.
The bloody conflict that pitted Russia against a large European coalition is shown here to be part of a chain of long-held antagonisms that continue to this day.
This landmark, high-end drama-doc tells the story of why Vikings chose to leave Denmark. With the help of dramatic re-creations and CGI, leading academics examine their actions and explain how cultural integration and the influence of Christianity allowed them to play a huge part in transforming Europe into what it is today.
Tony Robinson and his time team travel to Derwentcote near Newcastle in England. They have three days to investigate the ruins of an iron and steel works that produced world class metal from the early 1700's to the 1850's Their interest is based on the number of different processes developed in the area during the time, culminating in evidence the site was much older than first thought.
The true story of the suicidal mission of British forces to overrun the Imperial Russian fortifications with a courageous but foolhardy mass charge.
In the second half of the 900s, the Vikings return to France, but this time they choose unification over robbery. With a political connection, this paves the way for the Duchy of Normandy.
The Team are intrigued by metal detecting finds and pottery scattered across some fields in Leicestershire, which suggest they're on the site of a high-status Anglo-Saxon burial ground.
"Outlier: the story of Katherine Johnson" maps the trajectory of this African American girl-wonder whose mathematical genius catapulted astronauts into space. From America's first attempt at manned space flights to the Space Shuttle program, Johnson was an integral part of NASA. Includes an interview with Johnson, whose life was profiled in the movie "Hidden Figures."
The final programme looks at the aftermath of the war with Germany, with Italy and Romania springing up from the ashes of the confrontation. Meanwhile, in defeated Russia, the peasants and serfs were sowing the seeds of a future revolution.
The Vikings have turned from a monastic robbery into a power struggle for the crown. The Battle of Hastings 1066 marks the end of the Viking Age, but with the victorious Vilhjálmur a new era begins.
Tony and the team get their feet wet as they examine a stretch of the River Tees where local divers have discovered more than 2,000 high-quality Roman finds. The river flows past one of the most impressive Roman forts in northern Britain, and over three days the archaeologists cast their net far and wide investigating the buildings, roads and structures around this strategic crossing.
It is a great ‘what-if’ of the last century. What if Robert F. Kennedy, brother of the murdered JFK, had not himself been assassinated while campaigning for the Presidency in 1968?
From Austrian princess to ill-fated last queen of France, Marie Antoinette’s life journey is captured in this meticulously researched documentary about the woman who is considered to have triggered the French Revolution for her lavish lifestyle. Vilified for extravagant tastes that epitomized the wanton excess of the French aristocracy, the young queen found herself caught in a political firestorm, doomed no matter what course she followed.
In Sutton Courtenay, Tony and the team investigate a set of buildings once occupied by Anglo-Saxon royalty. It's the rarest of archaeological sites and uncovers the biggest Saxon building ever discovered in Britain. Aerial photography of an apparently featureless Oxfordshire field revealed crop marks that suggested to archaeologists it was once the site of an impressive collection of 1,400-year-old buildings.
The WW1 Christmas Truce of 1914 is a now legendary story; a spark of peace and goodwill between two nations amidst the chaos of war. But how did it happen? How much, if any, of the story is really true? Here, we speak to historians and researchers on how it all happened, and read letters from soldiers of both sides who bore witness to this remarkable moment of humanity during WW1.
Investigating an archaeologist's dream. An ancient moat has been discovered and no one knows what it once protected. Was it an early Welsh chapel, a Roman fort, a fortified cattle enclosure, or even the ancestral home of one of Wales's most important families?
Tony Robinson and the Team find themselves lost in the mists of a Welsh forest as they investigate the remains of Tregruk, one of the biggest castles ever built in Britain.
The true story of legendary flying pioneer, American hero and Congressional Medal of Honor winner Jimmy Doolittle is told with incredible insight by filmmaker/host Gardner Doolittle. Starting in Nome, Alaska (1905) “Wings of a Warrior” spans Doolittle’s life in close detail.
The Team descend upon the Oxfordshire town of Burford to respond to very special challenge - from Time Team's own Professor Mick Aston. They have just three days to uncover a medieval hospital under the front lawn whilst searching for Anglo Saxons in the vegetable garden.
Explores the genesis of the National Socialist Party, and how a failed artist and career soldier of the First World War would become one of the most prolific dictators and of modern history...
Founded by Henry V and built by his son Henry VI, Syon Abbey was a large, wealthy monastery for nuns of an obscure Swedish order. During the reign of Henry VIII it vanished. Its remains lie beneath the lawns of modern Syon House, designed by Capability Brown. What they find is on a huge scale.
Joseph Goebbels, Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Göring carry out the Führer's brand of terror. In this episode, we take a closer look at Hitler's inner circle, and the men who would become the captains of Hitler's vision.
Next to the beautifully manicured lawns of Whitestaunton Manor in the Blackdown Hills of Somerset lies a patch of muddy weeds. Coins and pottery have been found here, and it is supposedly the site of a Roman villa. Gradually the plan of a Roman bath house emerges.
The end of the war meant the end of Hitler himself. Explores how Hitler's popularity began to wane after the tide of WW2 began to turn, and explores how his legacy still persists in the far right to this day.
Time Team go to the Scottish Highlands! There's an island-ish round area of stones in Loch Migdale - could it be a crannog? 200 meters away on the banks is a small (12 m diameter) circular feature - is it a henge? Time Team rounds up some experts on the prehistoric Highlands and finds out.
Historian Neil Oliver presents this documentary series that goes behind the scenes of the Australian War Memorial. In the run-up to the 100th anniversary of the First World War, the museum prepares for a series of events to commemorate the day. Over the course of a year, the Australian War Memorial gives Oliver access to its vaults, giving the presenter a chance to explore some of the treasures that the building holds.
Only Fools and Horses star and passionate espionage enthusiast Sir David Jason searches for the origins of the British Secret Service and discovers the legendary characters, audacious missions and makeshift methods that characterised the early days of spying.
The unique story of Nelson Mandela's early years. Born in one of the most rural parts of South Africa, Mandela is adopted by the Thembu royalty after the death of his father. But the lure of the city is more powerful than an aristocratic lifestyle in the country, and Mandela flees to Johannesburg.
The team investigate a possible fifth century cemetery in a ploughed field, where they find a metal shield boss. One male skeleton is holding a drinking vessel. There are hints of much earlier activity as well, including a Bronze Age barrow. Using authentic tools, they fashion a Saxon shield.
Using the War Memorials weapons, artefacts and letters, Neil retraces the story of soldier Private Thomas Anderson Whyte - a champion rower who was among the first wave of soldiers during the historic Landing of Gallipoli, on April 25, 1915. Neil attends his first Anzac Day Dawn Service and grapples with separating myth from legend as he interviews well known Australians about the Landing and whether this first 'thunderclap' of war signalled the birth of a young nation.
Sir David lifts the lid on true stories of unbelievable heroism in World War II and explores a world of cold-blooded assassins, crack saboteurs, elite commandos, real-life super-villains and the ultimate femmes fatales.
The formidable racial prejudice that Nelson Mandela encounters on moving to Johannesburg, South Africa’s biggest city, leads to his rapid politicisation and fight to topple apartheid. The programme charts the events that began one of the most legendary civil rights campaigns of the 20th century.
The grounds of a Kent hotel have yielded a range of intriguing finds; the team investigates whether it could be the missing link in the Roman invasion.
The Australian War Memorial holds one of the largest collections of Great War weapons, artillery and artefacts in the world. The majority of the largest objects are stored away from the Memorial's main exhibitions areas, but Neil Oliver is granted unprecedented access to the weapons that changed the world forever -- and the lives of the soldiers who would face them in battle.
Sir David finds out how the best brains in Britain were recruited to help win a very secret war. From high-tech intelligence to undercover ops, he reveals how the real Qs of World War II defeated Hitler with their ingenious problem-solving designs.
An uncompromising insight into the darkest days of Mandela's life as he becomes the world's most famous prisoner. Despite lengthy incarceration in an apartheid prison, Nelson Mandela overcomes indignity and harshness to begin the negotiations that will eventually lead to a democratic South Africa.
Tony Robinson takes the boat to Green Island in the centre of Poole harbour to investigate what might have been a site of early mass production.
To many Captain Alfred Shout was known as the Laughing Cavalier-to others he was simply one of the bravest and most decorated Australian soldiers of the Gallipoli campaign. Media Magnate Kerry Stokes paid $1.2. Million to donate Captain Alfred Shout's Victoria Cross to the War Memorial. What is it about this hero of the infamous battle of Lone Pine that has captured the imagination of so many and why is he the epitome of the Anzac spirit?
Relive the bravery of the Dunkirk veterans in defenseless boats crossing the English Channel to rescue the stranded soldiers from the inferno through their uplifting stories of heroism in a battle that changed the course of WWII.
The Second World War was a war in which massive armies advanced, confronting whole populations with impossible choices. The manufacture of weapons transformed industry and the workforce; area bombing campaigns reduced cities to rubble; sieges doomed populations to starvation; racial policies sponsored campaigns of genocide.
Tony and the team travel to a quiet rural valley in Staffordshire and have just three days to get back into the dark days of medieval England.
For one year the series has followed the Australian War Memorial as it builds its new World War I Gallery. As the deadline to the opening of the new $32 million gallery draws near, the Memorial team work tirelessly to create one of the most impressive war galleries in the world.
This film details the never before told story of the Irish who surrounded the most charismatic political figure of the 20th Century. Who they were, how they supported their leader, and the price some of them paid for this unswerving devotion.
Pigs rooting in a windswept field in Dorset unearthed fragments including Roman mosaic floor tiles. In addition, a Bournemouth University excavation team located some burials nearby. The farmer, Simon Meaden, has asked Time Team to investigate further. Gradually a complex picture emerges of human activity here over thousands of years, including a heated Roman villa with bath-house.
Celebrating the Golden Wedding Anniversary of the Queen and Prince Philip, this programme is a sympathetic look at not only their lives together, but also an insight into Britain and the changes it has gone through in 50 Glorious Years.
Review the Messerschmitt Bf-110, originally built in 1936, unable to dog-fight with nimble RAF fighters, was deployed as a night fighter, serving alongside other types, such as the Junkers JU-88.
Digging up fields and car parks and back gardens is all very well, but how could Time Team pass up a chance to dig up a living room? The manor house in Nassington was purchased in a derelict state, and while restoring it, several massive post holes were investigated that are of a size and spacing to be a Saxon great hall.
Alan Davies explores the extraordinary life of Harry Houdini, who against the odds was among the richest, most successful entertainers in the world, he was the ultimate showman and one of the first American celebrities. In order to understand why Houdini felt compelled to perform such terrifying death-defying stunts, Alan tries to hold his breath under ice cold water, lies on a bed of nails and is strung up upside down in a straitjacket, among other things.
In the Second World War civilians became defenders against and targets of aerial warfare on a scale never before seen. We trace the escalation of strategic bombing campaigns which incinerated great cities in an attempt end the war. We examine the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the deaths of tens of thousands in the ultimate expression of total war from the air.
As renowned Suffolk archaeologist Basil Brown discovered, Castle Hill near Ipswich is named, not after a castle, but a substantial Roman villa. Brown was unable to complete his excavation, and Time Team have been called in by local schoolchildren to find out more.
The romantic tale of the Native American teenager, Pocahontas, and John Smith is an American legend. Was it really a love story or the figment of a vivid imagination? The truth of Pocahontas' life is subject to interpretation of both the oral and written accounts, which contradict one another. She lives on through her own people, who are still here today, and through the descendants of her two sons.
In 1942, an elite group of over six hundred Canadian soldiers were trained to create a lethal battalion that would, along with their American counterparts, parachute behind German lines and wreak havoc upon the enemy. DEVIL'S BRIGADE is a compelling four-part series that chronicles the journey of 15 present-day Canadian and U.S. soldiers as they are taken back in time to face the grueling training and hardship the original Devil's Brigade endured at their training post in Helena, Montana.
When the tide recedes at this point on the Severn estuary, rare evidence of stone age activity is uncovered. Time Team are on a three-day mission to help recover some of these relics before they are washed away. It involves excavating and painstakingly examining 15 cubic metres of muddy silt; but time is against them. The Mesolithic period is poorly understood, because these people were highly mobile hunter-gatherers who did not build permanent structures.
Throughout history, Pontius Pilate has been portrayed as a weak ruler-the man who allowed Jesus Christ to be crucified at the demand of the Jews. But this documentary portrays a very different Pilate, one who had his own motives for allowing Jesus' fate.
A Terrible Beauty is the story of the men and women of the Easter Rising in Dublin in 1916, Irish and British, caught up in a conflict many did not understand and of the innocent men and boys, executed because of what transpired in The Battle of Mount Street Bridge.
The Iron Age hill fort in Wittenham is an impressive monument. From behind its perimeter ramparts the hilltop offers commanding views of the Thames and the surrounding Oxfordshire landscape, but it is dwarfed and overlooked by a neighbouring hill less than 150 metres away. What did the Iron Age tribe use this second, much larger, hill for?
The rise of Margaret Thatcher, Conservative Party Leader and UK Prime Minister from 1975 to 1990.
Jeremy Clarkson examines the history of the Victoria Cross, and follows the story of one of the 1,354 men who were awarded it - Major Robert Henry Cain.
The Irish Rebellion of 1916 is often eclipsed by World War I, but the "Easter Rebellion" resulted in almost 500 deaths, over half being civilians. Over six days, Dublin was gripped by an uprising that tore the city apart and left causalities on both sides. This powerful film does much to remind us of the significance and sacrifice of the soldiers who fought in a place many called home.
Five-hundred years ago, a major city occupied what is now a large and empty field in the Scottish Borders. Founded by a king as a hub for international trade, Roxburgh was, along with Edinburgh, Stirling and Berwick, one of the four great centres of medieval Scotland. While the other three became thriving cities, Roxburgh simply vanished. Tony and the team have a unique chance to uncover whatever remains under the pasture.
The Brigade faces their first challenges on a practice mission. This documentary follows modern soldiers as they train in the manner of the elite WW2 Commando Unit, The Devil's Brigade.
Colonel Osvaldo Fernandez was one of the few Cubans who actually knew what was going on at the time. As a young liaison officer, his job was to follow the Soviet troops to the various sites where their deadly nuclear missiles would be installed, to save Cuba from a US invasion.
An unassuming field in Leicestershire provides the team with a prize that has eluded them for 15 years. In a first for the programme, Tony Robinson and the team finally uncover the rarest of archaeological finds: an Anglo-Saxon settlement. In an attempt to discover the true origin of Britain's most famous Wessex Man, Phil Harding undergoes a DNA test to establish where his ancestors came from.
Jeremy Clarkson tells the story of one of the most daring operations of World War II - the Commando raid on the German occupied dry dock at St. Nazaire in France on 28th March 1942. It was an operation so heroic that it resulted in the award of five Victoria Crosses and 80 other decorations for gallantry.
In the mountains of China's Sichuan Province is the sight of hundreds of ancient wooden coffins hanging precariously from a cliff face. Some experts believe the dead were placed there thousands of years ago to be within reach of the gods, while others say it was to keep them away from wild animals. This film chronicles an effort by scientists to understand and preserve these mysterious coffins.
The recruits get a history lesson on the Devil's Brigade, whilst their hand to hand training intensifies.
The team descend upon a field just outside Bath to investigate the remains of what could have been one of the country's grandest Georgian houses. An impressive set of stone arches is all that remains of the house built 200 years ago by local MP Sir Francis Popham, but a couple of paintings show the building in its prime. If they are to be believed, it could have been mistaken for Buckingham Palace.
Go behind these scenes of the documentary where Jeremy Clarkson tells the story of the audacious commando raid on the German occupied dry dock at St Nazaire in France on March 28th 1942.
Hundreds of Roman coins and bits of masonry have been found on a field near Coberly, but it's the discovery of a piece of Roman mosaic floor that has really got the archaeologists excited. They are joined by mosaics expert Anthony Beeson.
Political dynasties have been at the forefront for generations of war and revolution, and include the names Kennedy, Kim, Bhutto and Gandhi-Nehru.
From Sputnik to Yuri Gagarin, this film follows the Soviet space programme, kick-started by a mystic who taught that science would make us immortal and continued by a scientist who wanted us to colonise the universe.
One summer during the 1980s, strange crop marks appeared in two fields on the north Cornish coast near Lellizzick. Locals have picked up a wealth of 1,500-year-old pottery and metalwork from as far away as North Africa and Turkey.
A stirring cinematic journey into the dramatic and heroic lives of the convict rebels exiled to the prison without walls. Revered in their homelands their convict lives are an amazing untold story - until now.
Modern US Recruits try to walk in the footsteps of the legendary Devil's Brigade commando unit. The troops scale and capture an Italian mountain, nearly killing one soldier, and the veterans retell the story of the real mission.
The quiet village of Litlington in Cambridgeshire gets the full treatment as Tony Robinson and the digging team hunt for the missing remains of what is believed to be one of Britain's biggest Roman villas.
Australia's journey from prison colony, to British dominion, to finally being recognised as an autonomous independent nation was a long and arduous journey. Here, we take a look at some of the Australian men and women who fought for civil liberty, worker's rights, and the chance to define their own destinies...
