Variations of marriage existed in ancient West Africa

Anthropologists have found that, across the globe, nearly every culture embraces marriage customs

Despite these commonalities, different cultures have distinct customs, such as the number of people who can be married at one time, the types of marriage partners allowed, and whether elaborate ceremonies are observed. Families can range from the smaller nuclear unit to extensive multi-generation families and households.

Marriage as a concept is believed to be at least 4,300 years old

In the past, formal marriage spread because it was a great way to accumulate property and allies. Now, some couples want love and healthy companionship. Marriage has undergone many transformations, from the inclusion of consent, thanks to religious leaders, to sanctification by the state.

Divorce reportedly existed in hunter-gatherer societies

Though divorces have been around for centuries and have become increasingly common, they can still be perceived with hints of shame. Historian Stephanie Coontz advises readers that the good old days of marriage may have been just as bad as today, considering its prevalence throughout history.

In Ghana, newly married couples jump over a broom to ward off evil and welcome new beginnings

Weddings are surrounded by rituals, no matter how simple. These include slathering the couple with food, feathers, and soot and parading them around town in Scotland; Chinese tea ceremonies filled with gratitude; and breaking fine porcelain in Germany. Every family has their own rituals, and wealthy couples are more likely to engage in more lavish ceremonies.

Matrilineal societies—where women led households—were common among Northeastern natives

Such societies also viewed women as leaders in spiritual matters. Both men and women held political roles as clan leaders and worked in tandem with an advisory council.

The Gold Road: how the medieval empires of West Africa traded across the Sahara

Throughout the Middle Ages, the West African empires of Ghana, Mali, and Songhai moved valuables across the Sahara and as far north as France using the Gold Road. This route enabled the trade of gold, ceramics, manuscripts, ivory, religion, and...

Watch the history of human migration that led to civilizations

Starting in Africa where they hunted with spears and fires, humans would gradually move out of the continent over thousands of years as they navigated crossing deserts, rivers, uneven terrain, and shifting climates. Development of technology, language, farming, and other societal structures helped build up the first civilizations.

Cultural norms about how to handle the bodies of loved ones in communities in West Africa have hampered Ebola responses.

Feudal landholding organized medieval Europe’s economy without relying on slavery

From the 10th to 13th centuries, Europe’s agricultural system relied on localized hierarchies. Lords granted land to knights for defense, who in turn mainly oversaw free peasants paying rents in labor, goods, or money rather than living under slavery.

Cultural norms about how to handle the bodies of loved ones have hampered Ebola responses in West Africa

Awareness of local burial and grieving traditions eventually helped healthcare workers fight the spread of the virus. As healthcare workers and burial teams altered their procedures during the 2014 West African Ebola outbreak, and as community leaders pressed people to adapt traditional ceremonies, the spread of Ebola began to slow.

Colonial America imported brides for their beer brewing skills

Life in the New World's English colonies was hard, so it's easy to see how these colonizers might've wanted to reach for a cold one more often than not. This article explains how beer brewing became one of the most critical skills expected in imported English wives.

HIV originated in Central and West Africa from a virus in chimpanzees

Researchers believe the virus crossed from chimpanzees to humans through bushmeat practices in the early 20th century, with genetic studies suggesting the most recent common ancestor of the HIV-1 M group, which is responsible for the global AIDS pandemic, emerged around 1910–1930 in Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) in the Belgian Congo.

The Ishango bone suggests mathematics was born about 20,000 years ago

Ancient civilizations developed mathematical systems for various purposes, including the Egyptians for the construction of the pyramids and the Ancient Greeks for logical reasoning in theorems. However, these systems were predated by the Ishango bone—found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo—whose notches suggest a base ten system, prime numbers, and simple mathematical operations.

Post-WWII decolonization in Africa led to Cold War proxy conflicts

As newly independent African nations emerged after World War II, the US and USSR vied for influence—backing opposing sides in civil wars and revolutions. Conflicts in Angola, Ethiopia and Mozambique became proxy fronts in the Cold War.

One ethnic group in Kenya is responsible for most of the country’s running success

Both the men’s and women’s world record holders in the marathon hail from the same region in Kenya. They’re Kalenjins, a minority ethnic group responsible for nearly 73% of the country’s Olympic gold medals in running. Studies have determined that the success is thanks to high-altitude training, a healthy diet, and a tradition of excellence.

Unconditional birthright citizenship is rare outside the Americas

Around 30 countries, mostly in the Americas, grant automatic citizenship by birthplace. Elsewhere—especially in Europe, Asia, and Africa—citizenship typically follows jus sanguinis, based on parental descent rather than location of birth.

The ancient succession drama that led to the Sunni-Shia divide

The split that divided Islam into its major branches comes down to succession: after Muhammad's death, Sunnis backed an elected leader, Abu Bakr, while Shia Muslims sided with a member of Muhammad's bloodline, his cousin and son-in-law Ali. That 7th-century disagreement shapes geopolitics today, Ramadan's traditions, and communities worldwide.

