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Ancient Origins Tour IRAQ

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History

From the powerful civilizations of Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the Indus Valley, to the fearsome yet sophisticated society of the Vikings, the ancient world was a surprising and challenging place. Here we feature some of the most seminal and influential events and people throughout history, that have helped shape the world we know today.

Ostracism: From Divine Punishment to Political Maneuvers

Ostracism: From Divine Punishment to Political Maneuvers

As the world’s powers perpetually rise and fall, exile and banishment have forever been ubiquitous elements of human history. Exile and ostracism have afflicted individuals and nations, inspiring...
The Eleusinian Mysteries: Demeter’s Secret And Sacred Rites

The Eleusinian Mysteries: Demeter’s Secret And Sacred Rites

Conjuring up mystical images of secret initiation rites held under cover of darkness, the Eleusinian Mysteries had a reputation as a dark and dangerous festival. In fact, it was surrounded by such an...
Roman executions at the Colosseum were a gruesome affair, as depicted in The Christian Marturs' Last Prayer by Jean-Léon Gérôme. Source: Public domain

Roman Executions in the Colosseum: The Stories of Laureolus and Androcles

Public order in ancient Rome was a priority for the elite, who contrived a range of gruesome punishments for purportedly serious crimes deserving the death penalty. As a result, a day of fun and...
The Great Pyramid Of Giza Enacting The Rite Of Rebirth

The Great Pyramid Of Giza Enacting The Rite Of Rebirth

In Egypt, the pharaoh, who was the living incarnation of Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris, would undergo at death a transformation from being the living Horus to being the dead and resurrected...
The diagnostic methods and treatments in the Trotula are based on the theories of Claudius Galen and Hippocrates, shown in this 12th century mural from Anagni in Italy.

Medieval Attitudes to Women’s Medical Conditions Found in The Trotula

The Trotula is a very well-known 12 th century text, originally written for male medical practitioners treating gynecological or obstetrical issues, which reveals a great deal about how people...
Livia Drusilla: Imperial Wife of Rome and Emperor Maker

Livia Drusilla: Imperial Wife of Rome and Emperor Maker

Livia Drusilla was the third wife of Augustus, the first Roman emperor. Prior to her marriage to Augustus, she was married to a Roman politician by the name of Tiberius Claudius Nero. Through this...
The Passing of St. Brigid of Kildare. Smithsonian American Art Museum (CC0)

Bandrui And Banflaith The Druidesses Of Yore

A woman's face, dubbed Hilda, was reconstructed from an ancient skull housed in The University of Edinburgh's Anatomical Museum. Hilda lived between 55 BC and 400 AD and was of Celtic origin. She was...
Security: The Long History of the Lock and Key

Security: The Long History of the Lock and Key

The modern-era definition states that a lock is a mechanical device or innovation that is used for fastening any physical entity. This lock is triggered and released with the use of an object called...
The Triumphs of Tonyukuk the Wise, Supreme Commander and Kingmaker

The Triumphs of Tonyukuk the Wise, Supreme Commander and Kingmaker

Today the steles of Tonyukuk the Wise are situated at an immensely popular and historical 1300-year-old memorial site. It is located northwest of Bayantsogt Mountain in Erdene Soum, Mongolia...
The Venerable Bede and the Origins of the English ‘Nation’

The Venerable Bede and the Origins of the English ‘Nation’

How do you define a nation? Most people would probably think of a nation as being a defined geographical area governed by a political body of some sort which acts on behalf of its citizens, who are...
The Twists And Turns Of Religion: Shaman, Priest And Promised Messiah

The Twists And Turns Of Religion: Shaman, Priest And Promised Messiah

The world of late antiquity was extremely suspicious of novelty, anything, that is, that made claim to serious attention. Every innovation, whether of thought or technique, had to be justified in...
Prophecy has had a strong influence since ancient times

Prophecy Through the Ages: Society, Power and Legend

“Prophecy is an emanation sent forth by the Divine Being through the medium of the Active Intellect, in the first instance to man's rational faculty, and then to his imaginative faculty.” -...
Epistemology of Ancient Lost Technology

