The Archaeology Podcast Network
38 episodes listed below
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Join Egyptologist Stephanie Rice as she delves into topics such as the elaborate tombs built to immortalize the dead, ancient guardians of the afterlife, and the tales of heroes who defied and often triumphed over deities of death. The Past Macabre explores the diverse ways in which cultures throughout history have sought to understand, confront, and transcend death.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Stephanie Rice connects archaeological evidence with myth and memory while staying clear about what surviving objects can and cannot establish.
Stephanie Rice builds episodes around the meeting point between material evidence and the stories people tell about it. Her two-part examination of fossil finds moves through ancient texts, excavated bones, dinosaur tracks, and living cultural traditions, showing how natural…
'Dragon bones' in a Chinese pharmacy give your curiosity a very old receipt to inspect.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Three Egypt stories, plus a brief follow-up, keep the archaeology conversation moving.
The episode holds a steady Egypt focus through three linked stories: a mysterious structure beneath ancient Per-Wajet, a newly discovered royal tomb linked to Pharaoh Thutmose II near the Valley of the Gilead, and the remains of one of the largest Coptic monasteries ever found.
A tomb, a queen, and a clear study of power.
Fu Hao's tomb anchors the episode, but the larger interest is power: how a Shang-era queen could lead in battle, be remembered through weapons, and still stand out as a vivid historical figure.
A village archive turns one settlement into a study of power, property, and memory.
The episode follows Stephanie Rice as she narrows The Past Macabre to Deir el-Medina, one of the best-preserved ancient Egyptian settlements, and builds its case from texts, artifacts, and nearby cemetery evidence.
A careful look at the labor and logistics behind Haith el-Ghrab.
The piece presents Haith el-Ghrab as a working settlement bound to pyramid building, with barracks, larger administrative houses, warehouses, and a river port moving supplies toward the construction sites and nearby elite tombs.
A grounded material-history review of the Scorpion Kings, built around tomb goods and the trade networks behind them.
The real Scorpion Kings come through as a useful check on how quickly modern storytelling turns early civilization into vengeance and conquest.
A climate-threatened Alaskan shoreline frames a thoughtful look at trust, local knowledge, and archaeological responsibility.
Heritage Voices episode 98 follows the Nunachlik Digital Museum to an Alaska shoreline where climate change was pushing artifacts out of the ground and into danger.
A spirited look at Australian rock art, deep human time, and the stubborn difficulty of dating ochre.
The Rock Art Podcast frames Australian rock art as both a question of image-making and a deeper argument about human time on the continent. Dr. Alan Garfinkel's conversation with Dr.
A clear, grounded look at fossils, trade, and the ancient stories that gathered around dragon bones.
The Past Macabre treats ancient fossils as clues to the stories people made when the natural world outpaced explanation. Stephanie Rice first separates archaeology from paleontology, then follows the places where they meet: fossils in archaeological settings, long-running…
Greek myth told with fatal momentum.
Ancient empire told in old public-domain voices.
Host Stephanie Rice explores how fossils from mammoths, dinosaurs, and megafauna inspired myths across cultures, from Mesoamerican creation stories about Quetzalcoatl gathering giant bones to Hopi ceremonies mimicking dinosaur tracks and Irish bog finds reinforcing cycles of giants.
The Archaeology Show episode 326 opens with satellite radar and electrical resistivity tomography flagging a buried structure at Tell el-Fararin in Egypt's Nile Delta.
Stephanie Rice's episode 34 of The Past Macabre profiles Fu Hao, a Shang Dynasty queen who lived around 1250 to 1200 BCE, roughly the era of Ramses II and the Lion Gate of Mycenae.
Deir el-Medina, or Paademi, was a remote New Kingdom settlement about two kilometers from the Nile, and Stephanie Rice uses its preservation to reconstruct homes, graffiti, and legal records from named residents.
Stephanie Rice uses Haith el-Gurab, the Wall of the Crow, to argue that the Giza Plateau was supported by a purpose-built settlement rather than a slave camp.
The Past Macabre episode "The Archaeology of the Real Scorpion Kings" examines Scorpion I and Scorpion II, pre-dynastic Egyptian rulers associated with a scorpion symbol.
Heritage Voices episode 98 examines the Nunachlik Digital Museum, created from a community-based archaeological project at a Bering Sea site where artifacts were being exposed by shoreline erosion.
The Rock Art Podcast's Episode 144 features Dr.
Stephanie Rice’s The Past Macabre examines how fossils may have influenced dragon and sea-monster traditions in China, Greece, Rome, and Egypt.
An Egyptologist explores how different cultures have understood and confronted death throughout history.
An Egyptologist explores how different cultures historically understood and confronted death through tombs, guardians, and heroic tales.
This episode explores new archaeological discoveries about the construction and life around Egypt's pyramids.
An exploration of early Egyptian tombs and burial practices that led to the construction of the pyramids.
An Egyptologist explores archaeological discoveries at Tel el Ferja that challenge theories about the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt.