There's a school of thought out there that, following the fall of the Roman Empire around Europe, there's a decline in knowledge, technologies, and economics. But is this true? Greg Jenner and his guests look at a range of discoveries spanning a thousand of years, widely known as the Medieval period. How was knowledge and scientific findings shared across a world with its countless languages and regions before the internet? Looking at essential scholars of the time like Ibn Al Hytham, the 'father of modern optics', and the evolution of compasses and maps, this episode picks up some of the weird and wonderful advancements of the period that we still use today - Medieval Science. Greg is joined by Dr Seb Falk, a historian of Medieval Science, an expert on astronomy and mathematics and the author of the book The Light Ages, which was voted Book of the Year 2020 by the The Times and The Telegraph. Alongside Dr Falk, we have the multi-award-winning comedian, writer, podcaster and filmmaker, Josie Long, who has alsp appeared on 8 Out Of 10 Cats, Have I Got News For You and House of Games. Research - Rosanna Evans Script- Emma Nagouse, Rosanna Evans and Gregg Jenner Project Manager - Siefe Miyo Edit Producer - Cornelius Mendez The Athletic production for BBC Radio 4
My name's Joe Wilkinson and I've managed to force Patrick Bamford to come on a podcast with me and he's gonna slowly fall in love with me.
Do you go to the tip?
Believe it or not, yeah, I do.
Do you go to the supermarket?
No.
You know when all the shirts started getting tight on the players and they started selling them like that to the general public?
Yeah, yeah.
And everyone looked like sausages.
My mate's a footballer with me, Patrick Bamford and Joe Wilkinson.
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Hello and welcome to you're dead to me, a BBC Radio four comedy podcast that takes history seriously.
My name is Greg Jenner.
I'm a public historian, author and broadcaster.
I'm the chief nerd on the funny kids show.
Horrible histories.
Today, we are packing our sundials, star maps and astrolabes as we travel back many centuries to learn all about medieval science.
And to do that, I'm joined by two very special guests in history corner.
He's a historian of medieval science and is an expert in the history of astronomy, navigation and mathematics.
He teaches at the University of Cambridge and his fascinating book, the Light Ages, was a Times and telegraph book of the year in 2020.