Traces of History and Archeology and Art, Istanbul (2026)

20/10/2026

In February 2026, repair workers investigating a collapsed church floor in Maastricht, the Netherlands, made a discovery that has left historians eager for confirmation.

Beneath the nave, directly in front of the former altar, they found a skeleton. Nearby was a French coin dated 1660, and a lead musket ball was lodged at chest height. The deacon present when the first bone emerged said he was 99 percent sure he knew the person’s identity.

The team believes the remains could belong to d’Artagnan—the historical man, not simply the fictional character.

Many people know the name from Alexandre Dumas’s 1844 novel *The Three Musketeers* and its many film adaptations. The literary hero was inspired by a real figure, Charles de Batz de Castelmore, born around 1611 in Gascony in southwestern France. He was a soldier, spy and trusted operative for King Louis XIV.

The historical d’Artagnan was not a carefree romantic adventurer. He was a professional soldier who served Cardinal Mazarin as a covert agent during one of France’s most turbulent eras. He guarded a disgraced finance minister under house arrest for four years because Louis XIV trusted few others with the assignment. By 1667, he had become the effective commander of the Musketeers of the Guard, the elite unit responsible for protecting the king.

Accounts also describe him as a decent man, a quality not always associated with 17th-century French court life.

In 1673, at roughly sixty years old, he was called away from a governorship he disliked and sent to the French siege of Maastricht. On June 25, a musket ball struck him in the throat. He died on the battlefield and was buried nearby, but the exact location of his grave remained unknown.

French historian Odile Bordaz spent twenty-five years arguing that Maastricht’s Church of Saints Peter and Paul was the likeliest burial site. Louis XIV had used the church as his headquarters during the siege and attended mass there daily. Dutch archaeologist Wim Dijkman spent twenty-eight years trying to obtain permission to investigate the site. When the floor finally collapsed, church officials contacted him.

The skeleton was found in a place suitable for someone of considerable importance. The musket ball’s position at chest level appears consistent with historical accounts of the fatal injury. The coin had been issued by the bishop who led a royal mass for the Sun King.

A DNA sample from the jawbone is now being analysed in a Munich laboratory and compared with genetic material from living members of d’Artagnan’s family. Results are expected within weeks.

After 353 years, researchers may finally learn where one of history’s most celebrated soldiers was buried—not the fictional musketeer, but the real man.

20/10/2026

Plymouth Rock is a well-known boulder of Dedham granite, often described as roughly 600 million years old, in Plymouth, Massachusetts. It has traditionally been identified as the place where the Mayflower Pilgrims landed in December 1620.

The Pilgrims did not mention Plymouth Rock in their diaries or surviving written accounts. William Bradford and other early sources never describe them stepping onto a particular boulder. Their first landfall in North America was actually farther north at Cape Cod, before they eventually settled at Plymouth. The rock tradition was recorded more than a century later. In 1741, 95-year-old Thomas Faunce reportedly identified the boulder as the landing place remembered by his father’s generation. He spoke out because a new wharf threatened to bury it.

During the American Revolution in 1774, local residents tried to move the stone to the town square as a patriotic gesture. It split into two pieces during the attempt. People interpreted the break as a symbol of the colonies separating from Britain. The upper section was taken to the square and later moved to Pilgrim Hall in 1834, while the lower part remained near the shore.

In 1880, the upper portion was returned to the waterfront and joined with the lower section. The date 1620 was carved into the rock. Today it sits beneath a classical portico designed by McKim, Mead & White at Pilgrim Memorial State Park. It weighs about ten tons now, far less than its estimated original mass of more than 200 tons.

Over the years, souvenir collectors chipped pieces away, and the boulder was moved repeatedly between the harbour, the town square and Pilgrim Hall Museum.

20/10/2026

Yemen’s Jewish community, often called Teimanim, is among the world’s oldest and most distinctive Jewish communities, with a history extending back more than two thousand years.

Yemen’s Jews were one of the most long-established and isolated communities in Jewish history, and eventually among the last such communities to remain in their ancestral homeland. For perhaps three millennia they lived in Arabia’s southern highlands, preserving Hebrew traditions, liturgy and religious law that had fallen out of use elsewhere in the Jewish world.

They were not hidden from society. They practised their faith openly under rulers who alternately protected and persecuted them, until a mass departure emptied the country of most of its Jewish population in just eighteen months during the mid-20th century. Tradition traces their arrival to the time of Solomon or to the period after the First Temple was destroyed. Historical evidence is more cautious, yet still striking: by the fourth century, Judaism had become the religion of the Himyarite royal house, adopted by kings before the historical record mentions Dhu Nuwas.

