The Etruscans laid the foundations for Roman civilization

Ancient Rome explained

Ancient Rome left a high water mark on ancient civilization with its pragmatism and administrative prowess, dominating through its efficient military, engineering, and administration. At least 50 million people—a quarter of the world population—inhabited the empire, covering 5 million square miles at its height.

Twelve centuries of Roman history in 20 minutes

The Roman Empire may have been the world's first example of globalization, covering thousands of miles and crossing language barriers armed with Latin and short swords. Its legacy is nearly unparalleled in contemporary Europe, with nearly 50 Romance languages deriving from Latin.

Rome's legendary founders Romulus and Remus were raised by a she-wolf

Romulus and Remus escaped slaughter by drifting downriver in a basket. Once ashore, the two were nurtured by a wolf and woodpecker, growing strong enough to build Rome. This story may date back to the fourth century BCE and contains Roman and Greek elements.

The ancient Greeks laid the foundation of Western culture, from ideas to sports

The Latin alphabet is the most used in the world and stems from the Greek language. The greatest sporting event in the world, the Olympics, originated among the Greeks. The way many countries decide on policy is via forms of democracy, an innovation of the ancient Greeks.

How Byzantine scholars supercharged Renaissance Italy

A brief survey of how Byzantine scholars changed the course of the Renaissance by introducing Classical Greek literature to Italy. These scholars and their students were responsible for translating, interpreting, and printing many of the most fundamental texts in the Western tradition. Without their efforts, the Italian Renaissance and Western thought would have been immeasurably poorer.

How ancient Romans invested and worked

The first stock exchange didn't open for business until the early 1600s, but that didn't stop the Ancient Romans from working and investing their money centuries before. While Romans are better known for their political inventions than their economic ones, understanding how they viewed money can help paint a better picture of the Roman mindset that created systems like democracy. Read this article to learn more.

A look at what was on the menu for ancient Romans

"Delicious Italy" is a website exploring the food culture of various Italian cities and regions, and in this article, the editors explore what is known about the diet of ancient Romans. Olives (and their oil) were a key daily essential, alongside grains like barley, millet, and spelt flour. Where meat was found it was most often ox, pork, deer, lamb, and even pigeons. Middle Eastern fruits like cherries and peaches could last long enough to travel to Roman cities around the Mediterranean, and candy-friendly dates were sourced from Africa. Explore this and much more at Delicious Italy.

A collection of ancient graffiti from Pompeii, Herculaneum

From cavemen to marker-wielding children, humans have always wanted to leave their mark. Read some of the graffiti left by ancient Romans here. The cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum feature exquisite levels of preservation due to the nature of their demise. Viewers can see the surviving graffiti by clicking through the site's featured collections, which include topics such as poetry and love.

The land where Greece's ancient language survives

In a remote corner of Turkey, locals speak Romeyka, a language with no written form and an "impressive" similarity to ancient Greek. This article details how the language may have survived and highlights the roughly 5,000 Romeyka speakers in the area. Research shows that Romeyka bears a startling resemblance to the Koine Greek spoken at the height of ancient Greek influence between fourth century BCE and fourth century CE.

See how migrating tribes reshaped Europe after the fall of Rome

During the early Middle Ages (c. 300–700 CE), groups such as the Franks, Vandals, Visigoths, and Suebi migrated into former Roman territories. Their movements transformed European politics and culture while preserving many Roman traditions.

Homer's warrior tales were loosely based on the Mycenaean civilization

The great eighth-century BCE poet Homer's "Iliad" and "Odyssey" portray a great warrior culture based in large palaces around the Aegean Sea in the Mediterranean. Historians and archaeologists have long believed Homer's stories were based on the Mycenaean civilization, which flourished several centuries before his time.

Humans have speculated about alien life since ancient times

Around 50 B.C.E., Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius shared the idea that alien life was possible, which was put forth by Greek philosopher Epicurus. The writing is believed to be the first straightforward assertion in Western literature that aliens must exist.

In ancient Rome, toast was added to drinks

Toasted bread crumbs absorbed the acidity of bitter wine and, in some cases, added flavor. Although the term "toasting" was not yet in use, the practice was common. Some say the Roman Senate decreed in the first century CE that all citizens must drink to the honor of Emperor Augustus before every meal, though scholars debate the validity of that claim. Eventually, the literal toast became associated with the tributes.

Florence as it was: a digital reconstruction of a medieval city

Florence, Italy, is widely considered the birthplace of the Renaissance in Europe, where artists, poets, architects, and entrepreneurs renewed interest in ancient cultural forms. Using data from primary works, researchers have created a digital reconstruction of the city where users can explore buildings, artworks, and more.

The 12 tables: Rome's attempt to fairly enforce the law

It's unclear exactly why ancient Romans drafted the Laws of the Twelve Tables in the mid-400s BCE, but the result was a collection of precisely worded, written laws that could be made known to everyone. This article explores the history and importance of these 12 bronze tables, which were an attempt to make the law equally applicable to all and were destroyed when Rome was attacked in 390 BCE.

Graffiti dates back to at least ancient Pompeii, where citizens scrawled messages to one another on public walls

The ancient origins of focaccia

Focaccia, the Italian flat oven-baked bread that’s often a canvas for delightful culinary artwork, has been around for thousands of years. Archeologists have recently discovered evidence of flatbreads similar to today’s focaccia dating back to the Late Neolithic period in the Fertile Crescent. Researchers believe that communities from present-day Syria and Turkey made these distinctive loaves for large gatherings. Learn more about the bread’s history in this Archeology News article.

