"Five months ago, I set out to discover 80 of the world's greatest treasures." "Now, I'm almost back on home territory." "I'm excited." "It feels like seeing old friends again." "But, after all my incredible experiences and treasures from right around the globe, will I see these familiar sights in a new light?" "I've now almost circumnavigated the globe and am about to start my last lap in what used to be called Yugoslavia." "I'm in Bosnia." "A country that has until recently - been dominated by war, to see if man-made beauty, if history, if architecture can help in healing this land." "This historic town of Mostar fell victim to the violence and ignorance of warfare." "It remains today a painful reminder of" "Yugoslavia's tragic descent into chaos." "Ten years ago in the early 1990s, this was one of the most - dangerous, violent places on Earth." "With the collapse of the Soviet Union," "Mostar got dragged into a bitter, genocidal civil war, with the different communities," "Roman Catholic, Croats " "Christian Orthodox, Bosnian Serbs and Moslems fighting to survive." "And it's in this - rather unlikely setting I have come to find my next treasure." "It's a treasure that died, blasted to destruction in 1993 by Christian Croat troops." "But in 2001, work began to rebuild the bridge." "identical in form and using as much of the original fabric as possible." "The Mostar Bridge would live again." "It really is the most wonderful to minimal engineered construction." "So elegant." "The bridge was built on the er - direct orders of the greatest of the Ottoman rulers." "Suleiman the Magnificent." "And when the bridge was completed in 1566, it was the largest single span bridge in the world." "It - leaps across the river in an arch of almost thirty metres." "When it was built," "Bosnia was a recent acquisition of the Ottoman Empire." "The long established Christians having to accommodate the conquering Moslems," "Suleiman the Magnificent wanted the Mostar bridge to act as a bridge between peoples." "How did the people - of Mostar respond to this rather political gesture?" "Well they, both Christians and Moslems took it to their hearts." "It became a symbol of unity, of identity, of pride." "But now it's been rebuilt, does it means the same any more?" "Can an old building still have meaning when   it's a reconstructed old building?" "In this case a bridge." "Well, I think the answer is yes." "Providing the reconstruction is authentic." "Authentic materials, authentic means of construction." "These are - parts of the old bridge that have not been reused, but most of the stones that were found have been put back in place." "So to me it is still a living old building." "Ah, now very traditional." "Golly." "A very brave young man." "Oh, yes." "Certainly the age old custom ofjumping off the bridge to prove your manhood is alive and well." "But has the meaning of the bridge, this ancient symbol, been lost to local Moslems?" "Has rebuilding this - ancient bridge helped to heal wounds, helped to reunite the community of Mostar?" "Well, it did help, but it's just another step." "We need much more to do to heal our wounds." "And when you walk across the new bridge does it feel as if the old bridge has come back to life?" "I think it's the old bridge." "Yeah." "To me it feels - like an old bridge and just for ten years unfortunately it wasn't here " "Yes." " but it's now come back together." "And now the Catholic Croats and - and the Moslems and maybe the Orthodox Bosnian Serbs now tend to live separately." "They used to be living in one " "Yes, mixed up." "They - they were mixed up." "It wasn't important what religion you were, but now it is." "Umm." "There is too much anger, I think." "But the - bridge is a step." "Yes, yes it is." "A huge step." "In the narrow streets alongside the bridge, stalls selling souvenirs have opened up, optimistically awaiting the return of tourists to Mostar." "The strangest thing." "This stall, this shop is full of um, shells." "Not seaside shells but these monsters, brass shells fired from guns, machine guns and canon." "That's a 50 calibre one, I think." "Ornamental now." "Carved with um, patterns and local scenes." "Unbelievable there is the image of the Mostar bridge." "Could be the very shell of one of them that was responsible for destroying it." "God, what a kind of bizarre irony?" " But these shells you're selling." " Yes." "These are really extraordinary, are they not?" "These are shells that were fired during the fighting around here?" "Yes." "Do you find it odd making ornamental things out of - out of these shells, I mean which want to destroy the bridge here, the city here, people?" "Er, we see it like this." "From - from war to art." "Fair enough, absolutely." "Can rebuilding an ancient structure in a beautiful location really help rebuild a shattered community?" "And especially one that tore itself apart in such terrible circumstances and where bitterness and hatred survives." "Mostar is once again a beautiful place, full of life, but the bridge is like a mask, superficial really, worn over a scarred and snarling face." "You can rebuild things that were of beauty." "You can rebuild