Breaking the Bonds: 1360-1415 • 2013 • episode "2/3" • Chivalry and Betrayal: The Hundred Years War

59:04

Simon uncovers the truth about Spain's hero El Cid. He also investigates the horror of the Spanish Inquisition and in the process discovers an unsettling story about one of his own ancestors.

2/3 • Blood and Gold: The Making of Spain • 2015 • History

58:54

Neil Oliver reveals the truth behind the legend of the Vikings. (Part 2.) Neil Oliver heads out from the Scandinavian homelands to Russia, Turkey and Ireland to trace the beginnings of a vast trading empire that handled Chinese silks as adeptly as Pictish slaves. Neil discovers a world of 'starry-eyed maidens' and Buddhist statues that are a world away from our British experience of axe-wielding warriors, although it turns out that there were quite a few of those as well.

2/3 • Vikings • 2012 • History

26:00

The encounter between the conquistador and opportunist Hernan Cortes and the indigenous peoples of Central America is one of history's tragic tales of greed, conflict, imperial weakness and superior weaponry.

S2E3 • Butterfly Effect • 2017 • History

7:10

Time makes sense in small pieces. But when you look at huge stretches of time, it's almost impossible to wrap your head around things.

In a Nutshell • 2015 • History

59:08

The Romans were brilliant engineers and soldiers, but what isn't as well known is that they also gave us wonderful artistic treasures. In this three-part series, Alastair Sooke argues that the old-fashioned view that the Romans didn't do art is nonsense. He traces how the Romans during the Republic went from being art thieves and copycats to pioneering a new artistic style - warts 'n' all realism. Roman portraits reveal what the great names from history, men like Julius Caesar and Cicero, actually looked like. Modern-day artists demonstrate the ingenious techniques used to create these true to life masterpieces in marble, bronze and paint. We can step back into the Roman world thanks to their invention of the documentary-style marble relief and to a volcano called Vesuvius. Sooke explores the remarkable artistic legacy of Pompeii before showing how Rome's first emperor, Augustus, used the power of art to help forge an empire.

1/3 • Treasures of Ancient Rome • 2012 • History

59:01

From lowly Corsican Army officer to first consul of France, this episode charts the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte to leader of the French nation in the late 1790s. It tells of Napoleon's military triumphs in Italy, Eqypt and against anti-revolutionaries on the streets of Paris, his marriage to Josephine Beauharnais and leadership of the military coup of 1799 that swept him into power.

1/3 • Napoleon • 2015 • History