Dan Snow on history's defining moments; only the Greek episodes are indexed
39 episodes indexed · 26 hours
Presented by Dan Snow
Periods · The Bronze Age, Archaic Greece, The Persian Wars, Classical Greece, Philip and Alexander, The Hellenistic world, Greece under Rome
Themes · War Religion Empire and colonies Art and building Philosophy
Historian Dan Snow travels the world for the stories behind history's defining moments, from the Colosseum in Rome to the Tomb of Tutankhamun; only the Greek episodes are here, 39 of 1548, 7 eras, 27 hours.
Where to start. The earliest indexed episode is 'Greek Myths' (2020); 39 episodes of this show are in the section.
I feel like…
ideas, belief and how a polis was ordered
stories, performance, art and ordinary lives
war and expansion
when it happens
how much time you have
Minoans and Mycenaeans c. 3000 - 1100 BC · 9
Dan Snow narrates his own epic retelling of the Odyssey, following Odysseus on his 10-year journey home to Ithaca, from the Trojan War in Turkey to Cyclops' cave.
With Mary Beard, Edith Hall
Professor Dame Mary Beard and Professor Edith Hall join Dan to break down Homer's epic poem, weighing what the Odyssey reveals about Ancient Greece: traditions, anxieties, storytelling, values and its elusive author.
Dan Snow weighs the theories of ancient and modern scholars to see whether a route can be built for Odysseus from Troy, modern Hisarlik in Turkey, to Malta, Sicily and Ithaca.
With Tristan Hughes, Andrew Shapland
Dr Andrew Shapland, curator of a new exhibition at the Ashmolean, joins Tristan on the Bronze Age settlement of Knossos in Crete, where artefacts hint at human sacrifices being carried out.
With Eric Cline
Professor Eric Cline joins Dan Snow to unravel the lost Bronze Age world of Mycenaean warrior-kings, tracing the real diplomacy behind Homer's epics and the catastrophes that erased Mycenaean civilisation within decades.
With Tristan Hughes, Alastair Blanshard
Tristan Hughes and Professor Alastair Blanshard explore Achilles, son of Peleus and the sea nymph Thetis, his role in Homer's Iliad during the Trojan War, and his bond with Patroclus.
With Steve Kershaw
Steve Kershaw of the University of Oxford joins Dan to ask whether a labyrinth or a King Minos ever existed at Knossos, and to trace the Minoan rise, collapse and Arthur Evans' reconstruction.
Eric H. Cline, professor of ancient history and archaeology at George Washington University, digs into ancient poetry and archaeological discoveries at Troy to explain whether historical truth lies behind the legend.
With Natalie Haynes
Natalie Haynes, author of 'A Thousand Ships', discusses her all-female retelling of the Trojan War and the classical accounts of that legendary war and its terrible aftermath.
The Persian Wars 499 - 449 BC · 3
With Patrick Wyman
Patrick Wyman explains how the Achaemenids under Darius and Xerxes the Great sent armies against rebel Greek city states, reshaping the ancient world in the 5th century BC.
With William Shepherd
With Andrew Bayliss
Andrew Bayliss, an expert on Sparta and Ancient Greece, marks the 2,500th anniversary of the battle in which 300 Spartans battled the Persian army, and asks whether the Spartans deserved their reputations.
Classical Athens and Sparta 479 - 386 BC · 1
With Alastair Blanshard
In 430 BC, during the Peloponnesian War, Athens was struck by a plague that killed roughly a third of the city's population; Alastair Blanchard explains its causes and repercussions.
Philip and Alexander 359 - 323 BC · 4
With Tristan Hughes, Adrian Goldsworthy
Adrian Goldsworthy joins Tristan to discuss how Philip transformed Macedon into the dominant power in the Central Mediterranean, and how Alexander then conquered the Persian Empire and marched as far as the Indus.
With Tristan Hughes
With Sarah Saey, Hazem Balousha
Fishermen off the coast of the Gaza Strip found coins from the reign of Alexander the Great, and a strangely similar hoard later surfaced at a London auction house.
With Katherine Pangonis
Historian Katherine Pangonis joins Dan to tell how Alexander the Great, known as 'the two-horned one' by his enemies, besieged the defiant city of Tyre from bloody beginnings to the bitter end.
The Hellenistic Age 323 - 31 BC · 5
Tristan explains how Alexander the Great's death at Babylon in 323 BC triggered a gore-soaked showdown among his commanders and, within a fortnight, the first siege of the post-Alexander age.
