Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchBabylon
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the truth about Babylon. Six thousand years ago, between the Tigris and the Euphrates, the first cities were being built. The great empire to spring from the region wa…
Published on 21 years, 6 months ago
The Planets
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss our knowledge of the planets in both our and other solar systems. Tucked away in the outer Western Spiral arm of the Milky Way is a middle aged star, with nine, or pos…
Published on 21 years, 6 months ago
Toleration
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the ideas and politics behind the idea of religious toleration. In 1763 Voltaire remarked that "of all religions, the Christian is undoubtedly that which should instil…
Published on 21 years, 7 months ago
Zero
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of the number between 1 and -1, which has strange and uniquely beguiling qualities. Shakespeare’s King Lear warned, “Nothing will come of nothing”. The poe…
Published on 21 years, 7 months ago
Heroism
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss what defines a hero and what place they had in classical society. On the fields of Troy a fallen soldier pleaded with Achilles, the great hero of the Greeks, to spare …
Published on 21 years, 7 months ago
Tea
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss tea, the first truly global commodity. After air and water, tea is the most widely consumed substance on the planet and the British national drink. In this country it …
Published on 21 years, 7 months ago
Hysteria
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss a problematic notion which can be an emotional condition, a syndrome, an extreme or over-reaction, or the physical signs of trauma. The term ‘hysteria’ was first used …
Published on 21 years, 8 months ago
The Later Romantics
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the poetry, the tragedy and the idealism of the Later Romantics. There must have been something extraordinary about the early 19th century, when six of the greatest po…
Published on 21 years, 8 months ago
The Fall
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the concept of original sin and its influence in Christian Europe. Genesis tells the Bible’s story of creation, but it also carries within it a tale of the ‘fall of ma…
Published on 21 years, 8 months ago
China's Warring States period
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the astonishing productivity of the Chinese Golden Age. 400 BC to 200 AD is known as the Axial Age, when great civilisations in Asia and the Mediterranean forged the i…
Published on 21 years, 8 months ago