Caesar winters his army in Gaul near the Italian border while his enemies in Rome fear that he will do something no Roman General has done: cross the Rubicon with his army. To counter-balance his opponents, Caesar puts his friend Mark Antony up for office as the people's Consul. Vorenus and Pullo accompany Mark Antony and Octavian to Rome. For Pullo, it's an opportunity to get drunk and ravish every woman in sight.

Cicero is finally undone by his duplicity in the form of Titus Pullo, acting upon Octavian's request to assassinate all supporters of Brutus in Rome. Pullo and Vorenus enjoy a happy if counterfeit outing with their families in the countryside to hide their assassin mission.
Vorena the Elder's dangerous dalliance with one of Mimeo's men continues, and the torrid affair between Octavia and Agrippa escalates. Atia's casual cruelty to ask for the assassination of people she doesn't like results in complete disaster for Octavia's friend Jocasta.

Seven years have passed since Antony's departure from Rome, and the former commander, dissipated and debauched - held in thrall by the charms and sexual prowess of his new bride, Cleopatra, withholds precious shipments of grain from Rome, where people die in the streets from hunger.
Unable to incite a war with Antony and Egypt without committing political suicide, Octavian sends Atia and Octavia to Alexandria to mediate and reason with Antony; a strategy which proves predictably unsuccessful.

New York City, September 11, 2001. The morning everything changed.102 minutes passed between the first plane's impact into One World Trade Center, the second plane's attack on Two World Trade Center, and the eventual collapse of both buildings. In that time, people around New York experienced a range of emotions. Despite the horror and the incomprehensibility of what was happening, many knew, somehow, that they had a unique responsibility to record what they saw. They reached for their cameras.
This unprecedented documentary special joins hundreds of pieces of their footage and audiotape into a single, seamless historical record. It is an intensely personal perspective of the tragedy, communicating for the first time that morning s events, as they were experienced by people around New York. It is an evocative, authentic and reverential memorial to one of the most cataclysmic events in world history.

Richard Rudgley goes in search of evidence of the barbarians of the dark ages, people whose names have for 1500 years been bywords for mindless brutality. The real truth about the barbarians who marched across Europe during the Dark Ages is more shocking than what you may know. Where did they come from? Who are their descendants? Are any of their techniques and inventions still used? Richard discovers the secrets of forgotten empires, and of mighty clashes throughout Europe. The art, society and cultural legacy of the barbarians are shown to have shaped and moulded the destiny of Europe even more than the Roman Empire.
In the first part of the journey through the Dark Ages we will be tracing the legacies of the Huns, Vandals and Goths, to ask whether the 'dark ages' represent a resurfacing of much older tribal lines. Sites in Austria show how sophisticated pre-Roman communities had become with evidence of stunning craftsmanship and sophisticated farming techniques which defy the image of a mindless rabble we have come to accept without challenge.

On the second part of his journey through the dark ages Richard Rudgley continues into the age of the wandering peoples, the Volkerwanderung. These Northern people enjoyed a golden age unaffected by Rome and just 30 years after the Romans relinquished Britain, the 'Anglo-Saxons' made their move. The bedraggled legions are in retreat. Walls are pulled down. Mosaics shattered. And yet there never was a people called Anglo-Saxon. We look at the lasting influence of Saxon leaders like Alfred the Great, and his blue print for social justice.