Ancient Carthaginians really did sacrifice their children
By Oxford University.
After decades of scholarship denying that the Carthaginians sacrificed their children, new research has found ‘overwhelming’ evidence that this ancient civilisation really did carry out the practice.
A [...]
Immigration and history
By Robert Slayton.
My sister likes to forward to me chain letters. No, she does not send me entreaties to invest in an African oil scheme, but rather, political opinion pieces. The latest sample read:
So many letter writers have [...]
The Arab World: History of Revolts and Global Nexus
The Arab World: History of Revolts and Global Nexus
By Fadi Husseini.
In fractious, rife-with-conflicts Arab World, described for long time as immune towards democratic transformations, revolts sneaked in, toppling some regimes [...]
Domes of the Rock and Chain v. A Dome of Iron: Which Best Protects Israel from Islamic Attack?
By Timothy Furnish.
Over Thanksgiving I spent eight days in Israel, having been invited there by my friend Dr. Moshe Terdiman, founder of the think-tank “Research on Islam and Muslims in Africa.” I lectured at the Truman [...]
Geography, Personality, and the Fluorescence of Rome
By Mike Anderson.
If you analyze the great cultures of antiquity, you’d find their success was due to geography and personality — the geography of their physical space and personality of the people in that space. There are [...]
Giant sarcophagus leads Penn museum team in Egypt to the thomb of a previlusly unknown pharaoh
By Alton Parrish.
Archaeologists working at the southern Egyptian site of Abydos have discovered the tomb of a previously unknown pharaoh: Woseribre Senebkay—and the first material proof of a forgotten Abydos Dynasty, ca. 1650–1600 [...]
Our man from China
By Subodh Rana.
I knew that there was a lot of merriment at His Holiness the Chiniyia Lama’s residence at Bouddha when my father and his friends, known to us then as the 3 Musketeers, visited him. In those days I wondered [...]
First farmers and stockbreeders painted with the same pigments as their hunter ancestors
By Alton Parrish.
The first of the analyzed figures, depicting a bovid, belongs to the Levantine art practiced by the nomadic hunters-gatherers who inhabited the Iberian Peninsula about 10,000 years ago. On the other hand, the second figure, [...]
Ancient city discovered underwater
Story update 2016.
Ancient city discovered under water.
By Jaime Ortega.
What looks like a new ancient city was discovered submerged near the east coast of Canada in January 2014. I discovered the complex by mere coincidence looking [...]
Unknown Civilizations: Tell Mureybet
By Jaime Ortega.
Tell Mureybet
The site of Mureybet along the middle Euphrates in Syria, was occupied from the 12th to the 8th millennium BCE. It is one of the earliest known agriculture settlements from the Neolithic. In 1971, Jacques [...]
How ancient artist used palace floor as a creative canvas
By Alton Parrish.
New research finds that the Throne Room floor in the Bronze Age Palace of Nestor located in what is today Pylos, Greece, is an unusual example of artistic innovation for its time.
The floors of Greek Bronze Age palaces [...]
A Bridge of Boats across Frozen Tigris River, Mosul, 1903
By Juan Cole.
The authors say locals in Mosul told them that the last time the river froze was 1750. That freezing became more rare after that date is significant, since 1750 marks the beginning…
The authors say locals in Mosul told them [...]
Unknown Civilizations: Tell Qaramel
Research by Jaime Ortega.
Found in the north of present day Syria, Tell Qaramel dates close in age to Gobekli Tepe (Turkey) 9130–8800 BCE. Civilization that was said to had started thanks to religious ceremonies, instead of [...]
Baalbek Temple Prostitutes and Holy Prostitution for Baal
By Peter M. Jupp.
The most prevalent religious system in the immediate Canaanite context was the worship of Baal. Amongst numerous sources we have the Old Testament and the sacred scripts of Ugarit. Baal religion revolved around the cycles [...]
A tale of two cities in Jung Bahadur’s life and times
By Subodh Rana.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of [...]
Carrington Event 1859 and the Royal Charter Storm
By Peter M. Jupp.
The Carrington Event 1859 – Flu epidemic, Erzurum Earthquake, Aurora Australis and the Royal Charter Storm
Gold, Glamour and not so Ancient Destructions …
Could the Carrington Event of 1859 have had broader effects [...]
Octavian builds an empire
By Michael Anderson.
In the last post we discussed the careful effort employed by Octavian to rid himself of rivals and take control of the Roman Republic. Now we move on to the building of the Principate, which was significantly more [...]
Dissecting Rome’s Second Triumvirate
By Michael Anderson.
Rome’s first triumvirate was a power grab by Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey who sought to take the power of the Senate and share it among themselves. Crassus, the weakest of the three in political instincts, played [...]
The Duma’s Falsification of History
By Sean Guillory.
It appears that the Soviet practice of erasing history from sight and therefore mind continues in Putin’s Russia.
Kommersant reports that contrary to the position of the Duma’s Upper Chamber, the State Duma [...]
John Tom, 21st and 23rd Regiments, escapes and absconds
By Don Haguist.
John Tom was an Irish blacksmith born in 1757 who joined the British army as a teenager. By June of 1775, he was a private soldier in the 21st Regiment of Foot, the Royal North British Fusiliers. This was one of the regiments [...]