The Forum

The programme that explains the present by exploring the past.

World Service,763 episodes

Episodes

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The Kingdom of Aksum: Africa's trading empire
An ancient state in the Horn of Africa that is famed for its monumental stelae structures
17 Dec 2020,44 mins
Umm Kulthum: Egypt’s singing superstar
Exploring the life of a woman whose voice still captivates people across the Middle East
10 Dec 2020,39 mins
Alexandre Dumas: The man behind the Musketeers
The adventurous life of the much-loved French novelist
03 Dec 2020,44 mins
Unlocking the mysteries of cuneiform tablets
We explore the system of writing that developed 5,000 years ago in Ancient Mesopotamia
26 Nov 2020,44 mins
First impressions: The printing press
How the machine pioneered by 15th Century entrepreneur Johannes Gutenberg changed history
19 Nov 2020,44 mins
The woman whose cells changed medical history
The story of Henrietta Lacks who unwittingly left behind an extraordinary medical legacy
12 Nov 2020,39 mins
Comenius, a pioneer of lifelong learning
The life and work of the father of modern education
05 Nov 2020,44 mins
Dido of Carthage: A love story gone wrong
What makes the legend of Dido so appealing to the arts and beyond?
29 Oct 2020,39 mins
Paul Robeson: Singer, actor and civil rights activist
Exploring the life of a man who campaigned for disenfranchised people around the world
22 Oct 2020,44 mins
Telling the time: From sundials to satnav
A brief history of how we tell the time
15 Oct 2020,44 mins
Writer Jorge Luis Borges: Mixing the magical with the mundane
Teasing and thought provoking: the works of the Argentinian master of pithy stories
08 Oct 2020,44 mins
Elizabeth Fry: 'The angel of prisons'
How a nineteenth century Quaker philanthropist shook up the prison system
01 Oct 2020,39 mins
The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre
Investigating how a thriving African American community was razed to the ground
24 Sep 2020,44 mins
Queen Tamar: The myth of a perfect ruler
Georgia’s most iconic female sovereign
17 Sep 2020,39 mins
Who were the Huguenots?
The myths and mysteries surrounding French protestant refugees
10 Sep 2020,44 mins
Smallpox: The defeat of the speckled monster
Exploring the 200 year campaign to wipe out a killer disease
03 Sep 2020,44 mins
Lal Ded, mystical Kashmiri poet
A free-spirited woman whose pithy words challenged social norms
27 Aug 2020,39 mins
Secrets of the Great Pyramid
Exploring the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt
20 Aug 2020,44 mins
Ray Bradbury, a master of science fiction
Celebrating the author of Fahrenheit 451 and The Martian Chronicles
13 Aug 2020,44 mins
The Fall of the Roman Empire
Why did the once mighty Rome crumble and fall to invaders in 476AD?
06 Aug 2020,44 mins
Picasso, artist of reinvention
How an artist changed our way of seeing
30 Jul 2020,44 mins
Tolstoy: War and Peace
An epic sweep of war and love and family life set in 19th century Russia
23 Jul 2020,44 mins
Chaucer, father of English poetry
The man who in the 14th Century made English a language fit for literature
16 Jul 2020,44 mins
Up close with tango
The dance that seduced the world
09 Jul 2020,44 mins
Valkyries: Fierce women of war
Choosing dead heroes from the battlefield, to fight with Odin in the apocalyptic Ragnarok
02 Jul 2020,44 mins
Silk routes: 2000 years of trading
Luxuries and everyday goods that travelled West and East
25 Jun 2020,44 mins
Bertha von Suttner: A champion of peace
The writer who became the first woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize
18 Jun 2020,39 mins
Joan of Arc: Making a martyr
How a teenager fought to save France
11 Jun 2020,44 mins
Babylon, city of wonders
From The Tower of Babel and the Hanging Gardens to why there are 60 minutes in an hour
04 Jun 2020,44 mins
Aesop and the Fables
A black slave wrote 700 animal tales in Ancient Greece. Why are they still best sellers?
28 May 2020,44 mins