Search Results: Twilight cities lost capitals mediterranean

The history of the ancient world has always been told as a history of cities, from Homer's epic poems about events just before and just after the sack of Troy, through the prose histories of wars between Athens and Sparta, Rome and Carthage...

Constantinople at first had much in common with the temporary capitals of the 2nd and 3rd century CE and the tetrarchic capitals. It was an existing city of medium size, well located on the road network, and unlike most of them, it was also...

Piracy, defined as the act of attacking and robbing a ship or port by sea, had a long history in the ancient Mediterranean stretching from the time of the Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaten (r. 1353-1336 BCE) and throughout the Middle Ages (c. 476-1500...

The Mediterranean Sea was the economic focal point of the Roman Empire. Rome's armies first established an empire across these waters beginning back in the times of the Roman Republic. In 200 CE, the Mediterranean was still the channel that...

The Seven Cities of Cibola are the mythical lands of gold that the Spanish of the 16th century believed existed somewhere in the southwest of North America, comparable to the better-known mythical city of El Dorado. No sites matching the...

Caesarea Maritima was located on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Built from the ground up in 22-10 BCE by Rome's client king, Herod the Great (r. 37-4 BCE), its location in relation to ship traffic and proximity to historical...

Once upon a time, in the land known as Sumer, the people built a temple to their god who had conquered the forces of chaos and brought order to the world. They built this temple at a place called Eridu, which was “one of the most southerly...

Mediterranean trade increased exponentially at the turn of the first millennium. During Rome's zenith, goods of all sorts began to move in all directions. As a common traveler aboard merchant ships, Paul traveled within such a milieu. Tracing...

What happened to the places that history forgot – the cities submerged under water, decimated by invading armies or swallowed up by the sands of time? Where are they, and what can they tell us about our past? From the sunken city of Thonis...

The pirates of the ancient Mediterranean were not, for the most part, the outsiders who knew no country's allegiance and were the enemies of civilization as they are frequently depicted in novels and other media. They were often employed...