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Classic Tides | Peasants and the Medieval Countryside
Season 3 Episode 59
When we think of the medieval world, our minds usually turn to knights, royalty, and clergy. But the backbone of the medieval economic and social order was the humble peasant. In this rebroadcast fro…
Published on 5 years, 2 months ago
Prehistory Mailbag! Archaeology, Language, and the Advantages of Farming
Season 4 Episode 13
How do we know what we know about the deep past? What languages did people speak in prehistory? And why, if the life of an early farmer seemed to be so miserable, did farmers have so many children? I…
Published on 5 years, 2 months ago
Megalithic Europe
Season 4 Episode 12
It didn't take long for the first pioneering farmers of Europe to establish mature and stable societies. The monuments of these societies are still with us today: enormous earthen tombs and standing …
Published on 5 years, 2 months ago
The Neolithic Revolution: Europe's First Farmers
Season 4 Episode 11
Farming came into existence in the Fertile Crescent, but it didn't stay there. By 5000 BC, agriculture had spread east and west, reaching both Central Asia and the Atlantic Ocean. But how did this ha…
Published on 5 years, 3 months ago
How Did People Domesticate Animals? An Interview with Professor Greger Larson
Season 4 Episode 10
The domestication of animals has transformed the way that people eat, clothe themselves, and live over the past 10,000 or so years, but what in the world does "domestication" even mean? How did this …
Published on 5 years, 3 months ago
The First Farmers
Season 4 Episode 9
The domestication of plants and animals has remade the way that people feed themselves, organize their societies, and interact with the landscapes around them. But for most of the human past, this is…
Published on 5 years, 3 months ago
After the Ice: The Younger Dryas, the Mesolithic, and the Birth of a New World
Season 4 Episode 8
For most of Homo sapiens' time out of Africa, we lived in a world defined by ice. But by around 20,000 years ago, the ice had begun to melt, the glaciers retreating back toward the poles and mountain…
Published on 5 years, 3 months ago
How Should We Understand the Deep Human Past? Interview with Professor John Hawks
Season 4 Episode 7
Professor John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, one of the world's best communicators on the deep human past and paleoanthropology, joins me to talk about archaic humans, genomics, and w…
Published on 5 years, 4 months ago
New Insights on the First Americans: Interview with Professor Jennifer Raff
Season 4 Episode 6
Our understanding of the past is constantly in flux, and there's no field where that's clearer than with the early settlement of the Americas. I'm joined by Professor Jennifer Raff of the University …
Published on 5 years, 4 months ago
Who Were the First Americans?
Season 4 Episode 5
The Americas were the last continents Homo sapiens reached. Why did it take so long for people to enter this vast and promising expanse of land? Who were they, and where had they come from? In today'…
Published on 5 years, 4 months ago