All language subtitles for Killer.Kings.S01E06.Herod.1080p.NOW.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H.264-RAWR_track3_[eng]

Ancient Israel,
1st century BCE.

A ruthless King of Judea
is struggling to keep his throne.

He had many, many enemies

and they remembered him
as a wicked

king because of the way in which he
dealt with his political opponents.

There are no holds barred
for Herod the Great

in his pursuit of power.

He is jealous and paranoid.

He will do whatever is necessary,

even if that means
killing his own family.

Most infamous
of all his acts, allegedly,

a horrific mass infanticide
to eliminate one baby -

Jesus of Nazareth.

People do monstrous,
monstrous things

when power, wealth,
status is on the line.

But there remains huge
doubt about the historical accuracy

of this claim.

Using groundbreaking AI imagery,

we shall separate the myth
from the truth.

Can new evidence re-assess
Herod's role as a child-killer?

This whole picture of Herod

is simply missing
from the Jewish edition.

Rulers come and go

but what legacy will
the sands of time leave behind?

Herod the Great,
was he truly a killer king?

Since its conquest
by Rome in 63 BCE to this day,

the Kingdom of Judea;
now the West Bank

has seen bitter disputes
over who should rule the land.

Under Herod's rule in 37 BCE

even he has to walk a tightrope,

keeping his Jewish subjects in check

and his Roman rulers happy.

The complication for Herod's rule

is that he was living through
a time of huge political change

within the world
of the Roman Empire,

which kept him in power.

As Roman leaders rise
and fall dozens of Judeans

are brutally executed under Herod,

as he struggles to assert control
over the region.

Over the centuries his name
has become a byword for terror.

Many people think about Herod
strictly through the depiction

that we get in Matthew's gospel

of this extremely paranoid,

tyrannical figure
who would call for something

as horrifically upsetting

as the massacre of innocents.

But when we think about Herod
the Great, the historical figure,

we need to be looking past that.

Perhaps a complex man
who is more than meets the eye?

He's also a man who really,
truly understood

how to build a strong nation.

He clearly had an affinity for art,
architecture and design.

The grand buildings
that he engaged with,

they were beautiful, and he knew
what he was doing there.

So, what truth can be
established about Herod the Great?

Great or not so great?

A ruthless killer or a hapless pawn
in a Roman territorial game?

So what did he do? Who was he?

The roots
of what would become a range

of Herod's insecurities are perhaps
found in his upbringing

under the rule of the Hasmoneans.

The Hasmoneans
are a powerful Jewish dynasty

that governed the kingdom of Judea
and its surrounding regions,

from around 140 BCE.

Herod was born probably in
Jerusalem in 73 BCE,

his father was a courtier

of the Hasmonean high priest
Hyrcanus who ruled in Jerusalem.

The Hasmoneans were
a dynastic ruling family in Judea

that was pretty well liked
by the Jewish people.

Herod was not Hasmonean;

his grandfather was a convert
to Judaism.

His mother is Nabataean,
so he's Arab on his mother's side.

A fact which left many
of his future subjects sceptical,

was Herod originally Jewish at all?

Early in his life in Judea,
the young Herod is already judged

by those around him
as not being a 'real' jew.

My sense with Herod is that
he has grown up in,

always existed in, only ever known

a world of insecurity,
a world of being caught

between battling divisions.

His father, Antipater,
had come from Edgemere,

which is an area south of Judea,
around Hebron,

which had been converted to
Judaism only two generations before.

So, although he was brought up
within a Jewish environment,

he was brought up
very much as an outsider.

He will have sensed it

and this will have made him
agitated, confused, angry.

Even contemporaneous
accounts of Herod's life

cast the same aspersions.

There were always doubts
within the Jewish texts

whether he should really
be considered as a Jew.

Quite unreasonably, really,

since conversion to Judaism
was a very standard thing

by the time of Herod's ancestors
who'd been converted.

The young Herod grows up
battling against this injustice.

And it will have caused
no small degree of destabilisation

of his mental state,
as well as feeding into

considerable level of anger
and resentment.

But through his
well-connected father,

Herod has a chance
to turn the tables.

In Galilee in 47 BCE,

when Julius Caesar was presiding
over the Roman world,

Julius Caesar gave authority
to Antipater, Herod's father,

to appoint his sons Governor,

Herod, to Galilee, and Herod's
brother, Phasael to Jerusalem.

