History
fromwww.thehistoryblog.com
9 hours agoMosaics displayed under floor of new Istanbul museum
A fourth- or fifth-century mosaic floor in Istanbul remains in situ under plexiglass, anchoring a museum with artifacts and elevated glass walkways.
1 The world's largest ocean current circles which continent? 2 Who was both the 8th US president and the 8th vice-president? 3 Where did Britain's first nudist beach open in 1980? 4 What term did Liz Hurley coin for non-celebrities? 5 Stubbin and rumpy are local names for what felines? 6 Who was introduced on The Porter Wagoner Show in September 1967? 7 Which country's postal service stopped delivering letters in December 2025?
Standing beneath a tangled canopy of highway overpasses at the edge of a muddy bluff, I watched the Missouri River churn below me. Its murky water rolled relentlessly onward, folding into eddies as it wound its way toward the Mississippi. Hundreds of years ago, this treacherous brown ribbon marked the frontier's edge; it was where the West got wild. Of course, I knew
Two exceptionally rare and beautifully carved Mithraic altars found in Inveresk, East Lothian, Scotland, are going on display for the first time. They are not just the only Roman altars ever found in Scotland, but are among the finest examples of Roman sculpture in Roman Britain. They are also uniquely early in date, having been made in 140s A.D. during Antoninus Pius' reoccupation of southern Scotland, whereas most other archaeological materials related to the worship of Mithras in Britannia date to the 3rd century.
A conversation with Alicia Walker on the pseudo-Arabic inscriptions (or pseudo-kufic) that appear on a number of tenth- and eleventh-century churches in Greece, most notably at the monastery of Hosios Loukas. What did the Arabic script signify in Orthodox culture at the time if not tension with Islam? Alicia Walker is Professor of History of Art at Bryn Mawr College.
In this paper we investigate whether infant and childhood feeding practices influenced the imbalanced adult sex ratio reported in medieval Europe from historical and osteological evidence. First, we examine hypotheses for the observed imbalanced sex ratios in Europe and the evidence presented to support these hypotheses. We then use stable isotope analysis (δ13C and δ15N) of incremental dentine in 64 first molars from adults at three medieval sites (Aulla, Badia Pozzeveri, and Montescudaio) in north-western Tuscany (11th-15th c. CE).
The Antinomian Controversy ( antinomian from the Greek "against the law") ended with the banishment of Anne Hutchinson in 1638. Wheelwright had been banished the year before, and Henry Vane had returned to England that same year (1637). After Hutchinson was expelled, another religious dissenter, Roger Williams (1603-1683), who had been banished in early 1636, began a literary duel with John Cotton over religious freedom and persecution, which addressed a number of points raised by the Antinomian Controversy.
The German Spring Offensive, also called the Ludendorff Offensive after its commander, was the last major German advance of the First World War (1914-18). From March to July 1918, Ludendorff launched five major attacks on the Western Front to break the deadlock of trench warfare. The Allied resistance, use of tanks, and massive reserves, along with German logistical failures, meant that the offensives, despite each starting well, eventually petered out.
The remains of a monumental hall belonging to a 4th-century episcopal palace have been discovered at Ostia Antica, Rome's ancient port town. The base of the structure is eight by 20 meters (ca. 26 by 65 feet) and the walls were an estimated eight meters high. This is an extraordinarily large space, and it was richly decorated with mosaic floors and marble panels.
The shirt shows a man wearing a laurel wreath, the quadriga chariot drawn by four horses atop the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin and core details like the dates and location of the Summer Games in the capital. It's part of a collection of shirts for each of the modern-era Games, but, nonetheless, references probably the most politically contentious ones. There are no references to Hitler's government or its symbols and iconography on the shirt.
The foundation of future Mesopotamian advances in scientific/technological progress was laid by the Sumerians, who first explored the practice of the scientific hypothesis, engaged in technological innovation, created the written word, developed mathematics, astronomy, and astrology, and even fashioned the concept of time itself. Some of the most important inventions of the Sumerians were: the wheel the sail the corbeled arch/true arch irrigation and farming implements maps mathematics time and clocks astronomy and astrology medicinal drugs and surgery
It's no secret that America is fascinated with cults and their scamming, grifting leaders. Viewers flock to TV series like Wild Wild Country, The Vow and Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey, and elevate con artists like the Tinder swindler and Elizabeth Holmes as antiheroes who've found loopholes in American society and business. Paddison tells Harris' story from its beginning in upstate New York, at the time a hotbed of self-proclaimed seers and prophets, including Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism.
These days, brutalist buildings are among London's most celebrated works of architecture. But it hasn't always been this way. Back in 1967, the Southbank Centre, one of the city's most striking examples of the style, was voted Britain's ugliest building by readers of the Daily Mail. In the latest indicator of just how much times have changed, today (February 10) the Southbank Centre has been awarded listed status by the Department for Culture Media and Sport.
The aim of the Allied commander in this part of the Western Front, Field Marshal Haig, was to break out of the Ypres salient and recapture key Belgian ports and a railway junction vital to the German Army. After unusually heavy and persistent rains, the battlefield turned into a horrific sea of mud and water-filled shell holes, which reduced the advance to just a few miles.
