The Ancients

It's one of the most popular alcoholic drinks in the world. But did you know that beer is also one of the world's oldest beverages, with a history that stretches back more than 10,000 years. Beer was ...

Cats! These much loved furry friends have brightened people’s lives for millenia. And it was the same in ancient times. They were pets. They were pest control against rats. They were even in some case...

It is the most famous monument of ancient Greece. Its remains standing tall above modern Athens today, more than 2,000 years old. The Parthenon. A temple, treasury, the residence of a powerful general...

Overlooking the Argolid Plain in the eastern Peloponnese, Mycenae was once the envy of the Mediterranean world. It rose to prominence in the late Bronze Age, centuries before the great Greek states of...

Known as one of Rome's worst emperors, Commodus is famed for both his infamy and bravado. Ascending the throne as a teenager, he dressed up as Hercules, fought as a gladiator in the Colosseum, and ren...

The Olympics. It’s the most famous sporting event in the world, and the 33rd Olympiad is taking place in Paris right now. But how did it all begin? It's a story that takes us back more than 2,000 year...

As both the eldest and youngest child of the great titan Kronos, and the Greek goddess of hearth and home, Hestia was incredibly important in almost every sphere of Greek daily life. But she is arguab...

Just over 1,000 years ago, the ancient Maya world in Mesoamerica was turned upside down. Prominent cities like Tikal, Palenque, Copan and Calakmul, their great stone art and architecture left to be gr...

The ferocious, professional fighters who fought in great arenas all across the Roman Empire for the pleasure of the crowd were the celebrities of their day. They were sex symbols and yet they also ran...

For more than 100,000 years, Neanderthals made their home in Ice Age Britain, right on the edge of the inhabitable world. But what evidence do we have for this early species in what is today Britain? ...