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History

On New Year's Day, farmers in Mexico uncovered a sculpture dated to between roughly 1450 and 1521 A.D.

Cool Finds

Farmers Discover Rare Statue of Pre-Hispanic Woman in Mexican Citrus Grove

The sculpture may depict an elite ruler or a fusion of a goddess and a female leader

“A key tenet of ... constitutional democracy is the peaceful transfer of power following U.S. presidential elections, dating back to the republic’s first presidential election,” said Anthea Hartig, director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, in a statement. “This week, that core belief was shaken.”

History of Now

How the Smithsonian and Other Museums Are Responding to the U.S. Capitol Riot

Leading institutions have started collecting artifacts and working to contextualize last week’s violent attack

Activists toppled and defaced Edward Valentine's statue of Jefferson Davis during Black Lives Matter protests in Richmond last summer.

Why a Virginia Museum Wants to Display a Defaced Sculpture of Jefferson Davis

“Actually bringing that statue back to the spot where it was created has a unique power to it,” says the Valentine’s director

A whimsical bag designed to look like a European horse chestnut, made by contemporary British designer Emily Joe Gibbs

How the Handbag Became the Ultimate Fashion Accessory

An exhibition at the V&A in London traces the long history of the purse, from Elizabeth I’s court to “Sex and the City”

The Aranui 5 is a passenger-freighter vessel that makes 14-day voyages between Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands.

This Polynesian Cruise Ship Has a Resident Tattoo Artist

Sailing between Tahiti and the Marquesas, Eddy Tata provides passengers with Polynesian-style tattoos based on their life stories

The African Burial Ground National Monument in Manhattan commemorates the earliest and largest known black burial site discovered in the United States. More than 15,000 free and enslaved Africans who lived and worked in colonial New York were buried here between the mid-1630s and 1795.

New Legislation Seeks to Protect the U.S.’ Historic Black Cemeteries

Now headed to the House, a bill passed by the Senate paves the way for the creation of the African American Burial Grounds Network

New analysis of the fossilized tooth plaque of 16 ancient Mediterraneans reveals that they consumed foods imported from Asia—like turmeric and banana, pictured—a thousand years earlier than researchers previously thought.

Ancient Mediterranean People Ate Bananas and Turmeric From Asia 3,700 Years Ago

Fossilized tooth plaque reveals a diverse and exotic palette reflected in the region’s modern cuisine

As of Monday morning, a statue of Confederate commander Robert E. Lee no longer stands in the U.S. Capitol's Crypt.

Statue of Civil Rights Activist Barbara Rose Johns Will Replace U.S. Capitol’s Likeness of Robert E. Lee

Johns, whose efforts helped desegregate public schools, is set to represent Virginia in place of the Confederate general

The statue of Hannah Dunston has been vandalized with red paint in recent months

Why Just ‘Adding Context’ to Controversial Monuments May Not Change Minds

Research shows that visitors often ignore information that conflicts with what they already believe about history

This summer, activists in Richmond transformed a monument to Robert E. Lee (right) into a work of protest art (left).

Virginia Museum Will Lead Efforts to Reimagine Richmond Avenue Once Lined With Confederate Monuments

Governor Ralph Northam’s proposed budget for the coming fiscal year earmarks $11 million for the project

The Library of Congress recently completed a major digitization effort, making collections of 23 U.S. presidents' papers available online for study. From left: Calvin Coolidge, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Benjamin Harrison and Thomas Jefferson; behind: Jefferson's June 1776 draft of the Declaration of Independence

Library of Congress’ Presidential Papers, From Washington’s Geometry Notes to Wilson’s Love Letters, Are Now Online

Four newly added collections mark the conclusion of a two-decade digitization project

Johns Hopkins, founder of the Baltimore university that bears his name, enslaved at least four unnamed men in 1850. Pictured behind Hopkins is the 1850 "slave schedule" with his name (#33, circled in blue) and the enslaved individuals' ages.

New Research

Long Heralded as an Abolitionist, Johns Hopkins Enslaved People, Records Show

The Baltimore university that bears his name announced new research that “shattered” perceptions of the Quaker entrepreneur

Submissions will be included in an online exhibition, “Reclamation: Recipes, Remedies, and Ritual,” set to open in January 2021.

Your Cherished Family Recipes Could Be Featured in a Museum Exhibition

The National Museum of Women in the Arts is asking the public to share recipes that document unique family histories

A map of Doggerland, which once connected Britain to mainland Europe

Study Rewrites History of Ancient Land Bridge Between Britain and Europe

New research suggests that climate change, not a tsunami, doomed the now-submerged territory of Doggerland

Charles Darwin in 1857, photograph by Maull and Fox

Two Darwin Notebooks Quietly Went Missing 20 Years Ago. Were They Stolen?

Staff at Cambridge University Libraries previously assumed that the papers had simply been misplaced in the vast collections

Student researchers analyzed this leaf from a Book of Hours (left), a devotional Christian manuscript that dates to the 15th century. The students found traces of French cursive writing beneath the visible text (right). The cursive was likely scraped away to make the parchment reusable for the illuminated Gothic script.

Cool Finds

College Sophomores Discover Hidden Text in Medieval Manuscript

Students at Rochester Institute of Technology used a self-developed UV imaging system to assess a 15th-century religious document

The National Museum of the United States Army opened on Veteran's Day, November 11, 2020.

A New Museum Delves Into the Complex History of the U.S. Army

The Fort Belvoir institution is the first museum dedicated to interpreting the story of the nation’s oldest military branch

A couple hiking in the Alsace region of northeastern France spotted the tiny aluminum message capsule in a grassy field in September. The note, written in German in cursive script by a Prussian military officer, was probably attached to a carrier pigeon but never reached its destination.

Cool Finds

A Carrier Pigeon’s Military Message Was Delivered a Century Too Late

A couple in Alsace, France, stumbled onto a capsule containing a cryptic note dated to either 1910 or 1916

Left, 19th century visitors view Washington Crossing the Delaware (1851) by Emanuel Leutze; right, 21st- century visitors gaze upon the same work.

Celebrating 150 Years of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

An exhibition and a slate of virtual offerings commemorate the history of the iconic New York City institution

A 2016 study suggested that Henry sustained a traumatic brain injury that affected his temperament following the 1536 accident, but other experts attribute the shift in mood to an ulcerated leg, diabetes or hypothyroidism.

Researchers Find Remnants of Jousting Field Where Henry VIII Almost Died

In January 1536, the Tudor king fell from his horse and sustained significant injuries that troubled him for the rest of his life

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