Kyivan Rus laid the cultural foundations for Eastern Europe

From the 9th to the 13th centuries, Kyivan Rus was a powerful East Slavic state centered in Kyiv. It shaped the region's language, religion, and political traditions—forming the shared cultural roots of modern-day Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus.

Becoming a man in ancient Rome

In ancient Rome, boys between the ages of 14 and 17 underwent a traditional ceremony marking their transition from childhood to adulthood. This article explores what we know about this common practice and its significance. Learn about the ritual celebration, which included a new white toga, sacrifices, and becoming registered as a citizen.

The political ideology of fascism originates in Italy

Fascism—first named by Benito Mussolini in 1919—derives from the Italian word fasci, linked to the Roman fasces, symbolizing authoritarian unity. Mussolini adapted this term to represent his autocratic, ultranationalist movement.

Tombaroli steal precious items from ancient people's tombs in central Italy

The tombaroli, or tomb-robbers, raid ancient Etruscan tombs in the dark hours of the night to recover vases, statuettes, mirrors, ornaments, jewellery, and other objects in gold, bronze, and terracotta. Read a firsthand account of a tombarolo who made a living handing stolen items to middlemen who sold them to wealthy buyers abroad. The lives and practices of tombaroli are also explored in the 2023 film "La Chimera."

Stanford built a Google Maps for the Roman Empire, revealing how much it cost to travel in the ancient world

'Romeo and Juliet' was based on a preexisting narrative poem

Arthur Brooke's "The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet" was first published in 1562 and shares many details with Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet." Shakespeare wasn't alone in his borrowing; Brooke's poem was based on other earlier Italian stories. None of this writing was considered fan fiction—copyright law didn't exist, and stories were regularly cribbed from preexisting sources.

January is named after Janus, the Roman god of transitions

In 46 BCE, Julius Caesar introduced the Julian calendar, which established Jan. 1 as the beginning of the new year. The month was named after Janus, the Roman god of transitions, who had two faces—one looking back at the past, the other forward to the future. While the Babylonians also made promises as part of their celebration of the new year, the Roman tradition became more focused on looking backwards to plan for the coming year.

Who was the world's first author?

This article details the effort to define the world's first author, as supported by current archaeological evidence. Clay disks found in an ancient Sumerian city point to Enheduanna, a high priestess and daughter of Akkadian King Sargon, as the...

A timeline of key events during each period of Egyptian history

This timeline shows the dates, periods, dynasties, and significant events in the history and art of ancient Egypt from the Predynastic Period (before 3100 BCE) to the end of the Roman Period (395 CE).

Teotihuacán was already ancient when the Aztecs encountered it

By the time the Mexica reached Teotihuacán, the vast city had been abandoned for centuries. First settled around 400 BCE, the inhabitants developed monumental temples, canals, and a carefully planned urban grid centered on the Avenue of the Dead.

In 1963, a basement renovation in Turkey revealed a passageway to a hidden, multilevel underground city that once housed as many as 20,000 people

See a 3D reconstruction of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital that was home to an estimated population of 200,000 to 400,000.

The Mona Lisa's celebrity status and repeated restorations have obscured what made the painting so revolutionary for its time

The 19th-century painters of the Hudson River School were among the first American romantics, with portraits that displayed the natural beauty of the young country.

The Brothers Grimm were lawyers before they were storytellers, but became interested in fairy tales as they began investigating how rules and customs had been passed down through cultures.

The term 'algorithm' originated from the Latinized name of al-Khwārizmī, a 9th-century mathematician whose works introduced Arabic numerals and the decimal-based numeral system to Europe and whose treatise 'Al-Jabr' gave algebra its name.

The first line of 'immortal' human cells, which can divide indefinitely and are used in scientific research, was nonconsensually taken from a Black woman.

The US Constitution is widely regarded as the longest-standing written national constitution still in force—see how it has influenced rights worldwide.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

After NASA's Voyager 1 captured Earth as a single pixel as it left the solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan used the image to reflect on humanity's fragility and the responsibility to protect 'the only world we've ever known.'

The rivalry between Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson centered on federalism—the question of how much power the federal government should hold relative to the states.

Volcanic activity may have triggered the Black Death by spewing gases that led to crop failures in Europe, thus forcing the import of grain ships with plague-infested fleas.

Hear about the 250-year history of the United States Postal Service, complete with some of its strangest deliveries, important innovations, and the figures that made it an American institution.

Corals are themselves not coral reefs—the term refers to the tiny marine invertebrates that build the rigid reef.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

While the first exchange-traded fund (a 'basket' of different assets that can be bought and sold on a stock exchange) in the US only launched in 1993, the global ETF market has grown to more than $10T in the short time since.

In preparation for this weekend's Eurovision finale, which is something like the World Cup of pop music, here's a young Céline Dion performing (for Switzerland?) at the 1988 competition.

While the sun's gravity keeps the planets in orbit, their gravity also pulls on the sun, causing it and everything else in the solar system to orbit around a mutual balance point called the barycenter—the true center of the solar system.

Researchers believe the brain consolidates memories, processes emotions, and plans for the future during dream states

Some coin denominations have ridges etched on their sides, partly to prevent counterfeiting, in a practice called 'reeding.'

The first steps to rebuilding your credit score include getting to know exactly what's on your credit report and figuring out how far you are from the '700 club,' or 'good score' range.

Ebola is a filovirus, meaning it resembles a thread under a microscope, though it sometimes twists and can resemble a bowl of spaghetti.

While El Niño moves warm Pacific Ocean waters east along the equator, La Niña moves them west, shifting where rainfall will become more common for months.