In 1967 an expressive, colourful musical force painted a backdrop of social change, fashion, love, turmoil and war. The world remembers the Summer of Love in 1967 as one of those moments when a unique and creative explosion of music and popular culture arrived in the UK and USA.
Aerial photographs and dogged local investigation suggest Dinmore Hill in Herefordshire may have been a vast Iron Age hill fort. Can the diggers find the evidence to confirm this important discovery? With the site covering 40 acres, the team expect no shortage of targets to dig, but a frustrated geophys team can't find a single satisfactory target.
This unique film footage from around the world shows the clothes worn by the Princess of Wales, and how her timeless sense of style would affect fashion trends from around the world.
The first episode in this two-part series on the hunt for and sinking of the Bismarck focuses on the initial clash between the German battleships Bismarck and Prinz Eugen, and the British battlecruisers HMS Hood and Prince of Wales - the Battle of Denmark Strait, on 24 May 1941.
The team delve into the recent past to uncover the hidden archaeology behind the biggest battle that never was, the planned defence of Britain against a Nazi invasion in 1940.
75% of all enslaved Africans coming to America came in through Beaufort and the sea islands of South Carolina. This beautiful and picturesque tourist destination, by its unique history is the epicenter of the Gullah culture and the foundation of African American history; the result of the mingling of West African slaves with the plantation culture awaiting them in America.
Black Panthers and the Last Slave Plantation tells the gripping story of Robert King, Herman Wallace and Albert Woodfox, men who have endured solitary confinement longer than any known living prisoner in the United States. Politicized through contact with the Black Panther Party while inside Louisiana’s prisons, they formed one of the only prison Panther chapters in history and worked to organize other prisoners into a movement for the right to live like human beings.
Following in the footsteps of the Edwardian publishing sensation, the JK Rowling of her day, Patricia travels from London to Scotland and the Lake District to discover what fired Beatrix’s imagination and where her love and understanding of animals was born.
On June 6, 1944, the Allies land on the northern coast of France. This is the story of the 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade as they fight their way inland against a stubborn and ruthless German defence.
The first of a two-part programme in which celebrities embark on an emotional journey to discover how their ancestors coped with serving time in Victorian prisons. Comedian Johnny Vegas finds out how one of his forebears spent time behind bars for stealing, and that the man's alcoholic wife was a persistent offender. Broadcaster Mariella Frostrup hears the story of her great-great-grandfather, an entrepreneur who resorted to fraud when the economy crashed in the 1870s.
Egyptologist, Dr Joann Fletcher investigates what everyday life was like in ancient Egypt for an ordinary person.Joann explores how the people of Egypt lived by exploring their tombs, touring museums as well as uncovering their beliefs in the afterlife.
In the 1991 Gulf War the American 2nd Armoured Cavalry Regiment drove into a sandstorm. How did they overcome Iraq's elite Republican Guard blind?
The second of a two-part programme in which celebrities embark on an emotional journey to discover how their ancestors coped with serving time in Victorian prisons. Strictly Come Dancing judge Len Goodman is shocked to learn his great-great-grandfather was assaulted by his own son, who was convicted and subjected to hard labour building docks and quarrying for stone.
Egyptologist Dr Joann Fletcher reveals a strange and mysterious world: the ancient Egyptian afterlife. To them waking life was just a dress rehearsal. Joann clambers into rarely visited tombs, explores a treasure trove of long-buried objects and examines spectacular mummies to discover just why the Egyptians spent a fortune preparing for death.
The British Empire is the largest the world has ever seen ruling over a quarter of the world's population. But despite their vast territories and immense wealth, the imperial powers are still not satisfied. When two shots are fired in Sarajevo in the summer of 1914, killing the heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and his wife, it pits Empire against Empire and engulfs the world in a conflict that will eventually claim 18 million lives.
A look at the battle that changed World War II. Germany lost an entire army when the Soviets made their stand against their offensive in Stalingrad in 1942.
The hidden history of the Wheelchair President. Host David Reynolds exposes the cover-up of Roosevelt's failing health and its impact on his wartime decisions and tough talks with Stalin and Churchill.
On October 1, 1949 Mao Zedong held a victory celebration parade in Tian'amen Square and announced to the world the creation of a People's Republic of China. China had awakened, and the decades since have given truth to Napoleon's prophetic words. Interestingly, very few people actually understood Mao's speech, and only one sentence has ever been translated and synched to audio - until now.
The story of World War I, told through revealing data. Around 25,000 miles of trenches were cut as the sides dug in and UK factories built 30,000 aircraft a year.
War/Peace tells the story of the radical student activists Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn who founded the anti-Vietnam war group "The Weathermen" at the University of Michigan in 1969 and who's members carried out two dozen bombings of government building including an attempt to bomb the United States Capitol, the Pentagon, several major banks and police stations through out the US.
One mountain face in particular came to be seen as the Last Great Problem: the vast, brooding Eiger Nordwand in Switzerland's Bernese Oberland. The world's finest climbers were lured to its foot - and perished in the merciless world of ice and storm that awaited them above. Then in 1938 an Austro-German team conquered the face amid bitter accusations that they were climbing for Hitler.
The untold secret story of war production that shaped the Second World War, beginning with how the German aviation industry came to dominate the skies of Europe.
In his beloved, and very yellow, 1943 Piper J3 Cub, Arthur Williams kicks off his aerial adventure in the part of the UK he knows and loves the best. From the beautiful hilltop airfield of Compton Abbas, to the 'party Jumbo' of Cotswold Airport, this is a journey full of enthusiasts and fanatics. Think aviation is all about concrete runways and check-in queues? Think again.
Following the battles of north and south Korea and the American tankers that went on a rescue mission.
The first day of the Somme Offensive was the blackest day in the British Army's history. The shocking numbers are revealed as the war retrospective revisits 1916.
The role played by engineering giant Vickers during the Second World War, including the development of the Spitfire and how the Royal Navy recovered from losing so many warships.
Arthur is in the south-east of England tackling some of the world's busiest airspace and, on the Isle of Sheppey finding the unlikely spot where British aviation first got off the ground. North of London, there's the home of airships - ancient and modern - and, in the region that led the fight in the Battle of Britain, one massive tick for Arthur's bucket list... a flight in a Spitfire.
At the outset of WWII, the Germans pioneer a new form of mobile armored warfare. This is the story of the famed Nazi Blitzkrieg, as thousands of panzers burst through terrain thought impossible to conquer Western Europe in a matter of weeks.
The war changed daily life drastically - women were put to work in munitions factories, bonfires were banned, and pubs closed. Food shortages led to queues, then riots and rationing, then starvation.
Henry Ford's plan, with the help of Albert Kahn, to build a giant factory in Michigan, covering 3.5million sq ft and including an aircraft production line half a mile in length.
Arthur visits Loch Lomond and explores the complex coastline of Argyll and Bute, including Jura, Kintyre, and a beautiful airfield on the Inner Hebrides.
In 1916, the British Army unleash a terrifying new weapon against their German opposition in WW1. Here, we explore the deployment of the world's first tanks, and the German armies attempt to fight them before developing their own -- creating history's first tank war.
As the war stretched into 1916 beyond, it became clear that war would be won in materials. As the Empires desperately fought to produce enough munitions, armaments and explosives to maintain the deadly fuselages of gunfire and artillery, some turned to desperate and dark means to achieve victory.
How the Americans, once they were provoked into war, out-produced the rest of the world so quickly and by such a huge margin, including the likes of General Motors.
Filmmaker Philippe Mora, who lost eight family members in the Holocaust, visits the concentration camps three times in an effort to understand and to remember.
By 1942, Rommel's Afrika Corps had been pushed back to Tunisia and the new US tank force landed in North Africa. This is the story of the final North African battles.
Hear how the arrival of American forces and an Allied counter-offensive in 1918 helped defeat Germany. Tragically, 11,000 men were killed or injured on Armistice Day.
This is the story of oil and gas exploration in the Caribbean and the role played by Trinidad and Tobago in the world's quest for "black gold." The oil industry shapes our lives, rules our economies, and influences our political society. Beginning in 1595, the need only grew for locally available pitch in the Caribbean, and Trinidad and Tobago's reputation began to spread around the world.
The dramatic story of highly-decorated German tanker Ludwig Bauer who discovered the harsh reality of armoured warfare during World War II.
The sabotaging efforts of Peugeot in Nazi-occupied France, where the bosses and workers cooperated with the Resistance to hinder the Nazis' use of military vehicles.
Hitler's Olympics profiles the 1936 summer Olympic games, which were hosted in Berlin under Hitler's regime. The harrowing film discusses the temporary pause on the persecution against Jewish people in order for The Olympics to take place.
A dramatic look at Israel's pre-emptive strike against Egypt in the Sinai in 1967, one of the fastest and most significant battles in modern warfare.
The story of America's 'Liberty Ships', which were produced in incredible numbers and became known as the Model T Fords of the ocean.
August 6 and August 8, 1945: two atomic bombs-the first used in warfare-were dropped on Japan, leading to Japanese surrender on August 15. This insightful program, made to coincide with the 60th anniversary of V-J Day, charts the events that led to the end of the war. It includes interviews from many different sources and nations who witnessed it all first-hand.
The only prerequisites to joining were independence, imagination and a sense of adventure. Inevitably, these criteria gave rise to a collection of misfits and buccaneers who operated outside conventional military rules and who were characterised by their unequivocal acceptance that one day, they would die for their country.
Desperate to reclaim territory lost six years previously, Egypt launched an attack against Israel in 1973. Egypt suffered huge losses, but the battle brought lasting peace.
The remarkable story of how Stalin's massive war factories were dismantled and moved east on one and half million railway trucks, to avoid being lost to the Nazis.
Historian Dan Snow relives the story of a crack team of 133 young airmen whose mission is to destroy the great dams of Germany in World War Two using a revolutionary new bouncing bomb.
In 1942, British commandos raid France to destroy the docks at St. Nazaire, a virtual suicide mission that turns out to be the most successful of the war.
In this first episode, Tristan Hughes tracks the history of the Ninth Legion across the British Isles. From its arrival in Britain during the Claudian Invasion to a dice with death in the Scottish midlands and the last time it is mentioned in history. Featuring Dr Miles Russell, Dr Rebecca Jones, Dr Simon Elliott, Lucy Creighton and Dr Andrew Tibbs.
The story of the discovery and exploitation of the Baku Oilfields in the Russian Caucasus, which forced Stalin and Hitler to face-off in the battle of Stalingrad.
The Dambusters: the RAF's brand new specialist squadron of elite bomber pilots. In this episode, we continue the story of the Dambusters inceptions, where Barnes Wallis has to create an entirely new aiming device.
The Great Depression-era bank robber John Dillinger, whose charisma made some view him as a modern-day Robin Hood, robbing the banks to feed the poor. Who was the real man whose story was blown up into a larger-than-life legend?
By 1944, the Soviets were chasing the Germans back through the Baltic states. However, even though they had lost the war, the relentless German tankers fought on.
In our next episode of War Factories, learn how Fiat didn't just make cars, but also made trains, planes and, like modern-day kingmakers, they made and broke governments too.
The raid on Germany's dams gets off to a rocky start as the crews struggle to clear the airfield in their planes loaded with four tonne bouncing bombs. Of the 133 young men who flew on the raid, only 80 survive.
Revealing the strange Slavic story of Ivan and Koschei the Deathless, the origins of King Arthur and the wizard Merlin, the journey of Odysseus as he resists the beautiful song of the Sirens, and finally Sigurd and his battle with the dragon Fafnir.
This is the story of the Canadian Armored Corps making their combat debut on the European mainland.
The dark history of Volkswagen. While America had Ford or Chrysler or Buick, Hitler also wanted a car that would transform his nation: the 'people's car'- a Volkswagen.
In August 1941, the Allies launched Operation Dervish. This was the first of the Arctic Convoys, ships which sailed from the United Kingdom, Iceland and North America, and brought essential supplies to the Soviet Union.
Herbert Cukurs is an officer in the Latvian Air Force and his country's most celebrated pilot. But after the Nazi invasion, he earns the nickname The Hangman of Riga after joining forces with the fascists, and is responsible for the extermination of 30,000 Latvian Jews. Twenty years later, Cukurs is living quietly in Sao Paolo, Brazil. That is, until the Nazi-hunting unit of the Israeli secret service tracks him down.
Wittmann participated in many of the greatest tank battles of all time. He was a notorious figure, until he was finally defeated by Canadian tankers.
From the Manhattan Project to M.A.D. Follow the incredible story of the arms race to create America's nuclear arms factories.
By 1960, one of the world's most notorious Nazi war criminals, Adolf Eichmann, is living incognito with his family on the outskirts of Buenos Aires under the alias Riccardo Klement. Known as the architect of Hitler's 'final solution' and directly culpable for the murder of six million Jews, the former Lieutenant Colonel of the SS is now himself a hunted man.
The myths and folklore of the natural world and forest mysticism. The tragic Greek myth of Actaeon, the Celtic Otherworld, the Kraken and the woods of Brothers Grimm.
During the Vietnam War, US tankers had to undergo their baptism of fire, learning how to fight against a guerrilla army in hostile and unfamiliar terrain.
Japan would create arguably the greatest fighter in the Second World War - the Mitsubishi Zero, but their failed War Factories would ultimately reduce the Zero to a kamikaze plane.
How German activist Beate Klarsfeld helped capture Gestapo officer Klaus Barbie, whose war crimes earned him the nickname the Butcher of Lyon.
The American tankers battle fanatical Germans defending their homeland to the last, armed with the most powerful Panzers ever to take the battlefield.
How the Lancaster factory, one of the biggest buildings in Europe at the time, helped to create a truly war-winning weapon.
As one of the highest-ranking Gestapo officers in Rome during the war, Erich Priebke is responsible for one of Italy’s worst atrocities — the Ardeatine Cave massacres. On a direct order from Adolf Hitler, Priebke orchestrates the assassination of 335 Italian civilians. And, after escaping to Argentina, he eludes justice for fifty years until a high-profile team of American TV journalists stumbles onto his trail.
The Perseus Survivor is a docudrama, that reveals the story of the World War II Submarine HMS Perseus and presumably undercover agent John Capes – the only man, who survived the explosion causing the loss of said vessel. The intense investigation of her unnoticed loss by the research team, led by the famous underwater researcher Richie Kohler, uncovered the whole sequence of interconnected events that brought to light the numerous mysteries buried in the dark waters of Mediterranean.
During the later years of the Vietnam War, the NVA employed its own armor, fighting tank against tank to decide the war's fate.
Long before Henry Ford, Samuel Colt is the true father of mass production. Ironically, it was the inadequacy of Soviet factory production which made the AK47 so effective.
Arguably the most notorious Nazi fugitive, Dr Joseph Mengele earned the nickname the ‘Angel of Death’ for his perverse and sadistic experiments at Auschwitz-Birkenau. After the war, Mengele escaped to Buenos Aires where he lived the high-life on the run. That is, until 1959 when the West German government indicted Mengele for mass murder and demanded his extradition.
Spanish Armada captain Francisco de Cuéllar was shipwrecked off the Sligo coast in September 1588. He spent seven months in war-torn Ireland, trying to escape death and marriage before eventually making his way to Madrid.
Many people don't realise how pivotal armoured units played to Allies victory in the pacific. The key role played by U.S. Marine tanks in the Pacific Campaign against Japan.
The First World War led to a number of astounding war factories, which laid the foundations and paved the way for modern factories of today.
As the Gestapo Chief in Paris, Kurt Lischka orders the largest mass arrest in French history in 1942, and is responsible for the murder of 33,000 Jews. After the war, Lischka settles in Cologne thanks to a legal loop-hole protecting Nazis like him from prosecution. That is, until one morning when Nazi hunters Serge and Beate Klarsfeld show up.
David Susskind's historical, long and intimate interview with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Originally aired on June 9, 1963 by WPIX-TV New York. Among the subjects discussed were the current state of the American Civil Rights Movement and the recent (at that time) events in Birmingham, Alabama. Recently restored by the Paley Center.
In the last throes of WWII, Canadian forces launched the attack that would open the German heartland to Allied forces, at the Hochwald Gap.
Holloway prison covering the years between 1852 and 1948, including Edwardian baby-killers, suffragettes, Ruth Ellis and Diana Mitford.
One of France’s worst wartime villains, Paul Touvier is an overtly anti-Semitic traitor who terrorises his own countrymen. As a leader of a pro-Nazi paramilitary police force, he relishes his job of hunting down ‘enemies of the state’ and, murdering Jews and resistance fighters alike, earns himself the nickname the ‘Hangman of Lyon’. A devout Catholic, Touvier escapes retribution after the war by turning to the church for help. By 1988, France’s most notorious war criminal is still at large, and a high-ranking French investigator, Jean-Louis Recordon, is given the job of hunting him down.
April 8th 1950. Soviet Pilot Anatolij Gerasimov has the US Navy PB 4Y2 Privateer neatly positioned in his sights and fires the guns of his fighter plane. The Lavochkin 11 shudders, and a hail of bullets hits the giant American four-engined spy plane. Airmen bail out of the fatally damaged Privateer, parachutes blossom. While a Soviet rescue operation swings into operation, Gerasimov and his 3 wingmen return to their base to sign the pilot reports prepared for them, which assert the deliberate lie that the plane exploded - with no survivors.
In 1944, the Allies landed on the northern coast of France. How did the 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade fight their way inland past a ruthless German defence?
