Secrets In The Dust S02E01-E06 (2014)

Through its ability to make us dream and marvel at the achievements of the past, archaeology has evolved from an inconspicuous discipline based on ruins and fragments into one of the most attention-grabbing fields of scientific study today.This series presents not only some of the most groundbreaking archaeological discoveries, but also the turbulent history of archaeology itself, with its adventurers and grave robbers, its embittered rivals and passionate visionaries.

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Season 02 , Episode 01 - “Atlantis: A Dive into History”
Alfred Merlin was digging for Roman remains in Tunisia in 1907 when sponge-divers identified mysterious remains – stone columns, just off-shore in the Mediterranean. Was this the legendary lost city of Atlantis? But when beautifully crafted Roman works of art were salvaged from the site, Merlin came to an even more intriguing conclusion: These were the remains of a Roman shipwreck. The Mediterranean, he knew, was the highway of the ancient world – water was the only efficient way to transport heavy goods quickly throughout the Empire. And when greedy traders overloaded their ships, the resulting disasters left behind a gift for archaeologists 2000 later. Understand where the ships were going and what they were taking, and you could decode the whole of the ancient world. And so Alfred Merlin created a whole new discipline: marine archaeology. At first it was exhausting and extremely dangerous work. Divers in the cumbersome suits with lead boots and copper helmets depended on a steady stream of air pumped from the surface. Many suffocated or died in agony from the bends. But the rewards were fabulous: individual artworks and the revelation of a trade network that saw building materials and luxuries crossing hundreds of miles of sea to construct new colonies in the image of Rome. This film shows the pioneers at work in Merlin’s time and their successors today, faced with the same challenges of salvage and preservation, and even using some of the same methods.

Season 02 , Episode 02 - “Sacrifice and Science”
Through its ability to make us dream and marvel at the achievements of the past, archaeology has evolved from an inconspicuous discipline based on ruins and fragments into one of the most attention-grabbing fields of scientific study today. Luckily for him, Eduard Seler had a weak constitution; in 1882 he met and married his doctor’s daughter. Caecilie’s energy and curiosity complemented Eduard’s intellectual passion and capacity for hard, detailed work, and together they left Berlin for Mexico to decipher the codices of the Aztecs. These were the only authentic written accounts of the civilisation that weren’t destroyed by the arrival of the Spaniards in the 16th century – and nobody had succeeded in interpreting them. Seler cracked the code of the Aztec calendar, which in turn revealed a great deal about their sacrificial rituals and their temple-building cycles; at the turn of every Aztec century, new, grander temples must be built over the old ones. Seler also realised that Aztec illustrations revealed the truth about Aztec education and everyday working lives. Meanwhile, Caecilie photographed their discoveries on their travels, and collected Aztec artefacts, found in far-flung rural markets. Today’s archaeologists are making further important discoveries, like King Montezuma’s secret room for communing with the gods, unearthed when a lift shaft in a Mexico City block was renovated. Today’s scientists face the same challenge Seler knew – Mexico’s capital city is built right over the ancient Aztec capital, so the opportunities to dig are limited and frustratingly brief. Ironically this fact, like his poor health, played to Seler’s scholarly strengths and helped him become a giant in the story of archaeology.

Season 02 , Episode 03 - “Etrucans: Glory Before Rome”
It was a chance find of a coin in a field that led Isodoro Falchi to identify the site Vetulonia the last township of the Etruscan federation. This loose grouping of hilltop cities inhabited Italy’s beautiful Tuscany region for 1,000 years, until their disappearance around 500 BC. Because they decorated their tombs as facsimiles of their homes, we know exactly how they lived. From these, their unmistakable statues and other artifacts, we know that they used iron tools, built towns with stone temples, and lived in terraced houses with small interior pools. Theirs was a sensuous, prosperous lifestyle of banquets and pleasure, with equality between the sexes – and a healthy interest in sex itself. As if all this was too good to be true, they predicted their own downfall, after a thousand years. The Romans seemed almost too happy to oblige, for no-one must be seen to have influenced them – even though they built on the achievements of the Etruscans. Literally, in the case of Rome, where they even adopted their sewerage system! In Falchi’s day the archaeological authorities in Rome seemed almost as reluctant to recognise his discoveries as the Romans themselves had been to remember the Etruscans; but today’s geneticists have proved that Falchi was right. They have discovered that the current inhabitants of Campiglia Marittima , once called Vetulonia, are descended from the Etruscans of old; and they have solved a second mystery. The original ancestors of the Etruscans came not from Italy but from Asia Minor: today’s Turkey. From the latest excavations by Simona Rafanelli and Sylvia Guideri we understand one more crucial fact. The Romans may like to pretend that the Etruscans never existed – and the Etruscans may have predicted their own downfall. But today, archaeologists find evidence that Etruscans and Romans lived in harmony for a long period, worshipping the same gods, before the Romans took over, conquering lands far beyond the Italian hills to become the supe.

