This week's TV and radio: Filthy Cities, The Victorians and more

Submitted by mattelton

Wed, 2011-01-12 09:29

This week's
TV & radio
5 – 12 April

Pick of the week

Filthy Cities

Tuesday 5 April, 9pm BBC Two

What was life like in medieval London? As Dan Snow discovers, it wasn't a place for those who can't take robust smells. Snow reveals a world where people didn't wash, where rubbish was dumped in the street to mingle with animal excrement and remans, the contents of chamber pots and blood left by barber-surgeons, and where the Thames and its tributaries were basically open sewers. Although this doesn't reflect well on our ancestors, Snow says: "They absolutely strove to do things about it."

➘ Also this week The Victorians

Wednesday 6 April, 10pm BBC Two

A welcome rerun of the series in which Jeremy Paxman uses 19th-century paintings to explore the urban lives of our ancestors in Victorian Britain, starting with the Industrial Revolution and the squalor of London's East End.

Who Do You Think You Are?

Sunday 10 April, 8pm Watch

From one Jeremy to another, as motormouth Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson explores his family tree in an episode first broadcast in the very first series back in 2004.

Making History

Tuesday 12 April, 3pm BBC Radio 4

Helen Castor presents Radio 4's popular history programme in which listeners' questions and research help offer new insights into the past.

Catch up online Look Up Your Genes

Available online via BBC iPlayer until Sunday, 10 April

There's a chance to catch up with an instalment of the popular Welsh radio genealogy series online this week, as Charlotte Evans and Cat Whiteaway learn about an ambitious family history and heritage centre in Ebbw Vale.

Words | Matt Elton and Jonathan Wright

WDYTYA: Forum