In this six part series, War Machines combines archive and original material to tell the amazing, and sometimes amusing, story of man’s determination to kill. Each episode focuses on a different battlefield or type of killing machine and shows how mankind has shaped, remade and perfected tools for war, from sticks and stones to weapons capable of ultimate annihilation.
A fervent believer in Hitler’s theories on race and Aryan superiority, Franz Stangl is an Austrian career policeman who joins the Nazi party and works his way up the ranks. Proving to have a knack for mass murder, he eventually finds himself in charge of three Polish extermination camps where he is responsible for the genocide of 800,000 people. Following a well worn ‘ratline’, Stangl escapes to Brazil after the war where for nearly two decades he leads a comfortable existence in exile.
The Cold War was a deadly game in the depths of the oceans. More than 20 collisions between American and Soviet submarines are only the tip of the iceberg as far as these secret operations are concerned. The underwater interface was perhaps the most merciless frontier between East and West. This documentary reveals previously unknown information from the military apparatus of both sides, and shows that submarines continue to be an important weapon in the espionage war even today.
On December 7, 1941, Japan gambled all and bombed the US Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbour on Hawaii. In the following months, Japanese forces rampaged across Asia, humiliating America and her allies. It looked as though she was unbeatable. But then America fought back.
From simple mortar launchers, handheld grenade launchers and underbarrel attachments, this documentary explores the long and storied history of personal ordnance.
For generations, the First Nations of the Northwest coast lived in fear of the Haida raiders. From their island strongholds, they would won slaves, wealth, and glory at the point of a dagger. Giving rise to a dazzling golden age of art and architecture.
In 1973, Syria launched a surprise attack against Israel -- culminating in a great standoff at the Valley of Tears. How did a few outnumbered tanks hold off an enemy of overwhelming size?
The Humvee remains one of America's most versatile mobile military vehicle; but the history of the armored truck and armored vehicles in general, has played an absolutely vital role in the military success of America and the West...
In 1885, Louis Riel and rebel Metis would stun the upstart Canadian government with a violent uprising. Dismissed and dispossessed, the Metis would fight to secure a place in their own homeland.
By 1944, as the Third Reich was crumbling, Hitler gave detailed orders for the destruction of Paris. He wanted the monuments and all the bridges mined and the city reduced to a “pile of rubble”. General von Choltitz, the last Nazi commander in charge of Paris, famously claimed he saved the City of Light. But what really happened? We investigate.
Here we take a look at some of the world's most powerful warships. From aircraft carriers to nuclear submarines, we'll be looking at the fiercest nautical weaponry ever to rule the waves.
Once the Cree and their allies dominated the western fur trade. Sustained by the buffalo. By 1885, their decline meant disaster and starvation. Betrayed by Ottawa, who offered peace and food for land, the Cree would make a valiant last stand to save their people’s future.
From 1920 to 1954, hundreds of Irish men and women served as Roman Catholic missionaries in Central China. They worked in social, pastoral, and disaster relief services during this extraordinarily turbulent but fascinating period of Chinese history. They encountered floods, famine and disease, civil war and world war, and finally persecution and expulsion with the establishment of the Communist People's Republic of China.
From the Sopwoff Camel to the Apache Helicopter, the F-16 to the Harrier Jump Jet, we'll be exploring the legendary world of military aviation.
Once the five nations of the Iroquois were bitter enemies. Until the Peacemaker's law bound them together. Stronger together, the Iroquois used commerce, diplomacy and firepower to destroy their enemies. And fight the French Empire to a standstill.
On 7 May 1765 the HMS Victory was floated out of Chatham’s Royal Dockyard. She would become the most famous flagship in the British Royal Navy and achieve everlasting fame as the flagship of Vice-Admiral Lord Nelson in Britain’s greatest ever naval victory, the defeat of the French and Spanish at the Battle of Trafalgar.
In 1942, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 that cleared the way for the incarceration of Japanese Americans in U.S. confinement camps. Men, women, and children of Japanese ancestry were evicted from the West Coast of the United States and held in sites across the country.
In 1942, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 that cleared the way for the incarceration of Japanese Americans in U.S. confinement camps. Men, women, and children of Japanese ancestry were evicted from the West Coast of the United States and held in sites across the country.
Over 75 years ago, 1,177 men lost their lives on the USS Arizona during the attack on Pearl Harbor. The ship, underwater, is a shrine and monument, visited by tourists, and the families of those who perished.
The lives of the Niitsitapi are changed with the arrival of the horse, ushering in a violent era of the Blackfoot Confederacy.
While the United States was publicly engaged in the Vietnam War, a secret conflict was raging just next door in the country of Laos. Under the command of the CIA, a full-blown military operation engulfed Laos, with a select few of the U.S. Armed Forces participating.
Tanks were first used during the Battle of the Somme in 1916 to break the deadlock of trench warfare on the Western Front. While Britain and France built thousands of tanks, Germany only developed and brought into service 20 vehicles of a single design.
North American First Nations fight other each and the European newcomers over territory, resources and survival.
This documentary gives a new perspective of a critical period in 1940. With Britain in crisis after a devastating defeat in Europe, these are the key moments that lead to WWII’s most famous battle, and the moment the Allies stepped in to save a nation.
At the age of 10, Eva Mozes Kor fought through the horrors of Auschwitz, where she was experimented on as one of "Dr. Mengele's twins." Later, she helped launch a global manhunt for Mengele. After decades of torment and pain, she eventually came to forgive the Nazis and has since emerged as arguably the best-known and most-active Holocaust survivor in the world. This is her unforgettable story.
How did some Christmas traditions develop, when in reality, many of the places, times, and jobs of the story do not fit? Shepherding in December, no. Boar? Goose? Turkey? All unlikely, especially since they were locally unavailable or the preparation of them was arduous and disgusting. All the finery - glasses, fabrics, dining utensils, each meant hard hours in sweatshops, poorly paid, and unsafe. These, and many other, intrinsic elements have their history explored.
The battle for North America rages on as the Americans claim a manifest destiny to take the continent and the First Nations of the West are forced to fight for their survival.
Military historian Norm Christie presents a four-part series examining the First World War from a Canadian perspective. As he begins his journey through the historic battlefields of France and Belgium, Christie focuses on the career of General Sir Arthur Currie, a soldier who rose through the ranks from humble gunner in 1897 to lead the Canadian Corps to several victories during the conflict which began in 1914.
Documentary in which architect Jonathan Adams travels America exploring the work of Frank Lloyd Wright, possibly America's greatest ever architect.
A mysterious lost WWII submarine, German U-boat U-455 is discovered off the coast of Italy at 120 meters deep. For Lorenzo del Veneziano, an underwater marine archaeologist, it's an amazing sight. The U-boat is intact. It stands almost vertically at the bottom of the sea, its hull stuck in the sediment. What is the story of this ship? The history of U-455 and cause of the sinking are revealed.
The Trouble with Truth reveals the power of print in the face of oppression. As the South African apartheid government clamped down on free political activity, an independent-minded newspaper protested. The Guardian developed into the intellectual voice of the liberation movement in South Africa, taking on the discriminatory ideology of apartheid and exposing its practices in print and photographs, headlines and provocative cartoons.
The battle for North America rages on as the Americans claim a manifest destiny to take the continent; the First Nations of the West were forced to fight for their survival.
This documentary focuses on Jessica the Communist and Diana the Fascist. Separated by only a few years in age, but poles apart in ideology. They grew up in a divided Europe at the beginning of the 20th Century, a place and time full of great political tension. Old regimes were clinging on to power and new ones were eager to establish themselves. Many citizens of Europe were forced to decide which moral compass they wished to adopt, and both Jessica and Diana were quick to make that decision.
Even now -- maybe especially now -- Woodstock has deep, lasting meaning. Its mix of music, culture and idealism resonates across the years. It gave youth a voice. It changed the music business. It energized activists. From stadium shows to social-justice movements, its legacy is strong: half a century later. Follow the inside story of the event and the history that continues! Woodstock: 3 Days That Changed Everything gets inside this familiar story to shed new light on an iconic event.
Norm Christie reveals the extraordinary story of the largest peacetime armada in Canadian history - the spectacular 1936 Vimy Pilgrimage to Europe.
In an age of clashing empires, the Maliseet would fight for their place in North America.
Britain has always played a very important role in the aeronautic industry, from Sir George Cayley who designed the first actual model of an aeroplane to Sir Frank Whittle who is credited with single-handedly inventing the turbojet engine.
Action-packed tour through the history of one of the most controversial subjects of the 20th century – nuclear power – as told by those who experienced it first-hand. Focusing on events in the US, UK, France and Germany, it charts its social and political development from the early days of post-war atomic euphoria, through to the struggling ‘nuclear renaissance’ of the present day.
Hitler wanted the world to believe he possessed super-human qualities but in private he was a wreck, hiding shocking secrets that he kept covered for his entire life. This episode reveals the discovery of archives that confirm Hitler’s genital deformity, the alarming truth about his heavy drug addiction and the Parkinson's that plagued him for the last 10 years of his life.
A brutal war for the Pacific Northwest would be decided by a single battle.
Looking at how Amelia Earhart's legacy has lived on thanks to her beloved sister, `Pidge', 80 years since her plane disappeared on her historic round-the-world flight.
This landmark documentary offers a historical portrait of America’s 40th President as told through the recollections, observations and opinions of those who knew him and experts who have analyzed the Reagan presidency. The focus of the documentary is the crucial events associated with his two-term presidency and the legacy he left behind.
Hitler's parents were closely related and in his adult years, he was rumored to have engaged in incest himself. His father was a violent man, though his mother was very fond of her young son.
The battle for North America rages on as the Americans claim a manifest destiny to take the continent. The First Nations of the West were forced to fight for their survival.
With renewed debate approaching the 2020 presidential election about the potential impact of socialist influenced policies in America, the successes and failures of Milwaukee's "Sewer Socialists" profiled in America’s Socialist Experiment offer some real-world examples for those who only know socialism as a philosophy or label.
From exiles to conquerors, the Lakota nation would become legends.
At the end of the Cold War the Russian Navy, bereft of funds, abruptly decommissioned 100 nuclear powered submarines leaving behind a massive nuclear waste disposal problem. This program reviews the progress of the long term project to properly dispose of the submarine's reactor cores and the major challenges those working on the project are dealing with.
The concluding episode of The Reagan Presidency begins in 1985 with Mikhail Gorbachev's rise to General Secretary of the Soviet Union and chronicles the series of Soviet-American summits orchestrated by Reagan and Gorbachev.
Adolf Hitler had a depraved sex life that he tried to hide from the German public. He was said to constantly masturbate, to be a voyeur, and to have sadomasochistic sex with women.
For centuries, mass migration turned North America into a battleground. This final episode explores the lasting legacies of North America's colonial history.
The story of the engineers who worked tirelessly to keep the electric power running as the Titanic sank. Their selfless actions kept the lights on and the electric lifeboat winches operational to facilitate the survival of others.
The Second World War was fought everywhere; by land, by sea, by air -- and by sheer production power. Here, we examine the industrial mobilisation of Germany's production facilities and take an inside look at the many war factories that propped up Hitler's ambitions of conquest.
The series begins before the First World War when military commanders struggled to understand what uses aviation might have. The Wright Brothers had been the first to fly a powered aircraft in controlled flight in 1903, but even by 1914 aircraft were still fragile and underpowered. But the WWI saw the aeroplane develop into a formidable weapon capable of carrying bombs for thousands of miles.
Host David Reynolds focuses on Roosevelt's private life and how the onerous secrecy surrounding his troubled marriage influenced his presidency.
Chronicles the fate of the WWII heavy cruiser the USS Indianapolis. Features exclusive interviews with crew members and their families.
Docuseries exploring World War 2 through the sheer numbers involved. When the Nazis began their offensive, Britain had lost over 400,000 tonnes of supplies and had only 500 aircraft to fight off their invasion.
The 1920s and 30s were uncertain times for the RAF as well as all other armed services. With peace came cuts in spending on new aircraft development. The RAF found a useful role 'policing the Empire' - going to far-flung places that would have tied up land forces for months to reach and garrison. But, with the Second World War looming, money began to flow into aircraft design and production.
The glaciers of the Alps are melting down due to climate change, releasing an invaluable treasure - artefacts, human beings and other testimonies of the past preserved in the ice. Historians have found objects from the First World War when the Frontline was over 3,000 metres high. The objects today make us aware of how hard the lives of soldiers were at these altitudes.
The complicated relationship between Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and her sister, Lee Radziwill. A life of high fashion and parties masked sibling rivalry and tragedy.
By the end of the war the RAF had aircraft that could escort bombers to targets deep inside Germany and back. With the Gloster Meteor, the RAF had also entered the 'Jet Age'. Aircraft like the Hawker Hunter and F-86 Sabre took the RAF supersonic. This was the era of QRA - Quick Reaction Alert - when aircraft sat at the end of runways ready to launch in minutes to intercept intruders.
Hitler's bid to launch his full-scale invasion of Britain hinged on the Germans acheiving air superiority. In this episode of WWII In Numbers we take a look at the figures and see why this was never achieved during the Battle of Britain in 1940, and how despite common belief, the RAF weren’t as outnumbered as everyone thinks…
David Reynolds examines the legacy of the Great War, across 100 years and 10 different countries, explaining how the war haunted a generation and helped build the peace that followed.
This episode analyses Hitler’s decisions during the Battle of Britain, which lead to the first major defeat of Nazi Germany, and Operation Barbarossa, the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union.
In October 1940 President Roosevelt is running for his third term of office. He needs to win the election, and America entering WWII seems all but inevitable. But the US public don't want war. What Japan do next will change all that, entering the US into a war that they didn't want, but in doing so changing the course of history forever.
By the end of the First World War the RAF had bombers that could fly to Berlin and back. For the first time in a thousand years, British civilians found themselves under direct attack - by Zeppelin airships and Gotha bombers. The experience left an indelible impression on the public psyche, which was only exacerbated during the Blitz that began in the winter of 1940.
Interwoven portraits of Anatoly Karpov and Garry Kasparov, whose 25-year bitter rivalry accompanied the fall of the USSR. The story of a duel between two chess giants, fighting a personal war in a world gone to ruin. This battle of black and white was more than a face-off over a chessboard.
The RAF's maritime role is often overlooked. Between the wars the RAF operated elegant flying boats to patrol the far flung corners of the Empire. During the Second World War, air sea rescue of downed pilots and air crews was a vital role. Large flying boats like the Short Sunderland and PBY Catalina flew long missions far out over the oceans, looking for enemy submarines.
During the Second World War, the allies' key objective was to crack the German army's encrypted communications code. Without a doubt, the key player in this game was Alan Turing, an interdisciplinary scientist and a long-forgotten hero.
In December 1941 Japanese Admiral Yamamoto predicted that if Japan went to war with the US, that they would only last six months. His prediction was incredibly accurate, with the Battle of Midway turning the tide in the Pacific. So what did he know that Japan did not...the power of US industry.
After the war, RAF transports helped keep Berliners alive during the Soviet blockade of the city in 1948/49. As well as flying round-the-clock operations into the airport, Sunderland flying boats delivered supplies by landing on Lake Havel near the city. During the 1960s the RAF augmented its fixed wing aircraft with helicopters like the Chinook.
Based on previously unheard testimony by survivors, archive footage, secret documents and interviews, this landmark film provides insight into the folly of the 1958-1962 Great Leap Forward. It examines the decisions that led to possibly the worst famine in modern history under Mao in China.
At the height of Maoism, China was as closed off as present-day North Korea. But even at that time, some Western foreigners lived in the country and in the summer of 1966, they witnessed first-hand the upheaval of the Cultural Revolution. In this time young leftist activists In Western Europe idolized Mao as a harbinger of a utopian society. As China eased out of its age of isolation in the early 1970's, many Westerners outside of China had to face a harsh reality.
The Battle of Kursk was the last major offensive the German army would see on the eastern front in WWII. Despite huge Soviet losses, their ability to replace men with ease, not to mention the power of the feared T-34 tank mean that Kursk became one of the most decisive moments in the war, and in history.
The longest-serving cargo plane of the RAF, the C-130 brings the story of the Royal Air Force into the modern era. Another aircraft to have extended the RAF's capabilities is the C130 Hercules. This aircraft has proved its capabilities in countless environments from resupply to dropping paratroopers. As has been demonstrated many times in recent conflicts, control of the skies remains a deciding factor in the outcome.
A German businessman and Nazi Party member efforts to stop the atrocities of the Japanese army during the Nanking occupation and works to protect and help the Chinese civilians during the event.
Hitler's England tells the story of the British Channel Islands under German occupation from 1940 to 1945. There was collaboration and resistance, heroism and infamy, repression and violence, denunciation and deportation. But, there was also the everyday life between the conquerors and the conquered. The story that emerges is complex, heart-rending and enthralling. It is the story of ordinary people, many of whom became extraordinary as they lived through the harsh and bitter years of the German Occupation.
The world's worst war would come to its conclusion, as strategic errors and overstretched resources would culminate in the Axis powers facing the Allies on their own turf.
This whimsical look at rough-and-tumble American politics examines the role of money, religion and even ancient Rome on Presidential campaigns.
