Original subtitles

Thousands of years ago, ancient powers ruled our world.

Egypt.

China.

India.

Greece.

And Rome.

Players in a high stakes game of strategy and luck.

Success will bring them wealth and immortality.

Failure, oblivion, and death.

In their battle for survival, each civilization will face the same

How they respond will shape their destiny.

In this episode...

Making money.

When wealth means strength, our ancient powers must get rich

by trading their treasures and monetizing their assets.

Who will succeed in the world of commerce?

Our ancient powers have overcome their latest challenge.

They have built their empires and left permanent marks

on the landscape.

Now they face their next great test.

And one civilization seems to have a head start.

After suffering a century of rebellion and war, Egypt has

recaptured its lost territories in the south.

It is the beginning of the new kingdom.

Now they have peace, and they want their empire to flourish.

But how can they achieve this?

Egypt is often thought of as a gift of the Nile.

But in fact, it's actually a gift of the desert.

The new kingdom kings knew that they had a special resource.

The unique geology of the eastern desert and Nubia provided veins of gold

throughout the rock.

This nation is lucky.

There are rich sources of this rare metal right across the country.

The ancient Egyptian pharaohs would go to these mining sites.

They would break through the rock and get these precious bits of

gold, bring it back to the capital to produce some of the world's most

artifacts.

These golden objects lie at the very heart of their beliefs.

Gold was...

A religious, important, symbolic material.

The gods' skin were covered in gold. The gods were literally made out of gold.

So for the king to cover his own body in gold, it was to become divine, to

become like the gods.

The ancient Egyptians loved this precious metal.

And they have more than even a pharaoh could need.

So they plan to use it.

To get even richer.

They knew no one else around them had the gold that they did.

So they used their gold to set up political networks.

And this gold was used as a trading pawn.

Everyone was desperate for Egyptian gold.

The pharaohs knew it, and they made it work to their advantage.

This wealth gives them the upper hand when they start to barter with their

neighbors.

Gold became the currency for the ancient Egyptians abroad. With gold, pharaohs

could buy whatever they wanted.

They swapped their gold for practical necessities, like wood,

tin.

and luxuries like silver.

In this letter, written on clay, the king of Cyprus strikes a deal with

pharaoh, asking for a list of goods, including jars of fine oil, linen,

horses, and, of course, prized Egyptian gold.

In return, he's sending the pharaoh 100 talents of copper.

The Egyptians have become tycoons in the world of ancient trade.

Powerful players who are happy to bend the rules to stay ahead.

There's one particular instance where a Near Eastern ruler was very upset

because he was promised gold.

And in return, he got wood plated in gold.

These kind of flights were upsetting, and these rulers let the pharaoh know

exactly how they felt.

How dare the pharaoh cheat him?

Sharp practice is all part of the game.

But with gold for sale, the Egyptians are never short of bias.

Wealthy beyond their wildest dreams.

All they want to do now is flaunt it.

In 1323 BCE, the 19 -year -old king Tutankhamen dies

suddenly and is laid to rest.

His tomb will lie undisturbed for the next 3 ,000 years until,

in 1922, it's discovered and its riches

revealed.

I see gold everywhere.

This is a fantastic image. It shows the sheer scale of things that were in Tut's

tomb. There's chariots pushed against the wall.

And there's just furniture and stuff everywhere.

And most of the goods in Tut's tomb were gilded in gold.

This royal tomb contains over 5 ,000 items.

Wine, clothing, beds, chariots, and weapons.

And the most famous Egyptian relic of them all.

Here it is. This is the artifact of Tutankhamun, the one that we all know.

is gold. Gold, gold, gold. It's gold and gems and glass.

It's opulence, wealth.

It's the power of the pharaoh. It's his entire empire manifested in one

artifact.

Weighing in at over 10 kilograms, Tutankhamen's mask is a truly

object.

The gold is mined in Egypt, but the intricate decoration comes from across

ancient world.

Lapis lazuli from Afghanistan.

Glass, revolutionary new technology from Mesopotamia.

And black obsidian from Ethiopia.

It's a powerful symbol of the wealth of ancient Egypt and the value of trade.

