Search Results: Mediterranean

The Mediterranean Sea was the economic focal point of the Roman Empire. Rome's armies first established an empire across these waters beginning back in the times of the Roman Republic. In 200 CE, the Mediterranean was still the channel that...

Piracy, defined as the act of attacking and robbing a ship or port by sea, had a long history in the ancient Mediterranean stretching from the time of the Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaten (r. 1353-1336 BCE) and throughout the Middle Ages (c. 476-1500...

The history of the ancient world has always been told as a history of cities, from Homer's epic poems about events just before and just after the sack of Troy, through the prose histories of wars between Athens and Sparta, Rome and Carthage...

The pirates of the ancient Mediterranean were not, for the most part, the outsiders who knew no country's allegiance and were the enemies of civilization as they are frequently depicted in novels and other media. They were often employed...

The culture of drinking wine was enjoyed throughout the Mediterranean world, and what is true now was true in antiquity, too: wine is always good business. The Hellenistic Period (c. 335-30 BCE), between Alexander the Great and Cleopatra...

Colonization of the ancient Mediterranean had been taking place since the Bronze Age, especially with Minoan and Mycenaean expansion, but it was the Phoenicians from the 10th century CE that really took the whole idea to a new level. The...

Wine was the most popular manufactured drink in the ancient Mediterranean. With a rich mythology, everyday consumption, and important role in rituals wine would spread via the colonization process to regions all around the Mediterranean coastal...

Olives and olive oil were not only an important component of the ancient Mediterranean diet but also one of the most successful industries in antiquity. Cultivation of the olive spread with Phoenician and Greek colonization from Asia Minor...

A diaspora is a large group of people with a similar heritage or homeland who have since moved from their original homelands to another country. In terms of ethnicity, they share a common language, worldviews, myths, religious concepts and...

Museums have been around much longer than one might think, but in the ancient world, they were principally institutions of research and learning rather than places to display artworks and artefacts, even if they were often located in grand...