Episode 1 Beginnings
A History of Britain

Episode 1 Beginnings

From the dawn of civilization to the 20th centuryA History of Britain re-animates familiar tales and illuminates overlooked aspects of England's past. Hosted by Simon Schama, this series discards timelines and tiresome lineages for a lively look at the personalities and cultures that infuse British history. Epic themes and towering figures that transformed an island at the edge of the world into the greatest empire on earth. Episode 1 Beginnings - Covering the period 3100 BC - 1000 AD starts in the stone age village of Skara BraeOrkney. Over the next four thousand years Romans, Anglo-Saxons, Vikings, Danes, and Christian missionaries arrive, fight, settle and leave their mark on what will become the nations of Britain ...
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The Mongols
Barbarians Series 1 and 2

The Mongols

They were the dreaded forces on the fringes of civilizationthe bloodthirsty warriors who defied the Roman legions and terrorized the people of Europe. They were the Barbarians, and their names still evoke images of cruelty and chaos. But what do we really know of these legendary warriors? From the frigid North Sea to the Russian steppes, this ambitious series tells the fascinating stories of the most fabled groups of fighters in history, tracing 1,000 years of conquest and adventure through inspired scholarship and some of the most extensive reenactments ever filmed. Mongols Mongols rides with Genghis Khan and his descendants as they sweep from Asia to the heart of modern Germany in a frenzy of expansion ...
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City of Caves Budapest
Cities of the Underworld

City of Caves Budapest

Get to the bottom of the world's great cities, literally! Sink into subterranean discovery lead by intrepid explorers Eric Geller and Don Wildman. With each step below street level you travel back decades even centuries, into the fascinating past of the world's great cities. What mysteries await discovery in the dark corners of these subterranean realms? This is the stuff of fantasy exploring secret chambers and forbidden passages beneath city streets, unlocking mysteries of the past and discovering forgotten relics. City of Caves Budapest - Exploring caves beneath Budapest, Hungary. Included an underground World War II hospital ...
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Episode 5 Central America the Burden of Time
Legacy Origins of Civilization

Episode 5 Central America the Burden of Time

As the world approaches the 21st centurythis new series hosted by Michael Woods and produced in 1991, reminds us that other nations and cultures prospered for hundreds or even thousands of years. Now all that remains is the legacy of their civilizations, present and influential in our own. Shot on location on four continents, Legacy takes a different viewpoint from other series that concentrate primarily on the the Western view of history. Visiting China, India, Egypt, the Middle East, Greece and Meso-America, this series traces the rise of both Asian and western civilization. Central America The Burden of Time - Isolated from the rest of the world, the Mayans and Aztecs created sophisticated civilizations that in many ways paralleled ancient Mediterranean empires. god like kings and a priestly ruling class dominated splendid cities of temples and pyramids ...
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Episode 1 The Day The Sun Went Out
Secrets Of The Dead Catastrophe

Episode 1 The Day The Sun Went Out

The idea that an event of cataclysmic proportions shrouded the Earth's atmospheredarkening the sky and plunging its inhabitants into a massive crisis, is familiar to anyone who's read about the dinosaurs. But what if a similar event happened to humans? And what if recorded history around the world indicates a precise time when this disaster struck? This fascinating documentary tackles the premise that scribes in civilizations as far apart as Ireland and China all recorded a darkening of the sky and a drop in temperatures about the year A.D. 535. Episode 1 The Day The Sun Went Out - Looks at geological, meteorological, and other forces that may have significantly impacted the Earth's weather during the Dark Ages. Some scientists believe that either a volcano erupted or a meteor hit the earth, causing an unusually cold period to develop. Others are more attracted to Mike Baillie's theories involving tree rings ...
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Episode 10 Tibet The End of Time
Time Life Lost Civilizations

Episode 10 Tibet The End of Time

Time Life's Lost Civilizations combines cutting edge digital effects technology (for 1995) with powerful dramatization. Dazzling spectacles re-create rituals and eventsoriginal location cinematography in 25 countries. Computer graphics make lost worlds live again! Episode 10 Tibet The End of Time - Follow the tale of glory and tragedy as a young boy, the reincarnation of the Tibetan God-King, witnesses the collapse of a timeless culture. This episode explores a genuine Shangri-La and its struggle to survive in a hostile contemporary world ...
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Legend of the Holy Spear

Legend of the Holy Spear

When Christ was crucified 2,000 years ago a Roman guard thrust a spear in his side to see if he was still alive. In that moment a central tenet of Christian faith was realised Jesus was dead, he was thus able to be resurrected. Legend of the Holy Spear follows two investigators attempting to discover if any of them could have been present at the crucifixion. Scrutinizing each spear and closely analysing the stories and legends behind them, the film reveals astonishing clues as to their provenance. Amid tight security the ancient spearhead is undergoing the latest scientific testing. Can 21st century science reveal the truth behind the many myths of the Spear of Jesus? ...
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Episode 2 Conquest
A History of Britain

Episode 2 Conquest

From the dawn of civilization to the 20th century A History of Britain re-animates familiar tales and illuminates overlooked aspects of England's past. Hosted by Simon Schama it spotlights the epic themes and towering figures that transformed an island at the edge of the world into the greatest empire on earthexamining the impact of this extraordinary heritage on the modern nation. Episode 2 Conquest - The Battle of Hastings in 1066, which saw King Harold beaten after leading an army worn out from fighting his brother Tostig and a horde of Vikings, to confront William the Conqueror. The Saxon defeat led to 300 years of Norman rule and a country plagued by massacre and famine, but the rulers managed to keep an inventory of all land and possessions, better known as the Domesday Book ...
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The Vikings
Barbarians Series 1 and 2