The highwayman: heavily romanticized in literature, these glamorous gangsters became a social menace on the roads and a political thorn in the side of the creaking British state - threatening to steal our wallets and our hearts. But underneath the dashing image of stylish robbers on horseback lay a far darker reality.
A Terrible Beauty is the story of the men and women of the Easter Rising in Dublin in 1916, Irish and British, caught up in a conflict many did not understand and of the innocent men and boys, executed because of what transpired in The Battle of Mount Street Bridge. The British soldiers were the last of the Great War volunteers, who joined up together to fight the Germans. They knew that there was a strong chance they would die in France, but to die in Dublin would never have crossed their minds.
In the twentieth century, whaling ships killed 1.5 million whales in Antarctica, bringing the biggest creatures that have ever lived to the brink of extinction. Whalers from Europe led the rush south and were still whaling into the 1960s. This is the unseen story of whaling at the edge of the world.
Peter Greste continues to delve into the life of Australia's greatest General - Sir John Monash, while also discovering the fate of his four Great Uncles who fought under Monash.
Daredevil missions, dangerous assignments, and secret operations continue to mystify WWII experts. We take a fresh look at some of the most notable secret missions of the Second World War, from the 1943 Gran Sasso mission to free Benito Mussolini to the cold-blooded killing of the American-appointed mayor of Aachen in the last months of the war.
Fascinating story of the 1978 World Chess Championship between the Soviet Communist Party's protege, Anatoly Karpov and the traitor and Soviet defector, Viktor Korchnoi. One of those instances in life where truth is stranger than fiction.
War correspondent Peter Greste goes in search of the real man behind the Australian General who changed the way the world fights wars, John Monash. He is remembered to this day as one of the Great War's best military Generals.
From 1936, Hitler's personal physician Dr Theodor Morell remained at his side, handing out dubious treatments, up to 8 different medications daily, including one containing strychnine. Did Morell try to poison his employer? Was Hitler well enough to lead Germany? American psychologist Nassir Ghaemi has doubts. We give an exclusive and surprising insight into a previously unknown side of Hitler.
In the crucible of World War II, Germany’s most brilliant scientists must race to create an arsenal of terrifying new weapons of mass destruction, even an atomic bomb.
The 40-year mystery, uncovered by his wife. This is the story of Lord Lucan, playboy, aristocrat, gambler, and murderer. The public has been transfixed for over 40 years, when on November 7th, 1974 Lucan family nanny Sandra Rivett was killed and he disappeared without a trace. Ever since one voice has remained almost entirely silent; his wife, Lady Lucan. Now she wants to set the record straight.
On July 27th, 1943, a U.S. patrol plane spots the German U-boat U-513. With no time for the vessel to dive: 2 bombs hit, and only 7 men survive. Until now, the final resting place of U-513, and what exactly happened to it, has remained a mystery. The adventurer Vilfredo Schürmann managed to locate the wreck, allowing us to piece together the puzzle of the U-boat's final mission and grisly end.
In 1941, before Pearl Harbor was attacked, America was providing war materials to its democracies, and its young men were answering the call to service. Throughout America, "preparedness" was the watchword as the conflict that ignited in 1939 swept through Europe, Africa, and Asia, and a war with Japan loomed closer than ever.
The Kennedy Half Century received a 2014 Emmy Award for Best Historical Documentary. It tells the compelling story of how John F. Kennedy's life and administration, as well as his tragic death on November 22, 1963, have influenced the general public, the media, and every president who has followed him.
In the last weeks of the Third Reich, the Nazi regime goes about hiding their immense riches in the Alps, but was this 'Alpine Fortress' an elaborate bluff or a serious plan for future Nazi resurgence? What happened to the hidden Nazi treasure? We follow the trail of these old mysteries and uncover what happened in the turbulent last days of the Third Reich.
By the time the U.S. entered the war, the Nazi blitzkrieg had flattened France, Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, and Luxembourg, and the Japanese were overwhelming in the Pacific Ocean. At home in 1942, our mighty war machine roared to life, and crowds cheered America's first victories in the Doolittle Raid, the Coral Sea, and Midway.
Argentina's 1976-83 dictatorship was one of Latin America's most gruesome. Under the guise of a war on communism, the ruling Armed Forces tortured and "disappeared" thousands of young left-wing students, activists and militants, leaving a trail of devastation that would haunt the country for decades. But a soft-spoken journalist named Robert Cox had the courage to speak out.
Women Outward Bound profiles the first group of young women to participate in an Outward Bound survival school course in 1965, and chronicles their experiences in the wild. It also captures how one month in the woods taught them they could do more than they ever thought possible.
US scientists worked feverishly on developing the first atom bomb. They feared Hitler’s Germany was about to build it before them. Later it was reported that the Germans had abandoned their plans. According to new documents, allied military reports and existing construction plans, Hitler had already tested a new kind of nuclear weapon in March 1945. How far did the Germans really get?
This doc probes the presidential campaigns that have changed America through the eyes of former campaigners, journalists and researchers. Find out how financing, crime and corruption, and TV debates play a major role in swaying political opinion on the way to the White House.
By 1943, the battle turned against North Africa, Allied invasions of Sicily and Italy, and plans were laid to bomb Germany. The liberation of Tunisia and the defense of Stalingrad began to crack the myth of Hitler's super-race, while Allied forces fought back against the Japanese in the Aleutians and on New Guinea and Guadalcanal.
On the 17th of August, 1987, Hitler's former deputy Rudolf Hess commits suicide in prison, marking the end of a life of mystery and intrigue. We investigate some of the riddles still surrounding Hess. What motivated him to single-handedly fly to Scotland? Did he want to make peace with the UK? And Hess's last mystery: did he really kill himself, or was he murdered?
For decades after the end of World War II, rumors persisted that the mountains of southwest Poland held a precious secret—a mysterious train laden with tons of gold, rare jewels, and priceless art hidden by the Nazis in a secret labyrinth of tunnels. When 2015 two treasure hunters claimed that they had located “Hitler’s Gold Train” in the area of Walbrzych, and the news made headlines all over the world.
In the spring of 1944, America and its allies waged global warfare on an unprecedented scale, pushing towards the inevitable fall of Rome and on "the road back" in the Pacific. Here at home, months of planning and preparation paid off on June 6th with the D-Day landings in Normandy, unleashing the most massive invasion in history.
Sam takes to the high seas in search of the swashbuckling pirates of the golden age of piracy during the early 18th century. Sam also charts the devastating impact these pirates had during an era of colonial expansion.
From revolvers to battleships, jetfighters to nuclear bombs, we take a look at some of the giant production enterprises that quickly turned America into the dominant military force of WW2.
Alan Titchmarsh goes behind the scenes at Knole in Kent, Anneka Rice visits Croome Court and Miriam O'Reilly walks in the footsteps of giants on the Jurassic Coast.
In the final episode, Sam looks at urban crime, fraud and corruption in the 18th century, uncovering a fascinating rogues gallery of charmers, fraudsters and villains. Charmers like thief and serial escapee Jack Sheppard, so notorious that almost a quarter of a million people turned up to witness his hanging. Almost as controversial in her lifetime was Mary Toft, a fraudster who managed to convince no less than King George I and his surgeon that she had given birth to rabbits, making her, perhaps, the original 'con' artist.
As the Battle of the Bulge raged on into 1945, the U.S. battled stiff resistance on Leyte and Iwa Jima in the Pacific, and Americans brought the war into the Fatherland while mourning President Roosevelt, who did not live to see their final victory, signaled by the deaths of Mussolini and Hitler and the atomic bombs that defeated Japan.
How were nations worldwide brought to the brink of conflict in 1939? Hear of the triggers that sparked World War II in the first of a major 13-part documentary series.
The Great War was a conflict driven by quantity and numbers, fought by calculating generals for who no cost was too high. For the first time in history, everything was recorded in exacting detail and this documentary reveals the startling facts behind the staggering scale of the war to end all wars.
Alan Titchmarsh reveals some surprising facts about Beatrix Potter, Oz Clarke visits a nursery housing some of our rarest plants, Jon Culshaw visits a time capsule in Gloucestershire and Suzannah Lipscomb travels to Blakeney Point.
What were the noteworthy events at the beginning of World War II? See rare archive footage and hear remarkable testimony on early advances made by Germany, Italy and the USSR.
For over 40 years the Libyan despot terrified, tortured and tricked the world with one horrific act after another. This is the story of Colonel Gaddafi, the Middle East's longest serving dictator from his roots as an idealistic young revolutionary in 1969, to becoming one of the world's most deadly terrorists.
We are introduced to indigenous creation stories; discoveries by archaeologists, geneticists, linguists and anthropologists about the arrival of various indigenous people that are believed to arrive via the land bridge from what is now Russia and Alaska and also via boat and sailing down the N. American coast, settling in many areas and then developing differing languages, cultures and customs.
Dogfights over the English Channel in 1940 led to the Battle of Britain and the Blitz. Meanwhile, Italian troops entered North Africa. This epic World War II retrospective expounds.
Adolf Hitler is the very personification of evil. Yet somehow, he managed to convince a nation of sophisticated, civilized people to be complicit in his horrific crimes. What made him this way? What terrible forces turn a man born like any other into the most terrifying dictator the world has ever seen?
Indigenous people created significant changes to their environment through resource harvesting, farming, urban development, irrigation, controlled burning, and deforestation.
The Royal Charter was wrecked in one of the worst storms ever to hit Britain; the loss of life and gold on board was immense; gold hunter Vince Thurkettle is on a mission to recover the Royal Charter's lost treasure.
'Blitzkrieg' was an innovative tactic devised by the German military. Hear how it became the new word in warfare after the Nazis' swift invasions of Holland, Belgium and France.
Japanese Prime Minister Hideki Tojo authorizes the attack on Pearl Harbor and the torture of thousands of prisoners of war during World War II.
Maize from MesoAmerica, Potatoes from the Andes, biodiversity of the Amazon, Camus from the Plains, seal hunting of the Arctic, whale hunting of the NWCoast, Bison jumps, and Fishing weirs.
The wars of east and west that fused to become the Second World War remade the political map of the world. This is the story of how a world, centuries in the making, was completely remade in a couple of decades.
Iron-fisted ruler Josef Stalin leads the Soviet Union for 30 years, eliminating anyone who stands in his way.
Architecture and urban design. Whether living a nomadic existence or in sprawling urban centres, indigenous people throughout the Americas created their homes and community structures to fulfill the needs and values of their society.
America's entry into WWII in December 1941 would prove to be vital to Allied success. Discover how the United States' involvement shaped the course of the conflict in 1942.
This is the story Saddam Hussein, a man thought to be more sadistic than Hitler, and how he rules Iraq with an utter contempt for humanity for 23 years. This historical documentary looks at how the extreme pleasure he derives from limitless cruelty plays a significant part in his transformation from a violent young street thug to one of the most notorious dictators in the Middle East.
Early indigenous people in North America were using the number 0 before any other people, had mapped the planets and stars and had their own calendars and writing methods. We also see how the herbs and plants that they used often are utilized in our modern drugs, as in the Yew tree bears components in Tamoxifen for cancer treatment today and the Willow tree has acetylsalicylic acid for aspirin.
He was the man who would define the start of the 19th century. He has more documented victories than any other battlefield commanders in history. From a relatively humble background, he rose to become master of Europe. This is the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte. Featuring historians Dr Michael Rowe, Professor Pamela Pilbeam and Professor David Andress.
Discover how the political map of the world was remade by WWII. Recalling the spread of Japanese invasion in the Pacific and the bombing of German cities by British planes.
Supreme Leader of China for almost 3 decades, his merciless policies made him one of the most ruthless tyrants of the 20th Century. A communist leader obsessed with power and violence; a sadist intoxicated by others' pain; and a dictator convinced that politics had to be violent. He presided over the deaths of more people than Hitler and Stalin combined. The Chinese Chairman Mao Zedong.
Alan Titchmarsh reveals the secrets of the Cistercian monks who lived at Fountain's Abbey in North Yorkshire over 800 years ago, and visits its neighbour - the spectacular Studley Royal Water Garden. Anneka Rice is at Mottisfont in Hampshire and Britain's last working water-driven spade mill. Miriam O'Reilly joins a bat watch on the South Downs, and Dan Jones treads in the footprints of Giants in County Antrim.
In this episode, we look take a deep dive into the political infrastructure of Indigenous America. How did the Native Americans decide upon their leadership? Wha kind of intricate and sophisticated systems did they develop for trade?
WWII 1942: Hitler makes his move on Stalingrad. But before he does he makes the decision that some think to be his worst...splitting up his force. With the Crimea taken he sent army group A along the Black Sea coast, aiming for the oil cities of Maikop, Grozny and Baku, leaving army group B to advance on Stalingrad by themselves.
The rise and fall of Italian Prime Minister Benito Mussolini, whose involvement in the creation of fascism made him a role model to Adolf Hitler and other 20th-century dictators.
During the middle of WWII in 1943, the end was in sight for the Allied leaders. With this, thoughts turned to the post war age, and what would happen to the world the war left behind. Over a series of conferences these great leaders changed the fate of the world forever.
The real story behind Native American art. We learn about art in various native communities before 1492. We see their hand paintings and paintings of animals. We see the baskets that were woven and the pottery designs. We are shown the masks that were made and how they played a part in ceremonies.
The Second World War was won not just on the battlefield. From Vickers to Lancaster, here we examine the great war factories that powered Britain's production war.
We are informed about the indigenous perspective on cultural traditions and the concern about native languages becoming extinct.
The Japanese Imperial family is the oldest hereditary monarchy in the world, dating back to the sixth century BC. However, its central role Japan has not prevented controversy in recent years. Through personal scandals, and vagaries of the hereditary system, even to their own biology, it’s been a rocky time. But what is left if every tradition is changeable?
Up against seemingly insurmountable odds, Ancient Athens faces down an ancient superpower in the Persian Empire. Find out the incredible story behind one of history's most infamous battles.
World War II: Germany's retreat. The Germans begin to retreat from Russia; the war in the Pacific advances at Saipan and Guam; kamikaze pilots; Rome falls; D-Day landings; Free France leader Charles de Gaulle leads his troops in liberating Paris.
In summer 2007, at a site in Ireland, archaeologists were uncovering layers of graves. They were astonished to find two skeletons with large stones lodged in their jaws. This was exceptional; all the other skeletons in the cemetery had been normal Christian burials.
What was it really like in an old Victorian Workhouse? In the first of a two-part documentary, presenter Fern Britton, actor Brian Cox, and more famous faces go on an emotional journey uncovering how their ancestors were driven to the Victorian workhouse by poverty.
Follows in the footsteps of Themistocles and his fearsome adversary Xerxes, through two spectacular military engagements, one on land, the other naval: the battles of Marathon (490 BC) and Salamis (480 BC). Themistocles against Xerxes, the story of a duel and the exceptional parallel careers of two men of a similar age, but whose origins, beliefs, and cultures were very different: the son of a king and the son of democracy itself.
Brian Cox finds out how his ancestors escaped the shadow of the Victorian workhouse and Felicity Kendal discovers her great-grandmother was forced into the institution by her husband after her affair.
In the late 16th century Europe was in the grip of a witch hunt fever, where thousands were tortured and burnt at the stake. The church was fully behind this terrifying crusade. In France and Germany alone up to 40,000 people may have been killed as witches. But England and Scotland were almost untouched by witch persecutions until King James himself decided to launch his own, personal war on witchcraft.
The Mystery of Remote Ancestors looks at the possible origins of the Chinese people. Starting with the discovery of 'Dragon Bone' over a hundred years ago, the Three Gorges region of China has yielded fascinating evidence of a long-gone past. Combining over a century of scientific study, the film focuses on the controversial findings of ancient human remains that date back over two million years.
With its 80 warships, France has one of the most powerful naval forces. These surface combat ships which double up as firing platforms are brimming with all the latest technology. Using archive images, expert accounts, and 3D modeling, this film takes us back in time - from the galleys of the 17th century to the battleships of WWII - to explore the technologies that today's ships have inherited.
England's history has been steeped in ambition, greed, treachery and betrayal. Its castle walls have witnessed centuries of bloodshed. The anguished wales of the forlorn still echo through the corridors. Cut off by tragic death these restless spirits have been trapped in limbo between heaven and hell. This program presents stories in a riveting tour of England's ghostly heritage.
A mystery is emerging out the Yukon ice: human hunting tools hidden for as long as 9,000 years have started to melt out. And each new find is another piece to the puzzle of who these people were.
The women in the bible have always been portrayed as the downfall of their male counterparts. Eve makes Adam eat the apple, Delilah cuts Samson's hair... but what does the text really say about these women? Notorious Women of the Bible investigates the historical, geographical, cultural and theological context of the stories surrounding the infamous women of the bible: Eve, Delilah, Bathsheba, Jezebel & Esther. In a patriarchal society, they challenged, seduced, tricked, took risks and even staked their lives.
Scotland is a land that has witnessed a bloody history of intrigue and betrayal. The victims of cruel torture and untimely death have become restless spirits doomed to linger in its haunted castles. Cursing the generations that follow their suffering echos down the years.
In 2008, Nepal's royalty were ousted from power, forced out of their palaces, and the country began a new era as a republic. The story of the fall of the House of Shah is one of bloodshed, betrayal and intrigue. The transformation from kingdom to republic was swift, dramatic, and leaves huge questions unanswered about the future.
