Archaeology and war
The Documentary Podcast
BBC
4.3 • 2.7K Ratings
🗓️ 31 January 2026
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A top Russian archaeologist is currently under arrest in Poland. Alexander Butyagin is waiting for courts to decide on a request from Ukraine for him to be extradited. He is a scholar at the Hermitage, Russia's largest art museum in St Petersburg, and has been digging in an ancient site in Crimea since 1999. Ukrainian authorities claim that he is criminally damaging and looting the site, making the most of Russian occupation, Butyagin himself denies all charges. It is a story that Grigor Atenesian of BBC Russian has been looking into.
The Kalbeliya community is a nomadic tribe from Rajasthan in India, known for its distinctive folk music and the Kalbeliya dance form. Traditionally, Kalbeliya families have led a nomadic life, though some have settled permanently over the years. They follow a type of Hinduism in which burial, rather than cremation, is a religious requirement after death. Community members say that even those who are settled often do not have legal access to land for burial, leaving families struggling to perform last rites. Ashay Yegde, who reports for the BBC in India, recently travelled to meet the Kalbeliya to hear their story.
AI-generated caricatures of middle-aged men decked out in street wear, clutching an iPhone have gone viral on social media in South Korea. They are being called 'Young 40s' by younger generations. Teasing of an older person is very unusual in South Korea, where age difference, even by a year, forms the basis of social hierarchy. But the Young 40 memes also represent Korean youth's growing scepticism of this reverence for elders. Hyojung Kim of BBC Korean has been looking into the internet phenomenon, and shares what it tells us about South Korean society today.
This episode of The Documentary comes to you from The Fifth Floor, the show at the heart of global storytelling, with BBC journalists from all around the world.
Presented by Faranak Amidi
Produced by Laura Thomas and Caroline Ferguson
(Photo: Faranak Amidi. Credit: Tricia Yourkevich.)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:06.0 | Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:13.8 | You're listening The Fifth Floor. |
| 0:17.6 | The Fifth Floor, you know you. |
| 0:20.0 | You're a bit of the fifth floor, Farnak Amidi, Sobeth. |
| 0:26.8 | This is the fifth floor at the heart of global storytelling |
| 0:31.2 | with BBC journalists from all around the world. |
| 0:35.0 | I'm your host, Faranak Amidi. |
| 0:41.5 | Thank you. from all around the world. I'm your host, Faranak Amidi. A top Russian archaeologist is currently under arrest in Poland. |
| 0:46.6 | Alexander Butiagen is awaiting a Polish court decision on a request from Ukraine for him to be extradited. |
| 0:54.2 | He's a scholar at the Hermitage, Russia's largest art museum in St. Petersburg, and has been |
| 1:00.1 | digging in an ancient site in Crimea since 1999. |
| 1:05.0 | Ukrainian authorities claim that he is criminally damaging and looting the site, making |
| 1:09.8 | the most of the Russian occupation. |
| 1:12.3 | Butiagen himself denies all charges. |
| 1:15.5 | It is a story that Gregor Atenician of BBC Russian has been looking into. |
| 1:20.4 | I first asked him to tell me more about this ancient Crimean site. |
| 1:24.7 | So the archaeological site is called Mirmikion, which is the name of the ancient |
| 1:29.3 | Greek city, which was founded there by colonies from what is now Turkey, but ancient Greeks in the |
| 1:35.7 | 6th century BC. So around the time when democracy was founded first in Athens. And so from then |
| 1:41.7 | on, there was for millennia, we can say, almost, there was this civilization, |
| 1:47.9 | which was first a Hellenistic ancient Greek kingdom, then became a part of the Byzantine Empire |
... |
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