The amount of different TV that we’ve watched over the last year is why I split the roundup of the year into sections – and the non-fiction TV is split into three or so parts (vagueness because I’ve not written them all yet so I don’t know if it’ll stick to the plan!). This gathers together all the “ancient history” serieses or programmes we’ve watched over the year – 30 in all. I’ve drawn the boundary at roughly the fall of Rome, and as you might expect the list includes a lot of programmes about Ancient Egypt (given J’s obsession with the subject). Some programmes & serieses extend beyond that but if they’ve a significant chunk from before the cut off they’ll be in both lists. I’ve included in the list the ones that we watched but I didn’t really write about without links, most posts will have multiple programmes in them so you might have to scroll down and several serieses are split across multiple posts.
Picking a least favourite is easy – there was a dreadful documentary about Akhenaten called Sun Pharaoh where the narrator couldn’t even pronounce the name Akhenaten properly. Picking a favourite is harder! Ancient Egypt – Life and Death in the Valley of the Kings is one possibility, Pompeii: The Mystery of the People Frozen in Time another. And I did like Mary Beard’s Caligula one. There’s also Story of the Jews and Simon Sebag Montefiore’s one about Rome to add to the shortlist. I think I’ll go with the Ancient Egypt one as top. Tho I might change my mind tomorrow!
- 4,000-Year-Old Cold Case: The Body in the Bog. One off programme about the discovery and investigation of a body in an Irish bog. Was a bit Discovery Channel (they Solved The Mystery and Proved The Theory), and a bit unclear how general their idea was but nonetheless interesting.
- A303: Highway to the Sun. Tom Fort drives along the A303 & talks about the history of the area.
- Ancient Apocalype. Series about how various ancient civilisations met their doom.
- Ancient Greece: The Greatest Show on Earth. Michael Scott looks at the development of drama in Ancient Greece.
- Ancient Egypt – Life and Death in the Valley of the Kings. Programme about the more ordinary Egyptians – those who lived in the workmen’s village at Deir el-Medina.
- Britain’s Stone Age Tsunami. Time Team special about a tsunami that hit Britain about 8000 years ago.
- Caligula with Mary Beard. Mary Beard tells us what we know about Caligula, and looks at how much of the myth might be true.
- Cave of Forgotten Dreams. Film about the Chuavet cave paintings.
- Egypt’s Lost Rival. Documentary about the city of Qatna which is in modern day Syra and was contemporaneous with the Second Intermediate Period of Egypt, the programme was both about the history & about the excavation of it.
- Egypt’s Mystery Chamber. Mini-review of programme about KV63.
- The Egyptian Job. Documentary about the robbing of Amenemhat III’s tomb, I wasn’t keen on the framing narrative for the programme (overly fictionalised for my tastes).
- Ice Age Art: A Culture Show Special. One off show presented by Andrew Graham-Dixon linked to the Ice Age Art exhibition at the British Museum.
- Mothers, Murderers and Mistresses: Empresses of Ancient Rome. Three part series about the lives of powerful women of the Roman Empire, presented by Catharine Edwards.
- Museum Secrets: Cairo Museum. Mini-review of programme about selected objects from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
- The Mystery of Rome’s X Tomb. Programme about a mass grave dating back to the 1st-3rd Centuries AD found in the catacombs of Rome in 2003.
- Nefertiti. Mini-review of old programme about Nefertiti.
- The Other Pompeii: Life & Death in Herculaneum. One-off programme about what we can learn about Roman life from Herculaneum.
- Pompeii: The Mystery of the People Frozen in Time. Margaret Mountford presents a programme about the eruption of Vesuvius and how the people of Pompeii & Herculaneum died.
- Quest for Egypt’s Lost King. Documentary about Akhenaten & Amarna. Sadly took a nose-dive off the plausibility cliff towards the end.
- Ramesses III: The Pharaoh Behind the Myth. Mini-review of programme about the harem conspiracy against Ramesses III.
- Rome: A History of the Eternal City. History of Rome from the perspective of religion, presented by Simon Sebag Montefiore.
- Rome’s Lost Empire. Using satellite imagery to find previously unknown Roman sites to excavate.
- Secrets of Stonehenge: A Time Team Special. Time Team filmed a (non-Time Team) excavation at Stonehenge & talk about new theories about why & how it was built.
- The Story of the Jews. Series presented by Simon Schama about the history of the Jews.
- Stories of the Dark Earth: Meet the Ancestors Revisted. Julian Richards returns to digs that were originally filmed for Meet the Ancestors more than a decade ago & sees what new things have been learnt.
- Sun Pharaoh. Mini-review of dreadful documentary about Akhenaten.
- Treasures of Ancient Rome. Series about the art & history of Ancient Rome, presented by Alastair Sooke.
- Tutankhamun Conspiracies with Bettany Hughes. Mini-review of unfocussed documentary mostly about Tutankhamun.
- Tutankhamun: The Mystery of the Burnt Mummy. Cut down version of Ultimate Tut.
- Ultimate Tut. Documentary about Tutankhamun, including another theory as to how he died. Presented by Chris Naunton.
- Who Were the Greeks?. Two-part series with Michael Scot giving an overview of Greek civilisation & looking at the truth vs. the myth of what they were like.