Feasting Tips From Ancient Greece
Many of us strive to avoid talking politics at a big holiday feasts. But in Homer's Greece, feasting was all about politics.
Can the U.S. and China Avoid the Thucydides Trap?
The "Thucydides trap" refers to the theory that when a rising power threatens a ruling power, the result is often war. Are the U.S. and China headed there?
Do We Have to Tell Them the House Is Haunted?
On the law and mythologies of haunting, from antiquity to today.
The Curious Voyage of HMS Endeavour
Captain James Cook had secret orders to to search for a predicted Southern Continent. He ended up claiming New Zealand and part of Australia for the U.K.
Reconsidering Appeasement
After 1938's Munich Agreement, "appeasement" became a dirty word in international relations. But scholars argue that appeasement can be a useful tool.
Punishing Forgery with Death
In early nineteenth-century England, forging currency was considered to be such a subversive threat that it was punished with the death penalty.
When a Woman Was “King”
Maria Theresa, the King of Hungary, ruled over the "accidental" Austro-Hungarian Empire, overseeing social, administrative, fiscal, and religious reforms.
War and Pest Control
Since World War I, the connections between pest control and war have been scientific, technological, institutional, and metaphorical.
Preserving South America’s Uncontacted Tribes
There are still tribes living in the Amazon rain forest who carry on their traditional way of life and rebuff attempts at contact.
How Jack the Ripper Became a Legend
In 1880s London, an anti-prostitution campaign, anti-immigration feelings, and a deep class divide set the scene for the Jack the Ripper media frenzy.