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Phoenician architecture is typified by large temples with double-columned facades approached by a short staircase, enclosed sacred spaces containing cube-like and open-fronted shrines, and such large-scale engineering projects as dams and...

Jordan is a country in the Near East bordered by Israel, Syria, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. The country's name comes from the Arabic Al Urdun, referencing a fortified site but also meaning "prominence", though various sources also claim the name...

Alexios I Komnenos (Alexius Comnenus) was emperor of the Byzantine Empire from 1081 to 1118 CE. Regarded as one of the great Byzantine rulers, Alexios defeated the Normans, the Pechenegs, and, with the help of the First Crusaders, the Seljuks...

The White Huns were a race of largely nomadic peoples who were a part of the Hunnic tribes of Central Asia. They ruled over an expansive area stretching from the Central Asian lands all the way to the Western Indian Subcontinent. Although...

Caesarea Maritima was a city built over 2,000 years ago (c. 22-10 BCE) on the coast of the Eastern Mediterranean. With Roman engineering and largesse, Herod the Great (r. 37-4 BCE) accomplished this feat by constructing a whole metropolis...

Gabriel's Rebellion (30 August 1800) was a carefully planned slave revolt in Virginia orchestrated by the literate slave blacksmith Gabriel (l. c. 1776-1800), property of one Thomas Prosser, and so referred to as Gabriel Prosser. The plans...

Celtic hilltop forts, often called oppida (sing. oppidum), after the Latin name given to larger settlements by the Romans, were built across Europe during the 2nd and 1st century BCE. Surrounded by a fortification wall and sometimes with...

Leptis Magna (aka Lepcis Magna), located in western Libya, North Africa, was a Phoenician city founded by Tyre in the 7th century BCE. Continuing to be a major city in the Roman period, it was the birthplace of Emperor Septimius Severus (r...

Ihara Saikaku (1642-1693) was a Japanese poet and novelist who played a leading role in creating the so-called ‘floating world’ (ukiyo-zoshi) genre of popular literature in the 17th century. His work was significant because, in terms of both...

Xois (as the Greeks called it) was a vast ancient city located on a marshy island in the center of the Nile Delta of Egypt, modern-day Sakha. It was founded c. 3414-3100 BCE and was continuously inhabited until the rise of Christianity c...