structures, but can you really so easily rebuild... a shattered soul, a broken heart?" "Time will tell." "From Bosnia, I fly to Greece." "Once home to a great and ancient civilisation." "To tell the truth, I'm feeling pretty ancient myself." "I'm leaving Athens Airport." "This must be about the 90th flight." "To be quite honest, between you and me, I'm pretty exhausted." "Also exhilarated by the things we've seen." "Athens in the 21st century is an enormous polluted city." "High on cars, low on parks and greenery." "Yet it manages to retain a village like charm." "My next treasure stands right above me, but I'll have to wait until morning to see it." "At the top of this hill - is a building that since its rediscovery in the late 17th century, has inflamed the artistic imagination of the west." "It's become known as the perfect piece of architecture - and has gained Greece the reputation of being the cradle of civilisation." "The Parthenon." "It's inspired great architecture, great art entire cities." "Many have believed that it represents the origins of architecture, that it's divinely inspired." "Many of the world's great artists and architects have come here, seen this building and fallen on their knees." "The Parthenon was built around 430 B.C." "by the great Athenian leader Pericles." "It housed a giant statue of Athena, the goddess of the city." "After the demise of Ancient Greece, it fell into neglect." "Even being torn apart by explosions in a Venetian attack in the 17th century." "But even in its ruined state, it would come to inspire the modern world." "It's beautifully built out of marble, all carved, but structurally the Parthenon has little going for it." "It's not pioneering, it's not ingenious nor ambitious." "There's no arches, there's no vaults, no domes." "Really the Parthenon is no more advanced structurally than Stonehenge." "It's all very primitive." "So why is this my treasure?" "It's because of what it came to symbolise." "It became a powerful emblem of a lost civilisation." "Its ruined state inspired the artists of western Europe to explore the heroism and tragedy of battered beauty and defeated ambitions." "No surprise the Romantic poet Byron loved this building." "But our experience is now very different." "In fact the Parthenon is now largely a building site." "This is the main route of entry to the Parthenon in ancient times, up these steps into... what would have been a dark chamber with the great goddess Athena somewhere in there." "And now almost impossible to imagine what it would have been like." "All is gone, all is now construction." "Athena, the great goddess would have stood roughly here, right where the crane is now." "Restoration has been going on for twenty-five years, making good poor repairs of the 1920s." "And by the looks of things, will continue for years to come." "Looking round one can't help but conclude very soon this building will be an amalgam of old and new." "Oh, it's all ladies." "Lady masons." "Hello." "You're removing old repairs, aren't you, that's what's going on, I can see that." "Restoring old things is often a problem, isn't it, 'cause one can in the process - l don't know, remove some of the magic of the place." "The new marble - l know it comes from the same quarry but it looks very different, doesn't it, to the old?" "Yes." "How will it look?" "Do you think a sort of patchwork of old and new will it look all right in the end, do you think?" "I think yes. I think it will be all right." "Yeah. lt's lovely to see." "Thank you very much." "Go on." "Thanks." "Bye." "Well, nobody here shares my worries." "But to me it feels like the restoration is swamping the magic of the building." "Buildings like the Parthenon, of supreme historic and architectural importance must of course be conserved, preserved for posterity." "But this is more than that." "It seems to me the Parthenon's being appropriated by contemporary politics." "Being made into a national symbol of the image of modern Greece." "And that, I find, sad and worrying." "If gunpowder and missiles can destroy historic treasures, so can over-zealous restoration, even when well-meaning." "I leave Athens and head for another treasure at risk." "This time from the rising tides of the Adriatic Sea." "After all my travels, will Venice still feel the most beautiful city in the world?" "Trading gateway to the east," "Venice has been the meeting place of two worlds for more than a thousand years." "Here art and trade marry in... an explosion of splendid palaces and miraculous churches." "At its heart lies my treasure." "It is the main artery of Venice." "The Grand Canal." "There's nothing, nothing like this in the world, of course there's not." "This great highway water highway, a highway of palaces." "This spectacular architecture floats, it seems on water." "This is the largest canal in Venice." "The fusion of nature and engineering." "Harnessed by man it weaves its way through the city, lined with palaces built on stilts hammered... deep into the muddy waters." "The palaces were also warehouses." "The princes also merchants." "The riches of the world were brought to Venice." "From the Orient spices and silk." "India, from