Royalty: Did you mean...?

The Egyptian Book of the Dead is a collection of spells which enable the soul of the deceased to navigate the afterlife. The famous title was given the work by western scholars; the actual title would translate as The Book of Coming Forth...

Thutmose III (also known as Tuthmosis III, r. 1458-1425 BCE) was the 6th king of Egypt's 18th Dynasty, one of the greatest military leaders in antiquity, and among the most effective and impressive monarchs in Egypt's history. His throne...

Baal (also given as Ba'al) is a Canaanite-Phoenician god of fertility and weather, specifically rainstorms. The name was also used as a title, however, meaning "Lord" and was applied to a number of different deities throughout the ancient...

The religion of the Aztec civilization which flourished in ancient Mesoamerica (1345-1521 CE) has gained an infamous reputation for bloodthirsty human sacrifice with lurid tales of the beating heart being ripped from the still-conscious victim...

Ancient Egyptian literature comprises a wide array of narrative and poetic forms including inscriptions on tombs, stele, obelisks, and temples; myths, stories, and legends; religious writings; philosophical works; wisdom literature; autobiographies...

A pyramid is a structure or monument, usually with a quadrilateral base, which rises to a triangular point. In the popular imagination, pyramids are the three lonely structures on the Giza plateau at the edge of the Sahara Desert but there...

The Phoenician Religion, as in many other ancient cultures, was an inseparable part of everyday life. Gods such as Baal, Astarte, and Melqart had temples built in their name, offerings and sacrifices were regularly made to them, royalty performed...

Persepolis was the capital of the Persian Achaemenid Empire from the reign of Darius I (the Great, r. 522-486 BCE) until its destruction in 330 BCE. Its name comes from the Greek Perses-polis (Persian City), but the Persians knew it as Parsa...

The Gandhara Civilization existed in what is now Northern Pakistan and Afghanistan from the middle of the 1st millennium BCE to the beginning of the 2nd millennium CE. Although multiple major powers ruled over this area during that time...

The vizier in ancient Egypt was the most powerful position after that of king. Known as the djat, tjat, or tjati in ancient Egyptian, a vizier was the equivalent of the modern-day prime minister of the nation who actually saw to the day-to-day...