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Ancient Origins Tour IRAQ

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New Years Fireworks over a golden temple.

How Have Ancient New Year’s Traditions Influenced Festivities Today?

January 1st, New Year’s Day, is often ushered in with fireworks and festivities beginning on December 31st. Although this practice is the norm in many places around the world, not every culture has...
Finding the Grave of Nicolaus Copernicus - Heretic Turned National Hero

Finding the Grave of Nicolaus Copernicus - Heretic Turned National Hero

Today, Nicolaus Copernicus is hailed by many historians as the originator of heliocentrism, one of the first steps towards modern cosmology and away from the Aristotelian cosmology which had...
Bologna, San Petronio: Meridian of Giandomenico Cassini

Synchronizing Science and Religion? Why We Find Solar Observatories and Astronomical Features in Churches

It is often assumed that science and faith are always at loggerheads with each other. This, however, is a common misconception, as there are numerous instances demonstrating the co-existence and co-...
Uncovering the history of timekeeping through archaeological exploration and historic research. Source: jozefklopacka/Adobe Stock

A History of Timekeeping: Mankind’s Obsession With Time

From our humble hunter-gatherer beginnings to the most advanced of ancient civilizations, the sun and moon have always held a particular fascination for humanity. Several forms of tools, monuments,...
The 10,000-year-old pebble which is believed to be the oldest lunar calendar in the world. Source: SAPIENZA, Università di Roma

10,000-Year-Old Engraved Stone Found to be World’s Oldest Lunar Calendar

A new study, coordinated by Sapienza, claims to have discovered the oldest lunar calendar in the world in a pebble that was carved during the Upper Paleolithic period. The remarkable find has been...
Example of an ancient calendar. The ancient Egyptians created a calendar with 365 days in a year.

Why Are There 365 Days in a Year? Organizing Dates with an Ancient Egyptian Calendar

The calendar is one of mankind’s most important inventions. Calendars allowed societies to organize time for religious, social, economic, and administrative purposes. The calendar, or rather, two...
The Copper Scroll part of the Dead Sea Scrolls

The Copper Scroll Abacus: Is the Real Treasure Found In the Numbers?

Even the most intriguing mysteries have a sell-by date in a 24/7 mass communications age. But one has proven itself to be more enduring since a copper scroll was unearthed on the coast of the Dead...
The Mzora Stone Circle in Northern Morocco.

The Mzora Stone Circle: A Megalithic Mystery in Morocco

When people think of megalithic structures , there is a clear behemoth which undeniably dominates the history books – Stonehenge . The iconic stone circle has fascinated historians, archaeologists,...
Sun Stone - Part of the Aztec Calendar

The Aztec Calendar Wheel and the Philosophy of Time

The Aztec or Mexica calendar wheels have been a source of fascination for centuries. It was not just a way to keep time - it was a complete philosophy of time in which every day had a religious...
Medieval stargazers. People have been fascinated by the stars and their possible influence over our lives, long before and after the time of Babylonian astrology.

Complex Astronomical and Astrological Systems Detailed on Ancient Assyrian Tablets

Archaeologists studying a group of five unique stone tablets dating to the first millennium in Babylonia and Assyria have announced that they reveal a hitherto unknown level of astronomical...
Nabta Playa and the Ancient Astronomers of the Nubian Desert

Nabta Playa and the Ancient Astronomers of the Nubian Desert

Nabta Playa is a remarkable site composed of hundreds of prehistoric tumuli, stelae, and megalithic structures located in the Nubian Desert, approximately 100 kilometers west of Abu Simbel in...
Stonehenge Sunset impression.

Stonehenge Builders Had Ancient Knowledge of Pythagorean Geometry

A new book, Megalith , claims ancient Britons built Stonehenge “and other stone circles with a knowledge of Pythagoras' theorem, 2,000 years before the Greek philosopher formalized geometry.”...
The alignment of the rising sun on the winter solstice with the Saywas in the Atacama desert, Chile.