Tristan reads an abridged chapter from his book on the Perdiccas Years, telling of Spartan mercenary captain Thibron, who left Crete with thousands of mercenaries to forge a Greco-Libyan empire.
With Tristan Hughes, Chris Naunton
Dr Chris Naunton joins Tristan to explore what happened to the tomb of Alexander the Great, a place of holy pilgrimage in ancient Alexandria until all mention of it disappeared in the 4th century.
Tristan Hughes tells Dan the almost unbelievable tale of what happened after Alexander the Great died: a titanic struggle for control of his empire, with body snatching and soldiers eaten by crocodiles in the Nile.
With Islam Issa
Islam Issa, professor at Birmingham City University, explains how Alexandria went from a vision in Alexander the Great's mind to a global capital of knowledge, with its Lighthouse and Great Library.
Rome and the Greek World 200 - 31 BC · 2
Dan asks whether the tall tales hold: Archimedes' weapons of war, said to include the Claw and a Death Ray, repelled a Roman army from Syracuse from 213 BC until the city fell.
With Stacy Schiff
Stacy Schiff, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of 'Cleopatra: A Life', charts Cleopatra VII of the Macedonian dynasty founded by Ptolemy, from her ascension to the throne to her eventual death.
Greek Life, Thought and the Wider World across the centuries · 15
With Tristan Hughes, Sarah Iles Johnston
Professor Sarah Iles Johnson joins Tristan Hughes to unearth the origin of Hades, king of the Underworld in Ancient Greek mythology, and its myths of Orpheus, Eurydice and the Labours of Heracles.
With Tristan Hughes, Michael Scott
Professor Michael Scott joins Tristan Hughes to trace Zeus, chief deity in Greek mythology, back to his grandparents Uranus and Gaia, and the prophecy that overthrew Uranus and was fated for Cronus.
With Tristan Hughes, Liv Albert
Liv Albert joins Tristan Hughes to explore Aphrodite, goddess of love in Greek mythology, her marriage to Hephaestus, her affair with Ares and her role in sparking the Trojan War.
With Roel Konijnendijk
Roel Konijnendijk, Darby Fellow in Ancient History at the University of Oxford, explains how a Greek army operated and takes in some of the most decisive pitched battles of the period.
With Paul Cartledge
Paul Cartledge, Professor of Greek Culture Emeritus at Cambridge and author of 'Democracy: A Life', discusses democracy, the concept the episode calls the foundation stone of political culture, drawn from the back catalogue.
Dr Andrew Bayliss, professor of Greek History at the University of Birmingham, traces the rise and fall of Sparta, separating fact from fiction in its brutal education system and eventual downfall.
Professor Michael Scott joins Tristan to describe the Ancient Greek symposium, a drinking party led by a symposiarch, male aside from the occasional courtesan, where Hellenic men would wine, recline and philosophise.
With Nick Malkoutzis, Georgia Nakou
Greek journalists Nick Malkoutzis and Georgia Nakou explain the decades-long debate over the Parthenon Marbles, also known as the Elgin Marbles, in the British Museum and campaigned for by Greece since the 1980s.
With Rob Weinberg, Angie Hobbs
Rob Weinberg puts the big questions to Professor Angie Hobbs: why philosophy flourished in Greek culture, how the great philosophers were received, and whether it influenced Islam, communism and Sigmund Freud.
Classical historian Steve Kershaw joins Dan to explore how the Acropolis, with its festivals honouring Athena and the Parthenon, became a symbol of democracy, power and devotion, and how Lord Elgin sent huge chunks to Britain.
With Kristen Ghodsee
Kristen Ghodsee joins Dan to explore Pythagoras, the ancient Greek polymath behind the Pythagorean theorem, who founded Pythagoreanism, a secret society that strove to build a utopia on earth.
With Tony Freeth
Professor Tony Freeth explains the Antikythera Mechanism, a celestial calculator found by Greek sponge divers in 1901 in a shipwreck, which he believes may echo an earlier design by Archimedes.
With Stephen Kershaw
Stephen Kershaw, author of 'A Brief History of Atlantis: Plato's Ideal State', joins Dan to weigh whether any grains of truth lie behind Plato's fictional island of Atlantis.
Classicist Natalie Haynes joins Dan to tell the story of the Furies, goddesses of vengeance, deities whose whims and wishes shaped the course of human history in Ancient Greece.