William Dalrymple

Willam Dalrymple

The historian and co-host of the hit podcast Empire, William Dalrymple, will reveal India’s role as a cultural and scientific superpower of the ancient world.

One of Britain’s greatest living historians, Dalrymple is known across the globe for his ability to bring the extraordinary history of the Indian subcontinent to life, whether through award-winning, bestselling books like Return of a King and The Anarchy, or his hit podcast, Empire.

Live at Festival, he’ll tell the story of how, from 250BC to 1200AD, India transformed the world: exporting religion, art, science, medicine, and language along a Golden Road that stretched from the Red Sea to the Pacific, creating a vast and profoundly important empire of ideas.

Like ancient Greece, ancient India came up with a set of profound answers to the big questions about what the world is, how it operates, why we are here and how we should live our lives.

 Indian ideas crossed political borders and influenced everything they touched, from the statues in Roman seaports to the Buddhism of Japan, the poetry of China to the mathematics of Baghdad.

Don’t miss this chance to hear the story of how India became the great intellectual and philosophical superpower of ancient Asia.