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Important Events

Here we feature some of the most seminal, historical, and influential events throughout history – both celebrated and unheralded – from the emergence of powerful civilizations and empires, to famous battles, great achievements, and events that have helped shape the world we currently know.

Detail of illustration showing Roman soldiers killing the Anglesey Druids, as described by Tacitus. Source: Public domain
14 April, 2022 - 14:59 Jake Leigh-Howarth

The Conquest of Anglesey and the Destruction of Druidism’s Last Stronghold

With a reputation for their savagery, the destruction of the Anglesey Druids and conquest of the Welsh Isle of Anglesey by the Romans put an end to the last pagan corner of Wales in 77 AD. But was...
The Atacama Desert in Chile. Source: baisa / Adobe Stock
13 April, 2022 - 18:47 Nathan Falde

Chilean Mega-Earthquake Left Atacama Deserted for 1,000 Years

One of the most powerful earthquakes in recorded history occurred in the Pacific Ocean just off the coast of Chile approximately 3,800 years ago. This catastrophic seismic event created a massive...
Roman inflation from 90 BC onwards eventually brought the Roman Republic to its knees! The Roman Forum, the financial and political center of the city and the Republic would have been a busy place as Roman inflation began to destabilize the entire Roman world. Source: Jebulon / CC0
12 April, 2022 - 14:58 Nathan Falde

Roman Republic Experienced Deep Financial Crisis in 90 BC, Study Shows

In the early first century BC, the Roman Republic experienced a multiyear financial crisis, which we can call “Roman inflation.” But while scholars knew that some kind of breakdown in the Roman...
Sacrifice and care on Chinese Tomb Sweeping Day. Source: tuayai / Adobe Stock
8 April, 2022 - 01:58 aprilholloway

The Myths, Legends and Traditions of Chinese Tomb Sweeping Day

Every year, the Chinese celebrate the historic Qingming Festival. Fondly known as Ancestors Day or Tomb Sweeping Day, it is a day that commemorates the onset spring and the occasion when families...
Reconstruction of how the supercontinent Rodinia would have looked. Source: Manuel Mata / Adobe Stock
26 March, 2022 - 21:59 Caleb Strom

Rodinia: The Great Unconformity and the Creation of Life on Earth

The geologic record of Earth’s history is 4.6 billion years long. It contains the history of life on Earth and the formation of the continents and oceans which cover the planet today. There are,...
A plaque to the Black Death dead from 1349 and 1369 at Monmouth, Wales. Source: Jaggery / CC BY-SA 2.0
1 March, 2022 - 18:00 ashley cowie

Was Medieval Black Death Really That Bad? A New Pollen Study Says No!

Black Death is said to have killed over half of Europe’s population. However, a new pollen study suggests many parts of Europe were not affected by the bacterial onslaught. Black Death was a bubonic...
Medieval exorcism of a woman.
27 February, 2022 - 00:40 Mark Oliver

The Exorcism Of Marthe Brossier: The First Exorcism With Scientific Controls

Marthe Brossier was a celebrity in France in the 1590s. She was a woman possessed by demons and her family took “the act” on tour. They went from town-to-town showing off the Satanic entity that...
Young happy woman standing by an American Civil War canon in Manassas National Battlefield Park, Virginia. Source: Andriy Blokhin / Adobe Stock
13 February, 2022 - 22:00 Anthony Ruggiero

Women’s Changing Roles Before and During the American Civil War

Overall, the nineteenth century saw women continue to fight to improve their own roles, as well as the rights of others, like slaves. Women participated in a series of conventions and protests to...
The Australian National Maritime Museum say the Endeavour shipwreck discovery, pictured here underwater in Newport Harbor, USA, is the real thing but Rhode Island maritime authorities say it’s too early to be sure. Source: Australian National Maritime Museum
6 February, 2022 - 18:00 Sahir

Has Captain Cook’s Endeavour Shipwreck Finally Been Confirmed off Rhode Island?

The HMS Endeavour is the famous ship that Captain James Cook used on the first expedition to Australia in 1768 AD. The wreck of the ship that enabled this voyage is now believed to have been found...
A 19th-century woman during London’s Great Stink woman drops her teacup in horror upon viewing a magnified drop of polluted Thames River water, which was a prime source of water-borne diseases such as cholera and typhoid. Source: William Heath / Public domain
27 January, 2022 - 14:00 Aleksa Vučković

The Great Stink of 1858: When the Thames River was Filth and Excrement

What happens when we stop taking care of our surroundings? Humans create a lot of waste, and it needs to be disposed of adequately. Neglecting to do so can only lead to trouble. Londoners living in...
536 was a year of climate cataclysm. Winter landscape by Caspar David Friedrich. Source: Public domain
11 January, 2022 - 01:00 johnblack

Year of Darkness: The Climate Cataclysm of 536 You’ve Never Heard Of

During 536 the world was beset by a long winter. Dubbed “the year of darkness” in the New Scientist , temperatures plummeted and the sun was dimmed by a vast fog which blocked its rays from hitting...
The Bolivian celebration known as the Fiesta de las Ñatitas pays homage to the dead. Source: Carlillasa / CC BY-SA 4.0
6 January, 2022 - 21:59 Khadija Tauseef

