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Follow the Money. The Coinage of Later Imperial Rome: A Reflection of Economic Stress and Decline
Unlike the practice of professional numismatists, I prefer to see the “big picture”. So, my entire Roman coin collection, all 250 pieces, from Julius Caesar to Valentinian III is laid out on a single pane of glass in a cabinet, in chronological...
Definition
The Secret History of the Mongols
The Secret History of the Mongols is a chronicle written in the 13th century CE (with some later additions) and is the most important and oldest medieval Mongolian text. The book covers the origins of the Mongol people, the rise to power...
Interview
Interview: Living in Silverado: Secret Jews in the Silver Mining Towns of Colonial Mexico
Professor Emeritus David Gitlitz is one of the world’s leading experts on Jewish-Catholic interactions in Iberia and the Americas. While initially drawn to the literature of the Spanish Golden Age as a student at Oberlin and Harvard, the...
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Baal Cycle Tablets
Clay tablets engraved with cuneiform script preserving the Ugaritic poem known as the Baal Cycle, a story featuring gods from Canaanite-Phoenician religion. The Baal Cycle tells the story of the sea god Yamm's conflict with the fertility...
Definition
Yamm
Yamm (from the Semitic word yam for 'sea', also known as Yam and Yam-Nahar) was the god of the sea in the pantheon of the Canaanite-Phoenicians. Depicted consistently as tyrannical, angry, violent and harsh, Yamm was the brother of Mot, the...
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Empedocles' Cosmic Cycle Diagram
Diagram of Empedocles' cosmic cycle showing the relationship between love and strife in the operation of the universe.
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Arthur Draws Excalibur, Vulgate-Cycle
An illustration of King Arthur drawing the enchanted sword Excalibur from the sword. From the Vulgate Cycle manuscript (1316 CE) in the British Library, London.
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Devils Plotting the Birth of Merlin, Vulgate Cycle
A detail of a miniature portraying God opening Hell, in which devils gather and plot to create an evil being by fathering a child on a mortal woman. This child, through baptism and blessings, is made good and grows up to be the wizard Merlin...
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The Secret History of the Mongols Casket
The ornate casket containing the 'Secret History of the Mongols' which is a chronicle written in the 13th century CE (with some later additions) and is the most important and oldest medieval Mongolian text. (Government Building, Ulaanbaatar...
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Depiction of Metonic cycle
Depiction of the 19 years of the Metonic cycle as a wheel, with the Julian date of the Easter New Moon, from a 9th-century computistic manuscript made in St. Emmeram's Abbey.
