The Ridiculous Origin of the Modern Calendar

Today, Isaac Newton is best known for his scientific pursuits -- but he also served as Warden and, later, Master of the Royal Mint. And this wasn't some sort of honorary position, either: Newton took his job of hunting down forgers seriously, and may have even bent (or broken) th ...  Show more

Oof! Atari! As our producer Max likes to say, 'it was a thing.' In the second part of this two-part series, Ben, Noel and Max explore the pioneering rise of Atari, corporate overtake, and the final words of its founder.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. 

It's December 25th, 2024. Across this wide world, people commemorate one of the most famous birthdays in all of history: the birth of Jesus Christ. Then as now, adherents of Christianity celebrate the coming of the Messiah -- yet why does this holiday occur on a specific date in, ...  Show more

Why is the Western world's most famous birthday celebrated on a seemingly-arbitrary date? As Ben, Matt and Noel discover in the second chapter of this special two-part holiday series, the power structures of ancient empires experienced a progression of conspiracies, geopolitical ...  Show more

Professor Alexander Meyer visits Google to share the ways ancient Greeks and Romans kept time and their reasons for doing so. He discusses various time-keeping artifacts and works of literature to show that the manner in which time was kept and tracked reflected and continues to ...  Show more

As one of the world’s most historically important bodies of water, the Persian Gulf is home to fascinating evidence of ancient humanity. In tonight’s episode, Ben, Matt and Noel discover the true story of an ancient civilization lost to antiquity.They don't want you to read our b ...  Show more