Featured
Definition
Gunpowder Plot - Guy Fawkes & the Plan to Blow up Parliament
The 1605 Gunpowder Plot was a failed attempt by pro-Catholic conspirators to blow up the English Parliament on 5 November and kill King James I of England...
Featured
Article
Ten Halloween Facts and Traditions You Need to Know - A Celebration of Transformation
Halloween is the most popular holiday in the world, after Christmas (based on level-of-celebration and consumer spending) and, increasingly...
Featured
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12 Royal Princes Who Never Reached the Throne - From Germanicus to the Black Prince & Franz Ferdinand
Royal heirs and princes expected to succeed to a throne occupied an unusually precarious position: close enough to power...
Featured
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12 Largest Contiguous Land Empires Before 1880 - From the Mongol Empire to Rome, Qing China & Russia
Land empires were expansive states whose rulers exercised authority over large, substantially connected territories and...
Latest Content
Article
James Longstreet's Account of the Battle of Gettysburg - Excerpts From the Official Action Report
At the Battle of Gettysburg (1-3 July 1863) Confederate Lieutenant General James Longstreet urged his commanding officer...
Article
Gilgamesh and Huwawa - The Epic Battle of the Cedar Forest
Gilgamesh and Huwawa is a Sumerian poem relating the expedition of Gilgamesh and Enkidu to the Cedar Forest and the slaying of the monster-demon Huwawa...
Article
Stalin's Five-Year Plans - Collectivising Agriculture & Industrialising the USSR
Joseph Stalin's Five-Year Plans (1928-50) were a series of state-led initiatives which aimed to grow the economy of the USSR, rapidly industrialise...
Curriculum Collection
AP World History Unit 6 - Consequences of Industrialization (c. 1750–1900)
With industrialization, a small number of states gained the ability to project power across the globe. Steamships, railroads, machine guns...
Article
Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld - Messages From the Afterlife
Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld is a Sumerian poem pre-dating The Epic of Gilgamesh and featuring its central characters. It is sometimes...
Definition
Army of Northern Virginia - General Lee's Army
The Army of Northern Virginia was the main field army of the Confederate States in the eastern theater of the American Civil War (1861-1865). Famously led by General...
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Map of the Trade in the Indian Ocean 15th–16th Centuries - Monsoon Routes, Spice Trade, and European Expansion
Indian Ocean trade in the 15th and 16th centuries connected East Africa, Arabia, Persia, India, Southeast Asia...
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12 Royal Princes Who Never Reached the Throne - From Germanicus to the Black Prince & Franz Ferdinand
Royal heirs and princes expected to succeed to a throne occupied an unusually precarious position: close enough to power...
Image
Map of the Latin Empire - A Crusader State in Constantinople - The Fourth Crusade and the Fragmentation of Byzantium
The Latin Empire (Imperium Romaniae, 1204–1261) emerged after the Fourth Crusade (1202–1204) captured and...
For You
Definition
Woodes Rogers
Woodes Rogers (1679-1732) was a privateer turned administrator who was instrumental in the fight against piracy in the Caribbean when he served as Governor of the Bahamas (appointed 1717 and...
Article
Loyola's Spiritual Exercises
The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius Loyola (1548) is a manual of disciplines formulated by Ignatius Loyola (l. 1491-1556) to prepare one spiritually for Christian service. They...
Definition
English Civil Wars
The English Civil Wars (1642-1651) witnessed a bitter conflict between Royalists ('Cavaliers') and Parliamentarians ('Roundheads'). The Royalists supported first King Charles I of England...
Definition
August Decrees
The decrees of 4 August 1789, also known as the August Decrees, were a set of 19 articles passed by the National Constituent Assembly during the French Revolution (1789-1799) which abolished...
Book Reviews
Book Review
The Army of Alexander the Great
The Army of Alexander the Great (2025) is a highly detailed and insightful examination of one of the most influential military forces in history. Rather than presenting Alexander...
Book Review
The House with the Golden Door (Wolf Den Trilogy, Volume 2)
Elodie Harper has once again produced a captivating historical fiction novel that takes you right into the streets and the homes of ancient Pompeii. Set...