In his twenties
and now Governor of Galilee,

Herod is already showing signs
of ruthlessness.

According, that is,
to Flavius Josephus,

a Roman-Jewish historian
writing towards the end

of the 1st century BCE,

who was known to not be
well-disposed towards Herod.

So any crimes he accuses Herod of
or any details of Herod's life,

we really only have
Josephus to go on.

That means that we have to...

take everything
with a bit of a grain of salt.

One of the first things
that he accuses Herod of

is when Herod was in
the start of his career,

he captured a group of bandits

and had them executed without trial.

Very difficult now to tell

whether behind
the description of bandits,

whether behind that
lies something more political.

Whether these are freedom fighters
we just don't know.

But it's clear
that there were objections

to this kind of ruthlessness.

Herod's first killings
aren't allowed

to pass without censure.

So this was
an extrajudicial execution.

And that upset the families
of those who were executed.

And they appealed
to Hyrcanus the second

who was the high priest in Judea
at the time

and asked that he call Herod
to trial before the Sanhedrin.

The Sanhedrin were the sort of
High Court of Judea and Galilee.

So, this is the first time
that Herod really

was getting into trouble
for something that he had done.

But the young
Galilean governor plans

to wheedle his way out
of a tight spot.

Herod was summoned to Jerusalem
to stand trial,

and Herod's response to that was,
essentially,

to march on Jerusalem with troops
and refuse to undergo trial.

Looking instead to Roman support
so that he didn't have to follow

the laws that were being imposed
by the Hasmonean High priest

who he's meant to serve.

Herod's brinkmanship
fails spectacularly,

and he is forced to face the wrath
of the Sanhedrin.

The custom was to show humility
before the court

by appearing meek and dishevelled,

but Herod has other plans.

the Jewish historian Josephus
records that Herod instead

came with his hair on his head,
finely trimmed,

clean shaven face
and dressed in purple.

So, what Josephus is telling us is
that Herod was a bit shameless

Herod's vanity is legendary.
We know he dyed his hair black.

But for me, psychologically,
I think it's driven by his awareness

that he needs to appear
strong and virile

in order to retain his power.

He was ostentatious,

he didn't have the right mannerisms
for that context,

not that he didn't know it,
but that he chose to avoid it.

So that gives us
a good idea of Herod.

Herod then goes over
the heads of the Jewish Judiciary

and appeals directly to the Romans.

It is they, after all, that are
the real power in the land...

The Roman ruler of Syria
at the time, Sextus,

he was an ally with Herod, and he
pressured Hyrcanus the second

who was high priest to ensure

that Herod would not be found guilty
of the charges against him.

And so, Herod ultimately
is acquitted of that charge.

This tells us that Herod,

even in these early stages
of his political career,

is a master of spin, of strategy.

It tells us that he has these
finely honed political instincts.

He knows that this is the way to
maintain any sense of one upmanship.

So very early in his career,
this began his reputation

as somebody
who was completely ruthless,

and this is the origins
of his power.

The young governor
of Galilee will stop at nothing

to get what he wants.
Soon he sets his sights

on the ultimate prize... sovereignty
over the entire kingdom of Judea.

Roman leader Julius Caesar
has been assassinated.

His replacement, Mark Antony,
is now defending the Empire.

He was facing a little bit of
a crisis at home in Rome.

The eastern border of the
Roman Empire was not

all that well secured
and the Parthian forces,

the military force from Persia,
crossed the border.

They managed to infiltrate
into Roman territory

at the eastern reaches.

Rising star Herod,
uses the crisis

to further his efforts
to take complete control over Judea,

at the expense of his rival,

the Hasmonean High Priest
Hyrcanus the Second.

The Parthian forces
do indeed come down.

A number of battles ensue.

Herod loses. He's captured.

It doesn't work out so well
for Hyrcanus the second either,

who is also captured and mutilated.
He's castrated.

So, this means that
he can no longer be high priest.

With the Jewish
de facto king of Judea, Hyrcanus,

not the man he was, the way is clear
for Herod's royal ambitions

if only he was not in prison.

Herod then escapes
and he is fleeing south.

And, in his flight south,

sometimes
he encounters other forces,

and they have to battle again.

And there's one battle in particular
that happens amongst supporters

of the Hasmoneans
just outside Bethlehem.

And Herod wins that battle
quite decisively.

Herod is called to Rome

where the Senate rewards him
for his victory.

