After France's defeat, British and French consuls battled for Egypt's antiquities. Explorer Belzoni joined the race to seize the colossal Young Memnon as their ruthless rivalry intensified.

Belzoni uncovered Egypt's ancient wonders while Champollion raced Thomas Young to decipher the Rosetta Stone. His breakthrough gave a civilisation silent for 1,400 years its voice again.

Champollion travelled up the Nile to test his decipherment of hieroglyphs, bringing forgotten pharaohs back to life. His triumphant expedition came at a devastating cost to his health.

The Nazis went to great lengths to warp the natural world to their whims as they believed that ruins that could prove the Aryans to be the superior race lay buried in the soil.

The location of King Solomon's Mines has been a mystery for hundreds of years; new evidence has led to an amazing discovery. Might Solomon's wealth have come from the copper mines of southern Israel?

After Hatshepsut's death, Thutmose III proved himself at Megiddo against Canaanite kings; from Deir el-Bahari to Karnak to the fortress, discover the battle that made him Egypt's most warlike pharaoh.

The Nazis went to great lengths to warp the natural world to their whims as they believed that ruins that could prove the Aryans to be the superior race lay buried in the soil.

We follow the first active excavation of a pharaoh's tomb in the iconic Valley of the Kings since King Tut's tomb a century ago and reveal new secrets about Egypt's famous rulers.

The inter-war years saw the rise of dictators, appeasement and the policies of the Third Reich until the invasion of Poland, and Japan's 1937 invasion of China escalated into a full-scale conflict.

For 2,000 years, whoever controlled the Mediterranean controlled the resources of the known world. In WWII, this area was in control of the British Empire, and Mussolini wanted it back.

WWII has begun; new tank strategies take the world by storm and completely change the way wars are fought. As war engulfs Europe, each country learns to adapt to mechanised warfare in its own way.

Vyse blasted into Giza's pyramids as Lepsius and Prisse d'Avennes competed for Karnak's royal list. Their clash embodied an emerging Egyptology torn between preservation, science and plunder.

Auguste Mariette discovered Saqqara's Serapeum and pioneered a more scientific Egyptology. Once a looter, he created Egypt's Antiquities Service and Cairo's first museum to protect its heritage.

Archaeologist Zahi Hawass hopes to discover the tomb of Imhotep, the architect of the Step Pyramid of Djoser, and aims to unearth the many secrets of the Egyptian mummies with his team.

Zahi Hawass is excavating an enclosure called Gisr El-Mudir where sarcophagi containing mysterious mummies and rich painted tombs are discovered; will these treasures lead them to Imhotep?

The invasion of Poland forces even resistant nations into declaring war, Chamberlain is replaced by Winston Churchill, and hardly-remembered early naval encounters start to shape the war.

The Eastern Front saw Hitler's most brutal WWII campaigns, but it is also where the Soviets, with mastery of the ground on which they lived, beat him all the way back to Berlin.

Bettany returns to Azerbaijan for more adventures on the Silk Roads; she explores its most remote and hidden corners to find out the cultural impact of a history of isolation and influence.

1274 B.C. / B.C.E.: The Egyptian pharaoh Ramses II and Hittite King Muwatalli II clash in one of the greatest battles of antiquity at Qadesh in a story of spies, surprises and reversals of fortune.

The triumphal architecture of the Nazi regime hints at a deeply dystopian future; what might a Nazi city and the world, have looked like had Hitler succeeded in vanquishing his enemies?

We follow the first active excavation of a pharaoh's tomb in the iconic Valley of the Kings since King Tut's tomb a century ago and reveal new secrets about Egypt's famous rulers.

During WWII, countries all over the world leverage their industrial might to perfect the art of tank manufacturing; will quality or quantity matter more when it comes to armoured warfare?

Vyse blasted into Giza's pyramids as Lepsius and Prisse d'Avennes competed for Karnak's royal list. Their clash embodied an emerging Egyptology torn between preservation, science and plunder.