Decree: Did you mean...?

The Demonstration of 20 June 1792 was a final attempt by the sans-culottes of Paris to reconcile King Louis XVI of France (r. 1774-1792) with the French Revolution (1789-99). Prompted by the king's veto of popular decrees, the people invaded...

Ptolemaic police, or phylakitai, were responsible for law enforcement throughout Ptolemaic Egypt. The existence of a professional police force made Egypt different from ancient societies like the Roman Empire, which had no police. In addition...

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 capitalists. The more immediate consequences, though, of the Bolshevik...

Female gladiators in ancient Rome – referred to by modern-day scholars as gladiatrix – may have been uncommon but they did exist. Evidence suggests that a number of women participated in the public games of Rome even though this practice...

The ruins of the agora in Cyrene, modern Libya.

The cataclysmic end of the Roman Empire in the West has tended to mask the underlying features of continuity. The map of Europe in the year 500 would have been unrecognizable to anyone living a hundred years earlier. Gone was the solid boundary...

Egypt is a country in North Africa, on the Mediterranean Sea, and is home to one of the oldest civilizations on earth. The name 'Egypt' comes from the Greek Aegyptos which was the Greek pronunciation of the ancient Egyptian name 'Hwt-Ka-Ptah'...

The Bolshevik Revolution occurred on 7 November 1917 (old calendar 25 October) and established a new republic: Soviet Russia. The Bolsheviks were radical socialists led by Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924), whose goal was a fairer society where...

The Second Triumvirate was a political association of convenience between three of Rome's most powerful figures: Mark Antony, Lepidus, and Octavian in the 1st century BCE. Following the assassination of Julius Caesar the three vowed revenge...

Ancient Olympia was an ancient Greek sanctuary site dedicated to the worship of Zeus located in the western Peloponnese. The Pan-Hellenic Olympic Games were held at the site in honour of Zeus every four years from 776 BCE to 393 CE. Olympia...