The Bronze Age Collapse: A Sudden, Violent Plunge into Darkness (Part Two)

The main problem in understanding the Bronze Age Collapse is that we don’t really know what happened. This may look like an oversimplification but it is not. It is, instead, the simple truth. Of the four great civilizations that faced disaster in this 12th century BC collapse: the Mycenaean Greeks, the Hittites, the Assyrians and

Very demure, very mindful: Napoleon’s coronation as French Emperor came only 15 years after the French overthrew their last autocratic ruler. Source: Workshop of François Gérard / Public Domain.

Right Man, Right Place, Right Time: The Rise of Napoleon

In 1799 France changed forever. After a decade of rumbling discontent regarding the concentration of wealth towards the powerful and the exploitation of the masses who were facing widespread starvation, the French rose up and killed everyone in charge, from the King on down. The failure of the ancien regime, the creaking feudal order of

The wounds of many of the fallen soldiers were seen to be glowing after the battle, and those with glowing wounds seemed more likely to survive (Thure de Thulstrup / Public Domain)

The Battle of Shiloh, when the Injured Soldiers Glowed

It is early 1862, and Ulysses S Grant has just won two major battles. Fighting tooth and nail in Tennessee as he forced his way south in an effort to splinter the Confederacy and cut off vital supply lines, the victories were the largest the Union had achieved at the time, and earned Grant a

Raganrok is the fatalistic tale at the heart of Norse mythology. What happens to the gods of the Norse pantheon and the world in which they live?

Ragnarok: What Can We Learn from the Doom of the Gods?

In the 13th century in Iceland a poet and a scholar named Snorri Sturluson wrote two great masterpieces, texts which cast a shadow to this day. In his Poetic Edda and his Prose Edda his beautiful writing captured much of ancient Norse tradition: their people, their history, and their gods. These texts are a vital