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00:00:00I'm continuing my quest to discover 80 of the world's greatest man-made treasures.
00:00:10I'm on Europe's doorstep, where East meets West in a glorious explosion of cultures and religions.
00:00:19My treasures lie underground or concealed in busy cities.
00:00:23They come from man's efforts to create, for better or worse, an ideal world.
00:00:30Over the last four months, I've explored the Americas, Australia, Asia, the Middle East
00:00:59and Africa. Now, from Egypt, I'm about to arrive in Turkey.
00:01:04I'm floating above Turkey, above a fantastical landscape, a fairy landscape, in which these
00:01:08strange, fairy-like chimneys erupting from the land.
00:01:13I'm floating above Turkey, above a fantastical landscape, a fairy landscape, in which these
00:01:32strange, fairy-like chimneys erupting from the land. People have burrowed into them, inhabited
00:01:39them, as they have the landscape, the rock itself, below these strange, great rocky outcrops.
00:01:49This is a fantastic example of man working creatively with nature.
00:01:55For thousands of years, its region, called Cappadocia, was no man's land. Where rival empires clashed,
00:02:08is a land of trouble, a battleground for warring factions.
00:02:14Over the centuries, people fleeing war and persecution found sanctuary in this labyrinthine landscape, formed
00:02:37by volcanoes millions of years ago. My treasure lies beneath my feet, deep underground. It was
00:02:50the last refuge for the frightened and terrified. At moments in history, a subterranean safe haven
00:02:57for up to 30,000 people.
00:03:00This place is enormous. Goes on and on. Different levels,
00:03:29twists and turns, different staircases. It's a labyrinth. But I suppose that's the point. It's a defence.
00:03:38Any attacker would be frightfully confused.
00:03:47Imagine it, teeming with men, women, children and animals, and nothing but oil lamps for light.
00:03:56It's like being a termite in a termite mound. These clearly houses people's homes. Because there are bed alcoves.
00:04:15Some say all this was started by the Hittites. That's three and a half, four thousand years ago.
00:04:27The Hittites were an ancient and powerful civilisation at war with the Egyptians.
00:04:32But they would only have been the first inhabitants.
00:04:351500 years later, it's thought Christians sought refuge here.
00:04:41And you can imagine the congregation sheltering here, perhaps from Roman persecution within the 2nd century AD.
00:04:56And this is a sort of rock-cut secret space that forms the early Christian church.
00:05:03The great churches come from grottos like this. And here, amazing evidence. Look, there's a cross.
00:05:13Here's a cross cut into this recess. So clearly it had been a church at some time.
00:05:20Although it feels unplanned, slowly you realise how well organised it really is.
00:05:37This was the wine store, or one of them. I suppose it had flagons of the precious liquid placed in these recesses.
00:05:50And this, surely, was a bar.
00:05:56Oh, feels like it. Excellent. Amazing.
00:06:03Now, oh, now this is what I've been looking for.
00:06:08Fascinating. Defence in depth.
00:06:11A great stone wheel that could, with not too much difficulty, a couple of people perhaps,
00:06:18be pushed and it will roll down and block the door.
00:06:23And here, there's a ramp going to the outside world.
00:06:36Good lord.
00:06:38It's a huge shaft.
00:06:40So far down, I can't see the bottom.
00:06:43And so far up, I can't see the top.
00:06:47It's a ventilation shaft, of course.
00:06:50Getting air in to this place, fresh air and stale air out, was a great problem.
00:06:58And, of course, good ventilation was a secret for the success of this as a refuge.
00:07:05It must have been a very grim place in which to live for any length of time.
00:07:22The smell, the darkness, the noise.
00:07:27But, it is also a monument to man's ability to creatively manipulate nature, manipulate the landscape.
00:07:37Which is very strange.
00:07:40And, um, I suppose one would get used to it.
00:07:44It would feel safe.
00:07:46But no, it would have been very difficult to be here.
00:07:50I need a haircut.
