Ancient-Origins.net

We’ve lost the secret to making some of history’s most useful inventions, and for all of our ingenuity and discoveries, our ancestors of thousands of years ago

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Life on a pirate ship was fraught with peril, particularly for those assigned to the five most dreaded roles: topmen, forced men, swabbers, liars, and shipboard musicians.

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While Caroline Nunneley was exploring the Thames' shores in London, meticulously searching the mud on all fours for archaeological treasures, she encountered an unexpected find

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In the annals of religious history, the Roman Catholic tonsure hairstyle stands out as a peculiar and enduring tradition.

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There has long been an air of mystery and intrigue surrounding a set of wooden tablets with writing on them found on the tiny, remote South Pacific island of Rapa Nui

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The ancient Mediterranean harbors mysteries that continue to intrigue historians. Beyond the well-known empires of Rome and Greece lie enigmatic civilizations like the Sea Peoples, who wielded power yet remain unidentified. Carthage, renowned for its conflict with Rome, veils its origins in the legend of Queen Dido, whose existence perplexes scholars. Meanwhile, the Minoans, depicted in vibrant frescoes, puzzle researchers with their ritual of bull-leaping, possibly inspiring the myth of the Minotaur.

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Amid the vivid imagery adorning the plates of the Gundestrup Cauldron lies an enigma that has captivated successive generations of scholars.

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Except for perhaps Robert the Bruce, William Wallace has to be the most famous figure in Scottish history

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By Nicholas Bourne/The Conversation

Many of us want to live long, happy and healthy lives. Yet it’s often confusing to know the best way to achieve this, and many aspects of modern, westernized living conspire to keep us from achieving this goal. The solution may be to step back in time. For the bulk of our existence, we evolved following a hunter-gatherer lifestyle of foraging for food and hunting animals. Today, only a few hunter-gatherer communities still exist, such as the Hadza of Tanzania.

Research shows that many of the health problems that plague modern society, such as cardiovascular disease and poor mental health, have very low prevalence among hunter-gatherer societies of both past and present day. This suggests there’s much we can learn from hunter-gatherers to improve our lives.

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The gleaming yellow gold hue of amber is one of nature’s wonders and one which has been sought after and admired for centuries.

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In the realm of Viking lore, Ivar the Boneless emerges as a formidable, if mysterious, figure. Born to Ragnar Lothbrok and Aslaug

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Following the arrival of the first farmers in Scandinavia 5,900 years ago, the hunter-gatherer population was wiped out within a few generations

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The first mention of the famous ‘Sword in the Stone’ of the Arthurian tradition is found in Robert de Boron’s Merlin, a medieval French poem, part of the 13th-century Lancelot-Grail cycle of French romances also known as the Vulgate Cycle

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After five years of research two German scientists have published translations of a collection of Egyptian magical texts.

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In November 1519, the formidable Aztec king, Montezuma, ruled over a flourishing empire at its pinnacle. His empire, comprising 500 city-states and nearly 6 million people

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During excavations at a 2,500-year-old archaeological site in Puyang, China, a set of 10 polished and painted bone slips or sticks were unearthed, all of which were inscribed with an ancient Chinese

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Hawaii, known today as a popular tourist destination, conceals a deeper historical allure that predates Western influence.

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The Red Turban Rebellion, which took place from 1351 to 1368, was a pivotal event in Chinese history, marking the decline of the Mongol Yuan Dynasty

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A mortuary practice known as ‘Log Coffin culture’ characterizes the Iron Age of highland Pang Mapha in northwestern Thailand.

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While digging at the site of a rural, first-century AD Roman settlement in Houten-Castellum in the Netherlands, archaeologists uncovered a most unusual artifact. 

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