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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.

Pythagoras Emerging from the Underworld by Salvador Rosa (1662) Kimbell Art Museum (Public Domain)

Passage To Portals Of The Netherworld

A common cosmological theme within ancient cultures was the concept that the Netherworld, Underworld or afterlife was entered from this world through portals and these ancient gates were often built...
Portrait of Empress Mathilda, from "History of England" by St. Albans monks (15th century); the beginning of The Anarchy. (Overlay, modern Anarchy sign)                Source: Public Domain (Overlay; Public domain)

The Anarchy: A Whirlwind of Chaos and Warfare in Medieval England

Anarchy. The word itself is enough to paint a stark picture of lawlessness and disorder, a picture of a world in which no rules exist – for anyone. Such a world is bound to collapse under its own...
Recovering the Stolen Jewel from the Palace of the Dragon King. Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1853) The Metropolitan Museum of Art (CC0)

Dances With Dragons Of The Ancient East

Kinryuzan Sensoji Temple, located in Asakusa, Tokyo is one of the oldest Buddhist temples in Japan. Dedicated to Kannon Bosatsu, the Bodhisattva of compassion, the temple is one of the most widely...
Sultan Razia never gave up her rightful place as heir. One Friday, dressed in red, the color of protest, she visited Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque to appeal to her people for justice. Source: kharchenkoirina / Adobe Stock

Sultan Razia: The First and Only Female Royal of Delhi

On the eve of October 1240, two armies faced one another ready for battle. This was a last-ditch effort by Sultan Razia to recapture her throne which had been usurped by her brother. Razia was the...
Crucifixion miniature, Rabula Gospels, with the legend "Loginos". Meister des Rabula-Evangeliums - The Yorck Project (2002) (Public Domain)

Piercing Christ: The Trials And Tribulations Of The Heilige Lanze

Traditional religious literature affirms that the Heilige Lanze (Sacred Lance), also called Spear of Destiny, Longinus Spear, Maurice’s Spear and a myriad of other names, was the weapon with which...
Strips of the Copper Dead Sea Scroll at the Jordan Museum, from Qumran Cave 3, 1st century AD (Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin /CC BY-SA 4.0)

Enigma: The Copper Scroll Treasure List Decoded

The Dead Sea copper scroll has been deciphered. In a fascinating decoding exercise, it was discovered that the numbers listed as weights of treasures and cubit measurements on the scroll, were...
Dušan the Mighty, seen here in a detail of a 14th century fresco at Lesnovo Monastery in the Republic of Macedonia, ousted the Byzantine Empire from power in the region to create the great Serbian Empire which rose in the 1340s to become the leading political and economic power in the Balkans. Source: Public domain.

The Immortal Legacy: Dušan the Mighty and the Birth of the Serbian Empire

The medieval history of Serbia is an inspiring tale filled with great achievements, toil and struggle, and the strife of a small nation and its people as they attempt to rise to independence and...
The magi or three kings who followed the Star of Bethlehem to find the new-born Jesus. Source: Pawel Horazy / Adobe Stock

Did Augustus' Royal Coins Lead the Magi from Parthia to Bethlehem?

One of the great mysteries of the New Testament is the Star of Bethlehem and the magi (the three kings or wise men) who “followed” the star to pay their respects to the newborn Jesus . Most...
Christ Statue Flash (Pixabay Free Use)

Thunderbolt And Lightning: The Divine Spark That Shaped History

For millennia the phenomenon of lightning has been shrouded in mystery, inspiring much fascination by humans, who for the longest time lived outdoors in the shadows of these cosmic blasts of light...
Giulia Tofana was a 17th century leader of a poison cartel responsible for over 600 deaths thanks to her trademark poison Aqua Tofana. Source: Public domain

Giulia Tofana: Queenpin of the Criminal Magical Underworld

Between the years of 1630 to 1655, Giulia Tofana and her poison cartel were the primary facilitators of well over 600 deaths, by way of disgruntled wife, through their trademark poison known as Aqua...
Statue of Raja Bhoja in Bhopal at the time of sunset. Source: yash / Adobe Stock

The Curious Case of Multiple Raja Bhojas of India

Sometimes, a man acquires a legendary aura due to the benevolence of his heart or due to the greatness of his deeds. But often legends accumulate the collective qualities of various heroes and give...
The 15th-century, ninth European Map (Nona Europae Tabula), depicting the Balkans, from a medieval edition of Ptolemy's Geography. (Public Domain)

