Nestled in the mountains of Wakayama prefecture a couple of hours southeast of Osaka, Japan by car lies a world-famous cemetery that is home to the graves of over 200,000 Buddhist monks who are said...
Eastern Macedonia’s most important archaeological site, Philippi (also written as Fillipi), has had a huge role to play in shaping the history of the Western world. The UNESCO World Heritage Site,...
Stashed in a wall in Israel around the time of the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem 1,400 years ago, this gold coin hoard was minted during one of the bloodiest and paradigm changing periods of history...
Circe is a complex character within Greek mythology. Feared and desired in equal measure, Circe was a goddess of magic, and even today she continues to be one of the most enchanting and deadly...
Of all the religious texts, the Avesta is perhaps the least familiar. This is unsurprising, since the Avesta was written in a now-dead language, before being lost for almost one thousand years...
A routine road construction project has led to the accidental discovery of an extensive network of underground corridors in Bam village of Esfarayen county in northeast Iran. Archaeologists have...
Ironically, Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, written around 370 BC, a narrative describing the education of the ideal ruler centred on Cyrus the Great founder of the Achaemenid Dynasty, was a great inspiration...
In the early years of researching my 5-volume Gods of Atlantos Saga , I read and re-read Plato’s accounts of Atlantis – his dialogues Timaeus and Critias – and was brought up short by three of his...
We’ve all taken part in toasting rituals. At birthdays and weddings, in remembrance of loved ones or as a sign of respect, modern-day toasts range from a polite nod while wetting one’s lips to...
A team of archaeologists have studied the remains of a 10,000-year-old baby with high technology. Their new paper not only found signs of ritual burial, but it reveals that baby carriers, or baby...
There are few things humans love more than food. For centuries, humans have been creating new, delicious recipes to enjoy. While we may eat somewhat differently nowadays (after all, I don’t think our...
Mysterious ancient stone spheres found across Aegean and Mediterranean settlements were potentially used in a pre-historic board game! A new study, aided by artificial intelligence (A.I.), has...
Throughout history, many cultures and civilizations created funerary masks as part of their burial customs. The masks were used to represent a deceased individual, to honor them, and to cover their...
Nothing sparks the human imagination quite like the question, what came before? Philosophers, theologians, and countless religions have spent millennia pontificating on what came before humanity as...
Anyone with a thing against cats may get some satisfaction from a weird history “fact” circulating on the internet. Used as widespread clickbait, a frequently repeated story claims that in the 13th...
Over the last few decades, archaeologists from Bulgaria and Poland have been performing excavations at the site where the Roman legionary fortress of Novae once stood. The ruins of the fortress can...
For nearly 2,000 years, right up until Captain James Cook’s second voyage to the Pacific in 1775, geographers debated the existence of Terra Australis, a mythical landmass to the south-east said to...
Two massive stone mural carvings dating to the Northern Song dynasty (960-1127 AD) that were found in central China’s Henan province have been hailed by archaeologists as a remarkable discovery...
Archaeologists in China have uncovered a human skull that is almost unimaginably old. While performing excavations in the central province of Hubei, a team of researchers affiliated with the Hubei...
The Mitanni Empire was established in 1475 BC and was disestablished in 1260 BC. It was one of the biggest and most powerful nations of its time, and its influence spread far and wide. Yet you’ve...
Archaeologists in the UK have shown how ancient elite families retained their command over communities in the medieval world crannogs in north-western Europe. They controlled the communities they...
Obsidian mines mined by the pre-Hispanic Mesoamerican tribes of Central Mexico, located just 31 miles (49.88 kilometers) northeast of the ancient city of Teotihuacan, were discovered by...
The Aztecs emerged in central Mexico around 1300 AD, coming to dominate the surrounding area from their capital city Tenochtitlan , now Mexico City. Stretching across highlands, coastal plains,...
While it’s not what I’d do, legend has it that when King Louis XVI was beheaded in 1793, onlookers in Paris rushed to the scene to dip their handkerchiefs in the dead king’s blood. Years later, one...
