Free Republic

During his lifetime, the French dramatist Moliere elevated comedy to a level of respect and importance once exclusively reserved for tragedy. In 2022, the 400th anniversary of the year of his birth, his name is often mentioned in the same breath as William Shakespeare and other literary titans. Moliere was the alias of Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, born in 1622 to a upholsterer who served the royal household. He wrote his numerous plays well before the French Revolution, at a time when the authority of the king and the church was intact. Yet in his plays, which are still regularly performed today,...

We know that King Solomon fed his guests beef, lamb, venison, and poultry, in addition to bread, cakes, dates, and other delicacies. But … bananas?The amount of water needed to grow bananas makes them an unlikely fruit in ancient Israel, but a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reported some unexpected remains were scraped off the teeth of Canaanites and Philistines who died in the late second millennia B.C., the period of Solomon’s reign. Teeth don’t lie: They ate bananas.The dietary evidence indicates “a dynamic and complex exchange network connecting the Mediterranean with South...

Live Science makes predictions about what archaeologists will uncover in the new year. There are a number of archaeological finds and stories we might hear about in 2022. These include discoveries from Egypt's "lost golden city," new finds from Qumran — the site where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in nearby caves — as well as finds that may shed light on what life was like 11,000 years ago, when humans started building large ceremonial sites. In this countdown, Live Science makes five archaeology predictions for 2022. New finds from Egypt's 'lost golden city' In 2021 archaeologists announced the...

Afish long believed to be extinct in Ohio for 82 years has been rediscovered in the state, government wildlife officials proudly declared. The small longhead darter was thought to have been last captured in the Buckeye State in 1939. For decades the species was considered extirpated in Ohio, meaning the fish was extinct locally but could be found in other locations. In a Facebook post shared on January 6, the ODW said: "Who dis [this]? Believe it or not it's a longhead darter. "Why are we so excited? This striking creature, native to Ohio, was thought to be extirpated from...

Nikole Hannah-Jones is the New York Times Magazine reporter who wrote the 1619 Project which is being used in many schools across the country. The 1619 Project postulates that America began in 1619, when the first black slaves were brought here---not 1776, when the founders declared independence. Hannah-Jones made an historical faux pas in a tweet the other day, in which she said that the U.S. Civil War began in 1865. She later apologized, claiming that her tweet was just “poorly worded.” She said she knows the conflict that ultimately ended slavery in America began in 1861 and ended in...

Israeli mentalist intends to reveal the location of the Ark of the Covenant, Britain's Daily Star tabloid reports. The Star ran the latest Geller intrigue as its Sunday cover story under the headline "Uri Geller and the Temple of Spoons." According to the Star, Geller posted on Twitter that he knew where the Ark was and when he released the information, it would be "an earth shattering historical tsunami and an archeological and a theological earthquake."

A foraging badger has uncovered a trove of 209 Roman coins dating as far back as the third century in a Spanish cave, scientists report. Hailed as an 'exceptional find', the coins include some 'from the distant mints' of London, Constantinople and Antioch, an ancient city once located in what is now modern-day Turkey. Researchers think they were hidden in the cave before the arrival of the Suebi, a Germanic people who invaded the Iberian Peninsula in AD 409, known for their infantry and ambush tactics.

You’ve probably seen the famous footage of Bigfoot — that grainy film from 1967 showing an apelike creature ambling through the California woods, casting a brief, leisurely glance at the camera before disappearing off screen. What an Illinois man saw last month was rather different. The creature he says he spotted outside the small town of Chandlerville, northwest of Springfield, was fast, athletic and massive, covering a two-lane road in two quick strides. It had incredibly long limbs and was covered in shiny black hair, the man said, and was gone almost before he could register what was happening. “It...

When Kurt Luther walked into Pittsburgh’s Heinz History Center in 2013 to attend an exhibition about Pennsylvania during the Civil War, he didn’t expect to be greeted by his great-great-great-uncle. A computer scientist and Civil War enthusiast, Luther had been drawn to researching his own family’s connection to the conflict, gradually piecing together information over years and years. But his searches had always failed to turn up a photograph, and Luther was ready to give up on the possibility of ever seeing his ancestors’ faces. It was only through sheer happenstance that, walking through the History Center that day, Luther...

