History

TLDR: New research suggests that Seahenge was an ancient form of geoengineering, built in 2049 BC as a ritualistic attempt to prolong summer during a period of severe climatic deterioration. By aligning the timber circle with the solstice to "trap" the warmth of the sun, Bronze Age communities used social cohesion and myth to confront read more

TLDR: When extremists seized Timbuktu in 2012 and began burning shrines and manuscripts, local librarians and residents quietly mounted a low-tech resistance: they smuggled some 300,000 medieval African texts—on astronomy, medicine, law, poetry, and more—out of the city by donkey cart, motorcycle, canoe, and car, outwitting Al-Qaida with metal trunks and neighborhood trust. Those same read more

TLDR: A 2015 Hong Kong apartment demolition yielded a forgotten diary revealing that 24 Chinese naval officers—volunteers who trained with the Royal Navy—fought alongside Allied forces on D-Day, their existence erased by Cold War politics and institutional bias until a 13,000-character firsthand account forced historians to redraw the boundaries of WWII’s most mythologized battle. "Saw read more