Featured
Definition
Gunpowder Plot - Guy Fawkes & the Plan to Blow up Parliament
The 1605 Gunpowder Plot was a failed attempt by pro-Catholic conspirators to blow up the English Parliament on 5 November and kill King James I of England...
Featured
Article
Ten Halloween Facts and Traditions You Need to Know - A Celebration of Transformation
Halloween is the most popular holiday in the world, after Christmas (based on level-of-celebration and consumer spending) and, increasingly...
Featured
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12 Royal Princes Who Never Reached the Throne - From Germanicus to the Black Prince & Franz Ferdinand
Royal heirs and princes expected to succeed to a throne occupied an unusually precarious position: close enough to power...
Featured
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12 Largest Contiguous Land Empires Before 1880 - From the Mongol Empire to Rome, Qing China & Russia
Land empires were expansive states whose rulers exercised authority over large, substantially connected territories and...
Latest Content
Article
Stalin's Five-Year Plans - Collectivising Agriculture & Industrialising the USSR
Joseph Stalin's Five-Year Plans (1928-50) were a series of state-led initiatives which aimed to grow the economy of the USSR, rapidly industrialise...
Curriculum Collection
AP World History Unit 6 - Consequences of Industrialization (c. 1750–1900)
With industrialization, a small number of states gained the ability to project power across the globe. Steamships, railroads, machine guns...
Article
Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld - Messages From the Afterlife
Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld is a Sumerian poem pre-dating The Epic of Gilgamesh and featuring its central characters. It is sometimes...
Definition
Army of Northern Virginia - General Lee's Army
The Army of Northern Virginia was the main field army of the Confederate States in the eastern theater of the American Civil War (1861-1865). Famously led by General...
Definition
Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor - The Great Matchmaker
Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor (1459-1519), belonged to the imperial House of Habsburg, and the imperial electors made him King of the Romans in 1486 during...
Definition
James Longstreet - Civil War Hero and Lost Cause Villain
James Longstreet (1821-1904) was a Confederate general in the American Civil War, serving chiefly under Robert E. Lee in the Eastern theater. He was regarded...
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Map of the Trade in the Indian Ocean 15th–16th Centuries - Monsoon Routes, Spice Trade, and European Expansion
Indian Ocean trade in the 15th and 16th centuries connected East Africa, Arabia, Persia, India, Southeast Asia...
Image
12 Royal Princes Who Never Reached the Throne - From Germanicus to the Black Prince & Franz Ferdinand
Royal heirs and princes expected to succeed to a throne occupied an unusually precarious position: close enough to power...
Image
Map of the Latin Empire - A Crusader State in Constantinople - The Fourth Crusade and the Fragmentation of Byzantium
The Latin Empire (Imperium Romaniae, 1204–1261) emerged after the Fourth Crusade (1202–1204) captured and...
For You
Definition
Roman Science
The Romans assimilated earlier Greek science for their own purposes, evaluating and then accepting or rejecting that which was most useful, much as they did in other fields such as warfare...
Article
The Temple of the Emerald Buddha
A small carved figurine sits high on a grand multi-tiered pedestal in a magnificent wat (temple) in Bangkok, Thailand. It has been sitting there since 1784 CE and was originally...
Definition
US Presidential Election of 1789
The US presidential election of 1789 was the first presidential election to take place after the ratification of the United States Constitution. Held on 4 February 1789, it...
Interview
Interview: King of the World by Matt Waters
In this interview, World History Encyclopedia sits down with author Matt Waters to chat about his new book King of the World: The Life of Cyrus the Great published...
Book Reviews
Book Review
The Army of Alexander the Great
The Army of Alexander the Great (2025) is a highly detailed and insightful examination of one of the most influential military forces in history. Rather than presenting Alexander...
Book Review
Looking for the Hidden Folk: How Iceland's Elves Can Save the Earth
I was intrigued by the title of Nancy Marie Brown’s latest book Looking for the Hidden Folk: How Iceland’s Elves Can Help Save the Earth. In many...
Book Review
Swallow's Dance
Author Wendy Orr (famous for Nim's Island, which has been turned into a motion picture) has created a captivating narrative aimed at young adults. The protagonist in Swallow's Dance is Leira...