00:08:05I need a haircut and in town I hear of a man who cuts hair he sounds like a barber but he's not
00:08:24he collects the stuff I must investigate big scissors up there promising sign how do you do
00:08:34hair hair my hair so no no all the ladies are just ladies hair so why why why do you um silly question
00:08:45perhaps why do you collect ladies hair why not no why not that's a perfectly good answer you just
00:08:50have a thing about ladies hair I said why actually you've got to you've got to volunteer to be this
00:08:59is absolutely appalling I mean after wonderful every piece of hair has a label on it I don't know
00:09:12so many women in the world actually I mean look they're everywhere
00:09:17so no no chaps no men's hair at all no that was that would break the spell
00:09:32I head north to Istanbul the capital of modern Turkey but once half the great Empire
00:09:47of Byzantium I'm crossing the Bosphorus at Istanbul crossing from Asia over there on my left to Europe
00:10:05always historic and emotional moment this leaping from one world to the other but particularly so now
00:10:14for me it means I'm coming to the end of my epic around the world journey I'm entering familiar territory
00:10:23I'm nearing home
00:10:25when I land I'm going to see one of the greatest buildings in the world a building that's had a huge
00:10:40influence on Western architecture thank you Istanbul still feels like a city where two worlds meet the Christian world and Islamic world
00:10:52at its heart is my treasure once a church then a mosque
00:11:11I also fear was built by the Emperor Justinian in the sixth century AD when completed it was the greatest church in the world
00:11:29what an astonishing space when just a
00:11:59Justinian walked in here in 537 after nearly six years of construction he stood probably about here and said
00:12:10oh Solomon I have surpassed thee an incredible statement referring of course to Solomon's temple the great temple that had inspired so many churches
00:12:26around the world around the world and I must say
00:12:31and I must say
00:12:33Justinian had a point
00:12:36this is
00:12:38remains
00:12:40one of the greatest
00:12:42sacred creations
00:12:44ever
00:12:45ever
00:12:46ever
00:12:49ever
00:12:50...
00:12:56...
00:12:58...
00:13:03...
00:13:04...
00:13:08...
00:13:09The name Ayasevea means divine wisdom, and here, divine wisdom is made manifest through
00:13:21elegant scientific construction, a construction that reveals the forces of nature, the power
00:13:29of God's creation. And in particular, the manifestation here is revealed through this
00:13:37mighty dome that sits, appears to float above the space in which I'm standing. This is how
00:13:46it works. It's supported by a series of half domes and rises off great masonry piers almost
00:13:54concealed within the structure. So the outward thrust of the dome, the horizontal lateral thrust,
00:14:01is counted by an almost equal thrust from a series of half domes and quarter domes below.
00:14:10I'm on the gallery immediately below the dome. And right down there is the area where emperors
00:14:19were crowned a long way down indeed. It's very, very exhilarating being up here. And this
00:14:28timber gallery doesn't feel that it would take my weight if I toppled against it. It's
00:14:35very, very exhilarating being up here. And this timber gallery doesn't feel that it would
00:14:40take my weight if I toppled against it. This became a great prototype, a pioneering construction. The
00:15:00first time a church had a great dome, a symbol of the heavens. But after this, every great church,
00:15:06every great cathedral, had to have a dome. The Duomo in Florence, St Peter's in Rome and, of course, St Paul's in London.
00:15:23With the rise of the Ottoman Empire in the 15th century, Hagia Sophia became a mosque. Today
00:15:30there is a secular space, with sacred meaning to both Christians and Muslims.
00:15:40Good evening. How do you do? Hello. Hello. Hello. Welcome. How do you do? Good.
00:15:45Good. I've been travelling around the world for four months and I want a little bit of a haircut.
00:15:51Knead. Knead. Yes. Wash. Wash. OK. Wash.
00:15:55Gentle mess. Oh, dear.
00:15:57Oh, my God.
00:16:02Oh, my God.
00:16:04Oh, my God. What's happening?
00:16:06Oh, my God. What's happening?
00:16:22Ow. Ow.
00:16:23is the smell of the burning flesh. Sorry who asked for this good night thank you
00:16:53good evening. Brain, lamb brain, absolutely. Maybe a couple. Reminds me of the testicles. I had outsider Petra. A bit better actually. Definitely a bit better than testicles.
00:17:21The testicles are very good.
00:17:30From Istanbul I fly to Russia.
00:17:33I haven't been here since this was the Soviet Union. Advertising and neon-adorned walls once boasting communist slogans.
00:17:52But Red Square remains what it always has been. A glorious testament to Russia's might and totalitarian history.
00:18:08And this is where I'm heading.
00:18:23My treasure is experienced, enjoyed, by over seven million people a day.
00:18:34It's a world within a world and I'm already in it.
00:18:46Hello.
00:18:51This is the Moscow Metro. The greatest underground railway in the world. Construction began in 1931. And the intention was simple. To show the world that Soviet technical and artistic excellence was better than anywhere else.
00:19:10I'm only being allowed down here to film with a guide. Charming woman with a lovely red hat.
00:19:23And now I arrive at this great classical hall like a palace ballroom. Barrel vault. Chandeliers. Mosaics on the wall. And rich and inventive classical detail.
