A Viking ship replica's voyage turned tragic when it capsized off the coast of Norway on August 28, 2024, leading to the tragic death of an American archaeologist. The victim of this tragedy is...
The Aragonese Castle is a castle built on top of a rocky islet next to Ischia, a small Italian island on the northern end of the Gulf of Naples. Whilst a stronghold is said to have already been built...
When it comes to ancient love stories, few couples have captured the imagination quite like Mark Antony and Cleopatra. Their passionate romance, set against the backdrop of the Roman Empire’s...
Many people see death as a rite of a passage : a journey to some new place, or a threshold between two kinds of being. Zoroastrians believe that there is a bridge of judgment that each person who...
Marrying a ghost may sound like the plot of a paranormal horror movie, but even today posthumous marriage continues to exist. What’s more surprising is that it’s not just in far-flung corners of the...
Accepted historical accounts claim that Cleopatra, the last active pharaoh of ancient Egypt, committed suicide. Cleopatra assumed the throne of Egypt after the demise of Alexander the Great during...
Beneath the streets and buildings of many of the world's most historic cities lie mysterious and ancient catacombs. These underground burial sites hold the remains of thousands of people and have...
The ancient Romans had a unique relationship with death and dying, and their burial practices were no exception. When someone passed away, their loved ones would gather around the dying person's bed...
The Torajan people, living in Sulawesi, Indonesia, have a unique funeral tradition . According to their beliefs, a person isn't truly dead until water buffalo have been sacrificed at their funeral,...
In the shadow of Japan’s Mount Fuji, lies the sprawling Aokigahara Forest, also known as Jukai , or the Sea of Trees, because its rustling branches reportedly resemble the sound of the sea. The...
Sati, the practice of a widow self-immolating on her husband's funeral pyre, remains one of the most controversial and emotive issues in South Asian culture. While some view it as a sacred funerary...
The answers to decades-long questions about the health issues suffered by famed classical music composer Ludwig van Beethoven have been found in the most unexpected of places. Thanks to in-depth...
Having ruled England for less than a year, King Edmund is primarily remembered for his unusual death. In one of the most uncomfortable murders in history, legend has it the Anglo-Saxon king was...
By Jenefer Metcalfe / The Conversation Centuries after the first golden coffins were taken to Europe, ancient Egyptian mummies still vividly capture people’s imaginations. Perhaps we’re awed by the...
The unforgettable Tana Toraja is a regency located in the picturesque mountains of South Sulawesi in Indonesia. This region is home to the indigenous Torajan people, whose way of life is deeply...
The last man to serve as King of Greece, Constantine II, passed away on January 10, 2023 in an Athens hospital from complications related to a stroke. Constantine II hadn’t served as king since the...
Most historians long ago concluded that Edward of Woodstock, also known as Edward the Black Prince , the heir apparent to the English throne who died at the age of 45 in 1376, fell victim to chronic...
Funerals can be difficult to get through. The pain of loss can simply be too much for many. So why would anyone ever need to pay people to cry at their funeral? This didn’t just happen occasionally...
A new proposal by researchers of the oldest known naturally mummified corpse, better known as Ötzi the Iceman, questions both the time and place of his death. New analysis points towards the time of...
We all die eventually, but some of us go out in weirder ways than others. With the number of people who have existed throughout human history, at least a few strange deaths are to be expected. Below...
In what must have been one of the worst honeymoons in history, Attila the Hun, the brutal nomadic warrior of the 5th century AD, was found dead in his nuptial bed, drenched in blood the morning after...
There are cold cases, and there a really, really, cold cases. The story of two South American mummies falls into the latter category. When researchers analyzed the remains of three pre-Columbian...
Comfort in the afterlife was apparently a medieval concern. Gravesites can reveal aspects of past cultures and values, and are therefore a rich source for archaeologists and historians. An iron...
Empedocles of Acragas was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who lived in the 5th century BC. It is said that wanting to prove he was an all-powerful god, he decided to leap into the volcanic Mount...
