I uncovered a curious tale about a scrubby patch of land while writing a book on the folklore and history of East Anglia. Marked on modern maps as Lushbush, you pass it heading eastwards out of the...
Local authorities from South Korea announced recently that they have found proof of human sacrifice for the foundation of buildings for the first time at a Korean site. Experts suggest that the...
An unusual pentagonal diagram with numbers and letters is found in some old texts. The oldest extant version is in a French book published in 1754, but the image and explanation that accompanies it...
Until the Age of Enlightenment, it was widely believed that every land creature had its counterpart in the sea (and perhaps even in the heavens). The classic example of this belief is the horse,...
No English translation exists of The Buried Pearl , although it is a rather strange fact that in 1901, the French archaeological mission in Cairo made a regular French edition. Strange, because its...
[Read Part I] Let us then return to the Great Pyramid. Why was it built in the first place? According to the ancient Egyptian sources the pyramids were built to reflect the primeval mound that had...
Devil or angel? Sometimes it’s hard to tell. The concept of demons is an old one, harking back to the confiscation of pagan nature deities by the Roman Empire, which turned them into something more...
Ancient Origins asked experts to weigh in on the topic of ancient deities. Some ancient gods get all the attention - but which gods are largely forgotten… and why? The following is their views on...
Nostradamus (1503 – 1566) was best known as an author of prophesies. He is credited by some with predicting a number of events in world history, including the French Revolution, the atom bomb, the...
As long as humanity has had beliefs in deities, the supernatural, and the power of magic, the use of magic, spells, and curses have featured widely across cultures. Very much entwined with human...
In an interview in New York magazine, published on 6 th October, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia declared his belief in a living, breathing Satan . Scalia said that “I believe in the Devil…..Of...
Old news but current. Back in 2009 a scientific study had shown that the belief in ‘God’ or supernatural force that is above everything is programmed in different parts of our brain. This is...
