Search
Ancient History
After 10,000 years of civilization, have we figured out what virtue is?
More than 1,000 years ago, Mesoamerican societies conducted one of history's most interesting experiments in commodity money.
Million Stories
Venerated astrophysicist Carl Sagan entertained the possibility.
There were many other species of human on the planet. Svante Pääbo discovered one of them.
How drugs, demons, and the search for immortality gave us words we use everyday.
"Spanish Stonehenge" contains 526 giant stones, three circular burial sites, a quarry, and four necropolises.
Advances in ancient DNA analysis gave researchers a new way to trace the movements of peoples across Eurasia.
There are nearly 100 towns named "Troy."
The “first-of-its-kind” archeological find is being reburied despite the fact that researchers haven’t finished studying it.
Sex can be a death trap even for modern toad and frog species.
Fire-breathing dragons may represent chaos and the human impulse to conquer that threat.
Bring not a bagpipe to a man in trouble.
The Greeks were among the first to move beyond “primitive money” and establish an official currency, transforming their trade, government, and even philosophy.
Million Stories
Looking at ourselves in a mirror — or on a video call — shapes our sense of self. But what you see is not what others see.
Mesopotamian beer was not flavored with hops, and it was probably on the thick, porridgey side.
Bloodcurdling war cries, shrieking elephants, and whistling arrows all made soldiers flee in terror.
What's the point of all that money?
More than mindless bloodshed, the gladiatorial games were organized sports. Gladiators were treated as world-class athletes, receiving superior diets and medical care.
Commodus lived the anti-Stoic life, pursuing lust, narcissism, and self-indulgence.
Some artifacts drown in shipwrecks, others are taken by the tide. Many others will vanish as a result of climate change and rising sea levels.
Rock art in northern Australia depicts marsupial lions, giant kangaroos, and other megafauna that populated the Land Down Under long ago.
The 557-million-year-old specimen challenges the theory that animal body plans were laid out in the Cambrian explosion.
Human beings are descendants of these early tetrapods – at least those who made a new life on land.
Horses pranced around the western hemisphere until they went extinct in the late Holocene. They were reintroduced by European colonists — though where, when, and how has remained unclear.
Rare and costly paints have shaped art history in unforeseen ways. Mummy brown caused one artist to bury his paint.
Long before Christopher and Magellan, ancient explorers voyaged into the unknown and brought home extraordinary tales.
8mins
The history of music from bone flutes to Beyoncé.
"The surface is no longer a record of every impact the moon has ever had, because at some point, impacts were erasing previous impacts."