Features

Antiquity’s High Holy Place
The Athenian Acropolis By Harrison Eiteljorg II

In 80 B.C.E. the Persians invaded Athens. According to the Greek historian Herodotus, they “plundered the temple and burnt the whole of the Acropolis.”1 Although the Athenians and their allies followed up with a victory at the famous naval battle of Salamis, the Persian army returned the following year and “burnt Athens and utterly […]

Death at Halmyris
Two Christian Martyrs at a Roman Outpost on the Danube By Mihail Zahariade, Michael Phelps

The fabled Danube, Europe’s second longest river, has its source in Germany’s Black Forest and winds eastward 1,800 miles to Romania, where it empties into the Black Sea. Just south of where the Danube flows into the sea is a rocky strip of land that has been inhabited for more than four millennia, […]

Going, Going, Going, Gone!
A Report on Archaeological Sites in Iraq By Francis Deblauwe

A great deal of attention has been paid to the events of April 2003—when Baghdad fell to Coalition forces and looters pillaged the National Museum. Fortunately, most of the high-value artifacts on display in the public galleries of the museum had been securely stored elsewhere by the conscientious museum staff. Nonetheless, the losses, especially […]

Departments

Editors’ Page: Mesopotamia in Us
Why We Must Protect Iraqi Archaeology By Jack Meinhardt
Past Perfect: Unearthing the Fayum Paintings
British archaeologist William Flinders Petrie, father of modern Egyptology, makes an extraordinary discovery.
Destinations: Beneath Malta
Constructed 5,000 years ago, a vast subterranean temple lies under the island of Malta’s busy urban streets. By Nancy Breslau Lewis
Ancient Life: The Cruelest Cut
Castration in the Ancient World