Nuragic Civilization: Did you mean...?

European explorers began to probe the Western Hemisphere in the early 1500s, and they found to their utter amazement not only a huge landmass but also a world filled with several diverse and populous indigenous cultures. Among their most...

EPISODE 3: EMPIRE OF THE MIND The final segment describes how Athens, at the height of her glory, engaged in a suicidal conflict with her greatest rival, Sparta. Through the eyes of Socrates, Athens' first philosopher, viewers see the tragic...

EPISODE 2: GOLDEN AGE The second part recounts the Greeks' heroic victory against the mighty Persian empire through the life of Themistocles, one of Athens' greatest generals.The episode opens in 490 B.C. when tiny Athens prepares to safeguard...

This video takes a quick look at the archaeological site of Çatalhöyük (a.k.a. Catal Huyuk), one of the most impressive and complete Neolithic, or "new stone age" villages ever discovered.

In this third segment from Dr. David Neiman's lecture series, he describes how humans first developed the concept of the written word in Mesopotamia.

King Hammurabi of Babylon practices the art of diplomacy and war. In the second installment of lecture two, Dr. Neiman reads through the "Year List" which catalogs Hammurabi's accomplishments.

The Predynastic Period in Ancient Egypt is the time before recorded history from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic Age and on to the rise of the First Dynasty and is generally recognized as spanning the era from c. 6000-3150 BCE (though physical...

The Babylonians developed a calendar based on the moon and sun cycles. The Lunar calendar was designed to work in conjunction with the solar cycle by adding leap months known an "intercalary" months.

In the fourth part of his lecture, Dr. Neiman explains that writing is invented in the Mesopotamian region of Sumer. He describes that once a writing style is developed, literature flourishes. He then describes the first (probably) literary...

Part one of Dr. David Neiman's nine-part lecture outlines the rise of the earliest civilizations in the Near East geographically and with reference to the development of writing.