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| 1,765 | articles |
| 19,868 | illustrations |
| 2,643 | videos |
| 415 | 3D images |
| 16,425 | translations |
| 48 | languages |
| 1,343 | contributors |
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| 62,596 | registered users |
Ancient Period
Definition
Kim Yu-sin
Kim Yu-sin (aka Kim Yushin, 595-673 CE) was a general of the Silla kingdom which ruled south-eastern Korea during the Three Kingdoms Period. Kim would greatly help Silla unify Korea, famously...
Definition
Vortigern
Vortigern was a 5th-century British ruler best known for inviting the Saxons to Britain to stop the incursions of the Picts and Scots and allowing them to take control of the land. 'Vortigern'...
Article
Death, Burial & the Afterlife in the Ancient Celtic Religion
The ancient Celts who occupied large parts of Europe from 700 BCE to 400 CE displayed a clear belief in an afterlife as evidenced in their treatment of...
Definition
Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius (r. 161 to 180 CE) was a Roman emperor best known as the last of the Five Good Emperors of Rome (following Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius) and as the author of...
Definition
Writing - The Preservation of Human Thought and Action
Writing is the physical manifestation of a spoken language. It is thought that human beings developed language circa 35,000 BCE as evidenced by cave paintings...
Definition
The Anthesteria
The Anthesteria celebrated two seemingly disparate things: wine and the dead. Both Dionysos and Hermes Chthonios (Hermes of the Underworld) were celebrated as part of this festival. In many...
Definition
Cuicuilco
Cuicuilco is an ancient settlement site in central Mexico, now located in southern Mexico City. Prominent in the late pre-Classic period, around 500 BCE, it is noted for its large circular temple...
Article
Herodotus on Cats in Egypt
The Greek historian Herodotus provides an accurate description of the devotion of the ancient Egyptians to cats in Book II of his Histories, but this passage is often cited out of...
Medieval Period
Definition
Castle Keep - The Safest Place in a Medieval Castle
The keep, located within a courtyard and surrounded by a curtain wall, was the heart of a medieval castle. The hall keep was a low building while the tower keep...
Definition
Baba Yaga
Baba Yaga (Baba Jaga) is a witch or ogress from Slavic folklore who lives in a magical hut in the forest and either helps, imprisons, or eats people (usually children). She is among the most...
Article
Artillery in Medieval Europe
Artillery weapons in medieval Europe included the mounted crossbow (ballista) and single-arm torsion catapult (mangonel), both similar to ancient Roman machines. As armies battled...
Article
Madhubani Paintings: People’s Living Cultural Heritage
Mithila, a region in the state of Bihar, northern India (and also stretching into Nepal), has an important tradition of knowledge in the form of paintings...
Article
Aztec Food & Agriculture
The Aztec civilization, which flourished in central Mexico between c. 1345 and 1521 CE, was able to provide an astonishingly wide range of agricultural produce thanks to a combination...
Definition
Giovanni Boccaccio
Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375) was an Italian poet, writer, and scholar. His most famous and influential work is the Decameron, completed by 1353, in which his ten characters present 100...
Article
The Aztec New Fire Ceremony
The New Fire Ceremony, also known as the Binding of the Years Ceremony, was a ritual held every 52 years in the month of November on the completion of a full cycle of the Aztec...
Definition
Japanese Tea Ceremony
The Japanese Tea Ceremony (chanoyu or chado) is a cultural tradition involving very particular places, procedures, and equipment for drinking green tea. Originating as a habit of Chinese...
Early Modern Period
Definition
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault (1926-1984) was a post-modernist French philosopher and is considered one of the most influential philosophers of modern times. Aside from his critiques of social institutions...
Article
The Violent and Mysterious Death of Christopher Marlowe
On the evening of 30 May 1593, the sounds of a heated argument could be heard emanating from a boarding house in Deptford, a district of London on the south...
Definition
Spanish Requirement
The Spanish Requirement or Requerimiento was a document intended to be read out to and agreed upon by indigenous peoples during the Spanish conquest of the Americas. Created in 1513...