Damascus and these riches were transformed into architecture." "The buildings scream not just of power and of wealth - but also of all parts of the world, particularly the east." "One sees an oriental influence." "One sees Moslem influence as well, as classical design a thing called Venetian Gothic." "It takes half an hour to motor down the Grand Canal and it's one of the best thirty minutes life has to offer." "Here is the Ca'd'Oro, one of Venice's finest palazzos." "It was built in the 15th century and once sparkled with gold leaf." "Then the Rialto Bridge." "The first great bridge across the Grand Canal, linking the commercial heart of the city with its political head." "Venice is many, many things, but one thing it is of course is frozen time." "The city we see now has changed little since the mid 17th century." "It's a highway not just back in time - but through time." "Through taste, through culture and all around lie feasts." "One is utterly nourished by these images - from the great moments of western civilisation." "It's just breathtaking." "It's with reluctance that I leave this beautiful city." "Happily, my next destination is scarcely less spectacular." "I'm in Rome, which is the most spellbinding city, even in the rain." "I'm here to see the best of surviving ancient Roman architecture." "And to help me on this quest I've er, picked up a charming young man called Francesco, who will drive me round the city on his um, scooter." " Francesco, hello." " Hello." "I pass some of the most famous buildings in the world." "All evidence of the Roman Empire that flourished two thousand years ago." "But one in particular I consider better than all the rest." "So thank you very much indeed." " Goodbye." " Goodbye." "Um, charming." "Now here it is." "When I first saw this building thirty years ago I was overwhelmed." "It seemed to me to be the epitome, the essence of architecture." "It's the Pantheon." "The best preserved Roman temple in the world." "The Pantheon was built in the second century A.D." "by Emperor Hadrian." "Pantheon means, all the gods." "And like so many of my treasures this building had to be worthy of divine beings." "It also had to proclaim to the world that the might of Rome was unrivalled." "The first thing you see as you approach the Pantheon is this huge portico with its triangular pediment." "This is very much the architectural language of Ancient Greece." "So here we have a Grecian element, but there's more." "Each column is one great stone." "It's a monolith." "And these stones were brought from North Africa, from Egypt." "What we see here is Hadrian bringing the culture of Greece - and Egypt to Rome, absorbing it, developing it, saying we, Rome, have conquered these ancient and great civilisations and we are the new masters of the world." "But inside is a very different world." "Very Roman, very pioneering, very modern." "Especially modern nearly two thousand years ago, because there's a vast covered space." "The awe-inspiring dome is made of concrete, which the Romans invented, and remains the largest un-reinforced... concrete dome in the world." "Having made the dome of concrete, at least the dome then is a - is a rigid structure with minimal horizontal outward thrust." "But it does weigh an awful lot." "Around five thousand tons." "And that has to be carried on the wall behind me." "The problem is, this wall is eaten into, burrowed into by a series of eight niches." "Here's one behind me." "So, how on earth does this system work?" "I'm now walking into the wall of the drum to see how this five thousand ton concrete dome is supported." "Ah, now what's clear is that the er, curved wall of the drum is not made out of solid concrete." "There are these great brick arches, massively strong, and these great arches transfer the load of the dome to the solid wall each side of the great recesses, so the great dome is carried really by genius." "The Pantheon shows the Roman Empire at its peak." "Flexing its muscles." "Showing capability and invention that Europe would not equal for nearly a thousand years." "But what did this heroic structure mean?" "Most intriguing I think is the oculus." "The open space in the centre of the dome." "Not just a demonstration of engineering... skills to create a dome without a keystone, but it lets the light flood in." "It lets the sun in." "The sun god is present, is made manifest when the sun shines." "The truth is though this great building... retains its secret." "Remains mysterious and enigmatic." "The Pantheon is the ancestor... of every dome in the western world." "And to look at the skyline of Rome... is to witness evolution in architecture." "But the glory of Rome would like dormant until the Renaissance." "The rebirth of classical genius, art and architecture in the 15th century." "At the heart of the Renaissance was the city of Florence." "Its streets are lined with bold, classical palaces, the like of which had not been seen... since the days ancient Rome." "Renaissance princes were masters of the use of art and architecture to express wealth and power, their aspirations." "They were amongst the great patrons of the arts the world has ever