Adam Rutherford tells the story of 16th-century anatomist Andreas Vesalius, who produced the first complete account of the human body and how to dissect it. Show more

Adam Rutherford travels to Holland to find out what it was that drew Rembrandt to anatomy and why dissecting bodies was thought a suitable subject for high art. Show more

A look at the 4th century Codex Sinaiticus, the world's oldest bible, and the Winchester bible, which lay at the heart of the church's struggle with the state in the 12th century. Show more

Nicholas Crane travels across eight British historical maps. He uses Timothy Pont's 16th-century maps of Scotland to locate unidentified mountains. Show more

Nicholas Crane travels across British historical maps. In the 1740s, schoolmaster Murdoch Mackenzie used revolutionary ways to map the sea. Show more

Nicholas Crane travels Britiain using historical maps. He uses Bartholomew's Cycling Map to set a route through the Lake District. Show more

Adam Rutherford tells the story of how Henry Gray and Henry Carter put their bestseller Gray's Anatomy together based on dissections they personally performed. Show more

The story behind Leonardo da Vinci's diagram of the perfect human body, which synthesises his passions for anatomy, the mechanics of the human body and geometry. Show more

In 1543, a diagram drawn by a Polish priest revealed to the world a revolutionary idea, one that would change for ever man’s sense of his place in the cosmos – a sun-centred universe. Show more

Marcus du Sautoy tells the story behind Isaac Newton's diagram of a prism which demonstrated that white light is not pure, but made up of different colours. Show more

The story behind Florence Nightingale's rose diagram, designed to persuade the government that lives could be saved with better sanitation in hospitals. Show more

Marcus du Sautoy explores the story behind Odile Crick's diagram of the DNA double helix, arguably the most famous and significant scientific diagram of the last 100 years. Show more

Marcus du Sautoy explores the story behind the Pioneer Plaque, a diagram on board a space probe which would reveal facts about the Earth to extraterrestrial life. Show more

Nicholas Crane rediscovers William Camden's Britannia on an epic 5000-mile hike, battling the elements in search of Elizabethan Britain. Show more

Nicholas Crane rediscovers William Camden's Britannia on an epic 5,000 mile hike, battling the elements to find out why Elizabethans feared Ireland so much. Show more

Adam Rutherford looks at the relationship between discoveries in anatomy and artworks that illustrate them. He begins with Claudius Galen and Leonardo da Vinci. Show more

How the Hunter brothers transformed medicine and art in 18th-century Britain, believing that anatomy could only be learnt by performing dissections. Show more

The medieval era was the heyday of illuminated manuscripts. This episode looks at the Luttrell Psalter, a remarkable devotional book, and Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Show more

A look at the finest examples of illustrated books, including Alice in Wonderland and The Gruffalo, and the relationship between writer and illustrator. Show more

A look at paperback cover design in the 20th century, including the changing designs of Nineteen Eighty Four and David Pelham's iconic image for A Clockwork Orange. Show more