The Egtved Girl is one of the best-known figures from prehistory. One summer’s day in 1370 BC she was buried in an oak coffin that was covered by the barrow Storehøj near Egtved, west of Vejle. Although not much is left of the Egtved Girl, her tale is a captivating story of the Bronze Age people.
Deep in Wales' long memory is a history of violence and bloody curses. Acts of treachery and vengeance leave their stain within Wales' haunted castles.
This series tells us about indigenous peoples of the Americas before the Spanish explorer Columbus arrived. Each episode shows us via re-enactments about a particular subject. We learn about their art, architecture, archaeology, Science and Technology etc.
From haunted castles to dark and dangerous woodlands, Ireland's dark history of magic, ritual and prime evil worship.
This series tells us about indigenous peoples of the Americas before the Spanish explorer Columbus arrived. Each episode shows us via re-enactments about a particular subject. We learn about their art, architecture, archaeology, Science and Technology etc.
Two thousand years after it was built, the Colosseum is in dire need of repair; a look at how the worlds of science, fashion, archaeology and culture are coming together for a renovation.
Athens gave the world its modern political system – the birth of “democracy” is a long and complicated yet utterly galvanizing process. Even the Gods have a say in worldly doings. The city beneath the Acropolis becomes the very cradle of western culture.
Brunei may be one of the richest nations in the world, but financial problems have beset even their royal house. The sultan has recently made moves towards some form of partial democracy. However, it is up to him whether or not he introduces it. Why did he make a move to do so, and then let it drop?
How does mankind find its way around the planet? How do people know where roads lead and what lies on the far side of the ocean? Did Marco Polo have an atlas showing the way to China? Did the Romans mark the borders of their empire on maps? For thousands of years distant lands and foreign nations were mysteries. And yet accounts of these mysteries were available – in travel books and on maps of the world.
The story behind the creation of the world's most famous monument, from its genesis and ancient beginnings to its upkeep, preservations and renovations, despite a storm of controversy.
Michael Portillo visits four abandoned locations that were at the centre of relatively unknown historical events, examining their place and importance in Britain's past. He begins at the Royal London Hospital in the East End, which closed its doors on 2013 but pioneered medical breakthroughs and healthcare for generations of men, women and children from its founding in 1740. It was also the home of Joseph Merrick, known as the Elephant Man, who spent the last three years of his life as a resident.
After 200 years under lock and key, all the personal papers of one of our most important monarchs are seeing the light of day for the first time. In the first documentary to gain extensive access to the Royal Archives, Robert Hardman sheds fascinating new light on George III, Britain's longest-reigning king.
Tim Sutherland and the team make a return trip to Sweden, where they hunt for clues to a battle that took place on the island of Gotland. They travel battlegrounds and battlefields, towns and villages, churches and burial grounds to search for clues hidden in the bones of the dead from medieval time.
Experts try to piece together a gruesome jigsaw when the skeleton of a medieval woman is found at Tadcaster Castle in Yorkshire.
Nefertari was Known as “Lady of Grace,” “Lady of All Lands,” “Wife of the Strong Bull,” “Great of Praises” and many other nicknames, Queen Neferati was one of the most famous Egyptian queens and an iconic women of Ancient Egypt. Ramesses II, like other kings of Egypt, had a large harem of wives.
Michael Portillo unlocks the doors to four extraordinary abandoned locations. For almost a century, Orford Ness was owned by the MOD, a lens into a bygone era of secrets, spies and superpowers. When it closed in 1993, its buildings were still shrouded in secrecy.
An ambitious film that unveils how Marie Antoinette was transformed into one of the greatest symbols of France. It only took three days and two nights to convict the last Queen of France but the outcome was known in advance. Previously unseen documents have revealed a shocking truth about the trial: It was rigged.
Alexandria, a royal Greek city in the land of the Pharaohs. Along the sandy banks of the Nile delta on the African Mediterranean coast, the most powerful metropolis of its time rose from virtually nothing. The Hellenistic culture mingled with the legacy of the Pharaohs and bore the fruits of a glorious new heritage.
Combing through the Amazon wilderness, archeologists made an amazing discovery: artifacts of ancient seafaring people from the Iberian Peninsula. They may have fled the carnage of the Roman Empire's war on Carthage, called by some historians the Roman holocaust. This documentary investigates the claim that South America was discovered and settled by Mediterranean peoples over 2,000 years ago.
Diseases inevitably belonged to life in the Middle Ages; there was virtually no hygiene and sanitation, making it difficult to survive near-perpetual diseases.
Deep-sea divers investigate the wreck of the 'unsinkable' First World War British battleship, HMS Audacious. The pride of the Royal Navy was laid low by a single unexpected blow, and now lies 14 miles off the northern tip of Ireland.
Carthage came into being as a Phoenician trading base, its strategically favourable location eventually allowing it to develop into a major centre of trade and seafaring. Carthage, Rome's fierce adversary, is the gateway to the treasures of Africa.
Michael explores Shepton Mallet prison which over its 400-year history has seen executions and escape attempts, been used as a store for historical documents during wartime and became the U.S. military's WWII death-row.
This Halloween, we bring you true haunted house stories from Georgia and Connecticut.
The waters surrounding the islands of Britain and Ireland serve as some of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. Discover the incredible maritime history hidden beneath their waves.
Rome would never have made it into the history books without the backing of its huge military apparatus. The life and the incredible luxury the ancient city of over a million inhabitants enjoyed was only made possible through the exploitation of its colonies, a course of action that never would have been possible without its troops.
The SS Armenian was sunk in June 1915 by a German U-boat, killing 29 people on board. For nearly a century the location of the wreck remained a mystery, until now.
Follow the close analysis of an ancient fight master's manuscript depicting combat techniques and devices used over 500 years ago.
In 1798, a vast French armada - led by the young general Napoleon Bonaparte - left Toulon on a mysterious military expedition to Egypt.
In February, 1950 the world's largest bomber takes off on a secret Cold War mission from Alaska. Its cargo - a MK IV nuclear bomb. Halfway through the mission three engines catch fire while the bomber is flying near Canada's west coast. Forced to abandon the mission, the crew puts the plane on autopilot, a course that will take the crippled bomber out into the Pacific. Despite the largest search and rescue mission in US Air Force history, the aircraft, five crewmen and their nuclear weapon are presumed lost in the depths of the Pacific Ocean - until now.
Within sight of the coast of France lies a sunken allied troop ship. Remnants of the 2nd world wreck scatter the sea bed, evidence of a forgotten tragedy. Nearly 800 American soldiers lost their lives, the event surrounded by secrecy and mystery. The waters surrounding the islands of Britain and Ireland serve as some of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. Discover the incredible maritime history hidden beneath their waves.
After conquering Europe, Charlemagne orders a common-language translation of the Bible and converts Saxon leader Widukind to Christianity.
Princess Diana: A Life After Death is different from many of the recent programs commemorating the anniversary of Princess Diana's death. It is not just an anniversary programme. It is a powerful summary of Princess Diana's historical, political and social legacy.
Spring of 1798: Napoleon sets out with 38,000 men and 10,000 sailors to conquer Egypt. He also brought along 167 men of science and arts to start a scientific mission to explore the land. It is the beginning of a scholarly encounter between the West and the Muslim world.
Deep-sea divers locate the British warship Curacoa, which was rammed and sunk by the most famous liner in the world, the Queen Mary. The Curacoa lies at a depth of 400 feet, 50 miles off the coast of Ireland. This extreme dive expedition provides, for the very first time, an opportunity to solve the mysteries surrounding this terrible and fatal wartime collision.
This is the story of the dramatic and violent life of the Middle Ages' most important emperor: Charlemagne. But, one man seemed to evade Charlemagne's grasp: Widukind. The Saxon's legendary leader boldly resisted conversion to Christianity in the face of the Holy Roman Emperor. How did Charlemagne finally defeat the "child of the forest"?
In this series, we travel to the buried remains of some of the Ancient World's most enduring mysteries. From the Angkor Wat, to the buried legions of the Terracotta Army, to the long-lost city of Troy.
Game of Thrones star Alfie Allen sets off around the UK to explore the defining moments of football, from a visit to The Oval, the venue for the first FA Cup Final, to the near-mythical Christmas Day truce matches on the front lines of World War I.
Brendan Bracken was Winston Churchill's closest advisor for over 30 years. Was Brendan Bracken Churchill's illegitimate son? In the 1920's even Winston's wife had to ask. This documentary tells the truth about this remarkable man.
The Moscow Kremlin; chief seat of power of the Russian state. But what kind of secrets does it hide? What inspired its chimera architecture and what secrets of state hides within its walls?
The stunning Khmer temples like the Angkor Wat built during the 13th century Angkor Empire's era capture the imagination of all. As experts try to unravel the temples' significance, they uncover mysterious facts about them. From five-headed Lord Shiva to the shrine of the God of Death Yama, to the discovery of ritual human sacrifices, go on a journey of thrilling exploration of one of the largest cities in the world.
The series takes us to the very heart of urban life in the Mediterranean area, the hub of the ancient world. The mighty metropolises of antiquity evolved here from a scattering of settlements. And not one city is like the next. Each developed in its own characteristic fashion, each uniquely marked by its geographical location, its cultural environment, and the prevailing historical circumstances.
Mary Beard takes us on a fascinating journey to find out about the everyday lives of the people who lived in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius before its cataclysmic eruption.
In 1984, off Israel’s Mediterranean coast, marine archaeologist Ehud Galili discovered an ancient settlement that had been submerged for millennia. It turned out to be the biggest and best preserved prehistoric site ever discovered along the Mediterranean shoreline. Atlit Yam – a stone age village dating from at least 9,000 years ago.
Robinson and Harding travel to the Rocky Mountains in Montana, USA, for this special programme on dinosaurs and the professional and private 'dinosaur hunters' who seek and recover fossil remains. Accompanying several digs, they soon learn that the methods used by the dinosaur hunters turn out to be similar to those employed by archaeologists.
Discover the history & treasures of ancient Egyptians who lived in Pompeii in the shadow of mount Vesuvius. Were there really a sizeable number of Ancient Egyptians living in Pompeii before its destruction?
When Oswald Mosley tried to march his fascists through Central London in 1936, an epic two-hour battle would ensue between ordinary working Britons. A fully realized look at the world in the run-up to World War II. In colourized film, thousands of people attend a homecoming parade in Hull to celebrate local hero Amy Johnson, the first British woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia.
The film examines one of the greatest archaeological scandals ever. In 1908, the "Phaistos Disc" was discovered by the Italian archaeologist Luigi Pernier. Since then, the disc has aroused scientific debates. Is the Phaistos Disc a clever fake? Among other experts, art historian Jerome Eisenberg is convinced that it is. The search for the truth starts in the ancient Cretan palace complexes of Phaistos.
Archaeologist Agnes Hsu-Tang, director of New York-based China Institute, goes on a quest to answer one of ancient China’s most beguiling mysteries. An ancient kingdom based in Sichuan has been uncovered. Found at Jinsha - an excavation site in a Chengdu suburb - are a gold mask, bronze masks, jade daggers, and tons of ivories. Who were these people? What did they believe in? And why did they bury such exquisite objects along with their dead?
Documentary series brings the 1930s vividly back to life. Social historians and people with direct connections to the footage explore what everyday life was like.
The first of Jesus' apostles, guardian of the gates of Paradise, founder of the Christian Church, the first pope in history… Peter is a key figure of the Christian religion. Yet, there remain many unsolved questions regarding his incredible life.
For some the Anglo-Irish War is viewed through rose tinted glasses, a heroic struggle against an Imperialist monster and the Civil War a brave and honourable attempt to disentangle the country from an ill judged Treaty that did not deliver on the nation’s aspirations. But there is a much darker story to be told of the often innocent men shot as spies and made to disappear. In The Name of the Republic is a two part documentary series following eminent Historian, Professor Eunan O’Halpin as he explores this dark side of Irish republicanism.
Agnes Hsu-Tang explores the Nanyue King's Tomb in Guangzhou where a jade suit – the kind only bestowed upon Hahn Emperors was found. There was no historical record of an Emperor entitled to such a burial, so who was this man and what was the kingdom he ruled over? In Anyang, Henan the discovery of an ancient tomb sent shockwaves throughout the archaeological world.
Since its foundation, the FBI has always been shrouded in mystery. When J. Edgar Hoover took over, he made it into one of the most brilliant search engines of our time. Hoover was at the helm of the agency for nearly fifty years and survived eight presidents of the United States, as well as many attempts to get rid of him. What made this man so powerful?
Social historians and those with direct connections to the footage explore the last year before war officially began to reveal insights into child refugees and bomb attack drills.
For some the Anglo-Irish War is viewed through rose-tinted glasses, a heroic struggle against an Imperialist monster and the Civil War a brave and honourable attempt to disentangle the country from an ill judged Treaty that did not deliver on the nation’s aspirations. But there is a much darker story to be told of the often innocent men shot as spies and made to disappear.
In Anyang, Henan the discovery of an ancient tomb sent shockwaves throughout the archaeological world. Some believed it to be the final resting place of Cao Cao, one of China’s most divisive characters from the time of the Three Kingdoms. What can this ancient find reveal about one of the most celebrated epochs of Chinese history?
This documentary is about the evidence - real, scientific, and often dramatic - which proves that the Outback of Australia was once a place where dinosaurs roamed in vast numbers. Using live action and 3D animation, these compelling reconstructions tell the story of these grand creatures that roamed the land.
Today, Adolf Hitler’s autobiography cum Nazi manifesto is still sold all over the world, under the counter, on the internet or simply at the bookshop. This 700 page book, published in 1925, was re-edited numerous times since the death of the author. This documentary plunges deep into the secrets of Mein Kampf. A simple book of paradoxes: famous but unknown, fascinating and repulsive.
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
More than 200 Allied planes crashed in Australia's north during World War Two. Some are still missing, their exact whereabouts still unknown - all the crew died in the crashes. No survivors, no witnesses, no position to report. Now, Australian marine explorer Ben Cropp is lifting the veil on at least one of these lost warbirds.
In 1928 and at the age of eleven, Harry Birrell was given his first cine camera. ‘The greatest toy a child could ever receive,’ he would say. His obsession with making movies would span the rest of his life, despite the onset of blindness.
How did Hawaii go from an independent nation to a United State? Explore the controversial nature of Hawaii's statehood in this documentary, tracing the history of Hawaii's control at the hands of the U.S.
Lenin dies in 1924 and up steps Josef Stalin; FDR is Secretary of the U.S. Navy; Hitler ends the war in a military hospital; Churchill struggles to resume a political career. The first of the titans to emerge grabs power - Benito Mussolini.
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
A sobering look at how Hitler and the Nazi party manipulated laws to further their hate-filled agenda. People who were considered physically or racially inferior or disloyal to the state were deprived of their rights and often their lives under these Nazi laws. When Germany was ultimately defeated, Nazi leaders were charged with crimes against humanity in the Nuremberg Trials, in an attempt by the world community to restore the rule of law.
Chronicles the rise and fall of one of the most extreme civilizations in history. Join Bettany Hughes as we journey into the history of ancient Sparta and every stratum of its society is laid bare.
Franklin D. Roosevelt reaches the Oval Office. The crash of 1929 morphs into the Great Depression. Titans rise and fall in the era of unemployment and hunger - Hitler becomes chancellor in Germany, Mussolini secures absolute power, and Stalin tightens his grip.
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
The Real Treasure Island follows Alex Capus as he travels to exotic locales to unlock the true story behind a literary masterpiece. From the foggy Scottish Highlands to the sun-kissed islands of the South Pacific, Capus follows a treasure trail of clues -each one triggering dramatic recreations that tell the true story behind Stevenson's tale.
Treasure hunters Peter and Dennis were out on a typical day exploring the Baltic Sea when a very unusual image appeared on the sonar. A nearly 200-foot cylindrical object was something that had never been seen before. This documentary takes you on an extraordinary journey to find out what the object could be. Reviewed by multiple disciplines of scientists, and using advanced equipment, could this object be an ancient crash site from an advanced civilization millions of years ago?
War reaches Ethiopia with the Italian invasion and threatens Europe with the German occupation of the Rhineland and annexation of Austria. Spain and China plunge into civil wars. Mao and Chiang Kai-shek unite to face Japan's invasion.
Samuel Willenberg was the last survivor of the Treblinka death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland, out of only 67 people who were known to have survived the camp, and where an estimated 900,000 Jews were murdered in a 13-month period during World War II. Still haunted by the horrors he witnessed there, Samuel retells his story with extraordinary intensity and has immortalised his harrowing experiences in a series of bronze sculptures.
The Dino Trails series reveals the latest dinosaur discoveries in Canada that are making headlines around the world and explains why these locations are famous.
Using archive footage, stills and interviews with German ex-Naval officers and seamen, Great German Battleships concentrates on the exploits of the famous Bismarck. This is followed by an in-depth portrait of the mightiest and most famous German warships of World War Two, including the big sea battles they encountered.
The Spanish civil war reaches a bloody climax; Neville Chamberlain invents "shuttle diplomacy" at Munich, joining Hitler and Mussolini; peace is the last thing on Hitler's mind.
A young cameraman from Canada risks his life to interview Fidel Castro in pre-revolutionary Cuba and launches a career as one of the world's top war cameramen.
