She Measures the Heavens and Outlines the Earth

Enheduanna and the night sky.

The Oldest Maps in the World

On the marks ancient people left on rocks and walls.

The Rest is History

Flow states, hippo ranchers, and the Grand Canyon.

The Prehistory of Glass Windows

Making windows out of wood and stone in antiquity.

The Rest is History

Folk etymologies, guilty pleasures, and an ancient fruit pizza.

The Rest Is History

The teachings of Epictetus, hair removal, and nepo babies.

Nobody Can Do Without It

An eleventh-century ode to advice.

The Rest Is History

The first records of human kissing, biography, and an eel historian.

The Birth of Brainstorming

Meet the self-help author who wanted to teach corporate America how to think.

In Love with a Daguerreotype

The history of a nineteenth-century twist on love at first sight.

The Rest Is History

A haunted shrine, ancient pathogens, and love letters.

How Much Is a Smidgen?

The history of measuring a dollop or a pinch.

The Rest is History

Fascist architecture, Ethiopian manuscripts, and stolen coins.

The Language of Existence

Hubert Aquin’s writing articulated the struggle for Québec’s identity—and his own.

The Rest Is History

Wedding cake toppers, fake antiquities, and gun laws.

The Sheer Teeming Multiplicity and Variety of It All

The life and work of Pieter Bruegel the Elder.

Time and the Old Women

The legacy and context of Quinten Massys’ <em>An Old Woman</em>.

Ignorant, Pigheaded, and Perverse

Brenda Wineapple and Lewis H. Lapham review the impeachment of Andrew Johnson.

National Treasure

How the tea utensils used by early modern practitioners of <em>chanoyu</em> became a tool of Japanese nationalism.

The Hypocrisy of This Nation!

How abolitionists viewed the American flag.