Silphium was an extinct Libyan plant renowned for contraception, medicine, and trade. Its disappearance remains a historical mystery, and scientists continue searching for surviving descendants. Roman leader Julius Caesar is said to have kept a stock of it in the treasury. Ancient writer Pliny the Elder says Rome’s Emperor Nero owned the last stalk of [...]

Humans are wired to focus on threats, making constant negative news exhausting. Limiting exposure and focusing on what you can control helps reduce news fatigue. During several recent conversations, people have told me that they’ve stopped checking their phones in the morning. Not because nothing was happening, but because everything was. They described the feeling [...]

An Iliad fragment discovered inside an Egyptian mummy shows how Homer’s influence extended across Roman culture, from imperial identity and education to everyday life in Roman Egypt. Archaeologists have found something unexpected inside a 1,600-year-old Roman-era Egyptian mummy: a fragment of Homer’s Iliad. It wasn’t placed beside the body but inside the mummy’s abdomen. But [...]