Examine the process of "destructive creation"-the idea that fear, rivalry and conflict strengthen community bonds while stimulating an arms race of technological progress. The result is civilization. Ancient Mesoamerica exemplifies this development.
In 1415, the Portuguese launch an era of explorations that will lead to the European discovery of the world. The competition is intense between France and the United Kingdom for the possession of North America and the West Indies for the Indian colonies, but also for Science.
S3E4 • Butterfly Effect • 2018 • History
The world is linked like never before. Modern transport and communications have resulted in a world that is wealthier, healthier, more mobile and better informed than ever before.
4/12 • Mankind Decoded • 2013 • History
The Jazz Age, the 1920 bombing of Wall Street, the market crash, and other seminal moments of America's Roaring 20s - carefully colorised, frame by frame, for the first time.
S1E1 • America in Colour • 2017 • History
NOVA and National Geographic present exclusive access to a unique discovery of ancient remains. Located in an almost inaccessible chamber deep in a South African cave, the site required recruiting a special team of experts slender enough to wriggle down a vertical, pitch-dark, seven-inch-wide passage. Most fossil discoveries of human relatives consist of just a handful of bones. But down in this hidden chamber, the team uncovered an unprecedented trove—so far, over 1,500 bones—with the potential to rewrite the story of our origins. They may help fill in a crucial gap in the fossil record and tell us how Homo, the first member of the human family, emerged from ape-like ancestors like the famous Lucy. But how did hundreds of bones end up in the remote chamber? The experts are considering every mind-boggling possibility. Join NOVA on the treacherous descent into this cave of spectacular and enigmatic finds, and discover their startling implications for the saga of what made us human.
Alastair unpicks the reasons behind the dazzling revolution that gave birth to classical Greek art, asking how the Greeks got so good so quickly. He travels to the beautiful Valley of the Temples in Agrigento, and to the island of Mozia to see the astonishing charioteer found there in 1979, and marvels at the athletic bodies of the warriors dragged from the seabed - the Riace Bronzes. It was a creative explosion that covered architecture, sculpting in marble, casting in bronze, even painting on vases. Perhaps the most powerful factor was also its greatest legacy - a fascination with the naked human body.
2/3 • Treasures of Ancient Greece • 2015 • History
Industrialization brought the second great food revolution. Over the brief span of the 20th century, agriculture underwent greater change than it had since it was first practiced some 12,000 years ago.
4/5 • The History of Food • 2018 • History