Rome ultimately
rewards him with kingship.

And that's how we get
Herod the great king of the Jews.

Questions over
the new king's Jewish heritage

continue to haunt him.

He came to power entirely

because he was appointed
as King of Judea by the Roman state

and therefore had to impose his rule
over Judea

as a puppet king of the Romans.

So the appointment of Herod
having been made by Rome in 40 BCE

was as an outsider
to the Judean political elite.

That meant that he was bound to find
that there were a large number

of opponents from the previous
regime.

When Herod returns
to Jerusalem take the throne,

he finds that Hyrcanus' nephew
Antigonus

has already proclaimed himself King.

Herod is helped by the Romans.

Antigonus is removed from power

only for another challenge to arise.

The Hasmoneans were pretty
well liked by the Jewish people.

And The Hasmoneans both rule
as king and as high priest.

But you need to have
the patrilineal descent

to have that position.

And Herod did not.
So, he could not be high Priest.

In order to try
to establish himself more firmly

he married into the elite.

Despite already having
a wife and a son,

Herod marries
the 17-year-old granddaughter

of Hyrcanus the High Priest,
Mariamne.

This second wife, Mariamne,

who was a princess
from the Hasmonean ruling family,

which had ruled over Judea
for the previous hundred years or so

and a great coup.

Herod's first wife Doris
and their son Antipater

are banished from his court.

So marrying Mariamne,

that family that she's part of,

it legitimises Herod.

And that is incredibly important

because he doesn't have the lineage.

He's not from that dynastic family.

This is the point at which
the family of Herod became, so

to speak, part of the establishment.

So, this outsider entering properly
into the mainstream

of the Judean elite in a way
which he couldn't have done before.

The royal couple
soon have two sons

and heirs to Herod's throne,
Alexander and Aristobulus,

with Hasmonean royal blood
running through their veins!

The sons that they have together
legitimise him.

These things are vital.

And it's good PR,
it's a good strategy.

In Herod's eyes
his beloved Mariamne

who gives him legitimacy
is also a potential threat.

It was perfectly possible
in the 40s and 30s BCE

for people to imagine
that a powerful woman

from within the Hasmonean family

could rule over Judea.

There were powerful women ruling
over neighbouring states,

of whom best known
is Cleopatra in Egypt.

if Herod was suspicious
of Mariamne's political intentions,

that was
entirely reasonable.

This is a man who whose whole
existence, whose whole personality

is defined by the sense of always
needing to protect himself,

always living
on his survival instincts.

The increasingly paranoid
King of Judea even arranges

a back-up plan
in the event of his own murder.

In one of his most
dramatic gestures,

we know that Herod makes
plans for his beloved wife Mariamne

to be executed

should he, Herod, die.

In order that she cannot take up
with any other man.

This tells us so much about

the inner emotional landscape
of this man.

The sense of paranoia,

He is prepared to do anything
to ensure that that does not happen.

To further protect his position,

Herod decides to clean up his court

by ridding it
of all disloyal Hasmoneans.

And that,
for the first part of his reign,

was the main cause of his brutality

in getting rid of
those political opponents.

Done actually,
to surprising extent judicially.

So, with trials to show
that they were treacherous,

meaning that they were threats
to his rule,

after which they were put to death.

The King's ever watchful
eye then turns towards his in-laws,

particularly Mariamne's
handsome brother, Aristobulus.

Mariamne's brother,
really wanted to be high priest.

There were public demonstrations
requiring Herod to react

by sacking his first high priest
and getting in Jonathan Aristobulus.

Jonathan Aristobulus at the age
of 17, became high priest.

People got far too enthusiastic
about him.

Suspicious of a threat
to his throne,

Herod places his brother-in-law
and mother-in-law

under surveillance
by his own personal bodyguard.

Most of his control was done
through police work,

he had spies
all through his kingdom

who would tell him if there were
any attempts against his rule.

Aristobulus
and mother Alexandra hatch a plot

to flee to Egypt as guests of
its celebrity queen Cleopatra VII.

But Herod uncovers their plans.

Jonathan Aristobulus was invited
down to the palace in Jericho

and went swimming with friends

where they had some kind of game

which involved
holding him under water.

And there was a terrible accident.

He died; he drowned.

That's what Herod said.

Jonathan Aristobulus' mother,
Alexandra, complained bitterly

to her friend Cleopatra of Egypt

and Mark Antony,
Cleopatra's consort,

that this was murder.

