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Relations between ancient Japan and China have a long history, and in certain periods the exchange of political, religious and cultural practices between the two was intense. China, the much older state and the more developed, passed on to...

The Forty-Two Judges were divine entities associated with the afterlife in ancient Egypt and, specifically, the judgment of the soul in the Hall of Truth. The soul would recite the Negative Confession in their presence as well as other gods...

Throughout history, in order for a government to be respected and obeyed, it must possess some form of legitimacy recognized by the governed. Governmental systems have relied on a number of models for legitimacy, among them the dynastic form...

The Coffin Texts (c. 2134-2040 BCE) are 1,185 spells, incantations, and other forms of religious writing inscribed on coffins to help the deceased navigate the afterlife. They include the text known as the Book of Two Ways which is the first...

The Silla Kingdom ruled south-eastern Korea during the Three Kingdoms period (1st century BCE - 7th century CE) and then, as the Unified Silla Kingdom, all of Korea from 668 to 935 CE. The Silla produced fine pieces of art, but their most...

The War of the Eight Princes (291-306 CE) is the conflict which weakened and finally ended the Western Jin Dynasty (266-316 CE) in China and resulted in more far-reaching consequences throughout the country. The power of the Sima family was...

The Early Three Kingdoms Period in ancient China, from 184 CE to 190 CE for the purposes of this article, was one of the most turbulent in China's history. With an ailing Han government unable to control its empire, brutal localised wars...

A Praise Poem of Lipit-Estar is a Sumerian praise song honoring Lipit-Estar (also known as Lipit-Ishtar, r. c. 1870 to c. 1860 BCE), the fifth king of the First Dynasty of Isin, best known for his legal code written between the time of the...

The rarity of the appearance of Greco-Bactrian and Indo-Greek kingdoms in ancient literature is one of the reasons why those states are so little-known today. Indo-Greek literature did exist, but none has been found that speaks about the...

Although 30,000 archaeological sites have been identified in the AlUla area of Saudi Arabia, only 8 are currently open to visitors: Jabal Ikmah, which has hundreds of inscriptions; Hegra, a massive site settled during the Nabatean and Roman...