Zora Neale Hurston used her anthropological training to interview a man who had survived the slave trade

The writer's interviews with Cudjo Lewis documented the man's enslavement and travel from Africa to the United States. It also captured the story behind Africatown, a community in Alabama that emerged after the Emancipation Proclamation. Hurston's book was not published during her lifetime, though it was finally released in 2018 as "Barracoon: The Story of the Last 'Black Cargo.'"

What is the unlimited marital deduction?

One big way to avoid paying several death taxes? Get married. The unlimited marital deduction allows an individual to grant all their financial assets to their spouse while they're alive or after they’ve died without having to pay the federal estate tax or gift tax. There are limitations to this rule. For instance, how it works with state death taxes. Learn more here.

Rapping has roots in numerous aspects of the Black oral tradition

Although “rapping” began in New York with hip-hop in the early 1970s, it can be traced back to griots, who were storytellers in West Africa, and “toasting,” which was a similar talk-sing style practiced by dancehall DJs in Jamaica.

Learn how your earwax may be determined by genetics—and geography

Researchers have discovered that wet and dry earwax are associated with specific gene variations. Wet earwax is particularly associated with warmer areas of Europe, Asia, and the Americas, suggesting that dry earwax may have been evolutionarily advantageous in cooler climates.

George Washington married Martha Dandridge Custis in 1759

Before marrying George Washington, Martha Dandridge Curtis was a wealthy widow with two children. Their marriage formed a stable personal and economic partnership. She managed Mount Vernon during Washington's absences and later played a central role as a political host and confidant throughout his public life.

Women in WWII used tattoos to avoid capture

During World War II, Japanese soldiers kidnapped women from Southeast Asian countries and forced them into sexual slavery. But they hesitated to capture married women, a fact that women from the island of Timor exploited, painstakingly poking tattoos onto their bodies that marked them as married women.

'The Bean Belt' is where your morning coffee likely came from

Know how to tell your Java from your Kaffa? This quick explainer of major coffee-growing regions and their flavor characteristics helps. It breaks down the Bean Belt into three major regions: Central and South America; Africa and the Middle East; and Southeast Asia.

More than 300 distinct Native American languages existed at the time of European contact

Indigenous North America exhibited vast linguistic diversity, with over 300 languages spanning dozens of unrelated language families. This variety reflected centuries of distinct cultural development across the continent's many nations and regions.

To reach the afterlife, Egyptians lived in accordance with ma'at, or harmony

The ancient Egyptians held many beliefs about eternal life, fueling entire industries tasked with building tombs for the dead. Their leader, the pharaoh, was believed to be divine, and the lives of ordinary people were punctuated with ritual and myth. Learn more about their religion here.

The American cockroach is actually from Africa, an apparent hitchhiker aboard ships carrying enslaved people, with evidence suggesting the bug may have arrived in the New World as early as the 1600s.

For centuries, it was common to sleep in two shifts: a few hours at the beginning of the night, and a longer period beginning around midnight

Take a 3D tour of the Hajj, Islam's annual pilgrimage to Mecca, undertaken by over 1.5 million Muslims.

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

20,000 letters to the advice columnist 'Dear Abby' provide insight into prevailing sex, religion, and LGBTQ fears, anxieties, and concerns from the 1950s onward.

The United States is one of only around two dozen countries with a fully federal system of government, in which power is divided between national and state governments.

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 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.

A small portion of The Winstons' 'Amen, Brother,' an obscure '60s gospel record, is the basis for thousands of hip-hop tracks, making it one of the most sampled records ever that's informally known as 'the Amen break.'

US housing costs have risen by roughly 175% between 1991 and 2026—but a growing number of Gen Zers are becoming homeowners anyway. In 2025, 4% of homebuyers were Gen Z, up from 3% the year before.

In 2018, 26-year-old missionary John Allen Chau was killed by tribesmen after attempting to reach and evangelize on India's isolated North Sentinel Island

Many legends about George Washington, including his supposed wooden teeth and the story of cutting down the cherry tree, lack evidence.

See how each of the more than two million known species relates to each other—and to common ancestors—in this zoomable tree of life.

One of the most famous portraits ever taken is 'Afghan Girl' (1984) by Steve McCurry, yet the subject Sharbat Gula went much of her life without being identified or benefitting from the image's success.

Electrical grids worldwide must double their power delivery capacity by 2050 to meet surging demand from AI and electric vehicles.

In 2026, Finland was named the world's happiest country for the ninth consecutive year based on its wealth, social safety network, and high life expectancy, among other factors.

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.

Apeirophobia is an overwhelming fear of living forever, perhaps stemming from the brain's inability to conceptualize an infinite life.

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

Use this tool to calculate the dollar value of your parental mental load, from meal planning to coordinating after-school care, then see resources that help generate solutions.

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

The Russia-Ukraine conflict is the largest ground war in Europe since World War II in terms of casualties, forces mobilized, and displacement of civilians.

The US first hosted the World Cup in 1994, a tournament that lives in soccer infamy for its poor planning and the murder of Colombian player Andres Escobar, who'd accidentally scored on his own net.

Poison ivy is in the same family as mangoes, cashews, and pistachios—and they all produce oily urushiol in their raw, unprocessed state—but they are typically prepared in ways to avoid causing human discomfort.