Videos

Being the first beer-brewers in history, beer had religious significance to the Sumerians, and was often brewed in temples by priestesses. Ninkasi was the tutelary goddess of beer in ancient Sumer. The Hymn to Ninkasi is effectively...

Weavers, Scribes, and Kings: A New History of the Ancient Near East by Amanda H. Podany is a unique history of the ancient Near East that compellingly presents the life stories of kings, priestesses, merchants, bricklayers, and others. Rather...

Is your neighbourhood infested with the ancient Mesopotamian spirits of portly women or wise sages from distant times? Fear not dear viewer! Irving Finkel is here to show you how the exorcists of Assyria drove out those pesky spectral interlopers...

Learn how the near-universal belief in ghosts goes back to the beginning of time. Discover how the oldest known writing, in cuneiform script on tablets of clay, gives us a full picture of the ancient Mesopotamian ghost experience: who might...

Some of the most exceptional and distinctive buildings from the ancient world were crafted by the architects of ancient Greece and some of their structures like theatres, temples, and stadia became staple buildings in cities and towns from...

Sonar images of some of the White Terraces of Rotomahana have shown up in side-scan sonar data from a GNS Science led expedition in January 2011. Cornel de Ronde explains the discovery. Archival Images courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull...

Ningyo Joruri is a combination of ningyo (puppets) and Joruri (narrative music) which combines voice and shamisen. It is now known as “Bunraku” since that is now the main troupe that represents this art form. It is a comprehensive performance...

Hephaestus is the Olympian god of metallurgy, smiths, craftsmen, and fire and is the blacksmith for the Olympian gods. In fact, many of the myths associated with Hephaestus have him crafting something, whether it be for his own use, or because...

Short talk about the prerequisites of Icelandic literature, how manuscripts were made and a great example of such a manuscript and its context!

A talk about how time works in Norse mythology, whether it is linear or cyclical and some problems about relative chronology.