Gold made Egypt a powerful trading nation.

but it also enabled them to make some of the most beautiful things we've ever

seen.

Gold allows Egypt to enter a golden age.

Across the Mediterranean, another ancient power isn't quite so lucky.

and must find a different route to riches.

Greece is ruled by the Mythenians.

Based on the mainland, their territory stretches out across the island

into modern -day Turkey.

They have natural resources of their own.

Olives, wine, and wood.

But, unlike the Egyptians, they haven't yet discovered a wealth of valuable

metals in their homelands.

With few precious goods to trade, how can they make money?

In their search for an answer, they turn to the place they know best.

The sea.

Three and a half thousand years ago, a ship is sailing across the

It's a single -masted cargo vessel, 15 meters long and 5 meters wide.

It's very interesting.

We know everything about Mediterranean from that ship.

There are at least two Mycenaeans on board.

We know this because we found some personal artifacts, which are two

swords and some Mycenaean pottery.

And we all know that Mycenaeans, they are big seafarers.

The ship is carrying precious luxuries, including exotic blue -colored glass,

alongside rare and valuable hippopotamus and elephant tusks,

some fashioned into precious objects.

There are some cosmetic boxes made from ivory.

These dark -shaped boxes.

It's a very interesting piece.

And it's very beautiful.

There are also prized ostrich shells, along with fine weaponry,

intricate pottery, and gold jewelry.

The Mycenaeans on board are escorting these goods from port to port.

Over thin deals and bringing wealth back to their homeland.

But it's not just exotic items this ship is carrying.

They were carrying copper and tin ingots to western parts of the world.

They are the ingredients to making bronze. So it's very important. If you

have copper or tin ingots, you can't make bronze.

There were hundreds of amphoras on the ship.

They were carrying mostly olives and some wines.

So it's a very huge cargo.

Transporting 20 tons of goods worth a small fortune.

This ship is crisscrossing the whole Mediterranean.

They are trading with each other.

They are taking copper from Cyprus, from Syria,

and tin from Iran or Afghanistan.

And they were carrying to western parts of the world, mostly Aegean.

It's an import -export business that enriches everyone involved.

But it's also risky.

Sailing just off the Turkish coast, this treasure -filled ship sinks

and spills its cargo across the

sea floor.

The Greeks on board don't survive to enjoy their profits, but many others do.

Bringing exotic luxuries back to Mycenae, making themselves a

fortune, and creating the richest kingdom in this

corner of the ancient world.

The Greeks used their mastery of the thieves to broker deals and to build

ancient power.

Nearby, Rome's enormous empire gives it an advantage in the world of

international trade.

Just over seven centuries after the city was founded, Rome's first emperor,

Augustus, takes control.

He rules a vast state that stretches from Gaul's west coast all the

way to the Syrian border in the east.

Almost three million square kilometers.

Home to more than 50 million people.

This avaricious empire is getting rich by taxing everyone and

everything it now controls.

And the citizens of its capital city are consuming all the bounty of its

territory.

So this is Monte Tathachio.

You could mistake it for one of Rome's many hills.

But there's one major difference.

This hill is not natural.

When you visit a site like here, you can't help but appreciate the volume of

goods coming into Rome.

Tons and tons of goods every single day.

Towering 54 meters high and covering over 20 ,000 square meters,

this mound is a massive Roman rubbish dump.

It's entirely made up of clay fragments, pieces of amphora,

the trading pots of the ancient world, all used for just one

product.

Olive oil.

Olive oil seeps into the clay and it becomes rancid. You don't want to reuse

this. What you do is you discard it. You put it away somewhere. And this is our

hill for the discarded amphora.

The Romans are getting through 7 million liters of oil every year.

All imported from far beyond their city.

We know these amphora came from southern Spain.

Southern Spain was crucial for the olive oil supply in Rome.

Rome's million -plus inhabitants are super consumers.

Alongside the Spanish olive oil, they're eating grain from Egypt.

drinking wine from Gaul and Greece.

They're using timber, marble, tin, glass, leather, and

much more besides.

Rome is a monster devouring everything it can get its teeth into.

But this greed is a problem.