The Vikings

They were the dreaded forces on the fringes of civilizationthe bloodthirsty warriors who defied the Roman legions and terrorized the people of Europe. They were the Barbarians, and their names still evoke images of cruelty and chaos. But what do we really know of these legendary warriors? From the frigid North Sea to the Russian steppes, this ambitious series tells the fascinating stories of the most fabled groups of fighters in history, tracing 1,000 years of conquest and adventure through inspired scholarship and some of the most extensive reenactments ever filmed. Episode Vikings - Sails with the Norsemen from Arabia to the New World, stopping off for a bit of pillaging along the way. This is the U.K. narrator, not U.S.A. version ...
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Doomsday 2012 The End of Days
Decoding the Past

Doomsday 2012 The End of Days

Decoding the Past is a series that decodes the past by looking for unusualparanormal, and mysterious things written about throughout history that may give clues as to what will happen in the future. Doomsday 2012 - The End Of Days - The year famously red flagged by the Maya has popped up in many other end of the world prophecies. Could we be so short time away from annihilation? A surprising number of prophets from ancient oracles to contemporary internet crawling software called bots point to December 21, 2012 as the End of Days. Consider the ancient Mayan Calendar, the medieval predictions of Merlin, the Book of Revelation and the Chinese oracle of the I Ching, all highlighting the same terminal date. Then learn of a new technology a web bot crawling the internet to predict the future that has independently concluded there's no need to plan a New Year's ...
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The Holy Grail
Legend Quest

The Holy Grail

The series follows historian and adventure seeker Ashley Cowie in his quest to crack the code on his hunt for the most powerful lost treasures in the world that are some of history's greatest and most mysterious artifacts. After spending years studying some of the world's most fascinating relics he is on the hunt to find where they are. Episode 6 Holy Grail - Ashley and his team go after one of the biggest legends of the Middle Agesthe Holy Grail, thought to be the cup used by Christ at the Last Supper ...
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Episode 2 How the World Changed
Secrets Of The Dead Catastrophe

Episode 2 How the World Changed

The idea that an event of cataclysmic proportions shrouded the Earth's atmospheredarkening the sky and plunging its inhabitants into a massive crisis, is familiar to anyone who's read about the dinosaurs. But what if a similar event happened to humans? And what if recorded history around the world indicates a precise time when this disaster struck? This fascinating documentary tackles the premise that scribes in civilizations as far apart as Ireland and China all recorded a darkening of the sky and a drop in temperatures about the year A.D. 535. Episode 2 How The World Changed - 535 A.D. has come and gone the world has been hit by a catastrophe. Now comes bizarre weather, the sun is darkened, skies are turbulent, rain is red and snow falls yellow. There is frost and famine. Seasons are blurred. In some places great drought destroys the land. In others floods bring chaos ...
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Clash Of The Maya Kings
Time Travellers

Clash Of The Maya Kings

John Rhys-Davies hosts this 1991 series that explores various archeological subjects and their link to stories of the past. The show explores the efforts of archaeologists and the methods they use to discover the answers to these mysteries. Episode Clash Of The Maya Kings - From the early ideas that the Maya were a peace loving society to the slow realisation that they were state controlled, warring and bloodletting cities of warriors and priests, this programme looks at city sites such as Calakmul and Tikal. Maya kings were the centers of power for the Maya civilization. Each Maya city-state was controlled by a dynasty of kings. Maya kings and queens felt obliged to legitimize their claim to power. One of the ways to do this was to build a temple or pyramid. Pacal's Temple of Inscriptions still towers today amid the ruins of Palenque, as the supreme symbol of Pacal's ...
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Lords Of The Maya

Lords Of The Maya

The cities of the Maya were abandoned to the jungle 1000 years ago. They were rediscovered in the 19th century. Explorers came to try and learn what was here and what it meant. Now scholars are beginning to see the individuals involved their names, the dates, their arrivals, all of this very specific information is now coming out through epigraphy, the study of hieroglyphics. The Maya ruins of the central American jungle are are full of hieroglyphs, but the missionaries of the Spanish conquest deliberately wiped out the memory of how to read these stones. The Maya kept calendars of immense complexity and accuracy. The view developed that these cities were centers of a wise and peaceful civilization that had a deep understanding of nature and the universe. But now we are learning the truth about the classic Maya cities, and the truth is that the Lords of the Maya ...
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Episode 3 Dynasty
A History of Britain

Episode 3 Dynasty

From the dawn of civilization to the 20th centuryA History of Britain re-animates familiar tales and illuminates overlooked aspects of England's past. Hosted by Simon Schama, this series discards timelines and tiresome lineages for a lively look at the personalities and cultures that infuse British history. Epic themes and towering figures that transformed an island at the edge of the world into the greatest empire on earth. Episode 3 Dynasty - The story of Henry IIwho built one of the greatest empires in the medieval world, only to see it torn down by members of his own family. Infamous for inciting the murder of Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Becket, Henry has rarely been recognised for his achievements, which included the laying of the foundations for today's legal system ...
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