In this three part series we retrace Marco Polo’s legendary journey from Venice to the far reaches of the Mongol Empire, which he started in 1271. His travels 700 years ago revealed an exotic world of riches the west had little knowledge of. But how does his journey look today?
Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, their military leaders and their opponents to dominate both public and daily life; Eisenhower is still in the game; 26-year-old John F. Kennedy's PT 109 sinks in the Solomon Islands.
Exploring the life of Manuel Cortés, the former mayor of Mijas, who, after the end of the Spanish Civil War, spent 30 years completely hidden in a small hole in the wall of his house.
From their bases in western China, one of the most famous military units in history, the Flying Tigers, changed the course of the Second World War. Some say that their presence in the Far East led to Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor. For six months, from December 1941 to June 1942, they provided crucial last ditch aerial defence of China. Only fragments of their story have been told - until now.
In April 1918, a disease of unknown origin swept across the five continents. In 18 months, millions of lives that had not been taken by the war were swept away by a virus that would cause the worst pandemic in history: the Spanish flu.
Tells the stories of some of the most powerful individuals of the 20th century, including a look at Roosevelt's death, Churchill's election defeat, Hitler's unaliving, Harry S. Truman's presidency, and Gandhi's assassination.
A nation divided. It was a time of great bitterness and hatred in England - a war that set father against son and brother against brother. The breakdown in relations between Parliament and King. This series tells the story of the war that shaped the course of a nation’s history and laid the foundations of Britain as it is today. Drawing fascinating portraits of the men who were central to the entire tragic story.
From their bases in western China, one of the most famous military units in history, the Flying Tigers, changed the course of the Second World War. Some say that their presence in the Far East led to Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor. For six months, from December 1941 to June 1942, they provided crucial last ditch aerial defence of China. Only fragments of their story have been told - until now.
For explorers, the means to go into the mysterious depths of the world beneath the waves had always remained a dream. For military strategists, it held a particularly pressing fascination. This full-length documentary tells how the submariner's vessel was developed, from the erratic experimentation of the early days up to the triumphant diving and surfacing of the modern submarine.
Spanish Armada captain Francisco de Cuéllar was shipwrecked off the Sligo coast in September 1588. He spent seven months in war-torn Ireland, trying to escape death and marriage before eventually making his way to Madrid.
A nation divided. It was a time of great bitterness and hatred in England - a war that set father against son and brother against brother. The breakdown in relations between Parliament and King. This series tells the story of the war that shaped the course of a nation’s history and laid the foundations of Britain as it is today. Drawing fascinating portraits of the men who were central to the entire tragic story.
From their bases in western China, one of the most famous military units in history, the Flying Tigers, changed the course of the Second World War. Some say that their presence in the Far East led to Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor. For six months, from December 1941 to June 1942, they provided crucial last ditch aerial defence of China. Only fragments of their story have been told - until now.
An unbiased account of the top German Fighter Aces of the Second World War. Through exclusive interviews with the surviving few, this film portrays the exploits and achievements of such great Pilots as Adolf Galland, Gunther Rall, Walter Krupinski, Erich Hartmann, Emil Lang and Hans Joachim Marseille.
Explore the world of injured US soldiers - their loss, pain, redemption and rise as they return to an America which is ill-equipped for them. When a missile exploded next to his helicopter, Walt Fricke's life changed forever. He left Vietnam crippled & mentally scarred. With the chance to assist other wounded soldiers, he started an initiative that has changed the lives of thousands of veterans.
A nation divided. It was a time of great bitterness and hatred in England - a war that set father against son and brother against brother. The breakdown in relations between Parliament and King. This series tells the story of the war that shaped the course of a nation’s history and laid the foundations of Britain as it is today. Drawing fascinating portraits of the men who were central to the entire tragic story.
From their bases in western China, one of the most famous military units in history, the Flying Tigers, changed the course of the Second World War. Some say that their presence in the Far East led to Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor. For six months, from December 1941 to June 1942, they provided crucial last ditch aerial defence of China. Only fragments of their story have been told - until now.
The clock is then wound back to the early ’80s, to show a 19-year-old Diana Spencer being pursued by reporters. We watch as she becomes engaged to Prince Charles; marries him in a spectacular ceremony broadcast around the world; and soon grows into a national figurehead who is celebrated as much as she is criticised.
This documentary from the History of Warfare series examines the efforts of the 19th century British Empire to tighten its grip on the southern region of Africa. With clips from ZULU DAWN, reenactments, and photographs, this film recreates the bloody battles in striking detail.
A nation divided. It was a time of great bitterness and hatred in England - a war that set father against son and brother against brother. The breakdown in relations between Parliament and King. This series tells the story of the war that shaped the course of a nation’s history and laid the foundations of Britain as it is today. Drawing fascinating portraits of the men who were central to the entire tragic story.
Carefully chronicling in great detail the early years of Hitler's life and the events that shaped him into the zealous leader of Germany. This documentary offers a critical insight into the stealthy rise of the Nazi party and how its racist vision of the world slowly took hold in a disillusioned Germany.
As the war rages in North Africa in 1940, commandos train to wreak havoc behind enemy lines in unforgiving desert conditions.
This documentary gives an overview of the Napoleonic period, following the man who would be Emperor from his humble beginnings to his legendary victory at Austerlitz. With reconstructions, period imagery and expert analysis, it goes on to examine the disaster of the Russian campaign and the final defeat at Waterloo in 1815. Narrated by Mike Leighton.
During WWII, the fate of the world depended on the codebreakers at Bletchley Park, Britain's super-secret headquarters for cracking the "unbreakable* Enigma machine. Against the odds, these schoolboys, academics, and crossword fanatics turned Germany's greatest weapon into its greatest liability. This fascinating documentary offers first-hand accounts of "Station X" and how they cracked the code.
Thousands of women gave their all to the Suffrage movement - many endured emotional and physical abuse, and others would pay the ultimate price. Alongside the Pankhursts they all fought for “the sisterhood” - but for Christabel and Sylvia their own sisterhood would be strained to the point of breaking.
It is September 11, 1697 and the Ottoman army is annihilated in the battle of Zenta by the imperial army led by Prince Eugene of Savoy, thus ending the steady rise of the Ottoman Empire over the previous centuries. 30 000 die. The super powers of this period are the Habsburg Empire and the Ottomans. The dominance of the Habsburgs is well documented, but the Ottoman Empire was a civilization that was no less developed and whose culture we know only little about.
The Battle of Balaklava took place during the Crimean War (1854-56) on 25 October 1854. It witnessed one of the most famous acts of battlefield bravery, the Thin Red Line, and one of the most infamous blunders in military history, the Charge of the Light Brigade.
Josephine de Beauharnais was Napoleon's Empress, his muse and his great love. It is next to impossible to imagine him without her or her without him. She survived the death sentence of insurgency and a bomb attack. Her weapons were her razor-sharp mind, her good taste and her body. Josephine de Beauharnais held the love of one of the Europe’ greatest Generals.
Documentary series exploring the motivations of key figures in Hitler's regime, beginning with propaganda master Josef Goebbels.
It is September 11, 1697 and the Ottoman army is annihilated in the battle of Zenta by the imperial army led by Prince Eugene of Savoy, thus ending the steady rise of the Ottoman Empire over the previous centuries. 30 000 die. The super powers of this period are the Habsburg Empire and the Ottomans. The dominance of the Habsburgs is well documented, but the Ottoman Empire was a civilization that was no less developed and whose culture we know only little about.
Launched in 1588, ‘la felicissima armada’, or ‘the most fortunate fleet’, was made up of roughly 150 ships and 18,000 men. At the time, it was the largest fleet ever seen in Europe and Philip II of Spain considered it invincible.
Archaeologist Agnes Hsu-Tang, director of New York-based China Institute, goes on a quest to answer three of ancient China’s most beguiling mysteries. She visits an ancient kingdom based in Sichuan, the Nanyue King's Tomb in Guangzhou where a jade suit was found and an ancient tomb that send shockwaves through the world as the possible resting place of Cao Cao.
A profile of Adolf Eichmann, the bureaucratic civil servant whose robotic willingness to follow orders led him to design the system that would bring about the holocaust.
A close look at Alexander the Great - from Macedonia to India. Alexander the Great has always enjoyed a unique status in history. To the Greeks and Romans, he was a hero, to the Arabs, he was a prophet, to Westerners, he is a myth.
The Battle of Brandy Station, also called the Battle of Fleetwood Hill, was the largest predominantly cavalry engagement of the American Civil War, as well as the largest ever to take place on American soil.
Nelson’s Trafalgar examines the legendary Admiral Horatio Nelson, a complex figure known for his heroic deeds, complex controversies, and his great romance with Lady Hamilton. His death during the Battle of Trafalgar is immortalized in bronze and stone in Trafalgar Square.
A profile of Hermann Goering - the dashing, young, down-on-his-luck war veteran who turned into an extravagant, heartless, obese, drug-addled Nazi billionaire.
Follow our journey into the horror and heroism of the American Civil War's key battles from 1861-1865. Over 600,000 American patriots would engage in fierce firefights and hand-to-hand battles that would permanently shape the future of the United States.
The Battle of Marston Moor near York on 2 July 1644 was one of the most important engagements of the English Civil War.
The unique story of the development of the B-36 the United States' very long range nuclear bomber.
Heinrich Himmler, the book-loving loner whose strange mystical beliefs drove him to carry out the most shocking act of genocide in human history.
Follow our journey into the horror and heroism of the American Civil War's key battles from 1861-1865. Over 600,000 American patriots would engage in fierce firefights and hand-to-hand battles that would permanently shape the future of the United States.
Less than a century after gaining independence from Great Britain, the United States of America would be wracked by a Civil War as the secessionist Confederate States of the South fought the Union forces of the remaining loyal states. Four long years of war would result in the deadliest military conflict in American history, as the fate of the Union hung in the balance.
In October 1957, one of the Windscale nuclear reactors caught fire. It was the world's first nuclear accident, attributed to the rush to build atomic weapons.
Lost Battlefields takes the viewer back to the Western Front with archival footage and memoirs, and by walking the forgotten fields of battle today, captures the feeling and sacrifice of those desperate struggles 80 years ago.
An analysis of the trials of being an up-and-coming royal in the modern world, and how they compares with the life of a celebrity.
The marriage of Charles and Camilla is shrouded in controversy, especially due to Camilla's involvement in Charles' tragic marriage to Princess Diana. For the monarchy, the marriage is a step into the unknown.
Here, we examine the rocky first marriage of King Charles to Diana, the People's Princess. What started out with such excitement and hope would end in scandal, betrayal and ultimately tragedy for one of the royal family's brightest. But from the ashes, a new royal partnership would emerge...
This original programme asks how Charles and William have stayed so visibly fond of each other. A generous son to his father, and a great role model for his brother, William was always an enormous comfort for his mother. The death of a mother, the alienation of a wife and a lover in the background - these striking events somehow have not broken the love of these two men - father and son.
New evidence of Cleopatra's reign comes to the surface leading scholars to embark on a quest to uncover the truth behind her mysterious death and lost tomb.
Victory in Europe Day is the day celebrating the formal acceptance by the Allies of World War II of Germany's unconditional surrender of its armed forces on Tuesday, 8 May 1945, marking the official end of World War II in Europe in the Eastern Front, with the last shots fired on the 11th.
From his birth in the Corsican capital of Ajaccio in August 1769, Napoleon Bonaparte seems to have been marked down for greatness. There was little during his early years to suggest as much however for he came from an ordinary if well-to-do family and had a difficult schooling in France. Joining the military was the making of him and he soon discovered a remarkable gift for impressing people.
The US Civil War was many years in the making, but like many conflicts it was borne from a flashpoint. As the American nation divided, anticipating the most bitter and bloody period in American history, the touchpaper was finally lit at Fort Sumter. Find out how.
This documentary examines the conflicts between the French and the British in North America during the eighteenth century, with particular focus on the engagements featuring the Native American warriors used by both sides. By the end of the fighting, Quebec and Canada were in British hands, and North America became part of the British Empire.
In a major investigation, this documentary exposes the chlorine industry's negligence in tackling a potential time bomb - the poison dioxin.
Marriage to Joséphine de Beauharnais did little to quell Napoleon's vaulting ambition. Now he had the opportunity to display his military talents, which he showed to full effect during the stunning first Italian campaign - a campaign that saw him win the respect of his officers and gain the love of his men, merely by ensuring that, for the first time in years, they were paid properly.
The second episode looks at the early weeks of the war and explains the events leading up to the battle of First Bull Run - the battle that people thought would decide the outcome of the war. We see and hear the story of the battle and how the Confederate defeat sent Washington into a panic.
As the Royalists and Parliamentarian conflict of 17th century England comes to a head, a pitched battle is chosen for both sides to make their stand: Edge Hill. But this battle would prove notable in a way neither side expected in the story of the English Civil War.
A climatic catastrophe rocked the Earth in A.D. 535, causing two years of darkness, famine, drought and disease. Was it a comet? An asteroid? A volcano?
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
During four dark years of bitter and bloody fighting between the Northern and Southern states, more than 600,000 troops lost their lives. The country was torn apart as the military, political, and ideological struggle dragged on and on. For those who lived through it, life would never be the same again.
The French and Indian War was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes
The American attack on Hiroshima and Nagasaki marks the beginning of the Cold War, which is expected to last for decades and bring scientific advances with it. In secret laboratories, American and Soviet experts are working on new methods of warfare.
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
The American Civil War was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union and the Confederacy, the latter formed by states that had seceded.
This section takes a look behind the scenes at D-Day, revealing confidential decisions taken by the rulers, as well as the involvement of top-ranking officers and secret agents in the operations.
The superpowers USA and Soviet Union engaged in an arms race during the Cold War and at the same time drove the technological progress of an entire society. Areas of natural science that have so far received little attention, such as seismology and meteorology, are now being declared research goals.
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
The army that defeated Napoleon at Waterloo is often remembered as an iconic English redcoat force. A little known fact is that most of the men under the Duke of Wellington's command weren't English at all. Using unpublished accounts, the story of the battle is told from the perspective of those troops - Waterloo's Warriors.
As the momentum for the Allies started to turn in their favour, the next true milestone would come after D-Day. This episode explores the second turning point that led to the end of the war - the liberation of France.
In the race between the two superpowers, the USA and the Soviet Union, for supremacy during the Cold War, the development of new technologies was massively promoted. Especially in space and aviation. Rockets could be equipped with nuclear weapons and transported satellites into space. The development of computers also took a rapid course and the information age began.
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
The army that defeated Napoleon at Waterloo is often remembered as an iconic English redcoat force. A little-known fact is that most of the men under the Duke of Wellington's command weren't English at all. This second episode covers the climactic final battle between the Duke of Wellington and Napoleon Bonaparte at Waterloo.
In this episode, the secrets of Hitler's takeover of power are revealed, and events that led to his 1933 German election victory.
The Soviet Union sent the first satellite into orbit around the earth in 1957. This came as a shock to the western world. When Yuri Gagarin became the first human to fly through space on April 12, 1961, the race for supremacy in space seemed decided. But then, in 1969, the Americans became the first nation to set foot on the moon. The race to conquer space continued.
The Cold War: When nuclear weapons kept the entire world on the edge of M.A.D. – Mutually Assured Destruction. As Russia, China and the USA flex their military muscles on the global stage today, ‘M.A.D. World’ takes a close look at the last time we were threatened by the might of world superpowers: The Cold War.
The Ornithopter, the self-propelled flapping-flying machine. We explore the mythology and the marriage of artistry and science in a digestible, fun, and unique challenge. This film follows Todd Reichert and his team of young engineers as they attempt to construct and fly a human-powered ornithopter (a flapping plane).
The Battle of Belleau Wood occurred during the German spring offensive in World War I, near the Marne River in France.
The American Volunteer Group (AVG), more commonly known as the "Flying Tigers", was a civilian volunteer air force that fought the Japanese in Burma and China before (and just after) America's entry into World War II. The Flying Tigers were a bright spot of victory to both America and China during the early, dark days of the war.
Lyndon B Johnson was obsessed with his mistrust of Bobby Kennedy. Audio tapes from the White House illustrate that he was under the Kennedy's shadow throughout his presidency.
On April 24, 1951, following a rout of the South Korean army, the Chinese People Volunteer Army pursued their enemy to the lines of Australian and Canadian troops still digging fall-back defences, 39 kilometres to the rear. Here, sometimes at the length of a bayonet, often in total darkness, individual was pitted against individual in a struggle between a superpower and a cluster of other nations from across the world.
This documentary gives an overview of the Napoleonic period, following the man who would be Emperor from his humble beginnings to his legendary victory at Austerlitz. With reconstructions, period imagery and expert analysis, it goes on to examine the disaster of the Russian campaign and the final defeat at Waterloo in 1815.
It was a time of bitterness and hatred, a war which pitched father against son, brother against brother in the bloody battle for the soul of the nation. It was winner takes all. After seven years of turmoil, even the dramatic execution of King Charles I could not bring peace, more bloodshed still lay ahead. And when Cromwell's Parliamentarian forces won the day, their attentions would turn to Ireland and what would be one of the darkest periods of the British Isles.
