European Heritage Month: Music, Art, Folklore, and History

This film covers ancient Greek civilization, and is organized around a timeline that divides this civilization into historical periods. It covers the Minoan, Mycenaean and Dorian periods, and emphasizes the era of city states and the development of democracy in Athens and the Persian and Peloponesian Wars. Ancient Greek culture has been a contributing influence throughout Western civilization in the areas of art, literature, philosophy, drama, architecture and politics.

Hosted by Rick Steves, this episode resurrects the rubble and brings back to life the capital of the ancient world.

With the disappearance of the Neanderthal species some 25,000 years ago, Homo sapiens reigned supreme across Eurasia—but the human family was still dramatically in flux. This film depicts the cultural adaptations and far-flung migrations that continued to shape European societies from the end of the Ice Age through the development of agriculture to the invention of writing.

This film explores a point in Celtic history when women were often tribal leaders, warriors, bards, druids, artists, and craftsmen. The La Tene era was named for the site in Switzerland where a rich cache of artifacts were discovered in 1857, and it was the heyday of Celtic culture.

Using 3-D animation, location footage, archive materials, and interviews, the Beowulf epic is examined in the light of the civilization that created it.

This spectacular four-part series takes an in-depth look at the history of Europe’s wandering tribes: their migrations in search of land, their ensuing clashes with the Romans and the Huns, and their adoption, over time, of Christianity. Dramatic reenactments, computer-generated re-creations of period architecture, maps, images of anthropological and historical artifacts, and insights from leading scholars create a compelling picture of life and death in ancient and early medieval Europe.

In 988, Prince Vladimir ordered the destruction of Slavic pagan idols and converted his people to Christianity. He recreated the glories of Byzantium and built St Sophia Cathedral. A BBC Production.