How can the Romans transport all these goods into their growing city without a

solution?

They will go hungry.

In 42 CE, this city puts its faith in an

ambitious plan.

A building project like no other.

25 kilometers away on the coast, they begin construction on a gateway to

their vast empire that grows and expands over 60 years.

This is Portus, a mega harbor.

And at its heart,

A massive hexagonal dock.

Today it looked like a nature preserve here.

2 ,000 years ago, it would have been incredibly different.

The level of engineering...

here can barely be appreciated.

Built of waterproof concrete, a Roman innovation, this vast

port holds 350 ships all at once.

Enormous buildings.

The warehouses that lined the six sides.

This was a massive, massive endeavor.

Every day, ships from all over the empire offload goods onto its dockside.

But this harbor only solves part of Rome's import problem.

Because shifting this vast quantity of goods, demands a distribution network of

the same enormous scale.

So the Romans keep on building.

At 150 hectares, Ostia is the largest remaining Roman site

anywhere in the world.

This entire city was built for one purpose, and that was to serve the poor.

This is a monument to the Roman economy.

Ship owners, traders, tax inspectors, warehouse and dock workers

make this bustling city their home.

30 ,000 people who all play their part in making Rome rich.

We have a large plaza around us.

On three sides, 61 rooms frame it.

And we would have no idea about the function of these rooms if not for these

mosaics.

These mosaics.

act as hoardings for the huge variety of goods traded here.

Ears of wheat indicate imported grain.

An elephant, ivory or exotic animals.

And ships in the lighthouse, timber for boats.

At the height of Ostia, this would have been similar to a Wall Street.

All these deals being made, yelling, money exchanging hands, goods exchanging

hands, all sorts of things to continue this ongoing trade. It's so

necessary to supply Rome, to feed Rome, and this is really the business end.

This is where it happens.

If we could have been the city in its heyday,

I think we would have been stunned at the grandiosity of it.

The Roman Empire grows wealthy off the back of its vast territory.

But far to the east...

Another ancient power is producing something that will change ancient trade

forever.

The Han Dynasty have ruled for over a century.

Their vast territory and abundant landscape provides copper, gold,

and everything else they require.

They have little need to trade beyond their borders.

But these riches are a target for nomadic horsemen, who constantly raid

territory.

The Great Wall is being constructed to defend their land, but the Hand's

Emperor, Wu, wants to go on the attack.

The problem is, he can't do this alone.

The Emperor needs allies, and sends his diplomats west to find them.

But they face a grueling and dangerous journey, thousands of kilometers across

the vast Gobi Desert.

What they need is a safe route and accommodation along the way.

So Wu orders the construction of over 80 post houses.

It's an important will.

It's a 50m x 50m square courtyard.

To the north is its office area.

To the bottom is its accommodation area.

There is a corner on both sides.

These post houses stretch along the route from the Han's capital all the way

their western border, 1 ,700 kilometers away.

Wu now has a diplomatic path to the edge of his empire.

But these diplomatic routes also bring other unexpected

visitors.

Traders carrying exotic goods from the West.

Emperor Wu has unknowingly opened the door to a vast new market, and

the Chinese have something very special to trade.

To grow, these caterpillars eat their way through mulberry leaves.

But to transform into moths, they spin cocoons around themselves.

For millennia, the people here have carefully unwound these filaments to

them into the world's strongest natural fabric, silk.

Its production has always been a cottage industry, but now the Han

industrialized it, making more and

better silk than ever before.

Organic and delicate very little ancient silk survives.

But one remarkable treasure trove still exists.

thanks to a unique burial.

In 168 BCE,

Xin Jue, a Chinese noblewoman, dies.

She is buried within four nested coffins.

These are covered with five tons of charcoal and sealed with clay.

This airtight tomb miraculously preserves a stunning collection.

Some of the most intricate silk ever created.

In the ancient world, Xinzhui's silk dresses are unparalleled in

workmanship.

and even today are almost impossible to recreate.

The masterful hand -silk makers weave an amazing 120 threads per

centimetre.

in a technique called Suqin Xiao Luo.

Hand silk is beautiful and practical.

It's also wildly expensive.