French historians have demanded the return of Napoleon III in the wake of Brexit, whose remains lie in a tomb in Hampshire. The emperor, who was the final monarch to rule France before he died in exile in 1873, was laid to rest in a church in Farnborough. But historians in France are hoping to have his remains repatriated as part of a post-Brexit trade deal.

The last story is is the money piece in this one. It is very long and absolutely frightening, But it sort of fits with David Paulides 411 stuff.

A psychotherapist has claimed the trauma suffered by ancestors in the European witch hunts has harmed today's generation of women. Cali White, from West Sussex, insists women have inherited 'self-destructive' behaviours like a 'deep-rooted mistrust' of other females and a 'fear of being heard or seen' after their forebears had to adopt the traits to survive the witch hunts. During the Early Modern era - 1450 to 1750 - tens of thousands of women were executed as 'witches' across the continent. Cali is a lead curator of an exhibition I am Witch - Tales from the Roundhouse, which is to...

A letter penned by a young Army sergeant in Germany to his mother in Woburn was lost in the mail for 76 years until finally being delivered last month. On Dec. 6, 1945, 22-year-old Sgt. John Gonsalves wrote to his mother, sending his well wishes and hopes of returning home soon.

A historic archive of Freemasonry amassed by the Nazis in their wartime purge could still reveal secrets about the society, researchers say. From insight into women's Masonic lodges to the musical scores used in closed ceremonies, the trove - housed in an old university library in western Poland - has already shed light on a little known history. But more work remains to be done to fully examine all the 80,000 items that date from the 17th century to the pre-World War II period.

A father-son duo of Pennsylvania treasure hunters have sued the FBI for failing to produce records chronicling a top-secret excavation the agency administered in the state nearly four years ago that may have yielded a $400million cache of Civil War-era gold. Court documents unsealed earlier this year revealed that the bureau had in fact engaged in the previously undisclosed dig in Elk County in search of the fabled treasure, lost by the US government in 1863. The filing attested that agents engaged in the dig came up empty-handed.Fortune seekers Dennis and Kem Parada, however - who together comprise the lost...

The year 2021 ended with a major ‘peel’ for the site as LiDAR-equipped drones helped find 12 previously unknown small structures in Machu Picchu National Park which help identify the caretakers of the complex back in the 15th century. The LiDAR also revealed previously unknown canals that show how the Incas controlled water – a feat they believed was a ‘superpower’ granted to them by the gods. As described in a new study published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, a team of researchers from the Center for Andean Studies at the University of Warsaw and the Wroclaw (Poland) University...

Historical artifacts were discovered in eight tombs dating back to the fourth century in present-day northern Turkey, officials announced on Friday.The tombs were uncovered during roadway expansion efforts in the Kurtulus district of Ordu, a province on Turkey's Black Sea coast, with teams from the local museums directorate launching excavations for the artifacts' urgent recovery.Officials added that many human and animal remains, including skeletons, were found in the tombs, along with pieces of jewelry made of gold, sardine stone, silver, glass, and bronze.Pieces of a glass bottle and beads were also found in one of the tombs, they said.The findings...

Prof. Jennifer Bates and her coworkers, Kelly Wilcox Black and Prof. Kathleen Morrison... explore charred lumps from the site of Kadebakele, in southern India... The site dates from around 2,300 BCE to CE 1600 or so, but these data are from the Early Iron Age, about 800 BC. Charred lumps are usually seen as not identifiable, but using high-quality imaging, they were able to show that (some of) these are charred remains of dough or batter; these would have been used to make bread-like dishes. Comparing the data with experimental studies done another lab group, they identified two kinds of...

[AP, so no excerpt, the plane was shot down by the Germans July 10, 1943]

An ancient Egyptian "garbage dump" discovered within a temple honoring the powerful female Pharaoh Hatshepsut is piled high with offerings to a fertility goddess, archaeologists report.Archaeologists unexpectedly found the rubbish heap in a tomb within the 3,500-year-old Hathor cult complex, a three-temple complex that sits within the Hatshepsut Temple at Deir el-Bahari (also spelled Deir el-Bahri), near Luxor. Even though the dump was hidden in an early Middle Kingdom tomb, many of the artifacts in the dump date to the New Kingdom, which includes the 18th, 19th and 20th dynasties...Many of these artifacts are votive offerings — special objects, like...