Olive: Did you mean...?

According to biblical tradition (and some say myth), King Solomon was the third and last king in the ancient United Kingdom of Israel. Other faiths, such as Islam and Rastafarianism, also embrace the notion of Solomon as a sagacious king...

The Manila galleons were Spanish treasure ships which transported precious goods like silk, spices, and porcelain from Manila in the Philippines to Acapulco, Mexico, between 1565 and 1815. The Atlantic treasure fleets then shipped some of...

Pompeii was a large Roman town in Campania, Italy which was buried in volcanic ash following the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 CE. Excavated in the 19th-20th century, its excellent state of preservation gives an invaluable insight into Roman...

Poseidon was the Greek god of the sea and rivers, creator of storms and floods, and the bringer of earthquakes and destruction. He was perhaps the most disruptive of all the ancient gods but he was not always a negative force. He was a protector...

Lesbos, a Greek island located in the eastern Aegean, had several prosperous city-states which thrived from the Bronze Age to the Byzantine era. Switching many times between independence, Persian and Greek control, Lesbos was often a victim...

The African kingdom of Axum (also Aksum) was located on the northern edge of the highland zone of the Red Sea coast, just above the horn of Africa. It was founded in the 1st century CE, flourished from the 3rd to 6th century CE, and then...

Crucifixion as a punishment was practiced by several ancient cultures, but most notably adopted by the Roman Republic and later Roman Empire. Crucifixion was a method of hanging or suspending someone on the combination of vertical and horizontal...

Thebes is a town in central Greece which has been continuously inhabited for five millennia. It was an important Mycenaean centre in the middle to late Bronze Age and was a powerful city-state in the Classical period, participating in both...

Vasco da Gama (c. 1469-1524) was a Portuguese navigator who, in 1497-9, sailed around the Cape of Good Hope in southern Africa and arrived at Calicut (now Kozhikode) on the south-west coast of India. This was the first direct voyage from...

Asclepius was the ancient Greek god of medicine, and he was also credited with powers of prophecy. The god had several sanctuaries across Greece; the most famous was at Epidaurus which became an important centre of healing in both ancient...