Artifacts

There are undoubtedly millions of ancient artifacts from the past that have served to shed light on the lives of our ancestors from many millennia ago. But some ancient mystical artifacts stand out for their uniqueness, their intrigue, or their ability to expand our knowledge about previously unknown aspects of our history. Here we feature many such ancient history artifacts, from amazing examples of ancient technology, to artistic masterpieces, unexplained objects, ancient texts, and mysterious artifacts that shed light on the daily lives of our ancestors.

Looking up inside a Yakhchal

1 October, 2021 - 02:03 Caleb Strom

Ancient Advanced Technology: 2,400-Year-Old Yakhchals Kept Ice in the Desert

The ancients were cleverer than some people today assume. They didn’t have rockets or electricity, at least no indisputable proof has been found of such technologies, but they did come up with...

The mostly silver Vale of York Hoard found in 2007 by two (father and son) metal detectorists. Photo source: Wikimedia.

28 September, 2021 - 14:47 dhwty

The Vale of York Hoard: The Finest Silver Viking Treasure Find In The UK

The Vale of York Hoard is a Viking hoard dating to the 10th century AD. The hoard, which consists primarily of silver coins, was discovered by a pair of metal detectorists in 2007. The objects in the...

Great Wall of China, China.

23 September, 2021 - 02:00 Daria Shatsylo

8 Ancient Chinese Inventions the West Had Not Imagined

According to the statistics provided by the World Economic Forum, nowadays China can boast its position as the world’s second largest spender on scientific research and development, yielding only to...

Cuneiform tablet from Van fortress, Turkey Source: Konstantin / Adobe Stock

21 September, 2021 - 14:49 ashley cowie

AI Model Is Solving 4,500-Year-Old Cuneiform Translation Mysteries

Archaeologists just got infinitely smarter. AI is now successfully predicting lost passages of ancient texts, meaning 4,500-year-old cuneiform tablets, with missing sections, can now read. A deep-...

Ceremonial Shield Showing the Storming of New Carthage. Source: PhilaMuseum

18 September, 2021 - 14:34 ashley cowie

Philadelphia Museum Returns Stolen Shield to Czech Republic

This striking Renaissance ceremonial shield was intended to feature in Adolf Hitlers Mega-Museum in Linz, Austria. Now, this highly-symbolic piece of ancient armor will be returned to the Czech...

10th Century Astronomical Text of Abd-al Rahman al-Sufi Unveiled

17 September, 2021 - 22:55 Sahir

10th Century Astronomical Text of Abd-al Rahman al-Sufi Unveiled

The “suwar al-kawakib" or the Book of Fixed Stars is a 10th century astronomical Arabic text, authored by the famed scholar Abd-al Rahman al-Sufi in the year 964 AD. It was produced by the powerful...

A cylinder seal impression, ca. 2100 BC, sometimes interpreted as Ur-Nammu (seated) bestowing governorship on Ḫašḫamer, ensi of Iškun-Sin.

15 September, 2021 - 02:00 dhwty

The Code of Ur-Nammu: When Ancient Sumerians Laid Down the Law, Everyone Obeyed

The Code of Ur-Nammu is the oldest surviving law code. This text was written on clay tablets in the Sumerian language and is reckoned to have been produced towards the end of the 3rd millennium BC...

Marie Antoinette was entirely innocent of the crime. Source: oksana_bondar / Adobe Stock.

11 September, 2021 - 18:38 Bipin Dimri

Marie Antionette’s Diamond Necklace: The Fraud That Killed A Queen

This is the story of Marie Antoinette, the 18 th century Queen of France, and a diamond necklace that was never actually hers. Although the story seems so outlandish as to be fiction, it is all true...

They’re Alive! Megalithic Sites Are More than Just Stone

11 September, 2021 - 01:00 Freddy Silva

They’re Alive! Megalithic Sites Are More than Just Stone

It doesn't take much to stimulate the human body's electro-magnetic circuitry, in fact a small change in the local environment is enough to create a change in awareness. People who visit ancient...

Ark impression, 17 miles south of Ararat. Source: David Allen Deal.

9 September, 2021 - 21:01 Robert Bowie Johnson

Evidence that Noah’s Ark Landed on a Mountain 17 Miles South of Ararat

An illogical and unwarranted assumption prevails today relating to the landing spot of Noah’s ark. People—highly educated people—are sure that Noah’s ark landed on the remote and inaccessible heights...

Urfa man

9 September, 2021 - 01:35 Alistair

Voices of the Dead: The Strange Origins of Eye Idols

Urfa man, known formally as the Balikligöl statue, is the oldest human-size statue of a man discovered in the world to date. He is currently housed in Şanliurfa’s Archeology Museum, Southeast Turkey...