Bolivia’s Fiesta de las Ñatitas: Venerating Human Skulls and the Dead

As the sun reaches its zenith, people begin to flood the streets of La Paz, holding in their hands glass urns containing — wait for it — skulls. Although to many cultures this practice may seem...
The Battle of Shiloh by American illustrator Thure de Thulstrup. Source: Adam Cuerden / Public domain
2 January, 2022 - 14:00 dhwty

The American Civil War and the Battle of Shiloh’s Glowing Wounds Mystery

The Battle of Shiloh was a one of the battles fought during the American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 9, 1865), in 1862 in southwestern Tennessee. The Union’s victory at the Battle of Shiloh...
A firework show at the Temple of Dawn in Thailand
31 December, 2021 - 17:38 Joanna Gillan

The Ancient Origins of New Year’s Celebrations

On January 1st of every year, many countries around the world celebrate the beginning of a new year. But there is nothing new about New Year’s. In fact, festivals and celebrations marking the...
Depiction of the Sea People during naval battle with Egyptians as depicted on the temple of Ramses III in Medinet Abu, Egypt. Source: AlternatHistory
24 December, 2021 - 14:00 Doug Mears

Ramses III Verses the Sea People & the End of the Bronze Age

The end of the 3,000-year-long Bronze Age was one of the most violent periods in history. Hittites and Egypt are usually cited as the last remaining major powers until a recently translated stone...
Kunta Kinteh Island in Gambia. Source: s-aznar / Adobe Stock
21 December, 2021 - 14:00 Aleksa Vučković

Kunta Kinteh - The African Island at the Heart of the Slave Trade

Not many people know of the Gambia. The smallest country of mainland Africa, this small nation can seem quite unremarkable at first glance, being confined only to the length of the Gambia River and...
The Celtic Wood mystery left 37 Australian soldiers unaccounted for and unburied in the huge Western Front cemeteries of Europe like this one in Passendale, Belgium. Source: kristof bellens-EyeEm / Adobe Stock
15 December, 2021 - 17:57 Aleksa Vučković

The Mystery of Celtic Wood: Where 37 WWI Australian Soldiers Vanished

Heroes of the Great War never die. Our memory of their bravery and daring will remain alive forever, as a testament of the unconditional sacrifice that our predecessors gave for us, the generations...
The Oppenheimer-Einstein report claims that alien UFOs on our planet is a fact known to the military. Source: ktsdesign / Adobe Stock
14 December, 2021 - 00:57 johnblack

The Ancient History of UFOs and the Oppenheimer-Einstein Report

An unidentified flying object, or UFO, in its most general definition, is any apparent anomaly in the sky that is not identifiable as a known object or phenomenon. Although its definition encompasses...
Anachronistic painting by Piero della Francesca of the Battle of Nineveh (627) between Heraclius' Byzantine army and the Sasanians under Khosrow II, which was pretty much the end of the Byzantine–Sasanian War. Source: Piero della Francesca / Public domain
7 December, 2021 - 13:57 dhwty

The Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 AD and the Rise of the Muslims

The Byzantines and Sasanians were rival powers who fought each other for supremacy in the Middle East. Although the conflict between the two powers began during the 6th century AD, it is in fact a...
The celestial phenomenon over the German city of Nuremberg on April 14, 1561, as printed in an illustrated news notice in the same month. Source: Public Domain
7 December, 2021 - 01:14 johnblack

The Mysterious 1561 Nuremberg Event ‘UFO Battle’

It was in April 1561 when all residents of Nuremberg, Germany, came out of their houses to investigate mysterious lights and loud sounds. They watched the sky, in awe and fear as they witnessed what...
Fireworks at the Opet festival at Luxor’s Sphinx Avenue opening. Source: Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities – Egypt
26 November, 2021 - 17:57 Sahir

Opet Festival Extravaganza Marks Reopening of Avenue of Sphinxes

Egypt hosted the re-enactment of the ancient Egyptian Opet festival last night. The grand ceremony was held to mark the reopening of the 1.7-mile-long (2.7 km) road which links the Temples of Karnak...
St. Sebastian pleads for those afflicted with plague during the 7th century Plague of Justinian in a painting by South Netherlandish painter Josse Lieferinxe. Source: Josse Lieferinxe / Public domain
23 November, 2021 - 21:57 Nathan Falde

Study Demonstrates Terrible Toll of Sixth Century Plague of Justinian

In a new study appearing in the journal Past & Present , Cambridge University history professor Peter Sarris argues that recent scholarship has badly underestimated the true impact of the sixth-...
The Tower of London, where King Edward V, and the Duke of York were killed by Richard III or someone else. Source: rpbmedia / Adobe Stock
22 November, 2021 - 21:57 Alex White

Why Did Richard III Spare Edward, Earl of Warwick?

We’ve all heard the tale of the Princes in the Tower, the young sons of Edward IV who disappeared under mysterious circumstances in the Tower of London in 1483, presumed murdered, only to be...
Hothouse Earth cycles, as proven by Harvard University's latest study, are extreme in heat and in rain with one following the other. Our near future will not be so extreme, but similarities are already apparent in droughts and deluges in many regions of planet Earth. Source: Günter Albers / Adobe Stock
9 November, 2021 - 17:57 Sahir

Extreme Heat Followed by Downpours Once Characterized ‘Hothouse Earth’

New research has found that the so-called hothouse Earth periods in our planet’s remote past were actually periods of extreme hot dry temperatures, hotter than today by 20-30 degrees Fahrenheit (17...

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