From its anti-immigrant origins to the Nazi-esque salute children used to make while saying it, this is the dark history behind the Pledge of Allegiance that you didn’t learn in school. Library of Congress Students pledging allegiance to the flag…
Jack London became so enamored with a dog he met while prospecting for gold in the Yukon Territory that he used their bond to create one of the 20th century’s most iconic works of literature. Jack London’s The Call of…
The SS Cotopaxi, before its disappearance in December 1925. The identification of a nearly 100-year-old shipwreck has debunked a popular conspiracy theory: that the Bermuda Triangle was somehow involved with the 1925 disappearance of the SS Cotopaxi. The steam powered…
The spiral patterns that appear prominently in the rock carvings are thought to be a symbol among ancestral Pueblo peoples for the sky or the sun. The Pueblo people created rock carvings in the Mesa Verde region of the Southwest…
These 30 “curse tablets” meant for the dead show what lengths Athenians would go to hex their enemies. Jutta Stroszeck/German Archaeological InstituteTablet curse containing incantation against the newlywed Glykera, focusing on her vulva, by someone jealous of her marital bliss.…
A bird’s-eye view of the temple, taken at the end of the 2013 excavation season. The discovery of an Iron Age temple near Jerusalem has upended the idea that the ancient Kingdom of Judah, located in what is now southern…
The 1,200-year-old glass game piece looks good enough to eat. What looks like a tasty, blue gumdrop decorated with white frosting is actually a 1,200-year-old glass “king” piece that may have belonged to an elite gamer, according to Durham University,…
One artifact was said to show the earliest depiction of the Christian crucifixion, but experts said its iconography suggests it was created much later than its supposed date in the third century A.D. A criminal trial has begun of an…
Pvt. Arthur Edward Diggens’ diary was written in pencil and spans from Feb. 13, 1916 to Oct. 11, 1916. It ends rather abruptly — but not because the soldier was killed in battle. Hansons AuctioneersThe diary was found in a…
Simon Sebag Montefiore is a best-selling historian, with books published in 48 languages. He is the author of the international best-seller “Jerusalem: The Biography,” (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2014). Q: How challenging is it to find sources about Jerusalem that can…
An image shows part of the Virgin on the Rocks. The hidden baby Jesus is in the right side of this frame. The Leonardo da Vinci painting the “Virgin of the Rocks” was hiding another image beneath its surface: a…
Ancient Egyptian murder mystery solved, mysterious population of human ancestors uncovered, 3,000-year-old mummy’s voice resurrected.Murder Mystery Behind Peculiar Egyptian Mummy Solved After 2,600 Years Ulster MuseumTakabuti has fascinated researchers since her 1834 discovery due to her blackened face and stunningly-preserved…