The Vale of York Hoard, Yorkshire, 9th century AD. A truly British treasure. Source: Portable Antiquities Scheme / CC BY 2.0

8 September, 2021 - 14:59 ashley cowie

Governmental Data Confirms Britain Is A Real Treasure Island

British treasure-data released by the UK government has now been visualized in a series of modern-day treasure maps. You can now see at a glance where exactly in the UK you stand the best chance of...

Replica Roman slave collars, after Zoninus. Source: nikhg / Adobe Stock.

4 September, 2021 - 18:33 B. B. Wagner

“Hold Me Or I Will Run!” Roman Slave Collars Came With A Warning

Slavery was a large part of the Roman Empire. Military expansion brought captives, to compliment the material wealth taken back to Rome. And there is strong evidence that these slaves were not always...

Detail from one of the fragments showing the name Merlin. Source: University of Bristol

3 September, 2021 - 14:47 Nathan Falde

13th Century Magical Merlin Manuscript Shares Original Legend

After two years of hard work, scholars have now finished an Old-French-to-English translation of a centuries-old manuscript that tells of the adventures of Merlin the Magician , King Arthur, and...

Hanging out in the margin of an illuminated manuscript

1 September, 2021 - 01:58 dhwty

Beautiful, Decorative, and Sometimes Crude: Illuminated Manuscripts and Marginalia

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...

Landowning houses used charters to confirm their ownings. Source: Thomas Mucha / Adobe Stock.

28 August, 2021 - 22:32 Meagan Dickerson

Forged Medieval Charters: How To Rewrite History In The Middle Ages

At first glance, charters seem to be nothing more than obscure and boring legal documents, as dull in the Middle Ages as they are today. On closer examination however, there is much more to charters...

Pictogram in the Aztec Codex Telleriano Remensi representing an earthquake that took place in 1507. Source: Gerardo Suárez and Virginia García-Acosta

28 August, 2021 - 18:37 Sahir

Aztec Codex is Oldest Written Account of Earthquakes in the Americas

Between the 1300s and the devastating arrival of the Spanish conquistadors in the early 1500s, the Aztecs were a flourishing Mesoamerican culture in the Valley of Mexico in Central Mexico, building...

The Roman Army employed whistling stones as an effective terror weapon. Source: James Steidl / Adobe Stock.

16 August, 2021 - 22:59 Bipin Dimri

Whistling Sling Stones: Psychological Warfare and the Roman Army

1800 years ago, Roman troops carried a very unusual kind of missile weapon for defeating their enemies. Those weapons were “whistling” sling bullets, and new research suggests these were employed as...

The Great Pyramid at Giza and Noah’s Ark: Are we coming closer to an understanding of the Ancient Mind? Part I

5 August, 2021 - 01:46 Carl Johan Calleman

The Great Pyramid at Giza and Noah’s Ark: Are we coming closer to an understanding of the Ancient Mind? Part I

Two phenomena that have been haunting humanity for a long time are Noah’s Ark and the Great Pyramid of Giza. It has however rarely been suggested that these two are connected. One, the Ark, is part...

The Prophet Nathan’, depicted in the stained-glass of Canterbury Cathedral. Source: Canterbury Cathedral / UCL

3 August, 2021 - 01:51 ashley cowie

Blood Stained Glass Panels At Canterbury Cathedral Saw Becket Die

The oldest known stained-glass windows in the world are traditionally associated with the late 11th century Augsburg Cathedral in Bavaria, Germany. Now, researchers from University College London (...

Latter Day Forgeries: The Hoax of the Kinderhook Plates

1 August, 2021 - 14:56 Kurt Readman

Latter Day Forgeries: The Hoax of the Kinderhook Plates

In the 19th century, golden plates were discovered in Kinderhook in the United States. They were meant to reveal an ancient pharaoh’s lineage, but all was not as it seemed. The first week in May 1843...

The Disc of Sabu: Ancient Egyptian Water Pump or Alien Hyperdrive?

31 July, 2021 - 22:57 Aleksa Vučković

The Disc of Sabu: Ancient Egyptian Water Pump or Alien Hyperdrive?

There is no doubt that the Ancient Egyptian civilization is filled with wonders and mysteries beyond our comprehension. An exceptionally old culture that reaches far back to the early dawn of man’s...

800-Year-Old Kakatiya Dynasty Statues Found Abandoned Near Indian Temple

24 July, 2021 - 01:59 Nathan Falde

800-Year-Old Kakatiya Dynasty Statues Found Abandoned Near Indian Temple

In the village of Duddeda in the southern Indian province of Telangana, amateur historians stumbled upon an astounding collection of ancient statues dating from the Kakatiya Dynasty, the Deccan...

The Vergilius Vaticanus and How It Survived 1,500 Years

14 July, 2021 - 18:56 dhwty

The Vergilius Vaticanus and How It Survived 1,500 Years

The Vergilius Vaticanus is an illuminated manuscript from the Late Antique period, said to have been created in the 400’s. Containing one of the few surviving fragments of Virgil’s Aeneid , as well...

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