Sun and Earth Aligned: Ancient Andean Calendar is Illuminated on the Atacama Desert

On the winter solstice of 2017 a dedicated historian at Chile’s Pre-Columbian Art Museum in Santiago, Dr. Cecilia Sanhueza, was following a hunch in the Atacama Desert, Chile. She observed “a row of...
Maria Reiche measuring the Nazca Lines.

Maria Reiche: The Governess of Nazca

Today, the birthday of the German lady who contributed greatly to our understanding of the famous Nazca Lines in Peru, is being marked by Google Doodle and others. Maria Reiche was a talented...
Episodes in the book of Genesis. Oil painting by a Spanish painter. Iconographic Collections.

Can the Babylonian Calendar Help Explain the Ages of Patriarchs Recounted in the Book of Genesis? - Part 2

The ages of Adam and his descendants in the Book of Genesis appear incredulous when compared to the average lifespan of Man throughout history. Though there have been several attempts to justify the...
Episodes in the book of Genesis. Oil painting by a Spanish painter. Iconographic Collections.

Can the Babylonian Calendar Help Explain the Ages of Patriarchs Recounted in the Book of Genesis? - Part 1

The ages of Adam and his descendants in the Book of Genesis appear incredulous when compared to the average lifespan of Man throughout history. Though there have been several attempts to justify the...
The laughing jester // Art museum of Stockholm, Sweden.

Jokes and Pranks: Here is the April Fools’ Day Origin Story

Every year, people celebrate April Fools’ Day with pranks, practical jokes, and hoaxes. Merriment, cheer, and joviality reign as people poke socially sanctioned fun at one another. This day has been...
13,500 year old carved bison bone dredged from the North Sea.

13,500-year-old Artwork Saved from the Abyss of the Continental Shelf

Snared in a fishing net at the bottom of the North Sea, on the edge of the continental shelf, the “oldest Dutch work of art” has been found, according to an article published in Cambridge Antiquity...
Mammoth in the Royal BC Museum in Victoria (Canada). The display is from 1979, and the fur is musk ox hair.

Surprising Stone Age Knowledge Revealed on a Mammoth Bone Bracelet

In Sivershchina, close to the village of Mizyn in Ukraine is one of the oldest and most unique settlements of humans – and it was discovered in a parking lot. The now well-known archaeological site,...
60 pieces of scroll have been reassembled in the latest scroll.

One of the Last Two Known Dead Sea Scrolls Is Deciphered

Researchers from the Haifa University have reconstructed the contents of one of the last two undeciphered Dead Sea Scrolls , disclosing a distinctive calendar used by a Jewish sect that lived in the...
Venus and Anchises

Explainer: The Gods Behind the Days of the Week

The Roman weekday ‘dies Veneris’ was named after the planet Venus, which in turn took its name from Venus, goddess of love. The origins of our days of the week lie with the Romans. The Romans named...
Mosaic with the months of the year, starting with the Roman first month March.

Where do the names of our months come from?

Our lives run on Roman time. Birthdays, wedding anniversaries, and public holidays are regulated by Pope Gregory XIII’s Gregorian Calendar , which is itself a modification of Julius Caesar’s calendar...
A Dendera Zodiac with added blue and gold color, Neues Museum, Berlin

A Circular Egyptian Mythology: Does the Dendera Zodiac Represent the Most Ancient Astronomy?

In 1799, Napoleon and his armies were beginning to expand their presence throughout Egypt. Napoleon brought not only armies but artists to record sketches of his findings of a country that was...
Detail of Alexandre Cabanel’s ‘The Birth Of Venus.’

Linking the Planets and Human Life: Venus Calendars Helped Track Pregnancy in Neolithic Greece

Back in 4000 BC women of the ancient Aegean civilization may have used a calendar tracking the movement of the planet Venus to follow their pregnancy milestones. This is an intriguing explanation for...

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