00:19:38This is the great Komsomolskaya station. It sits at the very heart of the network.
00:19:57You may think that this opulence associated with czarist times and with elite palace life.
00:20:03It's just the sort of thing the Soviet authorities would have rejected in 1931 when the decision was made to build the metro.
00:20:10But things were more sophisticated than that. It was recognised as palatial decoration.
00:20:15It would have great meaning for ordinary people. It would enrich their lives. It would make travel through the city a pleasure.
00:20:23And within this architecture is embedded very significant images and symbols about Soviet triumph.
00:20:30It really is a very, very clever piece of work. Presized over and given meaning and pedigree by the great man himself. Longing.
00:20:44This station is only one of the many lavish and themed stations on the Moscow Metro.
00:20:50One need only hop onto a train to discover new wonders.
00:20:54One need only hop onto a train to discover new wonders.
00:21:06At Myakoski station, you really get the idea of the metro system as an idealised underground city.
00:21:14clean and beautiful because, in that vault above my head, are these mosaics showing a window into the world above.
00:21:24A worm's eye view of the city showing sky, planes and bits of buildings.
00:21:32I really do feel I'm walking below the real dangerous and rather ugly world above.
00:21:44Within only 25 years of being commissioned, the Moscow Metro had 41 miles of trap.
00:21:50And 45 stations employing only Russian materials, designers and engineers.
00:22:00This is Revolution Square.
00:22:03And here is an amazing figure commemorating the October Revolution.
00:22:11October 1917.
00:22:13A sailor armed gun with a hammer cocked.
00:22:17Incredible stuff.
00:22:18One can't help but compare these heroic bronze figures fighting for a better world with the inheritors of that world.
00:22:31Only now, the struggle is for capitalism to deliver a better future.
00:22:35The Soviet era may have come to grief above ground, but it certainly lives on down here.
00:22:49Well, I've come to Mykoski Park on the edge of the centre of Moscow.
00:23:05It is the great Sunday market.
00:23:08Everything can be purchased here.
00:23:09I'm looking for a hat, because this one, I have to admit, after four months is worn out and maybe slightly inappropriate
00:23:17as I'm entering northern Europe and coldness, even snow.
00:23:23I know what I want.
00:23:25Black hairy hat with ear flaps.
00:23:30Hello.
00:23:38OK, thank you.
00:23:39Why are you in my hands?
00:23:40Why are you in my hands?
00:23:41Too small.
00:23:42My head's too big.
00:23:43It is?
00:23:44No.
00:23:45Too small.
00:23:46It's too small.
00:23:51Oh.
00:23:52Hat.
00:23:54This is more like it.
00:23:57I don't want mink.
00:23:59I don't want mink.
00:24:00And this one is too small.
00:24:01Why is it good?
00:24:02Why is it good?
00:24:03Look at my head.
00:24:04My head.
00:24:05How much a fox skin hat, Cox?
00:24:10Oh, how long?
00:24:11Like this.
00:24:12In such good condition, Ed?
00:24:14Me.
00:24:15Oh, you found a hat.
00:24:17Who really wants to make a sale?
00:24:19Oh, yes.
00:24:20That's great.
00:24:21Oh, God.
00:24:2265, 66.
00:24:23Is it Kate?
00:24:254,000?
00:24:26Let's lay this down.
00:24:27Let's lay this down.
00:24:28How much?
00:24:294,000.
00:24:304,000?
00:24:31Let's lay this down.
00:24:32Let's lay this down.
00:24:33How much?
00:24:344,000.
00:24:354,000.
00:24:36At last I find a hat that fits.
00:24:39But Russian free trade seems to depend on confusing the buyer into paying an exorbitant price.
00:24:46You said 1,000.
00:24:47Okay, 1,500.
00:24:48I'm not messing up.
00:24:49You can't mess me about like this.
00:24:501,500.
00:24:51You gave me a price.
00:24:52What?
00:24:53You said 1,000.
00:24:54You said 1,000.
00:24:55Goodness sake.
00:24:56Why fall out over 50 cents?
00:25:01500,000.
00:25:02OK.
00:25:03There you go.
00:25:07We should have shaken before.
00:25:10Thank you for doing business with you.
00:25:13What a road!
00:25:15Huh?
00:25:16What a road!
00:25:19Soothed by Aeroflock chintz, I head north to St Petersburg.
00:25:24St Petersburg was the vision of one man, Tsar Peter the Great, who forced thousands of peasants and prisons of war to build it.
00:25:46In 1703, this was bleak marshland.
00:25:51Just a few decades later, the magnificent city we see today was rising out of the swamp.