Season 02 , Episode 04 - “Etruscans Glory Before Rome”
It was a chance find of a coin in a field that led Isodoro Falchi to identify the site Vetulonia the last township of the Etruscan federation. This loose grouping of hilltop cities inhabited Italy’s beautiful Tuscany region for 1,000 years, until their disappearance around 500 BC. Because they decorated their tombs as facsimiles of their homes, we know exactly how they lived. From these, their unmistakable statues and other artifacts, we know that they used iron tools, built towns with stone temples, and lived in terraced houses with small interior pools. Theirs was a sensuous, prosperous lifestyle of banquets and pleasure, with equality between the sexes – and a healthy interest in sex itself. As if all this was too good to be true, they predicted their own downfall, after a thousand years. The Romans seemed almost too happy to oblige, for no-one must be seen to have influenced them – even though they built on the achievements of the Etruscans. Literally, in the case of Rome, where they even adopted their sewerage system! In Falchi’s day the archaeological authorities in Rome seemed almost as reluctant to recognise his discoveries as the Romans themselves had been to remember the Etruscans; but today’s geneticists have proved that Falchi was right. They have discovered that the current inhabitants of Campiglia Marittima , once called Vetulonia, are descended from the Etruscans of old; and they have solved a second mystery. The original ancestors of the Etruscans came not from Italy but from Asia Minor: today’s Turkey. From the latest excavations by Simona Rafanelli and Sylvia Guideri we understand one more crucial fact. The Romans may like to pretend that the Etruscans never existed – and the Etruscans may have predicted their own downfall. But today, archaeologists find evidence that Etruscans and Romans lived in harmony for a long period, worshipping the same gods, before the Romans took over, conquering lands far beyond the Italian hills to become the supe.

Season 02 , Episode 05 - “Persia Legacy of the Flames”
In 1923 Ernst Herzfeld was the greatest living scholar of the Persian Empire, that ruled in the Middle East from 612BC until it was defeated by Alexander the Great in 330BC. That year Herzfeld set out on his last major expedition. It would last more than 10 years. It would make crucial discoveries about this misunderstood civilisation, and it would end in personal disaster. A German expedition in the 1920s was of necessity small-scale, operating with little or no money. The defeated power in WWI could no longer afford such “luxuries”. But this was also an opportunity: the colonial powers – Britain and France – were not popular with the local governments in the region. By teaming up with oil money from America, Herzfeld could gain both political, and financial, support – enough to continue his work. And what discoveries he made: Herzfeld excavated the administrative centre of Persepolis, the Persian imperial capital, uncovering thousands of clay tablets which described in detail the administrative system and the trade networks of the Empire. Far from being the tyranny described by their Greek conquerors, this was evidence of a tolerant and cosmopolitan Empire that took the best from all the peoples it ruled. If Herzfeld found the information, his assistant Friedrich Krefter discovered the treasure – the solid gold plaque forged for the great King Darius to acknowledge his glory. But Herzfeld was Jewish, and while he was in Persia his country was taken over by the Nazis. Once again, distrust and prejudice ruled; stripped of his professorships by 20th Century tyranny, he was even accused of theft of Persia’s national treasures. Politics refuses to spare the region today, as archaeologists – notably from Australia – continue to research the ancient Persian Empire, trying now to understand how this Empire extended its power so many hundreds of kilometres from the capital.

Season 02 , Episode 06