Lost Cities of the Ancients

Recently I have been learning a lot about ancient Chinese history and am completely transfixed. I read a book about the treasure fleets of Zheng He, the Grand Eunuch during the Ming Dynasty who led, at the time (the early 1420s), the world's largest armada on a series of great voyages around the world, basically mapping the entire planet decades and centuries before the great European explorers. Unfortunately, because of internal strife (and an unbelievably unlucky lightning storm), the government was overthrown and all records of the voyages and discoveries deliberately destroyed, followed by China turning in on itself for hundreds of years, allowing the great European explorers like Columbus and Magellan and Cook to follow in the footsteps of the great Chinese fleets, often using their maps, and then claim credit for their discoveries.

I am still on the keen lookout for any TV or film representations of those great voyages, which immediately piqued my interest in seeing this BBC series about lost ancient cities. Each episode would be entertaining enough to me already, but becomes more so because each lost city is also shrouded in a seemingly unsolvable mystery, like the ancient city of Pyramesse, whose buildings were discovered nowhere near where the foundations were. How could it be in two places at once? And why did these great cities disappear altogether anyway?

These are completely engrossing stories about ancient civilizations that will really open your eyes about how complex and developed the history of mankind is. The evolution of society certainly did not take place over anything even resembling a linear pattern. Great, powerful civilizations rose and fell and were obliterated by millennia of sand, only to be discovered and then remain clouded in mystery for decades more, while the secrets of the cities remained to be solved for decades longer.

I did, I should admit, find it a little strange that, for example, the great city of Pyramesse (considered sort of a "holy grail" among Egyptologists), was discovered in the form of a huge area covered with the massive pieces of buildings, completely out in the open. They could have been seen from an airplane. How did it remain lost for so long?

I am usually not a big fan of seeing the TV recreations of the time periods, because given that they are made for TV they are automatically going to be of lower quality than a film version might be, although here they are generally very well done and present a vivid picture of what those times must have looked like. The only scene in the three episodes I watched that was a little too much was one which showed Rameses in his battle gear. He is riding on a chariot and wearing this goofy, bright blue helmet that not only looks like cheap plastic but also makes him look like a spaceball. Did he really wear such a thing?

At any rate, I will definitely be on the lookout for more of these. It's fascinating and well made, and leaves you with the feeling that there is still so much about human history that remains buried beneath the sand. Highly recommended!

Don't expect anything magical here. It's the same deep narrator voice saying stuff 5 minutes apart while the historical recreations and effects laden music is trying to keep you focused. But the subject here is pretty interesting.

I haven't really seen any of the other episodes, although I plan on finding them in the near future, but I would bet on this being the most interesting. It details the (known) history of the Hatti, a mysterious people that were apparently of European descent and have built a fortress in the middle of nowhere with the single purpose of conquering the world. They almost did it, too, as at some point they were on the same footing with Babylon and Egypt.

But ultimately they failed. They weren't conquered or anything, their ideology failed them. In the end they burned their city and vanished. It really seemed to me like they were some fascists of the ancient world. But most interesting of all is that their entire history disappeared until very recently when people managed to decipher some clay tablets and figure part of what happened. I wonder what the remains of the Hatti did after they abandoned their city. I have a feeling their hidden history might yet reveal interesting bits.

As far as documentaries go, this should have been a long movie rather than a series. It's the strrrrrrrrrrrretching out of each episode that makes this show kind of dull, rather as fascinating as it easily could (and should) be. While the topic is great, there just aren;t that many bits of information that can be held out without explaining everything there is to know about any one of these 'lost Cities" in more than about 5 minutes. And so most of the show is the narrator explaining that something mysterious and unexpected, which would change 'everything' was just about to be discovered. And we get boring fluff about the explorers and some decent re-enactments, a lot of slow panning across rocks, and fifteen minutes later we're reminded 'It was a tremendous mystery which nobody could have guessed, but which would soon be revealed...' at which point you might get annoyed, because it's clear that there's an extra twenty minutes to go, and you'll have to sit through it before the single interesting bit of information is delivered. At which point, you'll realize it was just a lot of hype. Whatever happened is inevitably interesting, but would have packed a hell of a lot more punch if the show hadn't spent so long teasing your attention span.

Having no expertise on the subject, I can't attest to the scholarship of the series. However, it seems that the parade of experts that such shows generally rely on are notably absent in this series. Which is actually kind of refreshing.

But altogether, while the subject matter is great, the show deliberately drags in annoying ways. And for this, it suffers greatly. Watch with extreme patience.