Dec 2020

Object 101

Ten years on from the ground-breaking Radio 4 series, "A History of The World in 100 Objects", former director of the British Museum Neil MacGregor looks back at the impact of the series, on how storytelling in museums has changed over a turbulent decade and asks which object fro ... Show More

37m 51s

Oct 2010

Solar-powered lamp and charger

The very last episode in Neil MacGregor's history of humanity as told through the things that time has left behind. The director of the British Museum in London has spent the past year choosing objects from the museum's vast collection to represent a two million year story of hum ... Show More

13m 34s

Oct 2010

Credit card

Neil MacGregor's history of the world as told through things. Throughout this week he is examining objects that speak of the great shifts in human organisation and thinking in the modern world - objects that raise questions about human lives, the environment and global resources. ... Show More

13m 59s

Dec 2022

The Challenger Expedition 1872-1876

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the voyage of HMS Challenger which set out from Portsmouth in 1872 with a mission a to explore the ocean depths around the world and search for new life. The scale of the enterprise was breath taking and, for its ambition, it has since been compare ... Show More

51m 14s

Dec 2022

The Challenger Expedition 1872-1876

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the voyage of HMS Challenger which set out from Portsmouth in 1872 with a mission a to explore the ocean depths around the world and search for new life. The scale of the enterprise was breath taking and, for its ambition, it has since been compare ... Show More

51m 14s

Jan 2023

Plastics in oceans and sea cucumbers

Max Pearson presents a compilation of this week's Witness History programmes from the BBC World Service. You'll hear the story of how a marine biologist made a shocking discovery finding small bits of plastics floating thousands of miles of the east coast of America. Then, marine ... Show More

51m 44s

Dec 2016

Johannes Kepler

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the German astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571 - 1630). Although he is overshadowed today by Isaac Newton and Galileo, he is considered by many to be one of the greatest scientists in history. The three laws of planetary motion Kepler developed transf ... Show More

48m 42s

Mar 2021

Darwin's Other Theory

From December 27, 1831, to October 2, 1836, the HMS Beagle set out on a scientific survey expedition in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. On the ship was a young man named Charles Darwin. That expedition exposed him to ideas that would develop his theory of natural selection which ... Show More

10m 17s

May 2021

Longitude

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the search for Longitude while at sea. Following efforts by other maritime nations, the British Government passed the Longitude Act in 1714 to reward anyone who devised reliable means for ships to determine their longitude at sea. Mariners could al ... Show More

50m 28s

Oct 2023

380. Captain Cook: History’s Greatest Explorer (Part 1)

The greatest sea explorer of all time, James Cook was born to a humble Yorkshire family, and first stood out for his talents as a cartographer for the Royal Navy in Newfoundland. He would go on to lead three epic voyages to the Pacific during the 18th century, as part of history’ ... Show More

52m 11s

Nov 2023

Plankton

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the tiny drifting organisms in the oceans that sustain the food chain for all the lifeforms in the water and so for the billions of people who, in turn, depend on the seas for their diet. In Earth's development, the plant-like ones among them, the ... Show More

48m 41s

Ship's chronometer from HMS Beagle