Book Review
The Cambridge Illustrated History of China
The Cambridge Illustrated History of China gives a very comprehensive account of the country's development from prehistory to the modern day. The author, Patricia Buckley...
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| 1,765 | articles |
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| 2,643 | videos |
| 415 | 3D images |
| 16,428 | translations |
| 48 | languages |
| 1,343 | contributors |
| 15,630 | keywords |
| 62,610 | registered users |
Ancient Period
Article
Heraclitus' Fragments
Heraclitus of Ephesos (l. c. 500 BCE) was an early Pre-Socratic philospher who claimed that the First Cause of existence was fire and that life itself was characterized by strife and...
Article
Diodorus Siculus: The Battle of Chaeronia
In the following excerpt from his Library of History, Book XVI, chapter 14, the historian Diodorus Siculus (1st century BCE) chronicles the famous Battle of Chaeronia...
Article
Enuma Elish - The Babylonian Epic of Creation - Full Text
The Enuma Elish (also known as The Seven Tablets of Creation) is the Babylonian creation myth whose title is derived from the opening lines of the piece...
Definition
Angitia
Angitia, which also appears epigraphically as Angita, Arigitia or Anguita, was a goddess among the pre-Roman Italic and Oscan-Umbrian peoples of central Italy and believed to have persisted as...
Image Gallery
A Gallery of Ancient Egyptian Gods & Goddesses
The gods and goddesses of ancient Egypt were an integral aspect of the peoples’ daily lives, inhabiting not only the temples thought to be their homes but the streams...
Article
The Column of Marcus Aurelius
The Column of Marcus Aurelius and Faustina which stands in Piazza Colonna in Rome is thought to have been erected by Commodus in memory of his father and mother sometime around...
Article
Herodotus: On The Customs of the Persians
Although the Greek historian Herodotus (l. c. 484-425/413 BCE) is often criticized for inaccuracy in his Histories, his frequently-anthologized On the Customs of the...
Definition
Silk in Antiquity
Silk is a fabric first produced in Neolithic China from the filaments of the cocoon of the silk worm. It became a staple source of income for small farmers and, as weaving techniques improved...
Medieval Period
Definition
Chaco Canyon
Chaco Canyon was the center of a pre-Columbian civilization flourishing in the San Juan Basin of the American Southwest from the 9th to the 12th century CE. Chacoan civilization represents...
Definition
Wars of the Roses
The Wars of the Roses (1455-1487) was a dynastic conflict between the English nobility and monarchy which led to four decades of intermittent battles, executions, and murder plots. The...
Definition
Kamakura
Kamakura is a coastal town located on Sagami Bay on Honshu Island, Japan, which was the capital of the Kamakura Shogunate from 1192 to 1333 CE. Provided with excellent natural defensive features...
Definition
Order of the Garter
The Most Noble Order of the Garter is the highest order of knighthood in Britain and the most exclusive with traditionally only 24 knights as full members at any one time, along with...
Definition
Yuan Dynasty
The Yuan Dynasty was established by the Mongols and ruled China from 1271 to 1368. Their first emperor was Kublai Khan (r. 1260-1294) who finally defeated the Song Dynasty which had reigned...
Definition
Harsha
Emperor Harshavardhana, better known as Harsha, lived from 590 to 647 CE and was the last ruler of the Vardhana Empire, the last great empire in ancient India before the Islamic Invasion. He ruled...
Definition
Tairona Civilization
The Tairona civilization - one of the Chibcha family tribes - flourished in northern Colombia between 200 CE and 1600 CE. Like the Muisca of Cundinamarca, the Tairona were known for...
Article
Chola Art & Architecture
Like many great civilisations, the origins of the Chola, a Tamil Hindu dynasty in southern India, are shrouded in the temporal mists of uncertainty and obscurity. It is however known...
Early Modern Period
Definition
Renaissance Humanism
Renaissance Humanism was an intellectual movement typified by a revived interest in the classical world and studies which focussed not on religion but on what it is to be human. Its...
Article
Saratoga Campaign
The Saratoga Campaign (20 June to 17 October 1777) was one of the most important military campaigns of the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783), in which a British army under General...
Article
Pets in Colonial America
Pets in Colonial America were kept by the colonists for the same reasons they were in Europe: for companionship and, in the case of dogs, for protection, hunting, and herding. Cats...
