The History of Timekeeping

The History of Timekeeping

Up next

History of Spices: commerce, colonialism and culinary innovation

Greg Jenner is joined by historian Dr David Veevers and comedian and quizzer Paul Sinha to learn all about the global history of spices and the spice trade. Nowadays, we take spices for granted, and our kitchen cabinets are full of ginger and cinnamon, cumin and coriander, pepper ...  Show more

Epic of Gilgamesh: myths and heroes in ancient Mesopotamia

Greg Jenner is joined in the ancient world by Dr Moudhy Al-Rashid and comedian Marjolein Robertson to learn all about the famous Mesopotamian poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh. Sumerian poems about a legendary king called Gilgamesh began to be composed sometime in the third millennium, ...  Show more

Recommended Episodes

Amelia Earhart
American History Hit

On July 2 1937, Amelia Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, took off on what was supposed to be the final leg of their circumnavigation of the globe, but would in fact be their final flight.


In this episode Don is joined by Susan Butler to explore this American sw ...

  Show more

History of Geishas
Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society

What does it mean to be a geisha? How does someone become one? And how do they differ from sex workers?


The geisha world is famously very secretive and private, and taking us into it today is Lesley Downer, who spent years befriending geishas in research for her book ...

  Show more

Thomas Edison
Scumbags Of History

Thomas Edison loved electricity almost as much as he loved publicly electrocuting animals.Scumbags of History is a production of Voyage Media and Enthusiast Gaming. The series is produced by Nat Mundel, and Dan Benamor (Voyage Media), J.B. Elliott, Roarke Boes, and Amanda Scherke ...  Show more

Black Boxes: Recording Airplanes' Final Moments
Dan Snow's History Hit

They can survive in lava for half an hour and accelerations of 3,400 Gs. Their beacons can be detected 20,000 feet beneath the waves. Most shocking of all - they aren't actually black! (They're bright orange = the least common colour in nature.)


Today it's the invent ...

  Show more