00:25:59It remains one of the most impressive and ruthless feats of city building of the modern age.
00:26:04I'm arriving at St Petersburg.
00:26:08Much of the Russian noblemen would have done 200 years or so ago, give or take the traffic jams.
00:26:17This is Nevsky Prospekt, which is the backbone of the city, its great street.
00:26:23And it was commissioned by Peter from a French architect and built by Swedish prisoners of war.
00:26:36In the very early 1720s, mostly, it was to be the great showcase of St Petersburg, lined with palaces and great public buildings.
00:26:46The point was to reveal to the world that Russia was no longer a cultural backwater, but one of the great powers of Europe, military power and a great place of culture.
00:27:00The streets narrowing, one's whole sense as one's being directed towards something special, the funneling effect.
00:27:19It's very dramatic, very theatrical.
00:27:21We're going below this arch, full of military trophies, incredible neocastical details, lovely mass of ancient warriors.
00:27:39One arch, another arch, and then, this is amazing, suddenly the space has been funneling in like that, explodes, opens up.
00:27:48I was in this spectacular square, the palace square.
00:27:54In front of me is the Winter Palace of the Tsars.
00:28:08All these buildings were completed after Peter's death, but that's not the point.
00:28:12They're realising, confirming its vision, an amazing thought, less than a hundred years after the plan was made to create a city here.
00:28:22A city was completed.
00:28:24A city that is one of the greatest cities in the world.
00:28:31But, perhaps strangely, none of this is my treasure.
00:28:35This little building may look rather drab, but it contains the secret of St. Petersburg, hidden like a jewel in a casket.
00:28:57This is where it all started.
00:29:12This simple cabin is the first building created in St. Petersburg.
00:29:18It was built in the summer of 1703 in three days by a party of soldiers.
00:29:27It was built for Peter the Great.
00:29:30It was here that he sat, imagining, conceiving the great city of St. Petersburg.
00:29:36This cabin is the smallest palace in Russia, but, to my mind, the most moving.
00:29:47Through these windows, Peter would have seen just marshland and forest.
00:29:52At that desk, he realised his vision for a magnificent city.
00:29:56This cabin is a remarkable and moving survival.
00:30:03But, what does it mean?
00:30:06Well, the key is that Peter himself ordered its preservation in 1723.
00:30:13It's very much a political statement.
00:30:16Its simplicity was meant to create a myth about Peter,
00:30:20the simple, modest, self-effacing man.
00:30:23So revered as a structure that no one, including me, is allowed inside.
00:30:38This little sort of closet, really, was his bedroom.
00:30:45Incredible.
00:30:46The fellow stood six foot eight inches tall.
00:30:49There's his coat and trousers over there.
00:30:51And he, well, it hardly fit in here.
00:30:55This shrine shows the almost monkish existence he lived here,
00:31:02while he conceived in his imagination the great city of St. Petersburg.
00:31:12Surely this must be one of the most beautiful visions of a city any man ever had.
00:31:17I fly north towards the White Sea, to a part of Russia that seems like another world.
00:31:35And the coldest leg of my journey so far.
00:31:37ORCHESTRAL MUSIC PLAYS
00:31:38ORCHESTRAL MUSIC PLAYS
00:31:41ORCHESTRAL MUSIC PLAYS
00:31:54I'm a hundred miles south of the Arctic Circle and entering a region of myth and folklore.
00:32:20Ahead of me lies a group of islands, and they are my destination because there, on one of those islands, is a place that in itself tells the history of Russia.
00:32:32In 1429, two monks, one called Savaty, the other called Gurman, landed here on Stolowski Island.
00:33:00They'd made a two-day trip from mainland, a dangerous journey.
00:33:05They came here because it was deserted, that was the point.
00:33:10They were hermits, really. They wanted to live in solitude to contemplate their god alone.
00:33:17They landed about here, and somewhere over there, they started to build a chapel and two cells in which to live.
00:33:30Word spread about the two hermits at Stolowski and the religious community grew up around them.
00:33:36Little over a hundred years later, they had built a fantastic stronghold to ensure their survival.
00:33:43In a beautiful and dramatic way, the monastery is a microcosm of Russia.
00:34:01Many of the great characters and social events in the nation's history have left their mark here.
00:34:09To enter a monastery is to enter the soul of Russia, to see its dark side, but also its glory.
00:34:18It seems more a fortress than a monastery, but then it is a monastery with a difference, a place of worldly power, of trade as well, and of God.
00:34:38It was the capital of this part of Russia, and also a great bastion against invasion,
00:34:47a great defence against the Swedes, the Danes, and indeed against the English,
00:34:52who in the early 17th century wanted to seize this area because this was, they said,
00:34:57the richest place of its date in the world.
