A personal tour of the British Museum’s major show in 2011 on Afghanistan: Crossroads of the Ancient World. This awesome and massively educative exhibition is brought to us thanks to the amazing bravery of a few men who took care of these objects in great secrecy and at great personal risk at the brink of two decades of civil war, strategic iconoclastic decimation and lawless looting.

Dr. St John Simpson is an archeologist and a curator at The British Museum and speaks here about the exhibition as a whole and Afghanistan’s place on the Silk Road where caravans from from Europe, China, India and Central Asia traveled back and forth. He guides us through the show and discusses details about several of the objects, of which his favourite is the fish-shaped drinking vessel pictured here.

This show was produced by Fari Bradley and originally broadcast May 2011.