History TV and radio in the UK: what's on our screens this week?
Can't decide which shows to watch or listen to this week? Here are the latest history radio and TV programmes airing in the UK that you won't want to miss
Bettany Hughes’s Treasures Of The World
Channel 4
Saturday 11th May, 7pm
In which the classicist heads for Turkey, Greece and, a country that’s as yet far less visited by tourists, Albania. Highlights include a search for traces of ancient Illyria, a visit to the birthplace of Alexander the Great and the story of a pirate queen who challenged the might of Rome.
Spy/Master
BBC Four
Saturday 11th May, 9pm & 945pm
Episodes three and four of the atmospheric thriller set in Romania during the 1980s. We begin with Ceausescu’s right-hand man, Victor Godneau, holed up in an American safe house. Meanwhile US agent Frank Jackson wants to force the CIA into a risky move, but there are big political factors at play here.
Rob And Rylan’s Grand Tour – pick of the week
BBC Two
Sunday 12th May, 9pm
Following in the footsteps of Lord Byron, Rob Rinder and Rylan embark on a Grand Tour of Italy. Their cultural odyssey begins in Venice where they both attempt glassblowing. Plus Rob wants to conduct a performance of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons in the church where it was first performed and Rylan learns about the secret history of Carnival.
The Remains Of The Day: The Read With Steve Pemberton
BBC Four
Sunday 12th May, 9pm
The League Of Gentlemen’s Steve Pemberton reads an abridged version of Kazuo Ishiguro’s 1989 novel. The story centres on a butler, Stevens, who in the 1920s and 1930s works at country house Darlington Hall. Gradually, we realise Stevens, a deeply repressed man, is in love with the hall’s housekeeper and that his employer has some dubious political leanings.
The Lost Scrolls Of Pompeii: New Revelations
Channel 5
Sunday 12th May, 9pm
Professor Alice Roberts reports on the work of computer scientist Brent Seales. As to what this has got to do with the ancient world, Seales has long been on a quest to read scrolls found in Herculaneum, documents that have an alarming habit of disintegrating if you try to open them. Can AI software unroll them virtually?
The Invention Of China
Radio 4
Monday 13th May, 11am
Misha Glenny and producer Miles Warde conclude their history of China, what it is and how it came to be that way, by focusing on revolutionary leader Mao Tse-tung. Born in 1893, Mao was for decades a crucial figure in events that shaped modern China.
Great Lives
Radio 4
Monday 13th May, 3pm
Dr Hayaatun Sillem, chief executive of the Royal Academy, celebrates the life of Lady Rachel MacRobert (1884–1954), a pioneering geologist, feminist and businesswoman. Sillem is particularly drawn to the way MacRobert dealt with personal tragedy. All three of MacRobert’s sons died while flying and, during the Second World War, she famously sponsored a bomber in their memory.
Being Roman With Mary Beard
Radio 4
Tuesday 14th May, 9am
With contributions from historian T Corey Brennan and archaeologist Elizabeth Fentress, Mary Beard tells the story of Antinous, Hadrian’s male lover, who drowned while on a cruise down the Nile. Did he slip overboard or was he murdered by rivals for the emperor’s attention?
Secrets And Spies: A Nuclear Game
BBC Two
Wednesday 15th May, 9pm
How did Margaret Thatcher come to connect with Mikhail Gorbachev? The second episode of the spy series explores how Oleg Gordievsky was, unknown to his Soviet employers, able to smooth the way for the duo’s first meeting, in 1984 when the future president visited the UK, to be a success.
Hidden Treasures Of The National Trust
BBC Two
Friday 17th May, 9pm
Cameras go behind the scenes at Cliveden House, an Italianate villa in Berkshire once owned by Nancy Astor (1879–1974), and Polesden Lacey in Surrey, the weekend retreat of socialite and philanthropist Margaret Greville (1863–1942). At both locations, precious portraits are in need of conservation work.
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