A History of the World in 100 Objects

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Factual: History

Director of the British Museum, Neil MacGregor, retells humanity's history through objects

Director of the British Museum, Neil MacGregor, narrates 100 programmes that retell humanity's history through the objects we have made.

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A History of the World in 100 Objects: Pilgrims, Raiders and Traders (900 - 1300 AD): Kilwa pot sherds

Kilwa pot sherds

Pilgrims, Raiders and Traders (900 - 1300 AD)

A History of the World in 100 Objects Omnibus

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Neil MacGregor - unlocking secrets with broken pots from East Africa.

In a week that explores the tangle of trade routes that crisscrossed the globe 1000 years ago, Neil MacGregor sifts through broken pot fragments from an African beach.

This week Neil MacGregor has been looking at objects from Japan, Britain, Java and central Europe, exploring the great arcs of trade that connected Africa, Europe and Asia a thousand years ago. Today he sifts through a selection of broken pots, found on a beach in East Africa, to see what they might tell us. Smashed pottery, it seems, can be astonishingly durable and can offer powerful historical insights. These ceramic bits - in a variety of glazes and decorations - were found on the island of Kilwa Kisiwani off Tanzania. Neil uses the fragments to tell the story of a string of thriving communities along the East African coast with links across the Indian Ocean and beyond. The historian Bertram Mapunda and the writer Abdulrazak Gurnah describe the significance of these broken pieces and help piece together the great cross-cultural mix that produced the Swahili culture and language. 

Producer: Anthony Denselow



A History of the World in 100 Objects: Pilgrims, Raiders and Traders (900 - 1300 AD)

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How trade, war and religion moved objects around the globe 1000 years ago

Neil MacGregor uses five objects from the British Museum's collection that show how, even 1,000 years ago, trade, war and religion moved objects freely around the globe

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A History of the World in 100 Objects

Pilgrims, Raiders and Traders (900 - 1300 AD)

Kilwa pot sherds

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