Ancient Origins Premium offers a wealth of knowledge and a variety of learning methods (articles, eBooks, webinars, expeditions and more) that will help you embark on a journey you will never forget!
Ancient Egypt was renowned and respected for her wisdom, art and architecture by all those who came into contact with her. What also caught the attention of these admirers was the practice of magic...
What is the universe? Where did it come from? Does it still exist when we die? Do we create the universe, or does it create us? These questions all pertain to what has become known as the mind-body...
To paint the canvas around the time of the birth of Jesus, one needs to examine the unfolding political landscape of Judea a generation before Jesus’ birth. By 40 BC, Judea was under Parthian rule...
The Festive Season - a time of peace and goodwill to all men. It is a message people in the Western World have grown up with since childhood. Except it is not. It one forgets the saccharine...
Women have been important members of Christianity from the very beginning of the early Christian church. In fact, women were among Jesus’ earliest followers. Apart from learning from and speaking to...
The idea that there is a direct link between our modern representation of Santa Claus and historic shamanic practice in Siberia is not new. It seems to have been first suggested by the historian of...
Astronomy is the oldest natural science and has calendrical, religious, cosmological, mythological and astrological origins. Long before famous monuments like Stonehenge in England and the pyramids...
In 2010, the traditional theory of who we are and where we came from got knocked on its head. It was an exciting year. It was an exasperating year. It was a frustrating year. And it was a...
In 54 BC, the Celtic Mandubii tribe ruled by Vercingetorix capitulated to Julius Caesar and so ended Gaul’s resistance to Rome. However, was the Battle of Alesia, located in southern France actually...
The artisans and builders who resided at Set Ma’at (‘The Place of Truth’) were among the most valued workers in all of Egypt. Yet, there came a time when the economy of the country was on the verge...
A couple of years before he celebrated his jubilee, Ramesses III was beset by internal problems. A great king who had combated vicious enemies from all corners and was deified by his subjects for his...
Left brain-right brain, intuitive-intellectual, patriarchy-matriarchy, make love-not war; is there a reason humankind seems so bi-polar? Maybe there is and the answer might be surprising. Of all the...
Sometime during the third millennium BC, a group of nomadic raiders expanded out of their mountainous homelands in Syria and stormed Mesopotamia. They were known as the Martu or Tidnum to the...
According to Greek mythology, Tiresias, the blind prophet of Apollo, was well-known as much for his clairvoyance as for being transformed into a woman for seven years. He was present for seven...
Indigenous Australian cultures held animistic beliefs and their everyday reality was a living, pulsing matrix of mythological cycles, outdoor rituals and ceremonies. Extending across the ancient...
With their daughter, Tiye, married into the powerful ruling family of Egypt, Yuya and Tjuyu led a charmed life. With strong ties to their hometown Akhmin, Yuya seems to have participated actively in...
Queen Tiye stands head and shoulders above all the Great Royal Wives of ancient Egypt. Though it is said that her background was that of a commoner, she rose to prominence mainly due to her...
History is threaded together with texts, scrolls and grimoires which were believed to contain the powerful supernatural rituals required to raise and control demons. A dark ancient text existed which...
Benzaiten is one of Japan's most complex and popular syncretic deities who has long ago been conflated and associated with other divinities from the Hindu, Buddhist, and Japanese pantheons. Her many...
‘Call in the Cavalry’ has become a proverb for reverting to damage-control expert assistance when things get out of hand. Yet the quote is embedded in the history of a noble and often elite unit...
On Orkney, the archipelago of the north coast of Scotland, ancient temple sites such as the Ness of Brodgar and Barnhouse Settlement, stone circles like Ring of Brodgar and Standing Stones of Stennes...
According to legend, about 3160 years ago, in the Levant, there was an enormously strong man, who tore the jaws of an adult male lion with his bare hands. Samson’ name was derived from the word semes...
According to the Bible, in the Book of Joshua , the Israelites encountered the city of Jericho as the first Canaanite stronghold they had to conquer in order to settle in their promised new land. In...
Creating abstractions of reality, art has been a part of human expression for hundreds of thousands of years. Prehistoric stone and bone sculptures, and cave art are ideas and emotions expressed...