Archaeologists in Serbia have found a Roman military base. Unlike many others, it was not found buried beneath a modern city, but in a rural location. This means that it can help experts to have a better understanding of the Roman army and its organization.
Researchers in Mexico have discovered a vast ancient building buried beneath the Main Plaza at the ancient capital of Monte Albán.
Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton was an American socialite and philanthropist who lived between the 18th and 19th centuries. She is perhaps best-known for being the wife of Alexander Hamilton, one of the American founding fathers.
In days of old, the dead were buried with a silver coin (the shiner the better) so that the souls of the faithful departed could pay the toll to the deathless demon ferryman of the underworld: Charon.
If you needed repairs done 50,000 years ago you would have been better off with a team of Neanderthals rather than Homo sapiens, a new study has shown.
Some jobs are a dream and others literally stink! But the most stinky job of all, believe it or not, was actually a very powerful position because it put you right next to the king!
A deep mystery haunts the origins and rituals of the Jewish Fall Festivals: Rosh Hashanah (New Year), Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement), and Sukkot.
In the Netherlands, construction workers have made a gruesome discovery. When working in the city of Vianen, they came across an enigmatic mass burial.
Albania was once part of the Greek, Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman worlds and as a result has a rich archaeological legacy.
Neuschwanstein Castle is a grand castle in Bavaria, Germany that was built during the 19th century by Ludwig II, the King of Bavaria. During that century, castles were no longer the formidable defensive structures that they once were
The pretentious title “Sanctuary of Thought” might ring a bell for some if you are familiar with ancient Egyptian history.
Research has shown that the humble turkey played a very important role in Pueblo Indian societies in the southwestern United States. Experts have been able to study an exceedingly rare feather blanket made out of turkey feathers.
Dozens of ancient arrows dating from the Neolithic to the Viking Era have melted out of the Langfonne ice sheet in Norway. In 2014 and 2016, reindeer bones and antlers, stone and river shell arrowheads, and iron points were exposed from Norway’s 60-acre Langfonne ice patch.
New technologies have allowed scientists to examine the insides of an Egyptian little girl mummy that is almost 2000 years old. This means that scientists can examine the objects interred with a cadaver in a non-invasive way.
Ancient beliefs are often a complex puzzle and putting the pieces together can often be extremely challenging. Time has its way with unwritten traditions, and little of what wasn’t written down survives to this day.
The remains of an ancient female skeleton with an elongated skull, dating back to 400 – 600 AD, has been found during recent excavations at the Gamurzievsky settlement in the city of Nazran, Ingushetia, southern Russia.
In the ancient world salt was so valuable that Roman soldiers were sometimes paid with salt instead of money. A monthly salt allowance was a salarium, and this Latin word seeds both the French word salaire, and the English language word salary.
Was there ever a Trojan War? That is, the almost legendary battle fought between Greeks and Trojans. This question continues to go unanswered by the academic and archaeological world. If we read from Homer and the later composed Epic Cycle, the literature would say that it did indeed occur, but what does archaeology have to say on this matter? While my hopeless romantic side wants to believe in Homer’s tale, we need to consider all of the facts and before we do that, we need to sit through a quick history lesson.
Heinrich Schliemann, a wealthy entrepreneur by profession, spent his early retirement years discovering and excavating the sites of Troy (at modern day Hisarlik, Turkey) and Mycenae (in the north-eastern part of the Peloponnese, Greece) during the late 19th century AD (Cline, 2); albeit through unorthodox and disastrous methods. He was not a trained archaeologist. Schliemann was just a simple man with a passion for Homer.
Ruins in the ancient city of Troy in Turkey. (GVictoria /Adobe Stock)
The deserts of Saudi Arabia may look desolate, but they hold many important archaeological sites. One of the most important of these is the vast archaeological site at Hegra which has been classified a UNESCO World Heritage site. For the first time, the public can visit the site without restrictions and view the remains of a remarkable and mysterious civilization.
Hegra, also is known as Mada'in Saleh, is in the deserts north of Al Ula in northwestern Saudi Arabia. Today the place is quiet, but it was once a thriving city located on a major international trade route. This remarkable city was the sister city of the more famous Petra in neighboring Jordan. Hegra was the second city of the Nabateans, who were nomads who controlled the spice trade and who built an astonishing civilization in the desert. The Nabateans were experts in hydraulics, they were able to channel rainwater from the mountains into cisterns that allowed them to build spectacular cities in some of the most inhospitable environments in the world.
Vendel and Valsgärde are two archaeological sites located in Sweden. Both of these sites were once used as burial grounds, and it is from the former that a period in Swedish prehistory, the Vendel period, derived its name.
One of the most famous voyages from England to Virginia was on the Mayflower. This ship became the symbol of the search for a new life and pilgrimage to the New World in the 17th century. 2020 marks the 400 year anniversary of this historic vessel’s iconic voyage.
When you think of psychedelics and the United States, famous psychonauts like Timothy Leary, Gerry Garcia and Jim Morrison come to mind. In the 1991 movie, The Doors, Jim Morrison got seriously stoned and wandered out into the New Mexico desert experiencing the full optical range of nature.
Horses have lived on earth for more than 50 million years and they were first domesticated in Asia between 3000 and 4000 BC. According to the American Museum of Natural History at this time they were sought mostly for their rich milk and protein packed meat. Serving as one of man’s closest allies at work, during war and at play, over their 6,000 years of domestic history several equines have stood out for their legendary strength, speed and intelligence. These are the hardest, heavy-weight champions of the horse world, who each left their hoof print on history and stood the test of time like those legendary men who rode on their backs.
Haniwa horse statuette featuring saddle and stirrups from the sixth century Kofun period. París, Musée Guimet.( Miguel Hermoso Cuesta/ CC BY-SA 4.0)
A mysterious metal monolith has been found in a remote area of Utah, USA. State wildlife officials came across the enigmatic object in a desolate area that is little visited.
An archaeologist believes that he may have found the childhood home of Jesus Christ. He has evidence that the remains under a convent in Nazareth are probably those of the family home of Mary and Joseph.
Ancient Greece, and Athens in particular, played a crucial role in the development as well as the history of Western Civilization. The center of Athenian life was the Agora, an open space at the heart of the city that served as a meeting ground for various activities.
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. This old adage has now been taken to a whole new level in the northeast of England.
Recently, an American professor has for the first time analyzed the First Book of Breathing, a famous ancient Egyptian book that reveals incredible insights into the afterlife.
The discovery of an ancient Etruscan honey harvesting workshop at Focello in Italy, and the analysis of charred remains unearthed at the site, has let archaeologists to propose a remarkable hypothesis.
A human gene injected into monkey brains not only made them larger, but it increased neuron function, making the animals more human.
