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The fascinating, fragile and ruthless reign of the first Tudor king, Henry VII. (Documentary appx 1 hr)

The remains of "monumental temples" dating to the Iron Age and medieval buildings may be hidden underground at Navan Fort, an archaeological site in Northern Ireland, a new study finds. Exactly what's left of these ruins, however, remains to be seen. Archaeologists discovered the buried structures by using remote-sensing techniques that allowed them to map the hidden landscape and detect anomalies, such as architectural features made by humans. These Iron Age and medieval buildings suggest that Navan Fort was "an incredibly important religious center and a place of paramount sacral and cultural authority in later prehistory," study co-researcher Patrick Gleeson,...

Catapult-makers were once ye olde celebrities July 05 2004 at 08:24AM London - Catapult designers were the celebrity scientists of the ancient world, according to a British expert. Until the discovery of gunpowder, the catapult was the most powerful weapon in existence, said historian Serafina Cuomo. The machines, capable of hurling large projectiles long distances, were in high demand during the time of the ancient Greeks and Romans - and so were their makers. But the construction of catapults was no easy task, requiring great mathematical and engineering skill. It became a science in itself, known as "belopoietics" from the...

Gutenberg Printing Method Questioned By Rossella Lorenzi, Discovery News Nov. 12, 2004 — Johannes Gutenberg may be wrongly credited with producing the first Western book printed in movable type, according to an Italian researcher. Presenting his findings in a mock trial of Gutenberg at the recent Festival of Science in Genoa, Bruno Fabbiani, an expert in printing who teaches at Turin Polytechnic, said the 15th-century German printer used stamps rather than the movable type he is said to have invented between 1452 and 1455.Overlapping Letters in the Gutenberg Bible Gutenberg and His Bible Gutenberg (c.1397-1468), whose real name was Johannes...

A corroded, damaged helmet unearthed in Yarm, Stockton-on-Tees, in the 1950s is a rare, 10th century Anglo-Scandinavian helmet, the first ever found in Britain and only the second nearly complete Viking helmet found in the world. **** The hammer marks covering the surface and ragged edges of the infill plates show the helmet was made at a blacksmiths forge without benefit of additional refinement. The rivet holes were punched through hot metal from the outer side, ensuring a smooth exterior that would not catch bladed weapons. The out turned lip of the brow band was a later alteration, pushing the...

In 1187, Saladin managed to defeat the Crusader states and reconquer Jerusalem, prompting Richard to initiate another military campaign to regain Christian control over the Holy Land. After Acre surrendered to him, the king started to descend along Israel's coast with his forces. "Ultimately, Richard and the Crusaders wanted to reconquer Jerusalem, but first the monarch decided to march south to capture Jaffa," the archaeologist explained. The march along the shore allowed the troops to be protected by the Mediterranean Sea on their right side and to receive the logistical support of their fleet. Lewis pointed out that Richard proved...

A metal detectorist found an incredible hoard of silver civil war era coins worth at least £100,000 ($130,000) in a field owned by his local pub. Luke Mahoney, from Lindsey in Suffolk, stayed up for three nights straight after coming across more than 1,000 coins so as not to lose any to rival 'nighthawk' detectorists. Forty-year-old Luke, who runs a metal detector shop called Joan Allen Electrics, has been hunting for treasures for the last 10 years. He found the 'biggest hoard' of his life last month when he and pals Dan Hunt and Matt Brown were detecting in a...

Columbus set sail on his first voyage AUGUST 3, 1492, with the Nina, Pinta and the Santa Maria. He explained how the Spanish monarchs approved his plan: "... And ordained that I should not go by land (the usual way) to the Orient (East), but by the route of the Occident (West), by which no one to this day knows for sure that anyone has gone." Why did he seek to find a sea route to India and China? Because 40 years earlier Islamic Ottoman Turks closed off the land routes. The background to Columbus' voyage goes back to the...

The discovery of the burials of four medieval knights near the Polish village of Cieple has highlighted the region's connections to Scandinavia during the reign of the first Polish kings. The warriors were found lying in richly adorned chamber tombs dating to the early eleventh century A.D., the time of Boleslaw I the Brave. They had been buried with a variety of weapons, including swords, spears, and daggers, as well as full sets of equestrian equipment, such as spurs, stirrups, bits, and buckles. Isotope and DNA analysis demonstrated, though, that these individuals were not locals, but instead likely immigrated from...

Two ships were to carry the pilgrims to the New World, the Mayflower and the Speedwell. Two ships would carry the Pilgrims to the New World, the Mayflower and the Speedwell. If you’ve never heard of the Speedwell, that’s because the ill-fated vessel was abandoned after two attempts heading to sea. The Speedwell was a pine-hulled, square-sterner built in England in 1577 as the light warship, Swiftsure. She participated in the battle of the Spanish Armada, and later sailed as an exploration vessel to the Azores. After her decommissioning, she was renamed Speedwell.

