Featured
Definition
William Still - Father of the Underground Railroad
William Still (1819-1902) was an African American abolitionist known as the "Father of the Underground Railroad" for his efforts in helping to free between 600 to 800...
Featured
Image Gallery
A Gallery of 40 Portrait Paintings Through History
Capturing in paint for all time the faces of particular people has been an endeavour of artists for millennia. In this gallery, we present in chronological sequence...
Featured
Image
Mongol Warriors in Deel Robes
An illustration of Mongol warriors carrying out an execution. They are wearing the traditional Mongol deel robe. 14th century CE. (From Rashid-ad-Din's Gami' at-tawarih)
Featured
Image
Nok Sculpture
A terracotta figurine produced by the Nok Culture of southern West Africa (500 BCE - 200 CE). (Louvre Museum, Paris)
Latest Content
Article
The Eternal Life of Gilgamesh - Literary Immortality
The Epic of Gilgamesh is among the most popular works of literature in the present day and has influenced countless readers, but for the greater part of its history...
Article
The Ideal of Christendom in the Middle Ages & Beyond
The ideal of Christendom in antiquity joined separate nations into one single community carrying out the precepts of the God of Israel. Constantine's conversion...
Definition
Gilgamesh - The Historical and Mythical King
Gilgamesh is the semi-mythic King of Uruk, best known as the hero of The Epic of Gilgamesh (circa 2100 to circa 1200 BCE), the great Babylonian poem that predates Homer's...
Article
The Ideal of Christendom in Antiquity
The ideal of Christendom is a historical and political vision where society and government are unified under the Christian faith. According to this vision, power on Earth...
Article
Lugalbanda and the Anzud Bird - A Sumerian Hero's Journey
Lugalbanda and the Anzud Bird is a Sumerian myth dated to the Ur III period (circa 2112 to circa 2004 BCE) featuring the hero-king of Uruk, Lugalbanda, father...
Image Gallery
75 Images of the Pacific War
In this gallery of 75 images, we examine the key features of WWII's Pacific War. After the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, the US naval base in Hawaii, Japan continued to expand its...
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Map of the Inca Empire (Tawantinsuyu, c. 1438–1533) - Expansion Across South America, Cities and Roads
The Inca Empire (Tawantinsuyu, c. 1438–1533) grew from a highland kingdom centered on Cusco into the largest empire in...
Image
Map of the Middle Kingdom Egypt (c. 2050–1800 BCE) - Reunification, Nubian Frontiers & Trade Networks
The Middle Kingdom of Egypt (c. 2050–1650 BCE) was a period of political reunification, renewed royal authority, and cultural...
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Map of the Seven Years' War in Europe, 1756-1763 - Alliances, Battles, and the Global Balance of Power
The Seven Years' War (1756-1763) was a major European and global conflict driven by the rivalry between Austria and Prussia...
For You
Article
The Mongol Invasions of Japan, 1274 and 1281
The Mongol invasions of Japan took place in 1274 and 1281 CE when Kublai Khan (r. 1260-1294 CE) sent two huge fleets from Korea and China. In both cases, the Japanese...
Definition
Alfred Rosenberg - The Infamous Nazi Race Theorist
Alfred Rosenberg (1893-1946) was an Estonian-born Nazi who propounded anti-Semitic racial theory and anti-Christian values. Rosenberg's theories matched those...
Definition
Parthian Warfare
Parthian warfare was characterized by the extensive use of cavalry and archers. Coming at enemy troops from all directions Parthian riders created confusion and wreaked havoc. They even...
Article
15 Complete Hyangga Songs from Ancient Korea
Hyangga was a form poetical 'country song,' distinct from contemporary Chinese songs, which were written in the Silla and Goryeo kingdoms of ancient Korea between...
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 Hidden Life of the Ancient Maya
The Hidden Life of the Ancient Maya by Clare Gibson is a very comprehensive and easy to read volume which covers key aspects of the Maya Civilization. Beautiful photographs...
Book Review
The Responsive Self: Personal Religion in Biblical Literature of the Neo-Babylonian and Persian Periods
Susan Niditch, Professor and Chair of Religion at Amherst College, explores the various self-expressions of lived religion...