Article
John Knox on Female Leadership
The rule of women in government and ministry has long been a source of controversy in the Christian Church. Beginning with the Apostolic period, female leadership has been embraced...
Image Gallery
A Gallery of Historical Maps
This gallery of 30 maps traces the history of cartography, with examples of maps made by cultures from the Paleolithic to the early modern period. The maps cover cities, states...
Definition
Juan Ponce de León
Juan Ponce de León (1474-1521) was a Spanish conquistador who led expeditions from Puerto Rico to the coast of Florida, giving the region its current name. He also served as the first...
Definition
Scientific Revolution
The Scientific Revolution (1500-1700), which occurred first in Europe before spreading worldwide, witnessed a new approach to knowledge gathering – the scientific method – which utilised...
Definition
Josiah Wedgwood
Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795) was an English manufacturer and inventor who designed and created pottery of all kinds. Noted for his jasper stoneware, Wedgwood was also innovative in how he...
Modern Period
Article
Eyewitness Accounts of the Holocaust
The Holocaust was the murder of 6 million Jewish people by the SS, Gestapo, and other organisations of Nazi Germany and its allies in the years prior to and through the Second...
Definition
Battle of Mill Springs - The First Union Victory in the Western Theater
The Battle of Mill Springs (19 January 1862) was the first Union victory in the Western theater of the American Civil War and propelled Union...
Article
Ûñtsaiyĭ', the Gambler
Ûñtsaiyĭ', the Gambler is a legend of the Cherokee nation, known as a Wonder Story, which features supernatural characters, sometimes interacting with mortals, sometimes with each other...
Article
Battle of Białystok-Minsk
The Battle of Białystok-Minsk in Jun-Jul 1941, which involved the encirclement of entire Soviet armies positioned near each city in Poland and Belarus, respectively, was one of the...
Definition
Marbury v. Madison
Marbury v. Madison (1803) was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court that established the principle of judicial review. In the decision, written by Chief Justice John Marshall...
Definition
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933. He gained power by making popular promises like improving Germany's economy and status in Europe, but when he took these...
Definition
Night of the Long Knives
The Night of the Long Knives (aka Blood Purge or Röhm-Putsch) of 30 June 1934 was a purge of the Nazi Sturmabteilung (SA) paramilitary group which continued through 1 and 2 July...
Definition
Little Crow (Eastman's Biography)
Little Crow (Taoyateduta, also known as Little Crow III, l. c. 1810-1863) was a Dakota Sioux chief best known as the leader of the Mdewakanton Dakota (Santee) Sioux during...
Prehistoric Period
Definition
Skara Brae
Skara Brae is a Neolithic Age site, consisting of ten stone structures, near the Bay of Skaill, Orkney, Scotland. Today the village is situated by the shore but when it was inhabited (c.3100-2500...
Article
Dolmens of Ancient Korea
Dolmens (in Korean: koindol or chisongmyo) are simple structures made of monolithic stones erected during the late Neolithic period or Korean Bronze Age (1st millennium BCE). In ancient...
Article
The Megalithic Funerary Art of San Agustín
Beginning approximately 2000 years ago, in a rugged stretch of southwestern Colombia where the Andes split into multiple ranges and the mighty Magdalena River is born...
Definition
Woolly Mammoth
The woolly mammoth, Mammuthus primigenius, is an extinct herbivore related to elephants who trudged across the steppe-tundras of Eurasia and North America from around 300,000 years ago until...
Article
The Dolmens of Sicily
It is a well-known fact that Sicily, the largest island in the Mediterranean sea, went through a quite complex prehistoric period. So much so that it is difficult to navigate through...
Definition
Dolmen
A dolmen is a megalithic structure typically formed from a large horizontal stone slab resting on two or more upright slabs. The oldest European examples are found in Brittany, northern France...
Definition
Homo Floresiensis
Homo floresiensis, nicknamed 'hobbit' because it only stood about 1 meter tall, is an extinct species of fossil human that lived on the island of Flores, Indonesia during the Pleistocene...
Definition
Locmariaquer
Locmariaquer is a Stone Age site in north-west France distinguished by its two large stone tombs and massive granite standing stone or menhir. The monumental structures, all built within metres...
