Ancient Greek & Roman Medicine
You're Dead to Me
BBC
4.7 • 11.8K Ratings
🗓️ 5 February 2021
⏱️ 57 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Greg Jenner is joined by historian Dr Kristi Upson-Saia and comedian Stu Goldsmith to explore the strange world of Ancient Greek and Roman medicine.
Welcome to a world where health was fleeting, water could be dangerous and communal bum sponges are all the rage. The team will take you through a variety of common ailments from tight atoms to wandering wombs and provide startling cures in the form of electric eels and beaver anuses.
Produced by Cornelius Mendez Script by Greg Jenner and Emma Nagouse Research by Hannah MacKenzie
The Athletic production for BBC Radio 4
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hi, Greg here. I just want to let you know that my other podcast, Home School History, |
| 0:04.4 | is back for a second series. We'll have episodes on the Great Fire of London, William Shakespeare, |
| 0:09.9 | Ancient Egyptian Religion, and many other things. So if you fancy hearing some short fun |
| 0:14.3 | history lessons which are suitable for children and families, then head over to Home School History |
| 0:19.1 | on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:20.1 | Hello and welcome to your DentalMe, a history podcast for everyone. For people who don't like |
| 0:30.0 | history, people who do like history, and people who forgot to learn any art school. My name is Greg |
| 0:34.8 | Jenner. I'm a public historian author and broadcaster and I'm the chief third on the BBC |
| 0:38.6 | comedy show Horrible Histories. And you might have heard my other podcast, Home School History, |
| 0:42.3 | but that one's mostly for the kids. On this podcast, we treat you with a soothing |
| 0:46.5 | sound of two parts book learning and one part chuckles, because laughter is the best medicine. |
| 0:51.4 | Today we are grabbing our scalpel and four seps to journey back to Ancient Greece and Rome to |
| 0:56.4 | learn all about medicine and health care in the ancient classical world. And to help me diagnose |
| 1:01.6 | fact from fiction, I'm joined by two very special guests. In History Corner, she's a professor of |
| 1:07.2 | religious studies at Occidental College in LA and is an expert in religions of the late ancient |
| 1:11.9 | Mediterranean world, but more importantly, she's co-writing a fascinating new book on Ancient |
| 1:16.8 | Medicine. It's professor Christy Upsen-Saya. Hi Christy, how are you? Thank you for coming. |
| 1:21.1 | Hi, thanks for having me. Lovely to be here. And in Comedy Corner, he's a stand-up comic and the |
| 1:26.4 | host of one of my favourite podcasts, the comedians comedian plus, actually several other podcasts, |
| 1:30.4 | including Child Labour with Sinduvi and the Infinite Sofa. And of course, you'll know him from the Black |
| 1:36.1 | Bit episode and the Jack Shepherd episode is the returning hero, Stu Goldsmith. Hi Stu, how are you? I'm |
| 1:42.2 | fantastic and that's the only time I've ever been described as a returning hero and I would like to |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.