And Anthony's response was
that kings must be allowed to do

what they need to do.

The bloodletting
of Herod's in-laws isn't over.

Next, he eyes his former rival
Hyrcanus II

who has returned to Judea.

Mariamne's Grandfather, Hyrcanus,

was also accused of treachery

and also put to death.

This is a man operating
in survival mode.

It's a man who has long ago learned

to completely suppress his emotions.

And the killing doesn't end there.

If threatened,
he will do whatever is necessary

to obliterate that threat,

even if that means
killing his own family.

To be close to Herod
meant being close

to the axe of his executioner.

Herod's Hasmonean wife
Mariamne is racked with grief.

Her brother and now her grandfather
have been murdered

at the hands of her husband.

Now, having learnt of Herod's plans
to have her killed

in the event of his death, Mariamne
gives Herod the cold shoulder.

Herod eventually starts to worry

that his wife, Mariamne,

is plotting against him.
And it's possible that she was.

When Herod hears
that his beloved wife, Mariamne

is potentially plotting against him,

this will have triggered
the pervasive sense of paranoia,

his survival instincts.

The insecure king hauls
his beloved wife before the courts.

She was accused of treason,

of obtaining under the guise
of a love potion for Herod,

what was actually poison.

We have no idea
whether that was true or not.

The accusation was treason
as well as adultery.

And we don't know who the adultery
would have been with.

Was it a manufactured charge
against Mariamne?

This is impossible to tell.

And there's an
unexpected twist in the courtroom.

Mariamne's mother who had
supported her all the way down

to this point in 29 BCE,

so eight years of marriage to Herod

which had been pretty tempestuous,

Mariamne's mother Alexandra
switched sides

and accused her of treason.

Exactly what Herod
was accusing her of.

And so he has her executed.

But the killer king is not done yet.

Mariamne's mother
was also accused of treachery

and put to death.

After Herod has Mariamne executed,

he falls into a prolonged state
of deep grief and mourning.

He will do whatever it takes

even if it means causing himself
considerable unbearable pain.

His survival instincts trump all.

Herod soon recovers
from his malaise

and with most of his rival
Hasmoneans now out of the way

the King embarks on
a huge-scale building programme

to cement his Herodian legacy.

He was a remarkable builder.

It's not just that
there were so many of them,

but they were done in
a really impressive,

monumental style.

Most monumental of the lot
is the temple in Jerusalem.

Situated on the Temple Mount,

the holiest site of Judaism
where the first temple stood

centuries earlier,
built by Solomon himself

the Israelite King
and son of David.

Herod improved and expanded
the second temple in Jerusalem,

turning it into one of the greatest
wonders in the ancient world.

It was a mammoth structure built out
of limestone, covered in gold.

Remnants of
the Western Wall of Herod's temple

remain a place of pilgrimage
to this day.

it is a great new central shrine
for the Jews,

rebuilt far more impressively

than it had been under his
predecessors, the Hasmoneans

It is through building
that Herod seeks to reinforce

his legacy
and shows his obedience to Rome.

Herod transformed Judea with,

in some cases
quite specifically Roman buildings.

So, the great port, port of Caesarea
which allowed trade

to come in to Judea
across the Mediterranean,

which is now a major trading route
from all over the Roman world.

It kept Herod in power.

It kept things stable.
It kept Rome at bay.

And Herod's
sweeping changes also herald

a new prosperous era
for his subjects.

He engaged in these
very large infrastructure projects,

aqueducts,
which would bring clean water.

So, the rule of Herod,
I think, it was mixed.

There were people who,
of course, judged him

for being a Jewish convert.

But Herod didn't reign with terror.

Herod was a deft politician.

Many of his subjects profited
from living under him.

And he grew the kingdom back
to the larger size that it had been

under the Hasmonean's
and he did this

through clever politicking,
not through conquest.

He was basically given more land
by the Romans,

who were the ultimate ruling power
in the region at the time.

As he reaches his sixties
the wheeler dealer Herod

becomes less sure-footed
in his obeyance to almighty Rome.

In 9 BCE he makes
a major miscalculation.

He was very proud of himself
as a military man.

Rather astonishingly,
when he's in his 60s,

he appears to have gone
on campaign himself.

The southern border
of Judea is being raided

by the Nabateans
in present-day Jordan.

