History Channel Documentaries

The Sahara (2006x8)

Air date: Sep 17, 2006

A certain mystique lingers in its very name. It's a haunting and hostile arena with a past as captivating as its landscape. In this desert blanketing 11 nations in Northern Africa, nature has crafted a world of mesmerizing desolation and across its scorching sands humanity has dared to carve history. Our cameras explore a land of mirage and myth--from a mountain fortress of ancient freedom fighters to a vast stadium filled with gladiators' gore to the vibrant chaos of a camel auction to the fabled metropolis of Timbuktu. Historians chronicle how a devastating climate change turned a lush savanna into the world's harshest desert. The Sahara...sinister and seductive, mythic and mysterious...as tantalizing and elusive as a mirage.