00:35:03The monks became so confident that they rebelled against the Tsar
00:35:07when he introduced church reforms.
00:35:10In retaliation, in 1668, an army was sent from Moscow and an eight-year siege ensued.
00:35:20Eventually, there was a monk that betrayed the monastery.
00:35:24He told the Tsar's soldiers about a small door in the wall, a postern,
00:35:30that was very poorly bricked up.
00:35:32They went to that door by night and broke it open.
00:35:36Just over there.
00:35:37Then they entered secretly and took the monks entirely by surprise.
00:35:44The soldiers' blood was up.
00:35:46They were angry.
00:35:47They attacked the monks and almost 40 were killed.
00:35:50Some were hung up by their heels and beaten till they died.
00:35:54Others were tied behind horses and dragged to their deaths.
00:35:59Back under Tsar's control, Peter the Great used Solovsky as a prison.
00:36:09And though monastic life returned,
00:36:11Solovsky would once again sink into despair.
00:36:17After the Communist Revolution of 1917,
00:36:20it was here, in and around the monastery,
00:36:24that the Soviet regime set up the first Gulag,
00:36:28a concentration camp for political prisoners.
00:36:32At its peak, 50,000 were held at Solovsky,
00:36:36and very many died here.
00:36:39This is one of the most infamous rooms in Russian history.
00:36:48This was built in the mid-19th century as a cathedral of the Holy Trinity,
00:36:54but in 1924 became Company 13.
00:37:02This is where all male prisoners who were brought to this Gulag
00:37:08were placed for three months.
00:37:11In this space, from 1924 to 1937,
00:37:16lived at any one time 800, 850 men.
00:37:21In bunks, teared up towards the ceilings.
00:37:27And below this world of bunks, living in filth, were children.
00:37:32They weren't known about, they weren't documented,
00:37:34they weren't fed by the camp authorities.
00:37:36They skulked in this room below the bunks of the men.
00:37:41It's a heartbreaking and terrible story.
00:37:43In here, I'm looking at the main altar at the East End.
00:37:47This was given over to latrines.
00:37:51A frightful insult.
00:37:53And up there, there had been a picture of Christ.
00:37:58It was a picture of Lenin, a mockery really.
00:38:02The whole thing, this little psychological warfare,
00:38:05to destroy the will and souls of these poor human beings,
00:38:11who, for all those years, suffered in this space.
00:38:16And the only way out, of course, was death.
00:38:21And the only way out, of course, the other way out.
00:38:25And, of course, the mother...
00:38:27..yes...
00:38:31Around the monastery, life still seems very bleak,
00:38:38as if the people are stuck in the dying years of communism.
00:38:43communism. So this is the town square, I suppose. Golly. This building is one of the gulag buildings
00:38:54dating from the late 1920s. Prisoners were confined. There's still the air of a gulag
00:39:01about this place. There's still a sense of people being confined here. Lots of people
00:39:09emerging. Ah, good morning. Hello. Good morning. You get a drink in there? No, it's closed.
00:39:21Ah, no good. It's closed at the moment. My goodness, what a big place this is. I say these
00:39:31people look like they're prisoners themselves, like they've been left over from the gulag.
00:39:37Since the fall of the Soviet regime, monks have returned to the monastery. History has
00:40:05come full circle. Life is lived here much as it would have been 400 years ago.
00:40:12I fly south to Poland. I'm on a journey for the world keep
00:40:14ient. They're all three. I fly south to Poland. I'm on a journey for
00:40:16my heart, and I'm on a journey for Poland. I'm on a journey for the dead.
00:40:22I fly south to Poland, I'm on a journey into my own past, into my memory.
00:40:52As a child, a very young child, I lived for some years in Poland, my father was a journalist
00:41:07based in Warsaw, this is almost 50 years ago, very, very different place now.
00:41:15We came here, Krakow, for a holiday, beautiful city, and it was here, and it comes back to
00:41:24me now as I stand in this delightful square, it was here that I fell in love with architecture.
00:41:36Miraculously, Krakow escaped the destruction of the Second World War. Legend has it, the
00:41:43German Commandant refused to obey orders from Hitler, in the dying days of the war, to
00:41:48flatten the city.
00:41:50PIANO PLAYS
00:41:53There's a sound that cuts through me like a knife,
00:42:22which brings back such memories.
00:42:24Every hour that chap up there playing his bugle
00:42:27sounds a very haunting little tune.
