"… great father Apennine, lifting elate to heaven his snow-crowned head…" At the feet of the Apennines, Aeneas and his men defeated the Latins in one of the first victories of the early Romans. Amid...
"Cannabis" and "criminal" are synonymous in many countries. While cannabis has been steadily weaving onto the "right" side of the law in recent years, the "high" people get from the plant is still...
Value, status, memory, family… These are ideals encompassed in names. Across cultures, the naming of persons and places hold varying levels of significance. The Norse named their swords; the Scottish...
One of the greatest mysteries of Scotland lies in the northeastern portion of the country. Though named for the Scots because the titular medieval clan won a decisive battle, much of Scotland's...
Lake Titicaca has long been the center of various socio-political cultures in South America. The lake has seen many cultures along its shores, such as the Pucará (400BC-100AD) and the Tiwanaku (200BC...
"My fleet sailed from the mouth of the Rhine eastward as far as the lands of the Cimbri to which, up to that time, no Roman had ever penetrated either by land or by sea, and the Cimbri and Charydes...
A primary female occupation in the early modern period (AD 1500-1800) was that of medicine. Though there were formal doctors—known by various titles and with various tasks detailed by their...
I never leave my house without a pair of sunglasses. Usually, there are also pairs in my purse, in my car, and in a coat that I keep in the trunk. In fact, I am both proud and ashamed to admit that I...
Early modern Europe was a period of patriarchy, in which men were in control and women only truly had a say in the household affairs. Power and regulation lay in the hands of men, while the care of...
"A gentleman and a scholar." There are few such men who fit this description from the "archaeological" community of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. There were certainly gentlemen and scholars...
If bull-leaping was a genuine practice in Bronze Age Minoan courts (estimated c.3200 BC-1100 BC), it was likely not nearly as fun as it appears in frescoes. Modern day professional matadors have...
"Unless the fates be faulty grown And prophet’s voice be vain Where’er is found this sacred stone The Scottish race shall reign." -translated by Sir Walter Scott, 16th century A stone valued more for...
At the edge of the world lies the last trace of Viking Christianity. Urnes Stave Church (c. 1130 AD) stands tall in Sognefjord in the west of Norway, yet it represents as much of an end as it does a...
The city of theater was Athens. Athens birthed drama, bred drama, and ultimately was responsible for cultivating it into the premiere art of the Classical world—at least according to Greek...
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles got a lot of ninja qualities right: their preference for sticking to the shadows, the emphasis on reconnaissance and espionage, and, of course, their choice of weapons...
Before Shakespeare, there were the Greeks. The infamous "all the world's a stage" quote attributed to the Elizabethan writer in the 16th century far more accurately describes the world of ancient...