Images

A French illustration of a horse-powered threshing machine. This machine, used to separate grain from the husk, was invented in 1787 by the Scotsman Andrew Meikle (1719-1811). The machine used a drum with beaters to remove the husk, first...

An 1884 illustration of the mechanized reaping machine which was invented in 1834 in the United States by Cyrus McCormack. (U.S. Library of Congress)

Kaya Şahin, the author of Peerless among Princes, the Life and Times of Sultan Süleyman.

Peerless among Princes, the Life and Times of Sultan Süleyman by Kaya Şahin.

Fragment of a Babylonian clay tablet, with 16 lines of inscription describing rites in Babylon relating to the Akitu festival. Fragment of the right half, copy of a text containing regulations for making offerings. From the Library of Ashurbanipal...

The Crisis of the Third Century (235–284 CE) began with the assassination of Emperor Severus Alexander (reign 222–235 CE) in 235 CE, triggering the collapse of centralized imperial authority. Over the next five decades, Roman power fractured...

Tim Pauketat, author of Gods of Thunder: How Climate Change, Travel, and Spirituality Reshaped Precolonial America.

An imagined portrait of the Merovingian king Dagobert I (r. 623-639). oil on canvas by Émile Signol, part of the "Portraits of the Kings of France" series commissioned in 1837 by King Louis-Philippe (r. 1830-1848), 1842. Palace of Versailles...

King Dagobert I (r. 623-639) on his deathbed, illustration from the Chronique des empereurs, 15th century. Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal, Paris.

Two depictions of crucial events in the reign of the Merovingian King Dagobert I (r. 623-639): to the left, Dagobert observes the construction of the abbey of Saint Denis Basilica in Paris; on the right, the Frankish army campaigns against...