Dhu Nuwas was not the originator of that royal tradition, but its final and most violent representative. He became king of Himyar around 522 and transformed the long-standing rivalry with Christian Aksum into a massacre, killing Christians at Najran in 523. Aksum retaliated from across the Red Sea, bringing down his kingdom within two years. From then on, the Jews of the highlands lived as a minority governed by others.

The arrival of Islam in the seventh century formalized their subordinate but protected status as dhimmis, a position the community endured for around thirteen hundred years. Medieval life brought intellectual achievement as well as restrictions.

In the 12th century, a forced-conversion campaign and the appearance of a messianic claimant deeply unsettled Yemen’s Jews. Maimonides responded with his *Epistle to Yemen*, encouraging endurance and rejecting the claimant’s assertions. The letter was copied, treasured and treated almost as scripture by later generations.

One disaster left a particularly lasting mark on communal memory. In 1679, Imam al-Mahdi Ahmad, acting on rumours that Jews were plotting with the Ottomans, ordered the Jewish population expelled from Sanaa and nearby towns to the barren region of Mawza.

The lesson associated with Mawza was an old one, but it was never forgotten: a ruler’s protection could be withdrawn at any time, and survival often depended on maintaining religious life within the safety of one’s own community.

The 19th century brought another failed messianic movement led by Shukr Kuhayl. Under Imam Yahya, an especially harsh older policy also returned: Jewish children orphaned before their twelfth birthday were to be taken away and brought up as Muslims.

Yet the same period produced an intellectual response. Rabbi Yihye Qafih established the Dor Daim movement, which rejected Kabbalah in favour of Maimonides and a more literal reading of Jewish law. His grandson Yosef Qafih carried this scholarly tradition into the following century and became one of the era’s most respected Jewish scholars.

The community’s departure unfolded with extraordinary speed. The United Nations voted to partition Palestine on November 29, 1947; three days later, violence erupted in Aden. Eighty-two Jews were killed and hundreds of houses and shops were destroyed before order was restored.

Within two years, the imam had agreed to their departure and Britain had cooperated with the airlift known as Operation Magic Carpet. Between June 1949 and September 1950, approximately 49,000 Yemenite Jews travelled from Aden to Israel. A community built over thousands of years had largely left its homeland in only eighteen months.

The newcomers were placed in transit camps and often treated condescendingly by a European-led society that marginalized Mizrahi Jews. Nevertheless, they brought cultural and religious traditions that became important to Israel: a Hebrew pronunciation believed to preserve features of the old Tiberian tradition, with distinct vowels and guttural sounds; the Tiklal prayer book; silverwork; poetry; and distinctive customs surrounding marriage and mourning. These traditions became part of the country’s cultural life, whether or not they were fully acknowledged.

20/10/2026

The Dying Warrior, identified as Laomedon, king of Troy, is a sculpture from the eastern pediment of the Temple of Aphaia on the Greek island of Aegina, dating to around 490–480 BC. The work is now displayed at the Glyptothek in Munich, Germany.

On the eastern pediment of Aegina’s Temple of Aphaia, a wounded warrior lies on the ground, with a mark near his right ni**le indicating where an arrow pierced his chest. The fatal arrow is traditionally associated with Heracles, leading scholars to suggest that the figure depicts Laomedon, the Trojan king. He wears a Chalcidian helmet fitted with an additional crest.

In Greek legend, Laomedon was a ruler of Troy and the son of Ilus and Eurydice. His wife was Strymo, also called Placia or, in some accounts, Leucippe, the daughter of the river god Scamander. His children included Tithonus, Podarces—later famous as Priam, king of Troy—and Hesione. Priam was captured when Troy was first destroyed, then ransomed and restored the city to strength and prosperity. His name, Priam, means “the bought one,” while Podarces was his original name. Laomedon also had a son called Bucolion, sometimes described as illegitimate, by the nymph Calybe.

Laomedon inherited Troy’s throne from his father and later planned to surround the city with great walls. To carry out the work, he hired Poseidon and Apollo, who had been sentenced by Zeus to serve a mortal. The two gods laboured for an entire year. Homer says Poseidon constructed the walls, while Apollo looked after Laomedon’s cattle on Mount Ida. Aeacus, king of Aegina, assisted them as a mortal worker.

When the year was over, Laomedon refused to provide the promised payment. He even threatened to restrain Apollo and sell him into slavery on the islands. Furious at the betrayal, the gods retaliated: Apollo brought disease to the city, and Poseidon sent a sea creature that came ashore with the tide and killed people.

An oracle told Laomedon that Troy could be saved only by sacrificing his daughter Hesione to the monster. At that moment, Heracles was travelling through Troy with the Argonauts. He offered to rescue Hesione if Laomedon gave him the extraordinary horses Zeus had awarded him for helping abduct Ganymede, who was the king’s nephew—or, in some versions, his son.

