Dr. Steven Mithen joins me to discuss his many books, including The Language Puzzle, The Singing Neanderthal, After the Ice, and The Prehistory of the Mind. The discussion ranges from the origins of civilization, to the key features of human behavioral modernity, to the role of language in the making of the human mind.

Tristan Hughes is the host of the podcast The Ancients, a presenter and producer for History Hit, and author of The Perdiccas Years, 323-320 BC: Alexander's Successors at War. We discuss his book, which covers the tumultuous events of the first War of the Diadochi. 

Dr. Johnston is an expert in the archaeology of ancient Ireland, and is particularly known for her work excavating Dun Ailinne, one of the most important ceremonial centers of the Irish Iron Age, a period still shrouded in mystery. We discuss her excavations at Dun Aillinne, and some of the big questions about this time period as a whole. 

In this interview, international filmmaker and explorer Trevor Wallace tells me about the Menorca Shipwreck Project, an ongoing excavation of a series of shipwrecks in the Balearic Islands of Spain.

In this conversation, we focus on one research topic: the Dene Transition, a pivotal moment of change more than a thousand years ago, when people speaking Na-Dene languages, such as the modern Navajo and Comanche migrated out of Alaska, the Yukon, and British Columbia, eventually settling as far south as the border of Mexico. 

Yale classicist Kirk Freudenburg discusses the epic poems of the ancient world. From the Iliad to the Aeneid. 

In this episode, I speak with Dr. Gino Caspari, an Explorers Club fellow and expert in the archaeology of the ancient Eurasian Steppe. Gino uses satellite imagery, LiDAR, and other forms of remote sensing paired with ambitious field surveys to discover new ancient sites. Check him out on Instagram @ginocaspari

Art historian Dr. Wei-Cheng Lin and I discuss the arrival of Buddhism in ancient and early medieval China. We track the emergence of a major sacred site called Mount Wutai, discuss the symbolism of the mountains in Chinese history, and much more. 

Dr. Morag Kersel and I discuss the ethics of archaeology, including the challenges posed by looting, the illegal antiquities trade, and the curation crisis. We focus on these issues in Israel, Jordan, and Palestine, through the lens of Dr. Kersel's archaeological and ethnographic research.