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| 1,763 | articles |
| 19,839 | illustrations |
| 2,642 | videos |
| 415 | 3D images |
| 16,276 | translations |
| 48 | languages |
| 1,339 | contributors |
| 15,567 | keywords |
| 60,778 | registered users |
Ancient Period
Definition
Writing - The Preservation of Human Thought and Action
Writing is the physical manifestation of a spoken language. It is thought that human beings developed language circa 35,000 BCE as evidenced by cave paintings...
Definition
Aphrodite
Aphrodite was the ancient Greek goddess of love, beauty, desire, and all aspects of sexuality. She could entice both gods and men into illicit affairs with her beauty and whispered sweet nothings...
Article
Akrotiri Frescoes
The Bronze Age frescoes from Akrotiri on the Aegean island of Thera (modern-day Santorini) provide some of the most famous images from the ancient Greek world. Sometime between 1650 and...
Definition
Zarathustra
Zarathustra (also given as Zoroaster, Zartosht, Zarathustra Spitama, l. c. 1500-1000 BCE) was the Persian priest-turned-prophet who founded the religion of Zoroastrianism (also given as Mazdayasna...
Article
Cliffs, Caves, Churches: A Weekend in Doolin, Ireland
County Clare, Ireland, is best known for the Cliffs of Moher, the ancient dolmen of Poulnabrone, and its rich musical heritage, but it offers many other fascinating...
Definition
Jomon Pottery
The Jomon Period (c. 14,500 - c. 300 BCE) of ancient Japan produced a distinctive pottery which distinguishes it from the earlier Paleolithic Age. Jomon pottery vessels are the oldest in the...
Definition
Janus
The Roman Republic owed much to the cultural influence of its Greek neighbors. For centuries the Greeks occupied a prominent position to the south on the island of Sicily. A series of wars in the...
Article
Psychological Intimidation at the Battle of Carrhae
Psychological intimidation in military conflict has been an art of war since ancient times. Employing misinformation, feigned movements, subtle messaging, and...
Medieval Period
Definition
Jörmungandr
Jörmungandr is the Midgard Serpent (also World Serpent) in Norse mythology who encircles the realm of Midgard. He is the son of the god Loki and the giantess Angrboða and brother of the great...
Article
The Early History of Clove, Nutmeg, & Mace
The spices clove, nutmeg, and mace originated on only a handful of tiny islands in the Indonesian archipelago but came to have a dramatic, far-reaching impact on world...
Definition
Angkor Wat
Angkor Wat is a temple complex in the province of Siem Reap, Cambodia originally dedicated to the Hindu god Vishnu in the 12th century CE. It is among the largest religious buildings ever created...
Definition
Margery Kempe
Margery Kempe (l. c. 1373 - c. 1438 CE) was a medieval mystic and author of the first autobiography in English, The Book of Margery Kempe, which relates her spiritual journey from wife and...
Definition
Sejong the Great
King Sejong the Great (15 May 1397 to 8 April 1450 CE) ruled Korea from 1418 to 1450 CE as the fourth king of the Joseon Dynasty (also spelled Choson). One of only two Korean kings called...
Definition
Trebizond
Trapezus (Greek: Τραπεζοῦς) or Trebizond was a Greek city on the southern shore of the Black Sea, modern Trabzon. According to the Christian author Eusebius, writing more than a millennium after...
Article
Women in the Byzantine Empire
Women in the Byzantine Empire (4th to 15th century CE) were, amongst the upper classes, largely expected to supervise the family home and raise children while those who had to...
Article
Copies & Fakes in Art during the Renaissance
The Renaissance period witnessed a great renewed interest in the art of antiquity. There was an appreciation of the technical skill required to produce such objects...
Early Modern Period
Definition
Federalist Revolts
The federalist revolts were a series of rebellions that erupted in several parts of France in the summer of 1793, in response to the concentration of power in Paris during the French Revolution...
Definition
John Rolfe
John Rolfe (l. 1585-1622 CE) was an English merchant and colonist of Jamestown best known as the husband of Pocahontas (l. c. 1596-1617 CE). He is also known, however, for his successful cultivation...
