Though John Adams was old and ill when he died, the curious timing of his demise sparked countless unusual theories.

Other, lesser-known towns were often just as raucous as Tombstone and Deadwood. Jerome, Arizona, for example, was once called "the wickedest town in the West" because of its proliferation of bars, ...

Although many in the modern day associate the Soviet Union with Russia, it was one of the world’s largest multi-ethnic states, comprised of 15 republics. The Soviet Union’s first census, conducted in ...

Although it's called the Golden Age of Hollywood, the harsh reality is that, for many actresses, life behind the glitz and glamour of the silver screen was difficult and rife with hardship. Some of ...

In the ancient world, more than 2,000 statues were built to honor a young man named Antinous. He had been born in a far-flung corner of the Roman Empire, and would have been little remembered if it ...

Zack Snyder’s 2006 film 300 was a major box office success and a cultural touchstone, largely thanks to the film’s iconic line, “This is Sparta!” While the real King Leonidas never shouted those words ...

Katarzyna Zowada, a 23-year-old university student based in Kraków, Poland, mysteriously vanished on Nov. 12, 1998. She was supposed to attend an important therapy appointment that day, so her mother ...

A construction project in Lisbjerg, Denmark, took a surprising turn when work at the site turned up dozens of 10th-century Viking graves. Not only are the burials packed with incredible grave goods, ...

Archaeologists in Virginia have discovered the 18th-century foundation that once held the historic Williamsburg Bray School, the oldest known schoolhouse for Black children in America. Unearthed at ...

Hürrem Sultan’s legacy is even more impressive in that it began so humbly. She was born in what’s now Ukraine, kidnapped by Crimean Tatars during a slave raid, and forced to be a concubine. From there ...

Magna, also known as Carvoran, is a fort located near Hadrian’s Wall, which was constructed by Emperor Hadrian in 122 C.E. to secure the Roman Empire’s northern border. Positioned at the junction of ...

For much of the 20th century, the book Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself was thought to be a 19th-century work of fiction about the life of an enslaved woman written by a white ...