The Isthmian Script of Ancient Mesoamerica
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 6, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 Last reviewed: May 6, 2026. In 1902, a farmer named Pedro Mimendi was breaking ground in a tobacco field in the Tuxtla foothills of Veracruz when his plow turned up a hand-sized lump of jadeite shaped like a shaman with a duck’s […]
The Lost Franklin Expedition
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 6, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 What Was the Lost Franklin Expedition? The Lost Franklin Expedition was a British naval voyage that left England in May 1845 under Sir John Franklin (1786-1847) to chart the final unmapped link of the Northwest Passage. Two reinforced ships, HMS Erebus and […]
The Baigong Pipes: Natural or Manufactured?
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 6, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 What Are the Baigong Pipes? The Baigong Pipes are a cluster of rust-coloured tubular formations in the slopes and caves of Mount Baigong, about forty kilometres southwest of Delingha in the Qaidam Basin, Qinghai Province, China. Reported by the Chinese writer Bai […]
The Imperial Regalia of Japan
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 6, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 What Are the Imperial Regalia of Japan? The Imperial Regalia of Japan, known in Japanese as Sanshu no Jingi, are three sacred objects: the sword Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, the mirror Yata no Kagami, and the jewel Yasakani no Magatama. They are first attested in […]
The Journeys of Alexander the Great
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 6, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 What Were the Journeys of Alexander the Great? The journeys of Alexander the Great were a single continuous campaign of roughly twelve years, running from his crossing of the Hellespont in spring 334 BC to his death in Babylon on 10 or […]
The Death of Marilyn Monroe
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 6, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 Last reviewed: May 6, 2026. What Happened to Marilyn Monroe on the Night of August 4, 1962? Marilyn Monroe died at 12305 Fifth Helena Drive in Brentwood, Los Angeles, on the night of August 4, 1962, of acute barbiturate poisoning. The Los […]
Machu Picchu: The Lost City of the Incas
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 5, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 Last reviewed: May 5, 2026. What Machu Picchu Actually Is Machu Picchu is a fifteenth-century Inca royal estate built on a granite saddle between two Andean peaks in the Cusco Region of Peru, roughly 2,430 meters above sea level and about 80 […]
The Tartaria Tablets: Europe’s Oldest Writing?
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 5, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 Last reviewed: May 5, 2026. What Are the Tartaria Tablets? The Tartaria tablets are three small clay objects pulled from a Neolithic ritual pit in western Romania in 1961. Two are pierced rectangles, one is a perforated disc, and all three carry […]
The Disappearance of Glenn Miller
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 5, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 What Happened to Glenn Miller on 15 December 1944? Bandleader Major Alton Glenn Miller boarded a single-engine UC-64A Norseman at Twinwood Farm airfield in Bedfordshire, England, on the afternoon of 15 December 1944, bound for newly liberated Paris to arrange a Christmas […]
The London Hammer: A Prehistoric Tool
By Emilia Wellesley · Published May 5, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 What Is the London Hammer? The London Hammer is a small iron-headed hammer with a partly mineralized wooden handle, recovered as a loose surface find in 1936 near London, Texas, and later embedded in a chunk of calcareous concretion. It has become […]