Rhetoric: Did you mean...?

The Stamp Act of 1765 was the first direct tax imposed on the 13 American colonies by the Parliament of Great Britain. It required the colonists to pay a tax on all printed materials including newspapers, legal documents, magazines, and playing...

A hetaira (pl. hetairai) was an educated female prostitute in ancient Greece and a common participant in symposia or drinking parties in private homes. Sometimes referred to in English as a courtesan, the Greek term hetaira was a euphemism...

Publius Cornelius Tacitus (l. c. 56 - c. 118 CE) was a Roman historian, active throughout the reign of Trajan (r. 98-117 CE) and the early years of Hadrian (r. 117-138 CE). His best-known works are Histories and Annals, which cover the history...

Pliny the Younger (61-112 CE) was the nephew of Pliny the Elder (23-79 CE), the author of the 37-volume Natural History. He had a remarkable political career and gained a reputation as an excellent lawyer and orator, but he is most famous...

The Intolerable Acts, also known as the Coercive Acts, were five laws passed by the Parliament of Great Britain in 1774 to punish the Thirteen Colonies of British North America for the Boston Tea Party. Though the acts primarily targeted...

Galen (129-216 CE) was a Greek physician, author, and philosopher, working in Rome, who influenced both medical theory and practice until the middle of the 17th century CE. Owning a large, personal library, he wrote hundreds of medical treatises...

Leo Africanus (al-Hasan ibn Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Wazzan al-Fasi al-Granati, 1485-1554) was a diplomat, merchant traveller and scholar who famously voyaged from Timbuktu to the Niger River and wrote 'The Description of Africa' (La Descrittione...

The Argead dynasty, the ancient Macedonian house of Dorian Greek origin, lasted from the 7th century to 310 BCE. The mythological founder of the dynasty was King Caranus but it was under Philip II of Macedon (382-226 BCE) that the Macedonian...

The Quran (also written Qur’an or Koran), revealed in the 7th century, is the sacred book of Islam, following in the tradition of the Abrahamic faiths, with the Torah as the sacred book of Judaism and the New Testament as the sacred book...

Samuel Adams (1722-1803) was a prominent Patriot leader in the American Revolution (1765-1789), and a Founding Father of the United States. He was one of the most vocal opponents of 'taxation without representation', was a founding member...