No togas today please. Natalie celebrates the mid-winter festival of Ancient Rome, Saturnalia. According to Catullus, it's the 'best of days'. Expect cross-dressing, sweets, drinking games and the wearing of special pyjamas. Oh and anarchy and jokes. Sounds a bit like a Christmas pantomime? Not surprising, according to veteran pantomime dame André Vincent, who traces the origins of panto back to the fifth century. Early in that same century - late antiquity - a Roman Christian named Macrobius wrote the most comprehensive extant guide to Saturnalia, which was celebrated in some places, in one way or another, until possibly the eleventh century.You are invited to be part of this festive show which includes gifts for the entire Radio Theatre audience (cue noisy rustling of sweet bags) and the wearing of traditional Saturnalian pointy hats (the 'pileus') to celebrate. Even Professor Llewelyn Morgan has one. Honest.Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery
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27:30
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27:30
Tacitus
Tacitus is the great historian of imperial Rome. His writing is beautiful, unsettling, extraordinarily persuasive. We know many of his likes and dislikes about people and politics, but facts about his personal life? Not so much. His memoir of Agricola tells us much fascinating detail about Roman Britain: that it's an island (the Roman fleet sailed all the way round, just to check), that it's very close to Spain (with only Ireland in between); that invading Anglesey was a great victory for the Romans. He notes that it rains a lot, but omits to mention the Druids. He is also, he says, dedicated to writing impartially. Natalie may disagree. Who needs evidence when you have Tacitus' persuasive prose? It's not as if we can cross-check, because so little of the written record of the time survives to us. Natalie's guest, (modern) historian Dan Snow, finds this hard to fathom. Her other guest, Professor Llewelyn Morgan, knows it's unwise to lament the lost work. We should value what remains and hope that some new bits of Tacitus may appear in the future. And it turns out that by boat, Britain IS actually close to Spain. Travelling overland was hard going in Tacitus' day, so compared to that, the sea journey to Spain was easy.'Rock star mythologist’ and reformed stand-up Natalie Haynes is obsessed with the ancient world. Here she explores key stories from ancient Rome and Greece that still have resonance today. They might be biographical, topographical, mythological or epic, but they are always hilarious, magical and tragic, mystifying and revelatory. And they tell us more about ourselves now than seems possible of stories from a couple of thousand years ago.Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery
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27:31
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27:31
Aesop
Aesop is probably the most famous author from antiquity, judging by the ongoing sales of his fables about animals. It should be easy to do a show about him, thinks Natalie. But it turns out that everything we know, or think we know about Aesop, is contradicted somewhere. He may have been Thracian, Phrygian or Ethiopian; mute - or talkative; clever, provoking and possibly blasphemous. It's a complicated story, and fables aren't even a Greek invention. With guests Edith Hall and Adam Rutherford, Natalie also takes advice from comedian Al Murray.'Rock star mythologist’ and reformed stand-up Natalie Haynes is obsessed with the ancient world. Here she explores key stories from ancient Rome and Greece that still have resonance today. They might be biographical, topographical, mythological or epic, but they are always hilarious, magical and tragic, mystifying and revelatory. And they tell us more about ourselves now than seems possible of stories from a couple of thousand years ago.Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery
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27:42
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27:42
Artemis
Natalie stands up for the goddess Artemis. She's a predator, a hunter, an archer. Goddess of wild creatures, the moon to her brother Apollo's sun, she's not averse to the odd human sacrifice. And if you forget her in your prayers, she's liable to send a really big pig to dig up your orchards.'Rock star mythologist’ and reformed stand-up Natalie Haynes is obsessed with the ancient world. Here she explores key stories from ancient Rome and Greece that still have resonance today. They might be biographical, topographical, mythological or epic, but they are always hilarious, magical and tragic, mystifying and revelatory. And they tell us more about ourselves now than seems possible of stories from a couple of thousand years ago.Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery
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27:42
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27:42
Aphrodite
The Greek goddess of love, sex, desire and beauty, Aphrodite is mostly depicted naked and/or wet. And depending on your age and taste, that could be by Botticelli, Bananarama or Lady Gaga. Born from the sea foam, you can still visit her rock in Cyprus, where there's always a crowd of tourists. No one is immune to her charms, says Hesiod. In fact we can all learn from Aphrodite's stress-busting strategy: when something annoying or stressful happens, she goes to Cyprus - for a bath.'Rock star mythologist’ and reformed stand-up Natalie Haynes is obsessed with the ancient world. Here she explores key stories from ancient Rome and Greece that still have resonance today. They might be biographical, topographical, mythological or epic, but they are always hilarious, magical and tragic, mystifying and revelatory. And they tell us more about ourselves now than seems possible of stories from a couple of thousand years ago.Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery
UK