Without consulting
the Roman Emperor Augustus,

Herod invades
and crushes the opposition.

He was severely reprimanded
by Augustus

and nearly lost
all authority in Judea

for going on a foreign campaign...

...without authority
from the Roman emperor.

We're told
that Herod contemplated suicide.

Increasingly frail,
Herod's paranoia

reaches another level.

The cloud of his suspicions
now surrounds the two sons he had

with his second wife Mariamne.
Aristobulus and Alexander.

These sons were assumed
by the Romans

as the most plausible heirs

to his rule when Herod should die.

They had more right to rule
than their father

because they came
from the previous ruling dynasty.

And they were accused by Herod
of plotting against him.

Both sons are imprisoned
pending trial.

In a whole series of trials
in front of Roman magistrates,

including the emperor himself,

in which Herod was indeed involved,

he was demonstrating
quite how horrified he was

that his sons
should be plotting against him.

How dare they?

He has his two sons executed.

Thus cutting off the Hasmonean line

that could challenge him
for his position of power.

The psychology of Herod
is such that if threatened,

his reaction will be
to do whatever is necessary

to remove that threat.

Even if that means
killing his own offspring.

We are told that Augustus

who was the emperor in Rome
at the time said of Herod

that he'd rather be his pig
than his son.

Herod maintains Jewish dietary laws.

Pigs would have lived a happy life
without being slaughtered.

Herod's sons? Not so much.

I understand why he did it,
logically, there was a concern

of a plot against him,

and it's quite probable that
that was a real thing.

Herod's everlasting notoriety

is still to reach new heights,

with the tale
of the alleged infamous slaughter

at the end of his reign.

Is the story likely to be true?

If Herod was sufficiently concerned
about any possibility

of opposition to him,
anything is possible.

The frail and insecure
Herod edges towards 70.

It is at this point
that the New Testament alleges

his final murderous act;

one for which he becomes most
infamous throughout the ages.

Within the Christian world.

Herod has been best known
for the massacre of the innocents

as described
in the Gospel of Matthew.

On hearing of the birth
of Jesus in Bethlehem,

the so-called King of the Jews,
Herod, according to Matthew,

orders the slaughter of all the
town's infants under the age of two.

Most Christians have always
engaged with Herod

through that narrative.

And it's characterised solely by
paranoia and tyrannical behaviour.

This sweeping brutality
against boys under the age of two

whether true or not,
tells us that he is seen as somebody

who is capable of anything.

He's somebody who's held
in considerable fear

and whose responses and acts have
given him a reputation,

which means that nothing is seen
as impossible with Herod.

But does Herod deserve
a bad reputation,

one of biblical proportions?

Many historians say the evidence
simply doesn't stack up.

It's unlikely
that this event ever happened

and we can say that
for one main reason.

The vast majority of the information
that we have about Herod

comes to us
from the Jewish historian Josephus.

And no reference
to the massacre is found

in Josephus' accounts
written in the 1st century

and closest to Herod's lifetime.

Josephus fills his record with
many ill deeds that Herod had done.

Josephus was no fan of Herod's,

so it's highly unlikely that he
would have avoided including

such a story had Herod
actually committed that act.

is more evidence to
suggest that this lurid description

was Christian propaganda
rather than historical fact.

The story of
the massacre of the innocents

is totally missing
from the later Jewish traditions.

And I think we can say
how deeply implausible it is

that Herod at the very end
of his life, coming up to 70...

A baby takes time to be a threat.

They won't be a threat to Herod
because he's not going to be there

by the time a baby grows up

We know that he committed
some violent acts

in order to secure succession.

But it's a little bit of a stretch

that he would have been concerned
about an infant being born

at this point in his life.

The story is, of course, possible,
but not very likely.

So how does the infamous
King of the Jews acquire his status

as a child-killer?

It is likely
that the widespread publicity

given to the execution of his sons
around the Roman world,

which was sort of
the affair of tabloids,

everybody would know about them.

And they were remembered
that these were terrible things

that Herod had done
to his own family.

And therefore,
he's the kind of person to whom

such a reputation could be attached.

Or was the inspiration

the battle young Herod
waged in Bethlehem

on his road to being anointed king?

The battle
in which Herod was victorious,

that occurred around the year 40 BCE
just outside Bethlehem

would have resulted in the deaths of
many of Bethlehem's young men.

This was retained in memory
in a form

and became sort of folded
into the narrative

that Matthew was crafting

of mass execution
and acts of violence.