00:42:31The story is in the 13th century
00:42:33there was a watchman up there looking around the fields,
00:42:36the plains around the town watching for attackers
00:42:38and then the attackers came.
00:42:40These fearsome nomadic warriors, the Tartars,
00:42:43he sounded a warning note
00:42:45but a Tartar arrow got him in the throat
00:42:47just as he was finishing the warning
00:42:49and that's why that note ends
00:42:52on that haunting broken note
00:42:54as the arrow severs his neck.
00:43:05But I must head to the edge of town
00:43:07to find a treasure that transports me back in time
00:43:10to Communist Poland of 1957 when I was eight years old.
00:43:16This is the Wieliczka salt mines
00:43:19a few miles from the centre of Krakow.
00:43:21This is a very exciting moment for me.
00:43:24When I came here as a child
00:43:26this place absolutely gripped my imagination
00:43:30and indeed has haunted my imagination ever since.
00:43:33will this experience I'm about to have now
00:43:38live up to my memories
00:43:40or will it be a bitter disappointment?
00:43:49The Wieliczka salt mine began operation in the 13th century.
00:43:53At one point it created 30% of Poland's income.
00:43:58The mine is 327 metres deep
00:44:01and the chambers and passages stretch for over 300 kilometres.
00:44:07It's not the size of the mine that is so haunting
00:44:10but the extraordinary art that the miners have created inside it.
00:44:22This is the chapel of the blessed Kinga
00:44:24the patron saint of Polish miners.
00:44:27It started in 1896.
00:44:30Everything here is carved out of salt by miners
00:44:34including the walls, floor, statues and chandeliers.
00:44:42Memories coming back.
00:44:44This is incredible.
00:44:45This is, yes, an Anthony's chapel
00:44:48from the late 17th century.
00:44:52This is where I discovered that fairyland is real.
00:44:57Look at this fantastic stuff from the salt.
00:45:01Architecture, classical architecture.
00:45:04Really primitive salt, lovely.
00:45:06It's been carved.
00:45:07And figures of saints.
00:45:08And look at this.
00:45:20The chandelier is salt.
00:45:22Salt crystals.
00:45:23It's been absolutely brilliant.
00:45:25All made by the miners.
00:45:30That's the thing.
00:45:31This is working man's art.
00:45:34Not the art of artists but ordinary people.
00:45:38Celebrating their god in their place of work is fantastic.
00:45:43Yes, yes, this is, this is it.
00:45:48But as I penetrate deeper, there are more new additions.
00:45:52Well, I said this place was like fairyland when I first came here.
00:46:14But I didn't mean like this, sort of gnome land.
00:46:17This is quite astonishing.
00:46:19What on earth is going on?
00:46:22What was so moving is now in danger of being tarnished to attract more tourists.
00:46:35Only Snow White is missing.
00:46:37Oh, excuse me.
00:46:40Yeah?
00:46:41I can see by your attire that you are a guide.
00:46:44Yes, I am.
00:46:45We are from the BBC making a little programme about the salt mines.
00:46:48And I have memories of this place many years ago.
00:46:51And I remember it's slightly less presented as a museum.
00:46:55Are there still parts of the mine which are more authentic, which are more as it would have been when it was a living working mine?
00:47:01Of course, if you would like to, I can take you to another part of the mine which is much more beautiful.
00:47:07It's out of the tour and it will be really satisfying.
00:47:11Oh well, lovely.
00:47:12Satisfaction.
00:47:13Excellent.
00:47:14Thank you very much.
00:47:15Lead on.
00:47:16Commercial salt production at Vilichka stopped ten years ago.
00:47:26But one part of the mine is still being used by mineralogists.
00:47:31We walk for an hour.
00:47:33I am hoping to see more carving.
00:47:36Obviously the miners felt in some state of peril asking for protection as they worked the salt.
00:47:44This is the power of nature.
00:47:50The power of nature.
00:47:51Yeah.
00:47:52The mine.
00:47:53Such a huge, perhaps they were cracked.
00:47:56They are cracked like matches here.
00:47:58I think I'll move on.
00:47:59Not sure what's happening up here.
00:48:01Yeah, of course.
00:48:02That one's cracked too.
00:48:03Wow, the whole thing's in movement.
00:48:04And look at this.
00:48:05The salt.
00:48:06Yeah.
00:48:07Salt recrystallised.
00:48:08Yeah.
00:48:09That's fantastic.
00:48:10That's coming out of the rock.
00:48:12There is a seepage of the salt.
00:48:15It's salty, I think.
00:48:17Beautiful stalactites if you look.
00:48:20And here, yeah.
00:48:21This is, um, this crystal is salt.
00:48:34White gold.