known." "Without them there would have been no Renaissance of the arts." "This is particularly true of the mighty Medici family and they built this huge palace behind me in the 1450s." "This thing was meant to capture, reflect the power and the glory of ancient Rome." "The Medici princes rules Florence on and off for over three hundred years, until the middle of the 18th century." "It was the Medici dynasty that created my next treasure." "I'm in San Lorenzo - the spiritual stronghold of the Medici family." "And what I want to see lies through that door over there." "The Medici Chapel was created by Michelangelo in the 1520s." "It was commissioned by Cardinal Julio di Medici as a great mausoleum for his family." "This building's a dream." "It's a vision of death." "It's the theatre of death." "Here Michelangelo manipulates the emotions in a an astonishing way." "The colours, the muted light." "At the top the windows taper." "Amazing." "So one can almost feel one's soul rising upwards and out of this space." "This space of worldly suffering and woe." "The ceiling of the Chapel is a copy in miniature of the Pantheon dome." "A building which Michelangelo described as of 'angelic design.'" "The focus of the building, its very meaning, is a pair of fantastic memorials to members of the Medici family." "Here we see two incredibly haunting figures." "Night and day." "And there she's leaning upon a portrait, self portrait of Michelangelo looking wizened by time." "When these were made he himself was in a very strange position." "Florence was in the grips of a power struggle." "The people of the city has risen up in a republican frenzy against Medici tyranny." "Which side would Michelangelo choose?" "Michelangelo sides with the republic, against the Medicis." "Frightful business, so he's here working on the memorial to members of the family that he is fighting against and which he fears if they win will put him to death." "It was a terrible dilemma." "In the event, the revolt was crushed," "Medici rule restored." "So Michelangelo went on working." "But as he did he feared recrimination, a hired Medici assassin creeping up behind him as he worked." "Punishment for supporting the republic." "As he made this monument to death he was here fearing for his own life." "When he carved that self portrait he was really carving his own death mask." "But the love of art must have triumphed over a lust for vengeance, because the hired assassins didn't come for Michelangelo." "What's been fascinating about seeing Michelangelo's tomb is there's some - it's reminded me really of how many of the treasures I've seen in this great world journey have been to do with death." "I've seen how different people, different places, different times, have tried to understand the mystery of death, the passage that takes place from life to death." "It really is quite haunting, quite strange." "There it is, death this constant concern." "Life after death, recycling of the human soul." "Who knows?" "It's amazing really that so much of man's creative energy is focused not on love, on life, but on death." "From Italy to Spain and my penultimate country." "Compared to my destinations of the past few days," "Madrid is a young city." "Only becoming capital of Spain in the mid 16th century." "But behind the impetuous energy of its youth, lurks a dark spectre." "Visiting this colourful, vibrant city, it's easy to forget how relatively recently was in the grip of a civil war - that most terrible event when a nation tears itself apart." "In 1936, General Franco launched a fascist coup against the left wing government." "For three years the country was ravished by fighting." "Evidence of this division can still be found today." "Indeed shockingly, as recently as March 2005 a statue of the tyrant Franco was still standing." "The most shameful episode of the Civil War took place on the 26th of April, 1937." "That's when the Basque town of Guernica was bombed." "The Basques, an autonomous republic, were hostile to Franco and his forces and so he unleashed his German allies, the Kondor Legion operating in Spain... on this defenceless town." "The attack lasted for three and a half hours." "In the end, one thousand six hundred and fifty people were killed, nine hundred injured and most of the town damaged or destroyed." "It caused international outrage." "My next treasure was created in response to that massacre." "It's a work of the greatest painter of the 20th century and it's generally acknowledged to be one of the most powerful anti-violence, anti-war statements ever made." "It still has the power to move." "Guernica is the work of Pablo Picasso." "Picasso, a Spaniard, was appalled by this act of violence by Franco against his own people." "The difficulty Picasso had was how to respond artistically to this massacre." "He was appalled, outraged, politically engaged, but he knew that art and politics rarely mix successfully." "If he is painting was too full of obvious imagery against warfare, planes, raining bombs and collapsing buildings, he could end up making nothing more than a piece of propaganda." "And that's not what he wanted." "He wanted to make a timeless image against