Laomedon accepted the deal. Heracles killed the creature and freed Hesione, but the king once again refused to honour his word. Enraged, Heracles later returned with an army, seized Troy—long before the better-known Trojan War—and killed Laomedon and all his sons except Podarces. He then arranged for Hesione to marry his companion Telamon.

A different version says Heracles initially sent Telamon and Iphicles to request the horses. Laomedon imprisoned the pair and prepared to attack the remaining Argonauts. After Podarces warned Heracles, the hero captured the city and killed the king. Laomedon’s tomb was said to stand in Troy, and an oracle declared that the city could not be conquered while the tomb remained undamaged.

19/10/2026

In 1944, a four-year-old girl named Jane was invited to a special party, but her only formal dress had become too small. During wartime, clothing coupons were tightly rationed, so her mother, Elizabeth, could not simply purchase another one.

Unwilling to let Jane miss the occasion, Elizabeth spent the night making a dress. She collected fabric remnants she had kept, including floral cotton, plain pieces and small printed patterns, and sewed them together one square at a time.

By morning, she had completed a patchwork dress. Jane wore it to the party, and the garment transformed leftover cloth and wartime scarcity into a useful handmade outfit. Today, the dress is preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s collection.

19/10/2026

On the night of June 11, 1962, Frank Morris and brothers John and Clarence Anglin carried out the only known escape from the maximum-security federal prison on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay.

Morris and the Anglin brothers spent about six months preparing their escape from neighbouring cells in B Block. A fourth participant, Allen West, could not enlarge the opening in his cell wall quickly enough and was left behind.

The men fashioned lifelike dummy heads from improvised materials, paint and human hair. They put the heads in their beds to deceive guards during nighttime checks. Meanwhile, they widened openings beneath their cell sinks, crawled into a service corridor and found a route out of the prison.

With a makeshift raft made from raincoats, the three prisoners pushed off into the dark waters of San Francisco Bay. Guards discovered the empty beds and papier-mâché heads during the morning count on June 12, 1962.

A major FBI search later recovered a paddle, fragments of the rubber raft and a life vest near Angel Island, along with a plastic-wrapped wallet containing personal papers belonging to the Anglin brothers. The FBI formally ended its investigation in 1979, concluding that the men had probably drowned in the cold water and powerful currents. The U.S. Marshals Service, however, has kept the fugitive case open. What happened to the three men remains one of America’s most enduring true-crime mysteries.

19/10/2026

Irving Finkel is a British Assyriologist and philologist who works as Assistant Keeper of Ancient Mesopotamian script, languages and cultures at the British Museum. He is well known for interpreting a roughly 4,000-year-old cuneiform tablet that reshaped discussions of the story of Noah’s Ark.

In 2008, a member of the public brought a small Babylonian clay tablet, about the size of a palm, to the British Museum. Irving Finkel translated its sixty lines of cuneiform and found that it was a 3,770-year-old guide to constructing a large circular boat, shaped like a coracle and made from reeds sealed with bitumen. Its flood narrative predates the biblical account in Genesis by more than a thousand years. The tablet had been acquired by the owner’s father in the Middle East after the Second World War. Finkel’s translation revealed a Babylonian flood story from around 1750 BC. In it, the god Enki warns a man called Atrahasis of an approaching deluge and instructs him to build a vessel to preserve life on Earth.

The vessel’s design was particularly surprising. Enki’s directions do not describe a conventional ship with a pointed front. Instead, they outline an enormous circular coracle roughly 230 feet in diameter, with walls about twenty feet high. It required vast quantities of palm-fibre rope and bitumen for its construction and waterproofing. The text even says the animals entered “two by two,” wording familiar from Genesis, which was written centuries later. Finkel explored the discovery in his book *The Ark Before Noah*. The tablet shows that stories now associated with famous later texts had already existed for centuries before being recorded in those forms.

His interpretation also inspired a documentary project that worked with boat builders in Kerala, India, to build and launch a full-sized circular reconstruction of the Babylonian ark using the dimensions he had deciphered.

19/10/2026

Archaeologists working with France’s National Institute for Preventive Archaeological Research (INRAP) have found three ceramic vessels containing approximately 40,000 Roman-period coins in Senon, France.

Three substantial coin deposits dating to Late Antiquity were uncovered within an ancient Roman residential area in Senon, northeastern France. Rather than appearing to have been hurriedly concealed during a crisis, the containers seem to have been placed where people could reach them and maintained over time.

The first vessel weighed around 83 pounds and contained an estimated 23,000–24,000 coins. The second weighed approximately 110 pounds and may hold another 18,000–19,000. The third had already been emptied in antiquity, leaving just three coins behind.

