American often gets credit for having the first written constitution. But the constitution of the short-lived republic of Corsica preceded it by 30+ years.

Illness can challenge the notion of the self and disrupt patients' narratives about their own lives. Some scholars suggest that storytelling can help.

A strange initiation ritual involving a toad was required for members of a secret caste of nineteenth-century horse mystics.

Ever since women began to publicly play sports in the late nineteenth century, female athletes have been seen as threats and subjected to suspicion.

With President Trump calling for a “Space Force” and private enterprise increasingly invested in space, what of the dream of international peace?

Maria Mitchell became famous when she discovered a comet in 1847. She didn't stop there, fighting for education and equality for women in the sciences.

Different fruit flies species can learn each other’s language to warn against parasitic wasps.

Well-researched stories from the Conversation, Atlas Obscura, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.

Examining the 18th-century social contract of Captain Bartholomew Roberts and his men shows just how organized and codified pirate societies could be.

Old houses in Ireland often have horse skulls buried beneath the floors, but folklorists and archaeologists disagree on exactly why.