00:48:35In the past, salt was as valuable as gold or silver because it was in huge demand but limited supply.
00:48:46Poles take great pride in them, what they represent.
00:48:51The industry, the activity and the natural beauty.
00:48:55They are, in their strange way, the heart of the nation.
00:49:01I fly to Germany, the country which, more than any other, has shaped the modern world through its catastrophic embrace of fascism and genocide.
00:49:16No European city has endured such upheaval as Berlin.
00:49:21Its pre-war innocence shattered by Hitler.
00:49:24Its fabric smashed by Allied bombing.
00:49:27Its post-war years caught up in a Cold War nightmare.
00:49:31After the war came down in 1989, the city began a frantic reinvention of itself.
00:49:39So I want to treasure here that is contemporary and yet also transports me unflinchingly back into this country's dark past.
00:49:50I've come to Berlin to see a car, that most problematic, emblematic of modern objects.
00:50:01But this is not just any car.
00:50:04It was commissioned by Adolf Hitler.
00:50:06He, in 1934, ordered the production of a car that all could afford to use and to run.
00:50:13It was to contain two adults and three children.
00:50:18The ideal family, I suppose.
00:50:19And toot along at 60 miles an hour.
00:50:22And its form was to be inspired by natural history.
00:50:26And this is it.
00:50:29The Volkswagen Beetle is the familiar sight to all road users.
00:50:44And it's easy to forget that the love bug, as it later became known, was a Nazi prestige project.
00:50:52Hitler said to Ferdinand Porsche, a designer,
00:50:55that car should look like a beetle.
00:50:58Look to nature to find out what streamlining is all about.
00:51:02Nature being the inspiration for functional design.
00:51:05And on that note of functional design and economic design,
00:51:10of course the engine is at the back.
00:51:12Here it is, a beautiful little thing.
00:51:14At the back, immediately above the rear wheels, the driving wheels, to make construction cheaper.
00:51:20And what a lovely little engine it is.
00:51:22Look at it, beautiful thing.
00:51:24Very elegant.
00:51:25Now, I should give this wonderful machine a road test.
00:51:31Oh, a bit of a tight fit.
00:51:34But when I get my leg under the steering wheel, it's spacious.
00:51:39Indeed, here's me, my wife here.
00:51:43Three children in the back.
00:51:45And there's room for storage.
00:51:47Very spacious.
00:51:49Oh, yes.
00:51:50Indicators.
00:51:51Yes.
00:51:52Windstream wipers.
00:51:53Yes.
00:51:54Okay, well, let's take it for a spin.
00:51:56It works.
00:51:57The Beetle first rolled off the production iron in 1941.
00:52:02This particular car I'm driving was made during the war and belonged to Reichsminister Alfred Rosenberg, a member of Hitler's inner circle in control of the conquered eastern territories.
00:52:17After the war, Rosenberg was found guilty of crimes against humanity at the Nuremberg trials and was executed.
00:52:36By the way, this particular model is the light to drive except there appears to be virtually no foot brake.
00:52:46I guess all old cars are like this, but no one puts one's foot down to stop.
00:52:51A little happens at first, anyway.
00:52:53Oh.
00:52:56There we are.
00:52:57I've now halted this machine, using partly a handbrake.
00:53:21The Volkswagen Beetle is a wonderful, wonderful machine that's risen above its troubled origins, its troubled history.
00:53:33It is a great monument to utilitarian, practical, functional design.
00:53:40And I, along with millions of people in the world, love it.
00:53:45But I am aware that cars are entirely problematic creations, leading to pollution of the cities and their roads.
00:54:00The roads which they run, wrecking the countryside and damaging historic places.
00:54:07So, it's a great worry to love something like this, I guess, something which is ultimately rather devilish.
00:54:17Last of all, but no less importantly, the Beetle is also the means of transport to my next treasure.
00:54:23I've driven to the Bauhaus in Dassau, this epoch-making, inspirational design school that during the 1920s, until it was closed by the Nazis in 1933,
00:54:49really did much to forge the modern world.
00:54:53Many objects we now take for granted originated here.
00:54:57Also, the spirit of this place inspired designers, architects, interior designers, designers of furniture throughout the world.
00:55:06I've come here to find one object that captures the spirit of this truly extraordinary and amazing institution, the Bauhaus.
00:55:16The Bauhaus school opened in 1919.
00:55:22It rejected history as an inspiration for creativity.
00:55:26Instead, students here embraced the technological age.
00:55:30They wanted function to define architecture and design.
00:55:34And they wanted to use new materials.
00:55:38This building, constructed in 1926, captures their ideas perfectly.