Whether Herod's massacre
of the innocents is truth

or fiction -
almost certainly the latter -

there's little doubt about his final
infamous act.

Despite having married nine times,

the frail king has now reconciled
with his first wife Doris

and his firstborn Antipater.

Herod invited first Antipater back

and then through Antipater,
Antipater's mother Doris was allowed

to come back to court.

But like many
of Herod's relatives

the rapprochement doesn't last.

in the end, Doris and Antipater

were both accused
of plotting against Herod.

Antipater was kept in chains,

and again, followed long discussions
with the emperor in Rome

by Augustus as to what was the best
way to deal with a disloyal son.

And the answer from the emperor
eventually was Herod should do

what he wished as a king
and as a father.

Not easy.

As Antipater languishes in jail,

the sickly king is going through
his own torment,

due to the agonies
of his physical infirmities.

Herod was lying very ill.

There was a great
cry through the palace in Jericho.

Because Herod had tried
to stab himself...

...with the knife that he was using
to peel an apple

because he was in such great pain.

And he was just stopped
from committing suicide.

Antipater believes the
scream is his father's last sound.

Antipater thought that's great and
asked his jailers to let him out.

We know that Herod hears
that his firstborn son in prison

is plotting against him.

Then when Herod got to know that
he said that's one step too far.

and Antipater was put to death.

His whole life Herod has existed,
Herod has survived,

to the extent that he destroys,
that he obliterates,

those plotting against him.
So here we see him

prepared to do that,
even to his firstborn son,

I think, as a last desperate attempt

to hold onto his life,
his strength, his position.

The grief-stricken Herod
remains in agony on his deathbed.

But even from there it's said
that he attempts

one final masterstroke
to boost his PR.

He puts top-ranking Jews in jail.

The story was that Herod wanted
his sister and her husband

to put
all these leading Jews to death

so that even if his subjects
did not cry,

did not mourn when he died,

at least they'd be crying
for somebody else.

That was the story.

And then Herod dies.

Josephus tells us
that he died a gruesome death

of multiple illnesses.
He was not a well man.

And all these Jews who were in the
Hippodrome in Jericho were let free.

We have no idea whether
an unrealised project

was actually really intended
or was rumoured.

And again, the significance is
that the rumour was there.

People said that they could
imagine it as the kind of thing

that Herod might have done.

Herod's Kingdom is divided
up amongst his remaining family.

But the region soon misses
the iron grip of its former leader.

What is certain is that
his methods of ruling

kept the peace in Judea

from 37 BCE down to 4 BCE.

So that's 33 years,
and that when he died

the whole of his kingdom erupted

into a series
of different uprisings.

Different groups rose up
in rebellion against his sons

immediately after his death.

The repression was effective.

So was Herod a strong ruler

or just an out-of-control Tyrant?

How will the sands of time
treat this Killer King's legacy?

We know that he tried to sit
between the Jewish people

and the Roman Empire.

All of this will have meant
that he became somebody

forever looking over his shoulder,
somebody who learned to live

entirely on his survival instincts

Some Jews thought that Herod
had done rather well

at negotiating the relationship
between the people he was meant

to be ruling over
and the wider government of Rome.

There were other Jews who thought
that he was clearly a traitor

because he'd been far too Roman.

And the judgement as to whether
he's a good thing or a bad thing

swung back and forth.

He was a very skilful politician

and I think he deserves
a lot of respect

for what he was able to achieve
at that time for his people.

And what of the brutality
he meted out to so many subjects

and to his own family?

The things
that he did are immoral

but we cannot look at Herod
in a vacuum.

He needs to be understood
in his own context.

He was very concerned about his own
position during his own lifetime,

but so were many kings
and many rulers,

in many different time periods.

So the actions he took,
I don't think,

put him on the fringes of history
by any means.

Although Herod's thinking
processes are utterly logical,

strategic,
I think this is a man driven

by such a profound fear
and paranoia

as to almost render him insane.

He clearly is a killer King,

he had many, many enemies
and they remembered him

as a wicked king
because of the way in which

he dealt with his political
opponents.

But in 1st century BCE,

it would be wrong to think of
the amount of violence that he used

as being particularly unusual.

What is different about Herod

and gave rise
to his later reputation

was the publicity surrounding
these judicial executions,

in particular those of his sons.

Subtitles by Sky Access Services