Article
Seven Sacred Rites of the Lakota Sioux
The Seven Sacred Rites of the Lakota Sioux (Seven Sacred Rites of the Lakota Oyate) are the spiritual observances of the Native American Sioux nation that maintain their...
Article
Reformation in the Netherlands & the Eighty Years' War
The Protestant Reformation in the Netherlands was among the most violent and destructive of any region during the first 50 years of the movement, ultimately...
Definition
Suleiman the Magnificent
Suleiman the Magnificent (aka Süleyman I or Suleiman I, r. 1520-1566) was the tenth and longest-reigning sultan of the Ottoman Empire. Hailed as a skilled military commander, a just...
Definition
Sir William Johnson
Sir William Johnson, 1st Baronet (l. c.1715-1774) was a British military officer, diplomat, and Superintendent of Indian Affairs. He was instrumental in aligning the Native Americans...
Article
Siege of Yorktown
The Siege of Yorktown (28 September to 19 October 1781) was the final major military operation of the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783). It resulted in the surrender of British general...
Article
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death
"Give me liberty or give me death!” is the closing line from a speech made by Patrick Henry to the Second Virginia Convention on 23 March 1775, in which he argued that war with...
Modern Period
Article
Siege of Detroit
The Siege of Detroit (15-16 August 1812) was one of the first major actions of the War of 1812. After a botched invasion of Canada, a US army retreated to Fort Detroit, where it was besieged...
Definition
Camille Pissarro
Camille Pissarro (1830-1903) was an impressionist painter based in France who focussed on landscapes but frequently changed his style and subjects. He was an instrumental figure in the new...
Article
The Search for the Source of the Nile - Solving Geography's Last Great Riddle
The search for the source of the Nile River was one of the last great geographical mysteries of 19th-century European exploration. Men like...
Definition
Chunkey
Chunkey (tchung-kee) is a Native American game involving a rolling disc (or ring) and two teams of players who score by throwing their sticks to land as close to the disc as possible. The game...
Definition
Louisiana Purchase
The Louisiana Purchase was a land deal made in 1803, in which the United States purchased 828,000 square miles (2,144,510 km²) of land west of the Mississippi River from France for $15...
Definition
Second Anglo-Sikh War
The Second Anglo-Sikh War (1848-9) once again saw the British East India Company defeat the Sikh Empire in northern India. The war, which started off as a rebellion against British colonial...
Article
Battle of Okinawa - WWII's Last Major Battle
The Battle of Okinawa (April to June 1945) was the largest amphibious assault and last major battle of the Second World War (1939-45). A massive naval fleet landed...
Interview
Interview: American School of Classical Studies at Athens
The American School of Classical Studies in Greece has been running its operations since the 19th century CE, with excavations across the country and an...
Prehistoric Period
Article
Early Human Migration
Disregarding the extremely inhospitable spots even the most stubborn of us have enough common sense to avoid, humans have managed to cover an extraordinary amount of territory on this...
Article
The Megalithic Funerary Art of San Agustín
Beginning approximately 2000 years ago, in a rugged stretch of southwestern Colombia where the Andes split into multiple ranges and the mighty Magdalena River is born...
Definition
Clava Cairns - Monuments to Memory and More
Clava Cairns is an early Bronze Age site in Scotland, located east of the city of Inverness, consisting of three well-preserved cairns (two of which are passage graves...
Definition
Venus Figurine
The term Venus figurine is used to describe the more than 200 small statuettes of voluptuous female figures that have been found at Upper Paleolithic sites across Europe and some parts of...
Definition
Stonehenge
Stonehenge is a Neolithic / Bronze Age monument located on Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire, southern England. The first monument on the site, began around 3100 BCE, was a circular 'henge' earthwork...
Definition
Homo Naledi
Homo naledi is an extinct species of human discovered in Rising Star Cave in South Africa in 2013 CE in what has become the biggest single-species hominin find in Africa to this day, which is...
Definition
Predynastic Period in Egypt - The Time Before History Began
The Predynastic Period in ancient Egypt is the time before recorded history, from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic Age and on to the rise of the First Dynasty...
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...
