Smart News History & Archaeology

The statue is finally being unveiled this week after a seven-year fundraising effort and a three-year construction effort.

Women Who Shaped History

Chicago's First Monument to a Black Woman Will Commemorate Activist Ida B. Wells

Sculptor Richard Hunt designed the statue, which is called 'Light of Truth'

Visitors explore during a sneak preview of the newly renovated Harry S. Truman Presidential Museum and Museum in Independence, Missouri. The $29 million expansion took 2 years to complete.

At the Harry Truman Library and Museum, Visitors Get to Ask Themselves Where the Buck Stops

Interactive exhibitions pose questions about the decision to drop the nuclear bomb, the Red Scare, Truman's foreign policy and more

Officials unveiled the hypogeum—a system of underground tunnels beneath the Colosseum—during a ceremony on Friday.

The Tunnels Beneath Rome's Colosseum Are Open to the Public for the First Time

The chambers are finally on view after a $29.8 million restoration

A portion of Chicago's newly renamed Jean Baptiste Point DuSable Lake Shore Drive, pictured in 2013

History of Now

Who Was Jean Baptiste Point DuSable, the New Namesake of Chicago's Lake Shore Drive?

Chicago leaders voted to rename the city's iconic lakeside roadway after a Black trader and the first non-Indigenous settler in the region

Though researchers recovered most of the person's remains, experts were unable to find some portions of his skeleton.

Archaeologists Uncover a 3,000-Year-Old Shark Attack Victim

Researchers found the skeletal remains at a prehistoric hunter-gatherer cemetery in Japan

A memorial at Queen's Park in Toronto was set up to honor the 215 Indigenous children discovered in unmarked graves in British Columbia. Now, after the subsequent discovery of 751 such graves in Saskatchewan, the memorial continues to grow.

751 Unmarked Graves Discovered Near Former Indigenous School in Canada

Experts estimate 4,000 to 10,000 children may have died at the schools, often from a combination of poor living conditions and disease

One highlight of the find included a rare a leopard coin. Officials considered this coinage 'failed' because the costs for producing them were too high.

Metal Detectorist Discovers Black Death-Period Coins

The treasure dates back to the reign of Edward III and probably belonged to a wealthy person in England

The letter sheds light on Jenner's beliefs about the use of cowpox and horsepox in vaccination.

Letter From 'Father of Vaccination' Edward Jenner Sold at Auction

Jenner wrote that new research 'put a stop to the sneers' of 'little minded persons'

A proposed government plan will move the A303 highway, pictured here in the distance behind Stonehenge's iconic structures, underground. But Unesco warned in a report Monday that the efforts might endanger the site's OVU, or outstanding universal value.

Unesco Weighs Changes to Stonehenge's Cultural Heritage Status

A new report also cited Venice and the Great Barrier Reef as sites that might be placed on the World Heritage in Danger list

Enslavers pocketed the majority of the money earned by enslaved individuals hired out as part-time laborers. But in some cases, enslaved people managed to save a fraction of their earnings in hopes of purchasing freedom for themselves or their families.

This Rare Copper Badge Tells a Story of Slavery in 19th-Century Charleston

The South Carolina city used the metal tags to identify enslaved people hired out as part-time laborers by their enslavers

Authorities have returned the illegally transported artifacts to their home country of Italy.

Officials Seize 782 Ancient Artifacts Acquired Illicitly by Single Belgian Collector

The trove of treasures, including a funerary slab, amphorae and pottery dated to pre-Roman times, is worth an estimated $13 million

Archaeologists are working to decipher the slab's 15 lines of hieroglyphs.

Cool Finds

Farmer Stumbles Onto Egyptian Pharaoh's 2,600-Year-Old Stone Slab

The large sandstone marker may be connected to a military campaign led by the 26th dynasty ruler Apries

Richard Henry Pratt, founder of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, poses alongside students around 1900.

Remains of Ten Native American Children Who Died at Government Boarding School Return Home After 100 Years

The deceased were students at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, whose founder's motto was "kill the Indian, and save the man"

An eighth- or ninth-century B.C. Urartian castle similar to the one recently found in eastern Turkey

Cool Finds

2,800-Year-Old Castle Linked to Enigmatic Ancient Civilization Found in Turkey

The structures dates to the time of Urartu, a kingdom that clashed with the Assyrians in the first millennium B.C.

Bronzino, Eleonora di Toledo and Francesco de’ Medici, c. 1550

Florence's Medici Family Used Portraits as Propaganda

A new exhibition at the Met reveals how the Italian banking dynasty drew on art to cement its power and legacy

People who reopened graves might take items like swords and brooches but leave more valuable objects untouched.

Cool Finds

Why Did Early Medieval Europeans Reopen Graves?

Contrary to some assumptions, the removal of objects from burial sites was not typically motivated by greed

Scholars used a newly developed technique to test skeletons' teeth for the presence of Yersinia pestis, the pathogen responsible for the plague.

Cool Finds

Why Weren't These Black Death Victims Buried in Mass Graves?

New research suggests some Europeans who died of the bubonic plague were individually interred with care

In 1921, Ruth Middleton embroidered this cotton sack with a powerful family story.

History of Now

A Simple Cotton Sack Tells an Intergenerational Story of Separation Under Slavery

Historian Tiya Miles' new book traces the lives of three Black women through an embroidered family heirloom known as "Ashley's sack"

Early Juneteenth celebrations featured picnics, rodeos, horseback riding and other festivities.

Juneteenth, the U.S.'s Second Independence Day, Is Now a Federal Holiday

June 19, 1865, marked the end of slavery in Texas and, by extension, the Confederate states

Officials posted a video showing the statue's excavation on Twitter.

Cool Finds

Headless Statue of Ancient Woman Discovered in Turkey's 'Mother Goddess City'

The 1,800-year-old sculpture dates to Metropolis' Roman era

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