Here I am, 76 years old, grandson of the late Bertram L. Baker, the political pioneer who in 1948 became the very first Black person elected to office in the history of Brooklyn. Many tens of thousands of Blacks had lived in Brooklyn through the 1800s and into the first half of the 20th century. But it was this immigrant, born on the then British colony of Nevis in 1898, who made Brooklyn history, as the Black political pioneer.
You won't find this in Cortina d'Ampezzo over the next few weeks, but for several decades of the Olympics' history, the contest awarded medals not just for sport but for art too. In the Summer Games from 1912 to 1948, musicians, painters, and plenty of other aesthetes went brain-to-brain in events such as lyric poetry and chamber music. "Town planning" was even contested one year under the umbrella of the architecture competition.
The story of this corner of London runs deep. The roots of settlement here stretch back to the 10th century, when King Edgar granted 13 acres of riverside land to 13 knights (yes, an acre per knight), with permission to use it for trading along he river. By 1125, there was already a dock at St Katharine's. Over the centuries, the area grew into a small but busy community, complete with a hospital, a monastery, a school, almshouses and its own court.
We tend to think of the five-day workweek as a law of nature, as certain as the rising of the sun. But it's nothing of the sort. The five-day workweek is a human invention that was introduced just over a century ago to solve the specific problems of the industrial age. By now it's so ingrained in our lives that we've forgotten we created it in the first place-but we did create it and we can also un-create it.
If you were an immigrant kid in New York at the turn of the twentieth century, the candy store was the center of your world. You went there to kibbitz and schmooze, to get away from the crush of tenement life and the glare of the beat cop, and, of course, to eat sweets-Tootsie Rolls and Chicken Feeds and as many chocolate pennies as a copper one could buy.
But Brundage, who teaches at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, does more than expand our understanding of a neglected aspect of Civil War history. His study offers a window into larger questions-about the evolution of laws of war and the definition of war crimes, about the ethical responsibility of combatants, about the growth of the nation-state and its attendant bureaucracy, and about the defining presence of race in the morality play of American history.
Few ideas are as central to the nation's identity as that of the American Dream. With the 250th birthday of the United States coming up in July 2026, it's worth stepping back to examine a concept essential to the nation's self-image. The term "American Dream" was actually coined in the 1930s by historian James Truslow Adams. Ever since the establishment of the Colonies, however, America has been viewed as a land where individual and collective hopes and aspirations can be realized.
The Neptune of Lyon, one of the largest and most important bronze statues from Roman Gaul, has arrived in Rome for a one-time guest starring appearance at the Giovanni Barracco Museum of Ancient Sculpture. The statue is in the permanent collection of the Lugdunum Musee et Theatres Romains in Lyon, and is being loaned to the sculpture museum as part of an extraordinary exchange of ancient works between the two cities.
Today is Saturday, Feb. 7, the 38th day of 2026. There are 327 days left in the year. Today in history: On Feb. 7, 1991, Jean-Bertrand Aristide was inaugurated as the first democratically elected president of Haiti. (He was overthrown by the military the following September.) Also on this date: In 1904, the Great Baltimore Fire began; one of the worst city fires in American history, it destroyed over 1,500 buildings in central Baltimore.
Anne Hutchinson (1591-1643) was a religious dissident who was brought to trial by John Winthrop (1588-1649) and the other magistrates of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1637 for spreading "erroneous opinions" regarding religious belief and practice. She is known as the central figure in the Antinomian Controversy. The Antinomian Controversy ( antinomian from the Greek for "against the law") challenged the authority of the colony's magistrates,
An excavation in central London has uncovered the remains of a boys school complete with artifacts from the students' schoolwork and their playtime. The objects include a slate tablet used as an erasable notebook to practice handwriting, a slate pencil and several ceramic alleys marbles made of decorated white ceramic from the Victorian era. Artifacts related to children's lives are less frequently found than ones relating to adults, so these objects give us a special glimpse into the lives of schoolboys.
A rare red-chalk drawing by Michelangelo has sold for US $27.2 million at Christie's in New York, setting a new auction record for the Renaissance artist after around 45 minutes of intense bidding. The price far exceeded its estimate and surpassed Michelangelo's previous auction high of $24.3 million. Christie's identified the sheet as a previously unrecorded study connected to the Sistine Chapel ceiling—specifically, a preparatory drawing for the right foot of the Libyan Sibyl, one of the monumental seated figures painted along the ceiling's edges.
On Thursday, Mississippi Today reported that several officials, who requested anonymity out of fear of retribution, said NPS told them to remove visitor brochures from the Medgar & Myrlie Evers Home National Monument and edit out details about Beckwith. Among the details reportedly flagged for removal: that Evers was found lying in a pool of blood after he was shot. The brochures referred to Beckwith as "a member of the racist and segregationist White Citizens' Council."
While the bone was worn and poorly preserved, archaeologists managed to identify its origin by comparing it with modern elephant and mammoth bones. Despite there not being enough DNA to confirm the exact species, the researchers were able to carbon date a tiny sample of the bone. This places the elephant's death between the late fourth and early third centuries BC - right in the middle of the Second Punic War.