This EMMY nominated and awarded series delves into LBJ's hatred of Bobby Kennedy, J. Edgar Hoover's determination to destroy Martin Luther King and the US Government's deceit behind the beginning of the Vietnam War. All of which are the subjects for three in-depth, dramatized documentaries; 'Obsession', 'Playing with the truth', and 'Uncivil Liberties'.
Just prior to the end of WWII, the German military secretly undertook a massive push to design miracle weapons such as colossal tanks and the world's first guided missiles and long-range bombers that could attack New York. The technology advanced generations in little more than a decade and the machines were on a grander scale than reached even today.
The rise and fall of crime boss Billy Hill in the chaos of The Blitz on London during WWII.
By the year 1800, Napoleon's political career was in full swing. However, as First Consul, he was hardly a man of the people - by a stroke of outrageous good fortune he even survived an assassination attempt in1800, which gave him the perfect excuse to eliminate several political enemies.
The film follows J Edgar Hoover's absolute determination to find something to pin on Martin Luther King Jr..
From Catherine the Great (1729 – 1796) up until the last Russian Empress all the ‘Russian’ Tsarinas were, in fact, German. This was not because the path of true love led them straight to Petrograd, but the result of European power play at the highest level. Splendour and Misery of the Last Tsarinas, starting with Princess Charlotte (1798 – 1860), tells the dramatic stories of these young women – torn between strategic marriages, the longing for true love and the shackles of European power politics.
Known for his dubious medical practices and shady financial deals, the Nazi occupation liberated Dr. Marcel Petiot's murderous instincts, enabling him to embark on a shocking killing spree.
The Emperor's determination to impose the Continental System on the whole of Europe was the driving force behind the decision to invade Spain and Portugal. This was the long and bloody Peninsular War.
Documentary presented by Professor Simon Schaffer which charts the amazing and untold story of automata - extraordinary clockwork machines designed hundreds of years ago to mimic and recreate life. The film brings the past to life in vivid detail as we see how and why these masterpieces were built.
This presentation of inspiration and American history combines the past glory and achievements of General John J. Pershing with his modern-day impact upon young Americans.
When the US military takes over the German Kronberg Castle in 1945, a scandalous affair between a US Army Captain and Air Force Officer ensues, resulting in one of the most elaborate treasure heists of all time.
With the Peninsular War still raging, Napoleon made a fateful decision - in 1812, the Grand Armee began an invasion of Russia. Nothing could have prepared then for what lay ahead as they marched towards Moscow and little did they know that of the half a million men who crossed the Russian border, fewer than fifty thousand would ever see their homeland again.
This compilation of four M.A.D World episodes explores the events that shaped the early years of the Cold War and the nuclear age, from the first atomic bomb to Cuban Missile Crisis. A single bomb with the power of 20 000 tons of TNT flattens Hiroshima and creates a horrific burst of nuclear radiation. This terrible new weapon stuns the world and the nuclear age begins.
This documentary follows the stories of six female Holocaust survivors, each a former prisoner at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The women, from various countries, arrived at the camp with different backgrounds -- one was the daughter of labor activists, another was studying to be nurse and another was the child of a Prague industrialist. As the film splices current interviews with archival footage, each woman explains how she was able to remain hopeful and to survive in the face of unimaginable horror.
During WW2 in Los Angeles, white servicemen and civilians attack Hispanic and other minority youths who are seen as unpatriotic due to the style of clothes they wear.
During his enforced exile on the island of Elba he busied himself building forts and bridges and winning the support of the local population and making plans for a return to France. But there was to be no glorious ending to the tale - it ended in spectacular and bloody failure in June 1815, on the famous field of Waterloo.
Mary Beard reaches back to the myths and legends of the origins of Rome to gain an insight into the deep-rooted psyche of the people of Rome - a city born through fratricide and r***. But from the very beginning, Rome was also an asylum for outcasts and exiles and because of this, it adopted a uniquely inclusive approach towards its neighbours and defeated enemies. The expansion of the city brought territory in first in Italy and Sicily, where Rome first came head to head and eventually defeated her great rival, Carthage.
James is retracing the story of Heinrich Himmler to find out how the middle class son of a schoolteacher became one of the main architects of Nazi evil. Second only to Hitler, Himmler was the criminal mastermind behind the Aryan breeding program known as Lebensborn, and the infamous death camps. Today, James picks up disturbing signs of fascism's resurgence in contemporary Munich.
During the WW2 blackouts in Berlin and London, police race to catch serial killers who use the darkness as cover.
Matteo Ricci, a young Jesuit would be the first European to enter China at the end of the 16th century. Trained in geometry and algebra, he would soon discover that cosmology and the art of measuring time was at the very centre of Chinese civilization and imperial authority, the Emperor’s Mandate of Heaven.
In the second episode, Mary Beard explores the physical world of the Roman Empire, and finds surprising parallels with our own world. Setting out in the footsteps of the emperor Hadrian, she discovers a vast empire bound together by a common material culture, and a globalised economy of such scale that evidence of its side-effects can still be seen today, thousands of miles away from Rome.
James Ellis explores how the virulently anti-Semitic minister of propaganda Josef Goebbels orchestrated a campaign of hate that paved the way for the Holocaust.
Incensed by their treatment under Mussolini's regime and anxious to reestablish their European criminal network, a number of mafioso, including incarcerated kingpin Charles "Lucky" Luciano, offered their full support to American intelligence officers.
Over a century, three Jesuits would fight for power in the Forbidden City. Through dramatic historical recreations and unparalleled access to the world’s time labs, The Empire of Time brings to life the story of how China’s enduring pursuit of perfect time brought East and West together.
In the third episode Mary takes an in-depth look at the question of identity and citizenship within the Roman Empire. What did it mean to be, or to become, Roman, and how did the very different parts of the empire react to Roman rule?
Goering: The Man At The Head Of The Gestapo | Hitler's Most Wanted
A recounting of the infamous 1937 airship disaster and its subsequent investigation.
Manfred Von Richthofen, the Red Baron, was the greatest fighter ace of World War One and perhaps the most famous fighter pilot of all time. Credited with 80 air combat victories, more than any other WWI pilot, he was a brilliant tactician and led his "Flying Circus" to unparalleled success before being shot down and killed in April 1918 at the age of just 25.
In the fourth and final episode, Mary tackles the biggest puzzle of all: why, and how, did the Roman Empire fall? Surveying the massive walls and fortifications of Britain and Germany, she discovers an empire under pressure, struggling to control its borders.
James is on the trail of Adolf Eichmann, the notorious Nazi bureaucrat who escaped justice for 15 years until his trial made the Holocaust a household name. Under oath, Eichmann insisted he was a powerless middle manager who was simply following orders, and James is determined to find out if there's any truth to his defense.
Sodom and Gomorrah – the names of these two Biblical cities have long since become bywords for sexual immorality and licentious behaviour. Home of excess and wickedness, they were destroyed by a vengeful God under a hail of fire and brimstone. However, most people regard the story as a metaphorical warning against sin as no strong archaeological evidence for the existence of Sodom and Gomorrah has been found – until now...
They were bloodthirsty Scandinavian warriors and fine craftsmen. They opened trade routes, founded cities and captured ancient hubs. The Saxons of England feared them but mocked their careful grooming habits. In short, they were pirates with style. This series follows the Vikings everywhere they went, revealing new discoveries that turn Viking history on its head.
The story of how a unique British tunneling technique developed for the mud of Flanders was employed to win the strategic ground during the gruesome trench warfare of the Ypres Salient.
Renowned filmmaker Christopher Doyle narrates this uniquely vivid picture of Chinese history through film, compiled with exclusive access to the British Film Institute China collection. These never-seen-before films provide new insights into China’s momentous changes, from the first ever Chinese film in the Qing dynasty through to the Communist era.
A nation divided. It was a time of great bitterness and hatred in England - a war that set father against son and brother against brother. The breakdown in relations between Parliament and King. This series tells the story of the war that shaped the course of a nation’s history and laid the foundations of Britain as it is today. Drawing fascinating portraits of the men who were central to the entire tragic story.
This is the story of a remarkable life of a remarkable woman. The Queen's stability and continuity allowed Britain to shed an empire and create a new and prosperous identity against all the odds and expectations.
An exploration of newly discovered fortresses, dugouts, and bunkers tells the story of the innovative German engineering that made defenses resistant to massive bombardments.
Renowned filmmaker Christopher Doyle narrates this uniquely vivid picture of Chinese history through film, compiled with exclusive access to the British Film Institute China collection. These never-seen-before films provide new insights into China’s momentous changes, from the first ever Chinese film in the Qing dynasty through to the Communist era.
They were bloodthirsty Scandinavian warriors and fine craftsmen. They opened trade routes, founded cities and captured ancient hubs. The Saxons of England feared them but mocked their careful grooming habits. In short, they were pirates with style. This series follows the Vikings everywhere they went, revealing new discoveries that turn Viking history on its head.
The stories of the dramatic battles in Zululand in the late nineteenth century are forever locked in the public imagination. With the help Hollywood films and countless books, legends have grown around the principal characters and the main events. The Zulu Wars tells the full true story of a war that, even by the standards of the day, contained not the faintest trace of legality and costs the lives of many brave men on both sides.
For three years the Germans and French blew each other up with massive explosions, using a maze of underground galleries and tunnels. The whole story is told through the preserved diaries of Herman Hoppe, a German engineer who built many of the tunnels.
Eons ago, an enigmatic group of warrior monks made history. In the 21st Century we are still looking back upon their history and mystery with wonder and speculation. They are linked to the Holy Grail, the Ark of the Covenant and even the bloodline of Jesus Christ. They discovered a shocking artifact buried deep beneath the Temple of Solomon and held mankind's greatest secret of all by banding together to protect it for centuries, they are the Knights Templar.
The Vikings are famous not only for the brutality of their raids but also for the sheer scale of the area that they operated in. But why did the Vikings move so far beyond their native Scandinavia and how did they come to ultimately dominate much of the globe?
Perhaps the most famous part of D-Day is the landings themselves, but that is far from the whole story. Discover what it was like to be a Paratrooper, the allied troops who began the offensive that would ultimately liberate Europe.
A personal account of the tragic battles that unfolded amid the sharp gullies and ravines of the Dolomites, requiring men to perform the nearly impossible: excavate and tunnel through solid granite in freezing weather.
Cold War: The Tech Race tells the story of the war's most influential front: the race for scientific supremacy. It was a war that brought the world to the brink of destruction. But from under the looming threat of mass annihilation came some of our most incredible scientific and engineering achievements.
The Vikings are perhaps best known as Raiders, but perhaps their most enduring legacy is that of settlers. Many of Europe's nations owe a great debt to the Vikings and wouldn't be the same countries we know today without the influence of these warriors from the north.
Isandlwana has gone down in history as one of Britain's worst military defeats during its colonial period. How did these Zulu warriors overcome the British forces and how did it impact the rest of the Zulu Wars?
The largest mine blown on the Italian front literally destroyed half the mountain side of this strategic point in the Dolomite mountains. We explore trenches and tunnels and interview descendants of the Austrians and Italians who fought under and above this treacherous terrain.
Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's story begins with good ideas and ideals and ends in bloody chaos. On the one hand, he helped carry Iran into modernity. His wealth was legendary, and his marriages made tabloid headlines for years. However, his name also stands for a time of human rights violations, vicious oppression and intolerance.
The Viking's domination of western Europe is well known, but what about their expansion eastwards? Discover the seismic impact the Vikings had on Eastern Europe and beyond and just how far these raiders from Scandinavia reached.
The Last Flight Of Britain's Cold War Nuclear Bomber | Last Flight Of The Vulcan Bomber
The declaration of war in August 1914 was greeted with a wave of patriotic euphoria as the British Expeditionary Force was dispatched to Belgium and two million men volunteered for service. War seemed like a glorious adventure. But the experience of battle and the horror of the trenches was very different to what these men expected.
For nearly 3000 years, ancient Egypt was the greatest civilization on Earth. And in their ancient tombs and artifacts, they left a detailed record of their lives, but many mysteries remain. Due to advances in technologies and techniques, we are now able to learn more about one of the greatest Egyptian leaders, Tutankhamen. When Howard Carter found the tomb of the boy king Tutankhamun in 1922, he also found the remains of two fetuses buried in the pharaoh's tomb.
This is how British double-dealing during WW1 ignited the conflict between Arabs and Jews in the Middle East. This is a story of intrigue among rival empires; of misguided strategies; and of how conflicting promises to Palestine and Israel created a legacy of bloodshed which determined the fate of the Middle East.
After a series of skirmishes that proved costly to both sides, the Zulu commanders began to realise the true desperation of their situation. The Zulu realised that they needed to bet everything on the next battle or else face the slow erosion of the support from their country men and inevitable defeat.
This award-winning factual series draws on a unique collection of one hundred interviews with World War One veterans in which the soldiers and their loved ones relive all the heroism and heartbreak of the years from 1914 to 1918. Most of these men had never been interviewed before or since. All the voices are now silent.
The pyramids of Giza were, up until the 20th century, the largest structures in the world. For over 4000 years, they have aroused all kinds of speculation in all who have seen them. How were they built? And who built them?
With pandemics still in recent memory, we examine the last time London was gripped by disease, The Great Plague. Discover where the plague began and the devastating forces it unleashed.
Tanks are now such a fundamental part of modern warfare that it's hard to imagine a time without them and yet one morning in 1916, tanks rolled into battle for the first time. How did these juggernauts redefine combat and what did it take to build them in the first place?
This award-winning factual series draws on a unique collection of one hundred interviews with World War One veterans in which the soldiers and their loved ones relive all the heroism and heartbreak of the years from 1914 to 1918. Most of these men had never been interviewed before or since. All the voices are now silent.
In the tombs that ancient Egyptians prepared for their deaths, they left a record of how they lived more than 3,000 years ago, today. But the full meaning of many of the images remains a mystery. In almost every Egyptian tome one image stands out - the blue lotus.
As the black death ravaged London, the people of the 17th century began to turn to more and more outlandish ways to deal with the pestilence. How effective were these measures and how do they compare to how we've dealt with modern pandemics?
This compilation of four M.A.D World episodes explores the events that shaped the latter years of the Cold War and the nuclear age, from the neutron bomb to the fall of the Soviet Union. The most chilling weapon of the Cold War is tested in Nevada and sends headlines of horror across the globe. The Neutron Bomb uses an intense burst of radiation to maximise casualties while minimising damage to property.
This award-winning factual series draws on a unique collection of one hundred interviews with World War One veterans in which the soldiers and their loved ones relive all the heroism and heartbreak of the years from 1914 to 1918. Most of these men had never been interviewed before or since
Deep in the jungle of Cambodia, lies a jewel from the Khmer period: the Banteay Chhmar temple. Covered in grown over jungle plants, the 800-year-old temple has been forgotten by the world. On their own initiative, the villagers of Banteay Chhmar are slowly restoring the temple, dreaming of it becoming a destination for travellers who want to get to know the real Cambodia rather than a mass tourist site, like Angkor Wat.
As the plague ravaged London, the city quickly became overwhelmed. Find out how this ancient city dealt with the vast quantity of dead, the medical procedures that were undertaken to try and cure the plague and the ultimate sacrifice one village made.
Allied Special Forces launched daring wartime missions to capture or kill Nazi generals where they were stationed on the front lines of war. This film captures the real-time drama felt as the Special Forces ordered these dangerous and complicated missions to exotic locations.
This award-winning factual series draws on a unique collection of one hundred interviews with World War One veterans in which the soldiers and their loved ones relive all the heroism and heartbreak of the years from 1914 to 1918. Most of these men had never been interviewed before or since.
Karl Ludwig Schulmeister - a true supporter of the emperor, a real Bonapartist, a minister’s son with a longstanding career as a smuggler. He was an Austrian double agent who was responsible for conquering cities and spearheading a battle that led to the destruction of the Roman Empire. While he was acting chief policeman in Vienna, he was an escaped fugitive being hunted for under other aliases - his tricks and skills in the art of disguise were legendary.
Dreadnoughts were some of the most expensive war machines ever created and everyone wanted more of them. Following World War 1 German faced loosing their entire fleet, leaving their admiral with an impossible choice. What did he choose to do and how did he do it?
Nearly two thousand years ago most of Britain was a settled province of the Roman Empire. But those in the north held out against the world superpower and insurrection flared across Hadrian’s Wall. So, in 208AD, the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus marched into Scotland with 40,000 men - one of the largest invasion armies Rome ever mobilised.
This award-winning factual series draws on a unique collection of one hundred interviews with World War One veterans in which the soldiers and their loved ones relive all the heroism and heartbreak of the years from 1914 to 1918. Most of these men had never been interviewed before or since.
Diana: The Inquest takes a remarkable look at the mysterious beginnings and proceedings of the British inquest into the crash of Princess Diana, Dodi Al-Fayed and their driver Henri Paul. The film highlights the important questions that the inquest aimed to answer.
1666 was the year of both the black death and the great fire of London. Was this year the worst time to be a Londoner and how did this tumultuous period reshape England's capital?
Ten characters, ten dramatic stories, ten extraordinary days, all leading to one historic event: the end of the greatest war the world has ever known. Combining large-scale reconstructions with traditional documentary storytelling to evoke the climactic last moments of the Second World War.
Delve behind the many attempts to take down Adolph Hitler from inside Nazi Germany. Throughout World War 2 a number of factions had their reasons for wishing to eliminate Hitler and a variety of different plans to try and achieve this. Discover how they attempted to go about this and how Hitler ultimately survived until the end of the war.