00:55:44But my treasure is not a building.
00:55:48It's something small and commonplace.
00:55:50It's a chair.
00:55:52Before Bauhaus, no-one had dreamt of starting a revolution with a chair.
00:55:57But that's exactly what happened.
00:56:00So, which chair to choose?
00:56:02Hermeserschmidt, the Bauhaus archivist, has granted me exclusive access to the Bauhaus archives, just here through this secure door.
00:56:16Oh, now, yes, an old favourite.
00:56:28Action.
00:56:29The Vasily chair, designed in 1925.
00:56:34Very pioneering.
00:56:35Indeed.
00:56:36It's the first time tubular steel was used in the construction of a chair.
00:56:41It's great in many ways, but now looks a little clumsy.
00:56:45A bit like a bird's nest, a lot going on.
00:56:48It hasn't got quite that elegance and simplicity I'm looking for.
00:56:52So, come back to that, perhaps.
00:56:55Hermeserschmidt, the next one, please.
00:56:58For me to inspect.
00:57:04Ah, yes.
00:57:05Action, thank you.
00:57:07A simpler design.
00:57:09A bit later, 1929.
00:57:12I choose this really because it is so simple.
00:57:15It's a chair we've all seen and used, I think, making the point that the Bauhaus succeeded in its aim, providing elegant, functional, simple objects for everyday use, for ordinary people, like you and me, to enjoy.
00:57:29And here you have a very simple chair, designed, I say, 1929, and still in use, and still looking entirely modern.
00:57:37So, a glorious example of the Bauhaus ideal being achieved.
00:57:42Hermeserschmidt, the third one.
00:57:45I am now all a tremble, because I know what this is.
00:57:51I hope.
00:57:52Ah, yes.
00:57:56Well, what can I say?
00:58:00One or two things, actually.
00:58:02Designed by a different Bauhaus master, Mies van der Roem.
00:58:07Designed 1929, 1930.
00:58:11Mies was the last director of the Bauhaus in 1930.
00:58:17So, this is a very appropriate monument to him and to the Bauhaus.
00:58:21Just look at this thing.
00:58:22The steel had to be manufactured and tested, so research was necessarily very much part of modern tradition.
00:58:27Cantilever principle, very simple construction.
00:58:30But the weight of the person, in a sense, holds the chair steady, makes it work as an object.
00:58:36Look at the simplicity of it. Just look.
00:58:40What elegance.
00:58:42What function.
00:58:44What pure, joyful simplicity.
00:58:48Beautiful thing to handle, to hold.
00:58:51God.
00:58:52Just look at the form, the shape, as one turns it around.
00:58:56The thing is alive, doesn't it?
00:59:00Put it down.
00:59:01Another great test to sit in it.
00:59:03And see, really, if it is functional.
00:59:05It looks functional.
00:59:06It looks beautiful.
00:59:07Minimal and simple.
00:59:09But will it take the mighty load?
00:59:12Oh, gosh.
00:59:15The chairs are tremble.
00:59:18Vibrating with my weight and movement.
00:59:21This, without doubt, because of its functional qualities, because of its minimalism,
00:59:27because it really works, does its job,
00:59:31and, of course, in the end, looks terrific and beautiful,
00:59:35has got to be and is my Bauhaus treasure.
00:59:39Oh, yes.
00:59:40Sort of a few cans.
00:59:41Yes.
00:59:42It is so good.
00:59:43The night is well in the wilderness.
00:59:44In 1933, the Nazis closed down the Bauhaus, believing it have communist sympathies.
00:59:45In 1933, the Nazis closed down the Bauhaus,
00:59:50believing it to have communist sympathies.
00:59:54But within 20 years, designs inspired by the Bauhaus
00:59:58would define the modern world.
01:00:00The modern world is a modern world.
01:00:03It's a modern world.
01:00:05It's a modern world.
01:00:07It's a modern world.
01:00:10It's a modern world.
01:00:12It's a modern world.
01:00:14It would define the modern world.
01:00:17It's a strange thing.
01:00:19Although Hitler closed down the Bauhaus,
01:00:22he was instrumental in the creation of an object
01:00:25that followed the true principles of the Bauhaus.
01:00:29In fact, I think it's fair to say
01:00:31that the Volkswagen Beetle,
01:00:33because of its social purpose,
01:00:35its utilisation of mass production techniques,
01:00:38is the greatest object the Bauhaus never made.
01:00:44how it's changed.
01:00:48Oh, boy.
01:00:49Oh, boy.
01:00:50No way.
01:00:51No way.
01:00:52No way.
01:00:53No way.
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