Antiquarian Treasures Worth 150,000,000 Dollars

Before the invention of the Gutenberg printing press in Mainz, Germany, around 1440 AD, recognizable systems of writing had developed in three major ancient cultures: around 3000 BC Mesopotamian...
Artistic representation of a standing Gigantopithecus

The REAL Bigfoot: Gigantopithecus Would Have Been Terrifying to our Ancient Ancestors

From legends of Bigfoot to films like Mighty Joe Young, humans seem to have a fascination with giant ape-like creatures. This leads to the question of whether stories about giant apes have a basis in...
Known to all and feared by many, the Curonians were famed for their prowess in battle, strong warrior culture, and an infamous reputation of raiding and plundering their neighboring shores. Source: destillat / Adobe Stock

Men from the Land of Amber: The Shocking History of the Fierce Curonians

The modern Baltic nations of Latvia and Lithuania owe a lot to their fierce and rich history. The fearsome tribes of Balts – close cousins to the neighboring Slavs – carved for themselves a small...
Burning of a heretic by Sassetta (1423) Melburn Museum(Public Domain)

The Jester of God and Murderous Heretic of 14th-Century Italy

" Penitenzàgite! (Do penance) ", shouted Gherardo Segarelli, a young and eccentric peasant, with flaming, hallucinated eyes and a long beard, as he wandered barefoot, wrapped only in a cloak, in the...
Painting titled ‘Free Women of Color with their Children and Servants in a Landscape.’ Life changed for American women as the eighteenth century progressed. Source: Public Domain

Culturally Misunderstood: The Struggles and Advances of Early American Women

The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries saw a series of transitions in life in America, as many, particularly women, strove to find their identities in patriarchal society. Early American women were...
Mimir, the bodiless god of wisdom, plays a fundamental role in the stories of Odin and the Norse gods.

The Bodiless God of Wisdom: Mimir in Norse Mythology

The god who transcends even Odin’s power, Mimir (or sometimes called Mim) is remembered throughout Norse mythology as the oracular head from which the two races of gods, the Aesir and Vanir, seek...
Pope Alexander VI inspired the Showtime mini-series “The Borgias”,

Pope Alexander VI: Unscrupulous Borgia Patriarch With a Lust for Power

Alexander VI was a pope who lived during the 15 th century, when Italy was experiencing the Renaissance . He is considered to be one of the most controversial popes in the history of the Roman...
The Sati of Ramabai, Wife of Madhavrao Peshwa (reigned 1761-1772) (Public Domain)

The Bitter Battle of Bubat: Divorcing the Javanese and the Sundanese

The modern-day Java Island of Indonesia now boasts diverse ethnic and religious communities, but the island was once divided by the bitter Battle of Bubat, when a royal wedding turned into a blood...
Assyrian soldiers carry beheaded heads of their prisoners as depicted on a wall in the South-West Palace at Nineveh, during the “First” Fall of Neneveh.          Source: Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin / CC BY-SA 4.0

August 10 612 BC: Nineveh, the Largest City in the World, Fell

On this day, 2,632 years ago, the ancient metropolis of Nineveh fell. “ ABC 3 ” is a historiographical text from ancient Babylonia which records August 10th 612 BC as the date of this dramatic...
Prester John was a legendary Medieval king. Source: diter / Adobe Stock

The Legend of Prester John and His Lost Kingdom in the East

Prester John (known also as Presbyter John or John the Elder) was a legendary figure in Europe during the Medieval and Early Modern periods. Europeans living at that time believed that Prester John...
Hagia Sophia in February 2020 (A.Savin/ Public Domain)

The Storied Past of Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia

On July 12, 2020, Pope Francis stood silently in a pulpit placed in the large window overlooking St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican in Rome. He had just delivered the weekly Angelus prayer given each...
The Second Scorpion King of Ancient Egypt

Searching for the Lost Footsteps of the Scorpion Kings

There were two Scorpion Kings in the pre-dynastic period of ancient Egypt. They were forgotten by most of the world until Dwayne Johnson played one of the rulers in the famous movie ‘The Scorpion...
The Unfinished Obelisk at Aswan (Image: © David H Childress)

The Enigma Of The Unfinished Obelisk At Aswan

The standard definition of an obelisk is a monolithic stone monument whose four sides, which generally carry inscriptions, gently taper into a pyramidion at the top. These massive, pointed shafts of...

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