While exploring the enigmatic depths of ancient history, scholars often stumble upon cryptic relics, among which lie manuscripts that continue to defy the most skilled scholars and linguists. The...
A monastery, where the earliest surviving Scots Gaelic text was once noted within the margins of a significant Scottish manuscript called the Book of Deer , disappeared from the pages of history...
From Neolithic tablets containing the oldest known system of writing, to a series of letters scrawled on the back of a dead man’s book, some of the most legendary undeciphered codes and texts remain...
The Qur’an is the Islamic Holy text written approximately 1400 years ago, originally memorized and recited orally, and believed to contain the words of archangel Gabriel revealed to the Prophet...
The Greek magical papyri, as it is commonly known, is an extensive collection of ancient Greco-Roman Egypt magical spells, rituals, remedies, hymns, and myth. Scholars have placed its origin between...
A first-time study of a privately owned 16th-century prayer roll from England is a valuable addition to knowledge on medieval England’s Christian ‘cult of the Cross’ in which the Holy Cross was...
Illuminated manuscripts are manuscripts that are covered with painted ornaments presented under several forms. These documents are perhaps most commonly associated with the European Middle Ages...
Dozens of fragments of a 2,000-year-old biblical “Dead Sea scroll” have been found in a cave in the Judean desert, Israel. It is the first time such text has been found in 60 years, since the...
The famous ancient Greek astronomical calculator known as the “Antikythera Mechanism” is a mechanical device created to predict astronomical events. Now, UCL scientists have recreated the tool which...
New research has cast light on how and why the iconic Domesday Book was created. The study shows that the work of the medieval scribes was so efficient and sophisticated that they accomplished what a...
Ramayana is an integral part of life for millions of Hindus across the globe. It is one of the two most popular epics written in Sanskrit from ancient India, the other one being Mahabharata...
The British Library has digitized one of the most remarkable medieval books ever made in England. The Sherborne Missal contains many paintings on a vast array of subjects. Many of the images are...
Egyptian hieroglyphs are among the oldest writing systems in the world, dating back some 5,200 years. Known in ancient Egyptian as the “language of the gods” and said to have been created by the god...
Out of all the necessities in the world, three come to the forefront: food, water, and reproduction. While the first two are necessary for the survival of the individual among the many, the latter is...
The Rosetta Stone is one of the most significant discoveries in the history of archaeology. This artifact was created during the Ptolemaic Period, and was rediscovered at the end of the 18th century...
In secluded fields, on the walls of churches, and beneath construction sites, stones have been found with intricate markings that rise from the lower left up to the center and then down to the lower...
All modern concepts of the Garden of Eden stem from a few verses in the biblical Book of Genesis, none of which is entirely free from ambiguity. The ancient Hebraic documents, from which the early...
Runes are the characters of the earliest written alphabet used by the Germanic peoples of Europe called Futhark. The runic alphabet was used within Germanic languages but primarily in Nordic...
The Vedas are the sacred scriptures of Hinduism and are regarded as the oldest religious texts in the world. Thought to have been composed at least 3,500 years ago, the Vedas are a collection of...
With new technology available to us, we’re inching closer to the end of the days when deciphering ancient languages is a painstaking task filled with frustration and confusion. Nifty machines...
The oldest Buddhist scrolls ever discovered were made on birch bark and spent two millennia folded in clay pots, in a cave, situated along the northern border of Afghanistan and Pakistan, and now...
Within the varied teachings of the Jewish mystical tradition known as Kabbalah there is a minor tradition known as Practical Kabbalah (Kabbalah Ma’asit). This branch concerns itself with the use of...
Cuneiform is a system of writing that was invented by the Sumerians of ancient Mesopotamia. Believed to have been created sometime during the 4th millennium BC (between 3500 and 3000 BC), this script...
The discovery of an ancient Maya vase painted with hieroglyphs is the longest Pre-Columbian text ever found in Belize and is offering new information about this once powerful civilization including...