Articles

Saint Augustine of Hippo (354-430 CE) most famous for his work Confessions and his City of God, is regarded as one of the Fathers of The Church in the tradition of Catholicism. In this brief essay from his The Literal Meaning of Genesis...

Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus were a pair of tribunes of the plebs from the 2nd century BCE, who sought to introduce land reform and other populist legislation in ancient Rome. They were both members of the Populares, a group of politicians...

The Roman funeral was a rite of passage that signified the transition between the states of life and death. It was very important to conduct the proper ceremonies and burial in order to avoid having a malicious spirit rising from the underworld...

Boudicca (died 61 CE) was the Celtic Queen of the Iceni tribe who led a revolt against Roman occupation of what is now East Anglia, England. So charismatic was Boudicca that ancient sources record tribes joining her revolt which would not...

Although much of ancient Roman life revolved around negotium (work and business), there was also time available for otium (leisure). Ranging from swimming to playing board games to attending theatre performances, athletics and forms of entertainment...

In the following excerpt from his Library of History, Book XVI, chapter 14, the historian Diodorus Siculus (1st century BCE) chronicles the famous Battle of Chaeronia of 338 BCE, in which Phillip II of Macedon, his son Alexander and their...

Tacitus (full name, Publius Gaius Cornelius Tacitus, ca. 56 – ca. 117 CE) was a Roman Senator and an important historian of the Roman Empire. In the following passages Tacitus gives an account of the Iceni Queen Boudicca's revolt against...

The foundation of the Assyrian dynasty can be traced to Zulilu, who is said to have lived after Bel-kap-kapu (c. 1900 BCE), the ancestor of Shalmaneser I. The city-state of Ashur rose to prominence in northern Mesopotamia, founding trade...

After securing the eastern Mediterranean seaboard and Egypt, Alexander the Great pushed east into Mesopotamia with the intention of bringing Darius to battle. After crossing the Euphrates River unopposed, he marched his army eastward along...

One of the most effective and enduring military formations in ancient warfare was that of the Greek phalanx. The age of the phalanx may be traced back to Sumeria in the 25th century BCE, through Egypt, and finally appearing in Greek literature...