Pompeii: Life in the City

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Season 1
4 episodes

History
Documentary

Summary

Historians Dan Snow and Doctor Kate Lister take viewers to the Pompeii, the world's best preserved Roman city, to explore what it would have really been liked to live there.

Episode 1: Season 1, Episode 1

Summary

Historians Dan Snow and Dr Kate Lister reveal what it would've really been like to live in Pompeii - the world's best preserved Roman city. In this edition, Dan and Kate take a look at the working lives of Pompeii's people, from the very rich to the very poor. The town was a buzzing hive of activity as almost everyone, from wealthy merchants to lowly slaves, were busy making a living

Review

Jane Rackham

A Roman town like Pompeii was not dissimilar to our own: people worked, ate, laughed, shopped and raised their families. Some were doing extremely well, although — and perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, because the Roman Empire was built on slavery — a third of Pompeii’s working population were enslaved.

Dan Snow and Dr Kate Lister stroll the unusually empty streets — frozen in time since Vesuvius erupted in AD 79 — once full of laundries, bakeries, pubs, hairdressers, fast-food joints and shops, peeking inside the buildings and talking to historians to bring the ancient city to life for us. It’s satisfyingly illuminating, but it’s entertaining, too. We hear one sex worker’s complaint about a client she called “Mr Garlic Farts”, hear that many citizens would have two sleeps a night and learn about the grim reality of bleaching togas by trampling them in vats of stinking urine.

If you can’t join the 20,000 tourists who visit this extraordinary Italian site every day, this is a terrific alternative.

How to watch

Next showing

There are no live broadcasts scheduled for this show. But it is available via the streaming provider below.

Streaming

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Credits

Crew

rolenamePresenterDan SnowPresenterKate ListerExecutive producerBill Locke

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Episode 4

Season 1, Episode 4

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Episode 3

Season 1, Episode 3

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Episode 2

Season 1, Episode 2

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Episode 1

Season 1, Episode 1

Summary

Historians Dan Snow and Dr Kate Lister reveal what it would've really been like to live in Pompeii - the world's best preserved Roman city. In this edition, Dan and Kate take a look at the working lives of Pompeii's people, from the very rich to the very poor. The town was a buzzing hive of activity as almost everyone, from wealthy merchants to lowly slaves, were busy making a living

Review

Jane Rackham

A Roman town like Pompeii was not dissimilar to our own: people worked, ate, laughed, shopped and raised their families. Some were doing extremely well, although — and perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, because the Roman Empire was built on slavery — a third of Pompeii’s working population were enslaved.

Dan Snow and Dr Kate Lister stroll the unusually empty streets — frozen in time since Vesuvius erupted in AD 79 — once full of laundries, bakeries, pubs, hairdressers, fast-food joints and shops, peeking inside the buildings and talking to historians to bring the ancient city to life for us. It’s satisfyingly illuminating, but it’s entertaining, too. We hear one sex worker’s complaint about a client she called “Mr Garlic Farts”, hear that many citizens would have two sleeps a night and learn about the grim reality of bleaching togas by trampling them in vats of stinking urine.

If you can’t join the 20,000 tourists who visit this extraordinary Italian site every day, this is a terrific alternative.

How to watch

Next showing

There are no live broadcasts scheduled for this show. But it is available via the streaming provider below.

Streaming
- 5
Details

Languages

Formats

Colour

Credits

Crew

rolenamePresenterDan SnowPresenterKate ListerExecutive producerBill Locke

How to watch

Next showing

There are no live broadcasts scheduled for this show. But it is available via the streaming provider below.

Streaming

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