Ancient Egypt by Train - First Season

I'm Alice Roberts, and I'm on an adventure

to look at the world's oldest and greatest civilisation.

I'm going to be travelling the length and breadth of Egypt by train

to discover its ancient past.

I want to understand how the tombs, temples and pyramids came to be made,

and dig even deeper,

to understand what life was like for the ordinary people that made them.

Along the way, I'll be meeting archaeologists

who are still working to uncover the story of ancient Egypt.

I'll be looking at some familiar sites,

but also learning about brand-new discoveries.

In the first part of my journey,

I'll be looking at how Egypt was transformed

under the Greeks and Romans.

Look at this!

And this one here, as you can see...

Isn't it beautiful?

Look at those colours!

I learn about the slave soldier

who created the most beautiful fort...

So we're looking out here from the battlements, over the harbour,

and you suddenly realise what a prime position

this citadel is in.

..and I meet the archaeologist who believes she can solve

one of the biggest mysteries in the world -

finding the tomb of Cleopatra.

Welcome to the underworld.

Just incredible that it's only emerged in the last few years.

..as I travel ancient Egypt by train.

Ah, coffee!

Is this right? Coffee?

Coffee.

I think my train's coming soon.

This is good coffee.

It's thicker than the coffee I have at home,

sweeter than the coffee I have at home,

but it's just the ticket today.

It's my first time here,

and it's nice to see that train stations around the world

are more or less the same,

from coffee vendors,

to reflecting the hustle and bustle of a nation's daily life.

I have always dreamt of coming to Egypt,

especially after reading so much about it since childhood.

Until now, I've only encountered Egypt in books,

like Amelia Edwards' journey up the Nile,

and in museums,

but now I'm here, to see it for myself,

to immerse myself in the ancient history and culture of this country.

I'm going to see the Sphinx, the pyramids,

the temple at Karnak, of course,

but I'm also going off the beaten track to find new discoveries

and talk to the people who are still uncovering the secrets

of ancient Egypt.

And I'm travelling across this epic country by train.

Over 4,000 miles of railways

stretch the full length of Egypt,

mostly following the Nile.

I'm starting by travelling to Alexandria,

from the airport in Cairo,

a journey of 140 miles

towards the Mediterranean coast.

Alexandria is linked to some of the most famous names

from our history books -

Alexander the Great, Mark Antony and Cleopatra.

For a time, it was the world's biggest and most important city.

With its university, and the Great Library of Alexandria,

it was a centre of learning,

and it also had one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World,

the Lighthouse of Alexandria.

The library and the lighthouse are long gone,

both lost to time.

And I'm finally here in Alexandria,

which is the perfect place to begin.

It is the gateway into Egypt,

an immense, famous port city,

founded by Alexander the Great,

bearing his name in the 4th century BCE,

and it became the capital of Egypt.

Today, it's absolutely vast.

It's home to 5.5 million people,

it's incredibly busy.

It stretches along 25 miles of the northern Egyptian coastline.

But I'm here to find out all about ancient Alexandria.

The seafront promenade, known here as the Corniche,

is where locals come to relax,

and simply to enjoy the views of their beautiful city.

What better way to take in the sights and sounds of a place

that's completely new to me

than by exploring on foot?

You get a feel for the history of Alexandria, just walking around.

There's some fantastic architecture.

You get really modern buildings

rubbing shoulders with edifices like this from a century or two ago,

and then here,

we've got the Morsi Abu al-Abbas mosque,

absolutely stunning, dating back to the 14th century.

There are two separate mosques here,

one for women...

..and a larger one, for men.

But it seems I'm allowed to at least LOOK inside the men's mosque.

Head scarf on.

Shoes off.

Shoes here. Thank you.

A stone's throw away from the seafront,

the mosque is a relatively recent addition,

being only 700 years old.

Its doors and window frames are made from teak and walnut.

The decorated ceiling contains an octagonal skylight,

called a Shokhsheikha.

This mosque is a classic example of Islamic design,

which flourished in Egypt,

after the Muslim conquest of the 7th century.

A much later addition to Alexandria is the tram.

With the roads heaving with traffic,

the tram is how many locals prefer to travel...

..especially the city's vast population of students.

There are 20 lines and 140 stops crammed into the city centre...

..and my first stop is around the corner from a special place,

called Kom el-Dikka.

Kom el-Dikka is the biggest and most spectacular

archaeological site in Alexandria.

Nice to meet you.

The director of the site is Mahmoud Abd El Rahman.

Good morning.

So this excavation has been going on since the 1960s?

From 1960 until now.

Every year? Every year.

It was found by chance in the 1960s,

when city developers planned to build new apartment blocks.

But a couple of thousand years earlier, in Roman Alexandria,

people were coming here for learning and leisure.

I'm keen to find out more about what Egyptian life was like

under the rule of the Romans,

starting with what looks like a small theatre.

This seems like quite a narrow theatre.

Yes, a small one. Yeah.

Yes. Actually, it's not a theatre.

Actually, it was odeum,

for listening for the music in the ancient time.

OK.

And all of this covered with a huge bulb,

covering the place here.

A dome? Yes, a huge dome.

Yeah. For the echo sound,

so, collecting the sound and reflecting for the people.

And over 2,000 years later,

I can experience the same acoustic effect

as the musicians of Roman Alexandria.

So, echo sound, and you can try it here.

OK.

So I'm going to stand on this spot...

..and then speak to the room.

That's extraordinary. Yes.

I can hear my voice echoing back to me.

Yes. That's so peculiar, isn't it?

My voice changes completely.

I'm... I'm hearing myself very, very differently now.

I feel like I'm in a... in a bubble.

In an echo chamber, in fact. Yes.

And then, presumably, my voice is carrying up to the highest seats

up there as well.

I'd like to give lectures in a place like this.

This would be wonderful.

I'm in Alexandria,

at a site that was earmarked for some new apartments,

but then they discovered spectacular Roman remains,

and rather than being turned into apartment blocks,

the site has become an open-air museum.

There's an odeon for live music,

and just alongside it, what Mahmud, the site director, believes

was part of the famous University of Alexandria itself.

Also, we have this university,

magnificent, 22 classrooms.

In the ancient time,

it's a place for the professor and a place for the audience.

Can you and I walk on there?

We can walk in there.

Now, if I could just transport myself back in time

by around 2,000 years...

OK. I'm going to be the professor.

I would be here? Yes, and the students coming here.

Yeah.

So here I am, Professor Alice Roberts...

Yes. ..talking...

To the students. ..to my Byzantine students.

Yes, for philosophy, maybe, or chemistry or something like this.

Lecturing them, presumably, in Greek? That was the scholarly language.

In, uh, with Late Greek.

Now we can going down, under the ground.

It's magnificent architecture.

In the ancient time,

we cannot see what's happening under the ground

for the slaves and the people.

Yeah. But it's a hypocaust system.

The Romans also brought underfloor heating to Egypt,

a system called a hypocaust,

where slaves, working beneath street level,

would stoke furnaces to heat the bath house above.

Here we are, besides the hypocaust system,