Travel to China to explore the roots of modern agricultural genius, where we will learn why these inventions were developed and how they have contributed to society today. Host Michael Guillen shows how the ancient Chinese invented advanced farming technology. He explains how the early planting tools: the hoe, the wheelbarrow, and the cast iron guan plow revolutionized agriculture. We see a model of the Chinese seed drill which multiplied planting efficiency by a factor of ten and visit the Dujiangyan Irrigation Project which was engineered to control floods and irrigate farmland 22 centuries ago.

The state of the art in high-rise living, New York City's Time Warner Center features all the amenities: a health club, restaurants, dry cleaners, top notch security, and citywide views. But high-rise, high-density living isn't new. Romans were living in high-rise apartments 2,000 years ago. Host Michael Guillen travels to Rome and its ancient seaport of Ostia where a number of them still exist. He illustrates many similarities we share with the ancient Romans including health clubs and dry cleaners. Food of all kinds was available at restaurants called thermopelia. As for the apartment complexes, some were as high as seven stories, but building with un-reinforced concrete limited their height. We travel to Bath, England for an appreciation of the brilliantly designed Roman baths. Michael shows how ancient dry cleaners, known as fullers, cleaned garments with human waste. And the Los Angeles Fire Department helps demonstrate the Roman fire pump.

Travel to the heart of the Roman Empire to examine its remarkable civil engineering project that resulted in a 53-thousand mile network of highways. Host Michael Guillen takes us on a chariot ride through ancient Rome and discovers that many of the highway amenities that we imagine as modern developments date back over 2,000 years. It's an amazing look at a travel network where so little has changed after so many years.

Modern warships, cargo, and container ships are the cutting edge of maritime technology. But 2,500 years ago, no one dominated shipbuilding like the Greeks. We travel to Greece for a firsthand look at how their maritime expertise evolved. We examine a reproduction of the Greek warship called a trireme. A 3D CGI reproduction captures the grandeur of the gigantic cargo ship the Syracusia. Host Michael Guillen demonstrates an Archimedean Screw--designed to pump water out of a ship's hold. He also demonstrates Archimedes' most famous discovery: the principle of buoyancy, a key component in any shipbuilding process. In England, we investigate the Antikythera device. After decades of study, historians have concluded that it was actually a celestial computer that tracked the movement of the Sun, Moon, Mars, Venus, Mercury, and a handful of stars. And on the Greek island Kalymnos, we learn how sponge diving evolved into the lucrative business of salvage diving.

Today's modern armies employ missiles, machine guns, smart weapons, and clever strategies to use on the battlefield. These weapons may seem like cutting edge technology, but the ancient Chinese invented these weapons--in some cases thousands of years ago. Host Michael Guillen will demonstrate how the ancient Chinese repeating crossbow was a clear precursor to the machine gun, and we'll see how, more than a thousand years earlier, the Chinese invented a weapon that rivaled the European cannon. Explore how ancient Chinese armies developed battlefield strategies that shape how we go to war today.

Iconic structures are apparent: the Empire State Building, St. Louis Arch, Space Needle, and Statue of Liberty. But their roots go back over 5,000 years to ancient Egypt. Entry to a glorious afterlife and worship of the gods led Egyptians to build some of the world's most impressive structures. We travel to Egypt to see how such monumental masterpieces as the Great Pyramid, Temple of Karnak, Sphinx, and the obelisks were built using only primitive tools and brute labor. Host Michael Guillen demonstrates how ancient Egyptians might have leveled 13 acres of ground to within two inches before building the pyramids. He offers an explanation as to how a 100-foot-long obelisk made of a single slab of granite was raised. And he commissions an engineering study to determine what the Great Pyramid would cost to build today.

Surgeries, amputations, prescription medicine, fertility, and contraception...all the things we associate with the practice of modern medicine were actually introduced by the ancient Egyptians more than 5,000 years ago. Host Michael Guillen takes us to the temple of Kom Ombo where surgical instruments dating back to 2,500 BC can be plainly seen, carved on the temple wall. He conducts an experiment comparing the sharpness of ancient obsidian scalpels to modern, surgical steel ones. Watch as we test the accuracy of an ancient Egyptian pregnancy test. The picture that emerges is one of amazing medical treatments being practiced by an ancient civilization without any knowledge of germs or bacteria.

Travel to the Yucatan and Guatemala to explore how the Maya were able to build the city of Tikal without metal tools or beasts of burden. It had monumental masonry temples, lavish sports stadiums, and palaces all connected by an elaborate system of paved roads. Host Michael Guillen demonstrates the tools used by the Maya to carve limestone, he shows how they made cement and built roads that still exist today, and he examines the mysterious acoustical phenomena in the ball court and pyramid at Tikal. Journey up the Usumacinta River to the ancient city of Yaxchilan to explore the remains of what some believe to be the largest suspension bridge ever built until the 14th Century.