Many coins bear the images of rulers from the Gallic Empire, the breakaway state that separated from Rome in AD 260 and governed areas of present-day France, Britain and Spain until AD 274. Because the jars were accessible, archaeologists suspect they served as savings containers—something like ancient piggy banks—rather than emergency hiding places. The neck of the second jar was broken before its discovery, so its precise contents will remain uncertain until every coin has been taken out and cleaned.

Senon was an important settlement of the Mediomatrici, a tribe mentioned in Roman sources following the conquest of Gaul in 57 BC. Earlier discoveries had revealed traces of pre-Roman Gallic occupation, but the excavated areas were too limited to establish the settlement’s size or character. This excavation uncovered timber-framed buildings, demonstrating that a developed community existed from the middle of the 2nd century BC into the early Roman period.

The dig also showed how the settlement evolved after the Roman conquest. During the 1st century AD, urban expansion and Roman construction practices caused stone quarrying to increase dramatically. Stone buildings replaced the timber-and-earth structures typical of the Gallic settlement, and builders extracted limestone locally. At least ten quarry pits were identified, some reaching depths of about ten feet. As the town grew, these pits were put to new uses. Further scientific study may clarify their purpose, which could have included storage or latrines.

The rebuilt houses and streets followed a recognizable Roman layout. Because so many remains survived, archaeologists can reconstruct buildings, architectural details and, to some extent, the wealth of their occupants. At least three houses had living rooms with concrete flooring, hypocaust heating, carefully planned cellars, ovens and rear courtyards. Their residents were probably prosperous merchants or skilled craftspeople.

The settlement was eventually destroyed by a fire in the early 4th century.

18/10/2026

Tippi Hedren photographed in 1982 with one of the pet tigers living in her California home.

In 1982, actress Tippi Hedren was captured on camera inside her home with a full-grown tiger roaming freely through her kitchen. Known for her role in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, Hedren became equally known for her unconventional life alongside big cats.

Her fascination began in the 1970s when she and her then-husband Noel Marshall set out to make a film about lions. Rather than relying on trained animals, they brought dozens of lions and tigers into their home. The result was the 1981 cult film Roar, infamous for its dangerous production, during which more than 70 people were injured—including Hedren and her daughter, Melanie Griffith.

While the images of Hedren calmly living with a tiger became iconic, they also exposed the dangers of keeping such animals in domestic environments. In later years, Hedren devoted herself to animal welfare, founding the Shambala Preserve in California, a sanctuary for big cats rescued from private ownership and circuses.

18/10/2026

The ancient Japanese tradition of "ebai" is a lesser-known yet fascinating cultural practice. While the term itself is not widely documented in mainstream historical records, it is believed to refer to a specific form of ritual or offering, often associated with Shinto customs. These practices were deeply intertwined with the veneration of kami (spirits or gods) and were intended to show respect, seek blessings, or express gratitude. The precise nature of ebai varied by region and era, reflecting the localized and evolving character of Japanese spiritual life. Such traditions highlight the intricate ways in which communities connected with the divine through symbolic acts and offerings. Understanding ebai provides a glimpse into the rich tapestry of Japan's spiritual heritage and its enduring emphasis on harmony and reverence

One night in Inglewood, California, Gibbs attended a domino game where she met a man named Lonnie Franklin Jr. When she began feeling strangely tired after accepting a drink from him, she decided to leave.

Franklin offered her a ride home.

She accepted.

But when Gibbs told him where to turn, he drove in the opposite direction. He eventually stopped in a secluded area and demanded s*x.

Gibbs tried to open the door.

There was no handle.

She tried the window. That wouldn't open either.

According to Gibbs, Franklin had trapped her inside the van. When she refused his demands, he attempted to strike her.

She blocked the blow.

Then she fought back.

Gibbs had trained in martial arts since childhood and was already an undefeated professional kickboxer. She began throwing punches and powerful kicks, repeatedly striking Franklin's legs.

He tackled her, but she managed to overpower him, force him to the floor and demand the keys.

She unlocked the chained rear door, escaped into the darkness and eventually found a taxi.

Gibbs survived, but the experience left her deeply traumatized. She returned to Pennsylvania and initially refused to go back to California.

Then came an opportunity she had spent years preparing for.

In 1994, Gibbs defeated French champion Valérie Wiet-Henin in a stunning upset, becoming the first Black American woman to win an ISKA world kickboxing title. She eventually retired from kickboxing undefeated, with 16 victories and 15 knockouts.

But the identity of the man in the van would become clear only years later.

In 2010, Lonnie Franklin Jr. was arrested as the serial killer known as the Grim Sleeper. He was convicted in 2016 of murdering ten women and girls and attempting to murder another woman.

Gibbs has publicly identified Franklin as the man who attacked her that night in 1993. Her encounter was not part of his criminal conviction.

For years, she feared seeing him again.

The man who tried to overpower Fredia Gibbs had encountered a woman whose fighting skills were about to make history.

Traces of History and Archeology and Art

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