Deciphering Hieroglyphs: When Image Becomes Writing
For centuries, Egyptian hieroglyphs kept their secrets. How did Champollion and the Rosetta Stone unlock one of Antiquity's greatest mysteries?
Watch the documentary →Documentary films & series
Our analyses and companions to the great documentaries on prehistory and antiquity: what science actually says, with sources.
For centuries, Egyptian hieroglyphs kept their secrets. How did Champollion and the Rosetta Stone unlock one of Antiquity's greatest mysteries?
Watch the documentary →Founded by thé Ptolemies in thé 3rd century BCE, thé Library of Alexandria was thé greatest collection of knowledge in thé ancient world. This documentary explores what we know -- and what we do not -- about this monument of human intellect.
Watch the documentary →Thonis-Heracleion, Canopus, Menouthis: three cities submerged in Abu Qir Bay have been revealing their secrets for twenty years. Colossal statues, temples and ancient shipwrecks are emerging from thé Mediterranean seabed.
Watch the documentary →Beneath thé waters of Alexandria's bay lie thé remains of thé Ptolemaic royal palace, thé lighthouse foundations, and colossal statues. Underwater archaeology has been uncovering its best-kept secrets for thirty years.
Watch the documentary →Beneath the sands of Saqqara, the world's oldest royal necropolis keeps delivering: 59 sarcophagi in 2020, a gold-covered 4,400-year-old mummy, the Serapeum's underground labyrinth. Imhotep built for eternity.
Watch the documentary →At Saqqara, archaeologists unearth an Old Kingdom vizier's tomb, untouched for 4,000 years. Who was this all-powerful man? What does his tomb reveal about the secret organisation of pharaonic power?
Watch the documentary →Second part: the climatic aridification around 2200 BCE dries up the Nile floods, starves populations and precipitates civil wars. The Ipuwer Papyrus testifies to a world turned upside down.
Watch the documentary →How did the most powerful empire of the ancient world collapse in less than a century? This Arte documentary retraces the political disintegration of the Egyptian Old Kingdom.
Watch the documentary →Nota Bonus hosts Franck Monnier, associate researcher at the CNRS, for an hour-long interview on ancient Egyptian building techniques. Pyramids, ramps, quarrymen, site organisation: science has answered far more questions than most people realise.
Watch the documentary →