Epistemology of Ancient Lost Technology

What is “lost knowledge”? As human civilizations arise and develop, they accumulate knowledge. That knowledge has many forms, from the pragmatic to the theoretical. In most cultures, there is a...
The Tripitaka Koreana: A Vast Trove of Buddhist Woodblock Wisdom

The Tripitaka Koreana: A Vast Trove of Buddhist Woodblock Wisdom

The Tripitaka Koreana is a collection of Buddhist texts, laws, and treaties originally created during the 11 th century by the Korean kingdom of Goryeo. The Tripitaka Koreana was carved onto...
Telesilla, Warrior Poetess From Argos, Who Manned-Up On The Battlefield and Bedroom

Telesilla, Warrior Poetess From Argos, Who Manned-Up On The Battlefield and Bedroom

An ancient oracle told by a Pythian priestess says, “ But when the time shall come that the female conquers in battle, driving away the male, and wins great glory in Argos, then many wives of the...
Ancient Egyptian Painter Left Behind His Palette and The Paint Has Survived!

Ancient Egyptian Painter Left Behind His Palette and the Paint Has Survived!

When compared to later, more naturalistic Classical art of the Greeks and Romans, ancient Egyptian art has been described as blocky, static, abstract, and formal. But that doesn’t mean that the...
Hernan Cortes: The Conquistador Who Beat the Aztecs

Hernan Cortes: The Conquistador Who Beat the Aztecs

Hernan Cortes was a Spanish conquistador who lived between the 15th and 16th centuries AD. He is best remembered for his expedition against the Aztec Empire centered in Mexico. This was part of the...
The Ancient Language Of Sacred Sound: The Acoustic Science Of The Divine

The Ancient Language Of Sacred Sound: The Acoustic Science Of The Divine

It is an astonishing fact that, from the end of the so-called ‘Dark Ages’ and the settlement of Europe, a massive building program took place that was to transform Europe in a hitherto unsuspected...
Chivalry and The Order of the Golden Fleece

Chivalry and The Order of the Golden Fleece

The Order of the Golden Fleece is an order of chivalry that was founded by Philip III, the Duke of Burgundy, on the occasion of his marriage to Isabella of Portugal in the 15 th century. Through the...
Léon Bakst's vision of cosmic catastrophe. Stat Russian Museum

Bronze Age Cataclysmic Comet Responsible For The Sea People

The Late Bronze Age collapse of the 12th century BC is one of the greatest and most enduring puzzles of Mediterranean archaeology. A cosmopolitan age, perhaps one of the first true episodes of...
Representation of a historical femme fatale

Femme Fatale: The Ancient Sex Crafts of History’s Most Alluring Women

The seductress, or femme fatale (French for “Deadly Woman”), is one of the oldest female archetypes and although there has been great diversity in "how" she has been portrayed, she has some core...
The Roots Of Catoptromancy in Ancient Persian and Central American Sources

The Roots Of Catoptromancy in Ancient Persian and Central American Sources

“ Thus television... has a prehistory in the domain of oriental folk-lore ,” wrote Berthold Laufer in 1928 in an article with the delightful title, The Prehistory of Television . Television was quite...
Margery Kempe: Medieval Mystic and ‘Heretic’ Heroine

Margery Kempe: Medieval Mystic and ‘Heretic’ Heroine

Margery Kempe was, for the first 40 years of her life, an ordinary woman. Born into a middle-class family in 14th century East Anglia in England, she is remembered today for her remarkable later life...
“His Face Was Radiant”: Pulling Back The Veil On The Mystery Of Moses’ Shining Face

“His Face Was Radiant”: Pulling Back The Veil On The Mystery Of Moses’ Shining Face

One of the Bible’s most enduring exegetical enigmas has to be the strangely shining semblance of Moses . The Book of Exodus relates how after the great Hebrew lawgiver receives the Ten Commandments...

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