This detailed documentary digs into the private life of the nineteenth century's most extraordinary character - Napoleon Bonaparte. Comprehensive and authoritative but above all entertaining, the documentary provides a compelling portrait of the man and the legend from the early years of his life, through the glorious Imperial years, to the misery of defeat at Waterloo and exile on Elba.
The fascinating story of a president who knew how to harness the nation's grief over JFK's assassination, and become an unlikely champion of Civil Rights. The film includes rarely seen footage, secret White House tapes, and personal testimony from LBJ's advisors, biographers, friends, and family.
Their diaries, letters and interviews provide unique insight into the dramatic events of some of the most gripping and terrifying days in history. For these individuals, as for millions of others, the German surrender on 8th May 1945 marks the end of everything that has consumed their lives for six long years.
In 1943, the Allies were fearful that the Germans would soon be able to create a nuclear weapon. To prevent this from happening a top-secret operation was greenlit to enter occupied Norway to try and prevent the Third Reich from ever obtaining a super weapon.
Is there any truth behind Tarantino's 'Inglourious Basterds'? Discover the real story of the Jewish Americans who went behind enemy lines to exact revenge on Nazi soldiers.
For the first time, the fascinating hidden side of Holmes’ legacy is revealed through exclusive interviews – including BBC ‘Sherlock’ creator Mark Gatiss – reconstructions and memorable clips from popular Sherlock productions. Top NASA scientists, pop culture experts and front-line detectives uncover his incredibly widespread impact – without Holmes there would be no inspiration for Bond, Batman or much of the crime investigation entertainment that is so popular today.
The Cold War is often seen as a titanic struggle between superpowers, but that wasn't always the case. Discover how the small island nation of Iceland came to shape this enormous global conflict.
World War 2 in Europe truly began with the dual invasion of Poland by the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. However, Poland's story doesn't end with this quick defeat at the hands of two military great powers. Discover how the Polish resistance would go on to fight a brutal and punishing campaign to try and save their country.
Stonehenge is one of the most enigmatic monuments of the Ancient world. Almost everything about it is a mystery. Why was it built, who by and how? Delve into the world of Stonehenge and discover all we knew about this monument and why some questions can be left unanswered.
Over 350 years after the fact, 'The Great Fire' explores exactly what went down, hour by hour, street by street as the fire spread and destroyed almost every building within London's city walls. From the spark that set everything off at a bakers near Pudding Lane, to the warehouses by the Thames, to the blazing inferno that engulfed the entire city, the hosts present both old and new evidence to document the tragedy that caused £37 billion worth of property damage.
The Cold War was a truly global conflict, but one area of the map that sometimes gets ignored is the small island nation of Iceland. Find out how this small, artic nation found itself on the front lines between east and west during the second half of the 20th century.
A three-part companion to BBC's historical documentary series "Victorian Farm" tells how the Victorians prepared for and celebrated Christmas. Re-creating life in the mid-19th century are archaeologists Alex Langlands and Peter Gunn and historian Ruth Goodman, who return to the same farm in Shropshire, England, where the original series was filmed. There, they make traditional food, gifts, games and decorations.
The construction of Hadrian's Wall began in 122AD, to separate the Romans from Barbarians, and was built under the direct orders of Emperor Hadrian. Hadrian's Wall took over a decade to complete and was built out of stone. The wall is over 73 miles long and marks the northern border of the Roman Province of Britain, running between the North Sea and the Irish Sea. This fascinating program provides a glimpse of military life during the Roman occupation.
Dan Jones follows the path of the fire on the worst day of its rampage as it swept through some of London's iconic buildings. Suzannah Lipscomb finds evidence in the archives of who was blamed and who escaped scot free. Rob Bell visits Imperial College London for more information about the spread of the fire and to re-create the intense heat it generated.
Taking a historical journey through first-century Judea, which explores the emblematic events of the Christian Bible and focuses on the daily life of the ordinary people of the time.
The Victorian period has often been called the beginning of the modern world, but these huge leaps forward could only be made on the back of staggering inequality. Discover what life was really like in Victorian times.
Thousands of years have passed since the Egyptian Pharaohs of antiquity built the spectacular tombs which are known to history as the Great Pyramids. Yet time has not dimmed their magnificence. Even today, visitors from all over the world are awe-struck by their power, fascinated by their history, and excited by the air of mystery which surrounds these unique monuments.
Dan reveals why Londoners were desperate to stop the fire reach the Tower, Rob looks at the bizarre 17-century methods of treating burns and Suzannah examines a controversial new theory about how many people died. They also examine how the authorities dealt with the 100,000 people who had lost everything and how a new city was built from the ashes.
The story of Oliver Cromwell’s head is perhaps the most bizarre, yet least well known, of all tales from English history. This documentary tells the full story of this extraordinary artefact. It’s a strange and grisly saga that runs from dark conspiracy to detective story - touching upon kings, radicals, eccentric collectors, society ladies, strumpets, and forensic scientists.
The documentary follows the footsteps of the children of Israel in an unforgettable journey of discovery. A journey that reveals physical evidence for the Exodus including: the remains of 3,800 year old Hebrew settlements in Egypt's Nile Delta; Egyptian records of the Israelites bondage under Pharaoh; the precise route they may have followed to freedom; their crossing site on the shore of the Red Sea; and the location of Mt. Sinai.
This documentary traces the history of Pompeii, the seaside city which was buried beneath a mountain of volcanic ash following the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 78 AD. Pompeii - along with 2000 of its entombed citizens - was rediscovered in 1748, and computer animated graphics are used here to recreate it in all its glory.
Julius Caesar is the most famous Roman of them all: brutal conqueror, dictator and victim of a gruesome assassination on the Ides of March 44 BC. 2,000 years on, he still shapes the world.
This is a unique look into what the world was like during the time period we now consider the Dark Ages. This film features authentic, atmospheric reconstructions of everyday life, expert commentary, and covers laws and religion, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and Alfred the Great.
Author Thomas Penn takes an extraordinary journey into the dark and chilling world of the first Tudor, Henry VII. From his victory over Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth, to his secret death and the succession of his son Henry VIII, this programme reveals the ruthless tactics Henry VII used to win - and cling on to - the ultimate prize, the throne of England. Exploring magnificent buildings and long-lost documents, Penn reveals the true story of this suspicious, enigmatic and terrifying monarch.
This documentary focuses on the ancient civilisations of the Aztecs and Mayans. It brings their incredible architectural acheivments to life through use of 3D graphics and stylish reconstructions of city life, and includes concise comment and analysis from various experts on the subject.
A cup, a chalice, or is it the most powerful bloodline on Earth that has been in power for millennia before recorded history? The Grail has become a corner stone of Royal power and holds a secret so powerful that it could bring down a religion followed by over a billion people. Is it a gift from ancient aliens or even a relic of Atlantis? The real truth is much more interesting, and much more powerful.
"Fighters" tells the story of those women who have experienced battle at first hand. Dressed as women - and often as men - they have fought in the wars that have shaped our world, from the English and American Civil Wars and the Napoleonic Wars to the Two World Wars, Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East.
The Imperial War Museum is the UK's largest military museum and contains thousands of priceless artefacts from Britain's armed forces. Join the staff that maintain these objects and discover the incredible history behind them.
Minor Cooper Keith was an American Industrialist who helped revolutionize the economies of central America by building railroads throughout the region and shaping these country's exports of produce such as the banana. However, he's long been a controversial figure accused of exploitative practices and establishing monopolies that would outlive him by many decades. What is the truth behind this polarizing figure?
Nearly 1,000 years ago, the Vikings left Scandinavia and settled across Europe - giving their name to Normandy along the way - before their Norman descendants seized the English throne at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. But what do we really know about them? By combining expert analysis with compelling drama, 'The Last Journey of the Vikings' tells a new and often surprising story about this complex people.
What "acceptable" roles have women taken in war that have still put them in the thick of the action? The ultimately tragic spy Mata Hari was the archetypal "femme fatale", the nun-like Florence Nightingale the selfless field nurse. Or were they? In Spies and Angels we look at the contribution of both women.
The Imperial War Museum is the UK's largest military museum and contains thousands of priceless artefacts from Britain's armed forces. Join the staff that maintain these objects and discover the incredible history behind them.
This is a powerful account of the German bombing raids on the central towns and airfields of England, including the terrible blitz on Coventry and the smaller raids on the airfields of Lincolnshire and East Anglia.
The Battle of Shanghai has been described as both the last battle of World War I and the first of World War II. This revealing film recounts the events that led to the fighting that began in Shanghai in 1937, which would become part of a larger, global conflict. The programme reflects the latest historical perspectives, with rare footage and vivid recollections of people who experienced the events as children living in Shanghai.
This is the story of a band of six geniuses whose names carry meaning to this day. The research and scientific achievements of John von Neumann, Edward Teller, Eugene Paul Wigner, and Leo Szilard were vital in the invention of the atomic bomb and modern warfare as we know it. Robert Capa became the world’s most famous war photographer. And Michael Curtiz’s film “Casablanca” is considered to be one of the most iconic propaganda films of all time.
Submarines are cramped and uncomfortable at the best of times. Now imagine trying to reach the North Pole in a Submarine built in 1916 without heating or insulation. That was the fate of the crew of the Nautilus in this daring and ill-fated expedition to reach the pole in a submarine.
Was there a more devastating and violent rivalry in the ancient world than that between Rome and Carthage? Discover how the Punic Wars shaped the ancient world and how they brought one superpower close to death and left another broken and lost to history.
An Irish doctor survived the atomic bomb attack on Nagasaki and was given a Samurai sword for the lives he saved. 70 years later his family searches for the origin of their father's sword.
This is the story of a band of six geniuses whose names carry meaning to this day. The research and scientific achievements of John von Neumann, Edward Teller, Eugene Paul Wigner, and Leo Szilard were vital in the invention of the atomic bomb and modern warfare as we know it. Robert Capa became the world’s most famous war photographer. And Michael Curtiz’s film “Casablanca” is considered to be one of the most iconic propaganda films of all time.
Thousands of Chicago factory workers boarded the SS Eastland in the summer of 1915, heading to a company picnic, but the steamship had a dark secret that the passengers never knew until it was too late. Discover the horrifying truth behind this often-forgotten disaster.
Singapore on Film explores the earliest footage of Singapore, dating back to 1900. The films include 'Coolie Boys' and 'Ananas', filmed more than 100 years ago by the Pathe Brothers. Much of this remarkable archive has never been seen before, and has been specially restored and digitised by the British Film Institute.
From Hadrian's Wall to the Pyramids of Giza and beyond, the ancient world contains countless treasures. Discover the history behind some of these iconic monuments in this collection of episodes from 'Lost Treasures of the Ancient World'.
Although there were no great Blitz campaigns such as those seen in London and Coventry, the Luftwaffe made many determined bombing attacks on the North of England. This documentary looks at life in the wartime North, including the V1 rocket raids on the towns on the North Eastern coastline and the work of anti-aircraft Barrage Balloon squadrons.
More than a hundred WW2 aircraft rest on the bottom of Lake Michigan, just off the Chicago shoreline. This is the story of how they got there. During the Second World War, the US Navy trained over 15,000 carrier pilots on two makeshift 'flattops', both former coal-fired, side-wheel passenger steamers. Not every pilot landed successfully on the pitching decks of the USS Wolverine and USS Sable, and many aircraft went to the bottom of Lake Michigan.
Secrets of Nazi U-Boat Bases offers a new look at the Battle of the Atlantic; the most important military campaign of World War II. While occupying France, Hitler built along the French Atlantic Coast what he thought was the secret to securing victory—five huge underwater bases that protected and rearmed his returning U-Boat fleet after attacking British supply ships.
China's 20th century has long been shrouded in mystery for the West, limited to a few major events. Go beyond these monolithic events to discover what real life was in China with this tireless compiled footage of what normal citizens experienced daily.
The Fall of Singapore on February 15, 1942 was described by Churchill as the "worst disaster" in British military history, but little is known of the Singaporean servicemen who fought for the Allies in WWII. This film tells the incredible untold stories of four courageous Singaporeans fighting across continents, forgotten from history, until now.
The Battle of Rorke's Drift was one of the main engagements in Britain's controversial war against the Zulu. Here 150 soldiers managed to fend off 4,000 Zulu warriors, allowing Britain to distract its citizens from disastrous encounters such as the Battle of Isandlwana. Discover how this small force managed to hold out against a far more numerous enemy.
The series’ narrative thread is an examination of the power struggle over who will win the peace. The fight takes place between the big three wartime allies: The Soviet Union, Britain and America. Each country and leader is embedded in each programme as central characters; we become familiar with their approach and their particular cocktail of double-dealing.
The Secret Routes To Escape Nazi-Occupied Europe During World War 2 | The Last Passage
In this exclusive documentary, Juan Carlos de Bourbon, for decades one of the most popular and powerful monarchs of Europe, reflects on his life. Born to a royal family in exile, following the proclamation of the second Spanish Republic, his childhood was shrouded in uncertainty. In 1981, he played a pivotal role in ending a coup and is seen as one of the founders of Spanish democracy.
The tale of the fall of Carthage is perhaps one of the most horrifying from the ancient world. But what happened after that? Discover the world of Roman Carthage and how this new city was built off the bones of the old one.
The Special Interrogation Unit were a unique force within the British Army. They all shared one common trait, they could all speak German and many were the children of German Jews whose families had been victims of the holocaust. This made their mission of disrupting the German forces and integrating them that much more personal.
This episode of Eternal Egypt introduces us to the Egyptians who live on the banks of the Nile from Rosetta where it flows into the Mediterranean to Abu Simbel where it leaves Egyptian territory to begin its Sudanese journey.
A fierce WW2 battle at sea, unreported for more than 60 years, is revealed at the bottom of the Gulf of Thailand. There lies the US submarine Lagarto and the remains of her 86 crewmen, entombed 8,000 miles from the tiny Wisconsin town where the sub was built. This is the powerful story of the last battle of Lagarto and her crew, the families left behind with no graves to mourn, bodies to bury, and the mystery of why no one escaped from the sinking sub.
Jerusalem is one of the most hotly contested cities in all of human history. From the Romans to the crusades, to the modern day, the city has rarely not been a geo-political hot point. Discover the ancient history of the city and what makes it so special.
A celebrated postwar fashion designer and style icon, Hardy Amies was one of the most unlikely spymasters of World War II. Discover how this man was not only a talent in designing clothing but also in orchestrating complex secret operations.
From mummification to the cult of Osiris discover the ancestral rites still present today that linked the Egyptians to death and eternal life.
In 1941 Nazi Germany set out to conquer Russia and they nearly succeeded. How did Germany nearly steamroller their way to Moscow and what ultimately prevented Hitler's ultimate aim of true domination of Europe.
Ancient Greece is a period in Greek history that lasted for around nine hundred years. It is generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the foundation of Western Civilization. Ancient Athens was at one point the envy of the ancient world. With gifted scientists and philosophers, a formidable military and a new and innovative mode of government. But what was ordinary life like for the populace?
The Mob played a pivotal role in the outcome of World War 2, particularly in the Allies' invasion of Italy. Follow the infamous gangster Charles 'Lucky' Luciano' as he manages to bargain his way out of prison and into a vital role in the war effort.
From architecture to necropolises or shipbuilding discover the Egyptian symbols that have survived through the ages and what they mean today.
Stalingrad is to many the most pivotal battle of World War 2. It represents a turning point where to some Germany's defeat became inevitable. But how did it reach this point? Learn about the buildup and eventual outcome of one of history's most brutal and devastating battles.
China is one of the oldest and most powerful countries in the world and yet many of us know little of its ancient origins. We delve into the accomplishments of great Chinese architects, including the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, and the Terracotta Army of the First Emperor.
As the leader of the Los Alamos Laboratory, Oppenheimer played a significant role in the development of the atomic bomb. This documentary examines Oppenheimer's private and professional life, from his early years to his involvement with nuclear physics and his later advocacy for nuclear weapons controls.
The last episode of the series ventures into the desert that the Egyptians of the Nile have never really managed to control. To this day it remains a place of danger and rebellion.
The Battle of Kursk was Hitler's last attempt to salvage Germany's eastern front. Discover the colossal amount of resources pumped into this crucial battle of the war.
From the Pyramids to the temple at Karnak, perhaps what makes Ancient Egypt so compelling is that so much of it is still around for us to see. Discover the incredible legacy of Ancient Egypt and what made this incredible culture so unique in world history.
What if the Nazis had a nuclear bomb? The Allies were terrified by the prospect of the Germans creating a nuclear weapon during the Second World War. This paranoia launched several covert operations, all aiming to prevent this terrifying hypothetical coming to pass.
How did a poor boy from a tiny flat in St Petersburg become one of the world's most powerful leaders? Admired by Trump and feared by his rivals, on the eve of his almost certain re-election as president of Russia, this film reveals the story of Vladimir Putin's extraordinary rise to power - from a lowly KGB colonel to Boris Yeltsin's right-hand man and ultimately his successor.
Based on the most extensive compilation of archive material today, with almost half of it previously unpublished sources, Hitler's life is shown in detail against the social backdrop of the first half of the 20th century in a contemporary interpretation.