The Triclinium. By Roberto Bompiani. 1875 • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Whatever the era, becoming a millionaire is a destiny reserved for a minority. Rome is no exception to the rule and is even an example for those who subsequently aspired to experience the same fortune. There were several ways to get r
The excavation team is at work on the site of the Etruscan necropolis of Aleria-Lamjone. • PRESS SERVICE The Etruscan civilization, which appeared in the 8th century BC. BC in the Italian peninsula, has spread to Corsica, as evidenced by a new tomb unearthed in Aleria by teams from Inrap (Nation
View of the Nile from a window in the Temple of Philae, Egypt • /ISTOCKPHOTO A long green ribbon crosses a large desert expanse to then form a vast delta which flows into the Mediterranean:it is the Nile, the river which for millennia ensured the prosperity of Egypt. Kemet , the Black Earth, is
Portrait of Christ on an icon of Mount Sinai, dated to the 6th century • WIKIMEDIACOMMONS Jesus announced the coming of the kingdom of God and performed miracles. He was perceived in his time as a prophet, in the continuity of those inspired in the history of Israel, whose oracles the Bible pres
Some objects, including an Iron Age torque and a Bronze Age dagger, among those seized in Metz, Lorraine, in December 2020 • AFP For years, he had been looting archaeological objects with a metal detector and preparing to launder his loot. Some 27,400 pieces were seized from this individual from
The god Cernunnos (detail from the Gundestrup cauldron, 1st century BC) • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS On May 28, 1891, in northern Denmark, not far from the town of Gundestrup, a 22-year-old Dane named Jens Sørensen was mining the Rævemosen bog, when his shovel hit a hard, metallic object:a 69 cm round pi
This bust, probably the portrait of an aristocrat from the 1st century BC. J.-C., was brought to light in the Côtes dArmor • INRAP / SERVICE DE PRESSE We talk about it less than the publication of the last Asterix. However, a Gallic discovery in Brittany deserves the spotlight:the discovery in T
Remains of the Temple of Athena in Assos, facing the Aegean Sea • ISTOCKPHOTO It is a fact that I, Athenians, have never exercised any magistracy except that of member of the Council, [...] at the time when you wanted to judge the ten strategists en bloc, because they had not collected the men w
In Autun, in the Morvan, excavation in progress of a stone sarcophagus • INRAP / SERVICE DE PRESSE In Saône-et-Loire, Autun, the ancient Augustodunum, is an important witness to the emergence of Christianity in Gaul. It was there, near the early Christian church of Saint-Pierre-lEstrier, that t
Cleopatra 1880, by Charles Gauthier, Palace of Fine Arts in Lille. • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Cleopatra and Arsinoe could have had Medea the Greek and Hatshepsut the Egyptian as spiritual grandmothers. More devious and power-loving than their brothers, they left an indelible mark on history. Their trag
Pierre Henri de Valenciennes represented in 1813 the death of the admiral and scholar Pliny the Elder, who sought to help the victims of the eruption. Augustins Museum, Toulouse • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Slight earthquakes have been sweeping the Gulf of Naples for several days. Simple unpredictable jo
The pyramid of Djoser, near Saqqara, whose particularity is to be in steps • ISTOCKPHOTO The oldest pyramid in Egypt, that of Djoser, erected around 4,700 years ago near the site of Saqqara, needed a major renovation. It took 14 years of work to revamp the old lady, seriously shaken by an earthq
A Roman and Etruscan necropolis was unearthed in 2019 in Aléria, on the eastern plain of Corsica • PASCAL DRUELLE/INRAP/SERVICE DE PRESSE A year ago, a rich Etruscan tomb was discovered in Aléria, Corsica. His study revealed that it belonged to a wealthy woman who lived in the IVe century BC. Si
King David carrying the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. Painting by Domenico Gargiulo (circa 1640), Pushkin Museum, Moscow • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS One of the most dramatic moments in the story told in the book of Exodus is when Moses, summoned by Yahweh to the top of Mount Sinai, stands in the pre
Aerial view of the ancient necropolis of Narbonne being excavated • INRAP/SERVICE DE PRESSE Narbo Martius (current Narbonne), a Roman colony founded in 118 BC. J.-C., became the capital of the province of Narbonne Gaul, which extended from the Alps to the Pyrenees, and the second port of the Rom
Portrait of Agrippina the Younger (15-59 AD), by unknown artist • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Great-granddaughter of Augustus, daughter of General Germanicus, grand-niece of Tiberius, sister of Caligula, wife of Claudius and mother of Nero, Agrippina the Younger was the noblest woman in Rome. Despite this
Fresco depicting a Christian banquet in the Catacombs of Saints Marcellin and Peter, Rome • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS The evangelization of the ancient Mediterranean area has often been read as a reversal of the situation which made Christianity go from a forbidden and very minority religion to an offic
Having become sole emperor, Theodosius promulgated the Edict of Thessalonica on February 28, 380 to force his people to embrace the “Catholic” faith followed by the bishops of Rome and Alexandria. His choice is religious as much as political, because he received Catholic baptism in the same year 380
The followers of Jesus were first identified as “Christians”, that is to say as a messianic movement of Judaism, before being perceived as an independent religion in 64, during the fire of Rome. Its invention is attributed to Paul, evangelizer of non-Jews in the 1950s and long considered the initiat
We believe we know everything about the first bishops of Rome, materialized by names in the canon of the mass, by a series of portraits in Saint-Paul-outside-the-Walls and by the “crypt of the popes” in the catacombs. However, this Roman memory is late and largely fictitious. The story only begins i
Astypalea is a small island in the Greek Dodecanese, possibly a colony of Megara, where around 360 B.C. Onesicritus was born, historian and cynical philosopher follower of Diogenes of Sinope (the one who lived like a beggar, in a jar). Of all of them Onesicritus would not stand out for the rigor i
There have been thousands of heroic figures in all peoples on the long road of History. But some nations, due to bad geography, have no other options. Such a nation is also the Polish (as well as the Greek). Poles have been slaves of three empires since the end of the 18th century. However, the larg
Because the economic relations between France and its external possessions are still in conformity, in 1934, with the principles of the old Colonial Pact, with the customs assimilation, the monopoly of the flag for the commercial navigation, the systematic development of the products and materials n
Thomas Edward Lawrence (August 16, 1888 - May 19, 1935), also known as T. E. Lawrence, and especially as the famous Lawrence of Arabia (Lawrence of Arabia), or - among his Arab companions - Aurens or Al-Aurens, is a British archaeologist, officer, adventurer and writer. He achieved notoriety as a Br