Over 3 ,000 cocoons are needed to produce one kilo of fiber, and hours of

painstaking labor to transform that fiber into fabric, making it

the ultimate luxury item of the ancient world.

And because it weighs just a few grams per square meter, it's also perfectly

suited to long -distance trade.

The hand pack their silk onto the backs of camels and send it out on their

brand new trade route.

The precious cargo heads west for over 8 ,000 kilometers,

far beyond hand territory, through Central

Asia, the Middle East, all the way to Europe.

China's prized fabric gives its name to this vast network.

The silk roads.

And when this luxury fabric reaches the eternal city, the Romans go

crazy for it.

At one point, paying over $100 ,000 worth of gold for just one

kilogram, the hands monopoly over silk production

catapults them.

to prime position in the world of ancient trade.

A winning combination of the perfect product and a new trade

network brings the Chinese huge wealth.

To the south, India is also looking to cash in on lucrative Mediterranean

markets.

Several kingdoms rule the Indian subcontinent.

There are sporadic skirmishes, but life is relatively peaceful.

They have a wealth of natural resources, staples like fish, rife, and

timber, and luxuries like ivory and perfume.

But one everyday product stands proud and defines their culture.

It's early morning here in Empress Market.

And the air is filled with amazing aroma of spices.

The treasures of India.

In ancient times, India used to grow a lot of spices like nutmeg, cloves,

cinnamon, ginger, not just for their flavor, but also for the medicinal

and offerings to God because they were sold special.

They're so important for Indian culture that one cannot sum up their benefits in

just one line or one paragraph.

Readily available within India.

For the rest of the world, spices are a rare luxury.

For thousands of years, small quantities have been trickling out of India along

the local coastline.

But now, resourceful traders have expanded their market, using the new

roads to carry spices to the east and west.

The problem is that these land routes are slow, and spices have a shelf life.

The Indians need a faster way to get them to market.

months or maybe years to get there.

So they had to come up with some alternate way and that's when they

looking towards the ocean or the sea.

But the sea routes here are dangerous.

The waters around Indian subcontinent, they have quite a character of their

It can be very tricky because of the winds and the harsh weather and

monsoon.

Monsoon is unforgiving, it's treacherous.

It makes it almost impossible to navigate.

Even today, sailing these tricky waters around modern -day Pakistan,

requires expert local knowledge.

Path down from ancient Ancestors.

Sailors here.

are massive at navigating these wild fiends, tracking the monsoon winds like

clockwork, using them to sail rapidly across the Indian Ocean to North Africa

and Arabia.

But only a handful of boats are successfully making this journey, so

desperately limited.

However, as legend has it, one sailor's misfortune

There is the very famous story of this Indian sailor.

There was a shipwreck near Egypt and only one sailor survived.

He was rescued by the Greek soldiers living in Egypt at that time.

The stranded sailor is desperate to get home.

In exchange for a lift, he offers up his navigational expertise.

They let him lead the way. He takes them on a journey that previously used to

take months or even years.

But the Indian sailor was able to navigate them within few weeks.

He opened India to the rest of the world, and he opened the world to India.

Now the fast routes into India are known.

Western traders set a course for the heart of the spice trade.

Traders from all over the world started coming in and Indian subcontinent became

a bustling economic zone.

Something that was previously important only locally became important and

significant for the entire world.

As rich Romans and Greeks rushed to get their hands on spices,

They pay for them with cold, hard cash.

A lot of Roman gold coins started coming in Indian subcontinent and they were

being traded in exchange of these spices.

And black pepper became so popular that it drained Rome of its gold reserves and

they started calling it black bone.

India has hit the jackpot.

Spices make it rich.

Each ancient power finds their own way to succeed in global trade and make some

money.

Egypt unearths its most precious resource, using it to secure a golden

age.

The Greeks use their skills as sailors to profit from international deals.

Rome taxes its military conquests and then builds massive infrastructure to

bring this wealth home.

While India and China hold monopolies on uniquely precious products

and send them out across the world.

The ancient world is now interconnected and getting richer.

Next, our ancient powers face their toughest challenge yet.

defending their wealth from everyone else.