Definition
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) was an Anglo-Irish statesman and political thinker. His most famous work is Reflections on the Revolution in France a critique of the social and political turmoil in...
Article
Arsenale - The Shipyard and Arsenal of Venice
The immense commercial trade, wealth, and sea power of the Republic of Venice was rooted in the ships built in the industrial site known as the Arsenale, or arsenal...
Definition
Declaration of Pillnitz
The Declaration of Pillnitz was a joint statement issued on 27 August 1791 by Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor (r. 1790-1792) and King Frederick William II of Prussia (r. 1786-1797...
Definition
Château de Chenonceau
The Château de Chenonceau, picturesquely located astride the river Cher, in the Loire Valley town of Chenonceaux, France is a magnificent Renaissance-style building also known as le...
Article
Cavalry in the English Civil Wars
Cavalry regiments were an essential component of both Royalist and Parliamentarian field armies during the English Civil Wars (1642-1651). Armed with a sword, carbine, and...
Modern Period
Definition
Dolley Madison
Dolley Madison (1768-1849), born Dolley Payne, was a prominent American First Lady, a function she held both during the presidency of her husband, James Madison, and for his predecessor...
Definition
Cheka - Lenin's Secret Police
The Cheka (Vecheka) Secret Police was created by Vladimir Lenin's Soviet government in December 1917 to ruthlessly stamp out all opposition to the Bolshevik Revolution. During...
Article
The Red Eagles
The Red Eagles is a Cheyenne hero tale featuring the popular champion Mok-so-is, the child hero best known from the legend Found in the Grass, popular among many Algonquin-speaking nations...
Article
The Bombing of Tokyo in WWII - How Napalm Firestorms Destroyed a City
The systematic bombing of Tokyo by US aircraft in repeated raids during the Second World War (1939-45) was intended to force Japan's surrender...
Article
Consequences of the Bolshevik Revolution
The long-term goal of the Bolsheviks, who took power by force in Russia in November 1917, was a fairer society where workers and peasants were not exploited by wealthy...
Definition
Paul Cézanne
Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) was a French post-impressionist artist. Although he struggled for recognition in his own lifetime and often lacked confidence in his work, the artist's unique style...
Article
8 Innovative Weapons of World War I - How New Tech Transformed 20th-century Warfare
The First World War (1914-18) has a close association with static trench warfare dominated by heavy artillery and machine guns, but the...
Definition
Gestapo
The Gestapo was the secret political police organisation of Nazi Germany. Created in 1933, the Gestapo became one of the most feared instruments of state terror, its members having few or no legal...
Prehistoric Period
Definition
The Sweet Track
The Sweet Track is a Neolithic timber walkway, located in the Somerset Levels, England. It was originally part of a network of tracks built to provide a dry path across the marshy ground...
Definition
Pre-Colonial North America
Pre-Colonial North America (also known as Pre-Columbian, Prehistoric, and Precontact) is the period between the migration of the Paleo-Indians to the region between 40,000-14,000...
Definition
Hill of Tara
The Hill of Tara is an ancient Neolithic Age site in County Meath, Ireland. It was known as the seat of the High Kings of Ireland, the site of coronations, a place of assembly for the enacting...
Definition
Homo Floresiensis
Homo floresiensis, nicknamed 'hobbit' because it only stood about 1 meter tall, is an extinct species of fossil human that lived on the island of Flores, Indonesia during the Pleistocene...
Definition
Barnhouse Settlement
The Barnhouse Settlement is a Neolithic village located in Antaness, Orkney, Scotland, which was inhabited between c. 3300 and 2600 BCE. The present designation of 'Barnhouse' comes...
Definition
Ice Age
An ice age is a period in which the earth's climate is colder than normal, with ice sheets capping the poles and glaciers dominating higher altitudes. Within an ice age, there are varying pulses...
Definition
Homo Heidelbergensis
Homo heidelbergensis is an extinct species of human that is identified in both Africa and western Eurasia from roughly 700,000 years ago onwards until around 200,000 years ago – fitting...
Article
The Neanderthal-Sapiens Connection
In May 2010, after years of intense discussions surrounding possible fossils of mixed Homo sapiens and Neanderthal descent floating around the scientific community, a team...