violence, against warfare." "Picasso shows universal human suffering, but the flavour of Spain is unmistakeable." "The imagery of the bullfight." "The bull stands for Franco and his forces." "The suffering horse, the people of Spain." "And these images, some of them, the horse, the bull, the weeping woman - are very personal for Picasso." "These images he'd been using for the last twenty years." "But here, in this painting, very bravely he used those images to make maybe different points." "Points about war and violence." "It's this fantastic sort of trembling balance between political statement and personal statement that makes this painting such a tremendous success." "Painted in Paris," "Picasso ruled that Guernica should only be returned to Spain, his spiritual home, after the country had embraced democracy." "It hung in New York until 1981." "A painting in exile." "Now it hangs here in the Museo Rainer Sophia." "A warning to Spain and every country at risk of tyranny." "It retains huge contemporary relevance... for many people around the world." "It has become the single image against the horrors of war." "Of violence, of military regimes." "Indeed so powerful is the image that a copy of this painting hanging in the United Nations had to be veiled, covered when Colin Powell in 2003 announced America's intentions to attack Iraq." "This image was seen as intolerable at the time." "This really is 'the' image of the 20th century." "From Madrid l head south on the journey back into Spain's history." "It feels like I'm in Morocco." "In fact I'm in Spain." "Here in Granada, I'm reminded of Europe's Islamic history, of a Moslem Spain that might have survived and even spread further north." "I've come to see the greatest and best preserved complex of palaces in Islamic history." "The Alhambra." "The Alhambra was built over several centuries by the Moorish dynasties," "Moslem sultans who ruled southern Spain from 711 to 1491." "For the times, their rule was enlightened and even tolerant." "Moslems, Christians and Jews lived peacefully together." "But even as this great complex of buildings was being completed, Islam was being squeezed out of Spain by Christian monarchs from the north, determined to convert everyone to their faith." "I've just entered the Comares palace." "This is the first anteroom here." "People coming for an audience with the sultan would wait, no doubt trembling and in fear." "Eventually they'd be called, their turn had come to confront the great man." "Perhaps they're here charged with some crime." "They go through this door." "The sultan would be sitting over here on his throne." "The people who'd come to see him down below." "This door on the right leads into the heart of the palace." "Only those people of high status, of grandeur, would be allowed to penetrate beyond this point." "Ordinary people kept back." "The beauty of the Alhambra is extraordinary." "The exquisite tile work, Koranic inscriptions." "This playful use of water and light." "This is the court of the fountain of the lions." "One of the greatest examples... of Islamic architecture in Spain." "The fountain's based on the fountain the bible tells us stands outside Solomon's temple in Jerusalem." "And the division of this court into four areas divided by four strips of water, they represent paradise as described in the bible." "Only those of great power in the land would be allowed to enter this paradise on earth." "This is the focus of the formal rooms of the palace." "The hall of the ambassadors." "Here the sultan would have received men with diplomatic missions to his court." "An incredible space this, because it is, from the political point of view, one of the most important rooms in the world." "Here late in 1491 the last Moslem ruler in Spain sat in an alcove over there - and signed away his kingdom." "He's been overcome by the Catholic monarchs," "Ferdinand and Isabella." "He agreed to go into exile and give up his land, so after nearly eight hundred years, the last Islamic kingdom in western Europe was over." "An era had certainly come to a most dramatic end." "It's mind boggling to speculate on what the loss of Spain... meant to Islam." "Spain was ajewel of the Moslem world." "The loss of Spain implied there was something wrong with Islam." "How could god let this land of the faithful be taken away?" "Particularly when the people doing the taking were ruthless fanatics." "And also the loss of Spain has meant that Islam has been divided from western Europe ever since." "And the results of that are very terrible." "Indeed, we are living with those consequences now." "And it's worth reflecting that barely had the sultan left before Christopher Columbus arrived at the Alhambra seeking finance for his trip that would discover the Americas." "It may be fanciful, but had Columbus been just a few months earlier maybe he would have crossed the Atlantic in the name of Islam." "I leave Spain for France and one of the greatest religious buildings in Europe." "Chartres Cathedral is not a great religious treasure because it's Christian." "To me... this monumental building embraces much, much more." "This is 13th century Gothic." "The