Spend 24 hours with the ancient Chinese. The year is AD 17.

The Han dynasty is in power and we are in and around Chang’an, the capital and one of the most developed regions of the empire, which is enjoying a prolonged economic and cultural pinnacle. There are extraordinary palaces, military bases and city walls.

Households are benefitting from the invention of numerous agricultural technologies and an unprecedented level of craft production, which includes ceramics, bronzes, iron objects and many other elaborate goods. This is an age that is both vibrant and innovative but also riven with conflict and contradictions.

For as successful as the empire is, the reality is that life for the ordinary inhabitants is still about the same problems: earning money, work struggles and family dramas. Discover what one day in ancient China is like by spending twenty-four hours with the people who lived there.

Every hour we meet a different person – from dancers to doctors, priests to convicts, textile workers to tomb looters – and build a multi-layered picture of the social fabric of ancient China and this fascinating period in history. .