...It was on this date in 1540 that the Machiavellian minister of Henry VIII fell by the instrument he had wielded so ably against so many others. While Henry strove to get his end away, Thomas Cromwell made the Reformation, setting his energetic hand to the needfully violent reordering of England. In almost a decade as the king’s chief minister, he had dissolved so many monasteries, annulled so many noble prerogatives, backstabbed so many courtiers, and sent so many of every class to the scaffold that most at court had some reason to hate him. (Cranmer was the only one...

Scientists have discovered extinct strains of smallpox in the teeth of Viking skeletons - proving for the first time that the killer disease plagued humanity for at least 1400 years. Smallpox spread from person to person via infectious droplets, killed around a third of sufferers and left another third permanently scarred or blind. Around 300 million people died from it in the 20th century alone before it was officially eradicated in 1980 through a global vaccination effort - the first human disease to be wiped out... He said: "We discovered new strains of smallpox in the teeth of Viking skeletons...

Dutch photographer and digital artist Bas Uterwijk shines a light on what iconic figures from history might have looked like in real life. By using various digital manipulation tools, he is able to create photorealistic portraits of famous artists, leaders, mummies, philosophical thinkers, and even the models of paintings. Based in Amsterdam, Uterwijk has a background in computer graphics, 3D animation, and special effects. He uses a well-known image of each subject to transform them into a photographic portrait. For instance, the enigmatic Mona Lisa is reimagined as a real person with barely-there brows, luminescent skin, and bright eyes. Even...

The location of a command post from where the first Great Khan staged his invasions has been the subject of lengthy debate among historians and archaeologists alike for decades. But, according to a new study from the Australian National University and the Mongolian Institute of Archaeology, researchers have found the 13th-century ruler's "ordu" or base camp. Avraga, a Mongol Empire site located along the Avraga River in east-central Mongolia, was one of four outposts used to strengthen what would become the largest contiguous empire in history, according to the paper published in the peer-reviewed Archaeological Research in Asia. Dr Li...

As many as one in five Londoners had syphilis by their mid-30s during the late 18th century, according to a detailed new study on the sexually transmitted infection (STI) and its spread in the capital of the United Kingdom. Researchers used data from hospital admissions and workhouse infirmaries to reach their figures, making allowances for duplicate records, private treatments, and the possibility of syphilis numbers getting mixed in with other diseases like gonorrhea or chlamydia. The findings show a much higher incidence in London than elsewhere in the country at the time – other studies show 'the pox' was half...

In June 1495, the Italian historian Niccolo Squillaci wrote a letter describing a horrific disease that was sweeping through Europe. “There are itching sensations, and an unpleasant pain in the joints; there is a rapidly increasing fever,” he wrote. “The skin is inflamed with revolting scabs and is completely covered with swellings and tubercules, which are initially of a livid red color, and then become blacker.” And, tellingly, “It most often begins with the private parts.”

Did Henry VIII suffer same brain injury as some NFL players? February 3, 2016 by Bill Hathaway Henry VIII may have suffered repeated traumatic brain injuries similar to those experienced by football players and others who receive repeated blows to the head, according to research by a Yale University expert in cognitive neurology. Traumatic brain injury explains the memory problems, explosive anger, inability to control impulses, headaches, insomnia—and maybe even impotence--that afflicted Henry during the decade before his death in 1547, according to a paper published online the week of Feb. 1."It is intriguing to think that modern European history...

Could blood group anomaly explain Tudor king's reproductive problems and tyrannical behavior?DALLAS (SMU) – Blood group incompatibility between Henry VIII and his wives could have driven the Tudor king's reproductive woes, and a genetic condition related to his suspected blood group could also explain Henry's dramatic mid-life transformation into a physically and mentally-impaired tyrant who executed two of his wives. Research conducted by bioarchaeologist Catrina Banks Whitley while she was a graduate student at SMU (Southern Methodist University) and anthropologist Kyra Kramer shows that the numerous miscarriages suffered by Henry's wives could be explained if the king's blood carried the...

The question of whether Christopher Columbus and his crew were responsible for bringing syphilis to Europe from the Americas appears to have been answered by the discovery of a collection of knobbly skeletons in a London cemetery. A popular theory among experts in tropical diseases is that outbreaks of syphilis in the mid-1490s were a direct result of Columbus and his randy crew returning from their first voyage across the Atlantic in 1492-93. However, the largest excavation of skeletons undertaken in Britain has unearthed seven that suggest the disease was known in England up to two centuries before that. Archaeologists...

New study blames Columbus for syphilis spread By Julie Steenhuysen 13 minutes ago New genetic evidence supports the theory that Christopher Columbus brought syphilis to Europe from the New World, U.S. researchers said on Monday, reviving a centuries-old debate about the origins of the disease. They said a genetic analysis of the syphilis family tree reveals that its closest relative was a South American cousin that causes yaws, an infection caused by a sub-species of the same bacteria. "Some people think it is a really ancient disease that our earliest human ancestors would have had. Other people think it came...