Medieval language of Christianity at its best." "But I'm not just here to celebrate the architecture or any one religion." "I'm here to share in centuries of man's search for enlightenment." "And I must say I feel rather like a pilgrim myself having been travelling for five months." "The question though, is will I find... a sort of spiritual enlightenment here that other pilgrims have found in the past?" "Incredible." "You can see the emotional impact of Gothic architecture." "Imagine pilgrims coming here, humble people." "They've seen nothing like this in their lives before." "The scale the glory of this place." "The bible acted as a design guide for the creation of great churches like this." "It makes it clear that the unseen world is more important than the seen." "That the spiritual is more important than the material." "So in a great church or a cathedral it's the spaces defined by the walls that are most powerful where god resides." "And then there's light." "God is light." "So the light flooding in here, manipulated by the coloured glass is in - itself sacred, holy." "Without necessarily realising it, pilgrims came here to worship an object that long before Christianity, since the birth of mankind, has been the subject of human devotion." "The sun." "All round the world I've seen the sun venerated." "In Egypt, in ancient Persia." "And I've seen the same veneration for the sun in Europe." "Indeed in this great Christian church." "Here before me a little brass pin." "Every year on the 21st of June, summer solstice at midday, a ray of light enters this church through a hole up there on the left and that ray of light exactly strikes this brass pin." "And, I should say, the hole in the window shows an image of St Apollonaire." "Apollo, the sun god." "So one sees here continuation of an ancient pagan tradition." "A tradition for worshipping nature." "Worshipping nature in the person of the sun." "The more I look around, the more I see images that aren't necessarily Christian." "Stone carvings on the doors depict signs from the zodiac." "Others simply show the world of man." "A huge beetle with a human head reminds me of an Egyptian scarab." "In the middle of the cathedral is a marble labyrinth which has... no Christian origins at all." "Pilgrims in the Middle Ages would stand here and then walk the labyrinth." "To do this they would take their shoes off, as in a mosque, so the shoes go off and I enter the labyrinth." "Which for me, when I reach its centre, represents the end of my journey." "The end of my pilgrimage around the world looking at the great treasures that man has created." "As with so many of my treasures," "Chartres is a monument to humanity's need to interact with a divine presence." "A presence we sense but cannot see." "Through the centuries different civilisations, unknown to one another, have created buildings to worship this mighty presence." "They fill these buildings with objects in an attempt to personify and honour it." "I've heard so many different voices, all speaking the same language." "Well, I've reached the centre of the labyrinth and what do I feel?" "Having travelled the world I've been aware of many other religions, social concerns, sacred concerns." "I've seen those reflected in the fabric, the detail of this great church. lt's a fusion." "There is a universal religion." "That mankind is bigger than one religion and all religions are, in their essential parts, related, all questing the same thing, an understanding of why we are here." "Where is mankind going?" "And so this great cathedral I do see in a fresh light." "The marriage of all that is marvellous in mankind and in the world." "That, as I stand here where these millions of pilgrims have stood, they've had enlightenment." "I feel I also have gained enlightenment." "That, that and that." "And that's my blessing." "Thank you very much, thank you very much." "Certainly ending of the journey in some style." "Um, getting the ferry tomorrow from Calais to Dover." "This charming hotel that we've found is um, about forty kilometres from Calais and um, not much by way of staff to help." "It's gone, incredible." "Ah, no here we go." "The hotel um, claims to be decorated in the English style, which seems to me leaving a few old riding boots around the place." "Incredible really." "Um, five months of hotels." "This is my last one." "Ah, there you go, look." "Hunting season." "Clearly the English style." "What do we have?" "Oh, I say." "Splendid." "And I feel sitting here with my champagne, my little plastic glass in this room decorated in the English style, that I'm entering back into the real world." "God help me." "Um, lovely." "The white cliffs of Dover." "An image that for centuries... has greeted returning travellers home." "But home will seem... a very small place for me, at least for a while." "It's worrying." "Will I fit in again?" "Rejoin the rat race?" "I've seen the remains of great civilisations' rise and fall, staggering evidence of mankind's great power to create." "And what's clear too, looking at these monuments, is that if they're to survive, to survive the destructive powers of man, we're going to have to fight for them."